Washington: A Life

by Ron Chernow

For Washington, land speculation was the ideal vehicle for amassing riches, a way to invest in his own future and that of the country, mingling idealism with profit.

At this stage of reading I can say without a doubt that the main reason of the economic and social development of English and French colonies of north america are due because of the economic nature of the rupture of those colonies with the British Empire. What a huge diference with the processes of Mexican, central and south amerca! While the United States sufferd a short war, the main issue was economical. Every colony had profound institutions. The process in Latin America was very violent, in many cases that independence process was unexpected, like the absence of a King after the napoleonic invation of Spain. Institutions where nonexistent.