George Bush's outgoing letter to Bill Clinton reemerges as a lesson in mutual respect

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George Bush Snr. left the note in the Oval Office for new President Bill Clinton after losing the election
Letter left advice for his successor: 'There will be very tough times. Just don't let the critics discourage you or push you off course'
Bush also wished him and his family well and said 'I am rooting for you'
Letter has reemerged online after Donald Trump's unprecedented threat to reject the results of the presidential vote during Wednesday's debate

Published: 20:24 EST, 20 October 2016 | Updated: 08:36 EST, 21 October 2016

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In the final stretch of a US presidential campaign marked by divisive rhetoric and acrimony, George Bush's outgoing letter to Bill Clinton is a lesson in mutual respect.

After Donald Trump's unprecedented threat to reject the results of the presidential vote during Wednesday's debate, a 1993 letter that George HW Bush sent to Bill Clinton as he passed the Oval Office torch has resurfaced and taken social media by storm.

'Your success is now our country's success,' Bush wrote to Clinton, a few months after conceding electoral defeat. 'I am rooting for you.'

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George Bush's outgoing letter to Bill Clinton reemerges as a lesson in grace during a presidential race marred by personal attacks and divisive rhetoric

The letter from Bush's presidential library quickly went viral on Twitter after a National Public Radio host shared it with the words, 'Read this. Think about this. George HW Bush's gracious hand-off to Bill Clinton.'

'It's beautiful.'

In his letter, Bush also gave his successor some advice: 'There will be very tough times,' he wrote. 'Just don't let the critics discourage you or push you off course.'

'I wish you well. I wish your family well.'

In yet another acrimonious debate on Wednesday night, the Republican candidate Trump declined to say if he would accept the election result.

Bush's (right, in 1992, pictured shaking Clinton's hand) left advice for his successor: 'There will be very tough times. Just don't let the critics discourage you or push you off course'

The pair shared a handshake during a televised debate between then-incumbent President Republican George H. W. Bush and Democrat Bill Clinton. In comparison, Trump and Hillary Clinton refused to shake hands at Wednesday's debates

He added Thursday that he reserved the right to launch a legal appeal against the electoral results, launching the United States into unprecedented territory and amplifying fears of post-election unrest.

The contrast with the tone of the Bush letter was lost on no one.

'What happened to us in the past 20 years? Stunned. Ashamed,' wrote another Twitter user with an image of the note.

'A grace note from another age,' another wrote.

The letter had also made the internet rounds earlier in the campaign. Hillary Clinton posted an picture of the handwritten letter on White House stationery in June, telling her followers it had brought her to tears.

'It had some good advice about staying focused on what mattered, despite the critics,' she wrote on Instagram alongside the image. 'They had just fought a fierce campaign.'

Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton faced each other on Wednesday for the final debate before the November 8 election

'Bill won, President Bush lost. In a democracy, that's how it goes.'

Presidents writing letters to their successors has become something of an Inauguration Day ritual.

George W. Bush left one for President Obama in 2009. While Ronald Reagan's note to the elder Bush advised him: 'Don't let the turkeys get you down.'

In Bill Clinton's autobiography My Life, he wrote that he had wanted to replicate Bush's graciousness when it came time to write a note to leave for the new president, George W. Bush.

'I wanted to be gracious and encouraging, as George Bush had been to me. Soon George W. Bush would be President of all the people, and I wished him well.

'I had paid close attention to what Bush and Cheney had said in the campaign. I knew they saw the world very differently from the way I did and would want to undo much of what I had done, especially on economic policy and the environment.'