George Washington — Father of the Nation

Washington lost more battles than he won. What he did instead was keep an army in the field for eight years against the greatest military power on earth, and refuse to let it be destroyed — which turned out to be the only victory condition that mattered.

Twice he did something with no precedent. In December 1783, with the war won and an army that would plausibly have followed him anywhere, he walked into Congress at Annapolis and resigned his commission. George III, told he intended to do it, reportedly said that if he did he would be the greatest man in the world. Then in 1796, after two terms, he went home again rather than stand a third time, setting a limit no president broke for 144 years.

He was not the cleverest of the founders and knew it. He was reserved, thin-skinned about criticism, bad at small talk and obsessed with his own reputation. What he had was an almost unbreakable sense of what the office required, and the discipline to hand power back twice when nobody could have stopped him from keeping it.