The South as a factor in the territorial expansion of the United States.
William Roberson Garrett, A. M., Ph. D., Captain of First Virginia Regiment Artillery—subsequently in Forrest's Cavalry. Professor of American History, Peabody Normal College, Nashville, Tenn.
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| William R. Garrett |
Chapter 1:
- Territorial expansion a distinctive feature in the history of the United States -- the South a leading factor in this policy.
In one important respect the history of the United States differs from the history—transcends the history—of any other great power of the world. Its boundaries have never receded. It is true, indeed, that some of the great powers have gained important territorial acquisitions, and have lost others; their boundary lines advancing and receding. At certain points of their history they may have claimed that their boundaries had never receded. This statement is now true of no great power except the United States.1 This is a fact of deep significance. It refutes the theory formerly so prevalent in Europe, and entertained to some extent in America, that a vast confederated republic could not possess cohesive force sufficient to hold its several parts together. Yet experience has shown that the United States, alone of all the great powers of the world, has preserved intact all the territory it has ever acquired. In another respect American history is distinctive. Every great war in which the United States has ever been engaged, has been accompanied by a large acquisition [62] of territory. Although we have grown to greatness, like ‘the great robber, Rome,’ by successive wars and successive acquisitions of territory, yet these wars have not been undertaken for the purpose of foreign conquest. Such a purpose has never been charged against the United States except in the case of the Mexican war. These several wars, accompanied by acquisitions of territory, have been so interspersed along our history, that they form the true key of our chronology. Not the successive presidential administrations, bat the successive epochs of growth in the acquisition of territory, and the corresponding eras of development in the assimilation of the territory acquired, form the true principle upon which the history of the United States should be studied and written. Whether these several wars and acquisitions shall be viewed as connected by the relation of cause and effect, or as forming a chain of remarkable coincidence, it is certain that an examination of the territorial map, in connection with a table of dates, will verify the chronological sequence. 1. The Revolutionary war, practically closing in 1781 with the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown, was formally terminated in 1783 by the treaty of Paris, confirming the title to our original territory, and defining its limits. 2. The war with France is sometimes omitted from the list of wars, on account of its short duration and its distance from American shores. War, however, actually existed, and had an important influence upon foreign relations: Peace was restored by the convention of September 30, 1800. On the next day, October 1, 1800, France acquired Louisiana, by retrocession from Spain. April 30, 1803, Louisiana was ceded to the United States. 3. Our next war, growing out of the purchase of Louisiana, and a logical sequence of the transaction, was the second war with Great Britain, closing in 1815 with [63] the brilliant battle of New Orleans. As a corollary, came the complications with Spain and the Indian wars leading up to the treaty of Washington, made between John Quincy Adams and Don Luis de Onis, February 22, 1819. By this treaty the United States acquired Florida, and the cession of all ‘rights, claims and pretensions’ of Spain to the territory of Oregon. 4. Next came the Mexican war, preceded in 1845 by the acquisition of Texas, and followed in 1848 by the Mexican cessions under the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, and in 1853 by the Gadsden purchase. In 1846, the treaty with Great Britain decided the northern boundary of Oregon. 5. Last came the Civil war, fought among ourselves, certainly not undertaken for any purpose of foreign conquest, yet attended by the uniform result of all our wars. It closed in 1865, and was followed in 1867 by the acquisition of Alaska. In this policy of territorial expansion, the South was the leading factor. It is one of the contributions which the South as a section of the Union, and as a factor in its upbuilding, has given to the United States. Historians have not chosen to emphasize this fact. It is written, however, in the records of the nation, and cannot be successfully denied. This treatise will be devoted to demonstrate its truth. Before entering upon the discussion, attention is invited to the consideration of several important points which the student of American history is apt to overlook, but which are essential elements to a clear comprehension of the territorial growth, and to an unbiased judgment of the forces which have been the factors in building the Union. The digression will, also, serve to indicate to the reader that this work is not conceived in a partisan spirit. 1. While it is true, that the ‘broad Atlantic’ rolls between America and Europe, apparently separating the [64] United States from the great powers of the world; yet, nearly every important era or turning point in our history has been more or less affected by the condition of affairs in Europe. This fact is conspicuously illustrated in our acquisitions of territory. Our territorial growth reveals the hand of destiny, and was made possible only by the coincidence of peculiar conditions in America and Europe, affording opportunities which our ancestors might seize, but could not create. 2. Territorial expansion was the foundation of American power and greatness. From the beginning of history to the present time, no country ever exerted a controlling power over the world until it had acquired a wide extent of territory. Greece, while a little peninsula, jutting out into the Mediterranean, did, indeed, possess a population of genius and intelligence, affording light to herself and her neighbors; but she did not reach power and control until after her fleets traversed the Mediterranean, until finally her conquering phalanx swept over the known world, and Alexander wept because there were no more worlds to conquer. Her sister peninsula, Rome, stretching likewise out into the Mediterranean, exerted no controlling influence until her victorious legions had carried the Roman eagles under Scipio into Africa, under Pompey into Asia, under C$asar into Gaul and Britain; subduing a wider world than Alexander had conquered, and reaching the ultma thule. The same is true of Asiatic domination. The empire of Charlemagne, Spanish domination, French domination, rose and fell with the gain and loss of territory. What power did the English race possess while confined to the British Isles? Britain's greatness began when her navy won the dominion of the seas, and placed upon her masthead, ‘Britannia rules the wave.’ Then came the spreading of her territory until now, in the language of Daniel Webster, her ‘morning drum-beat, following the sun and keeping company with the hours, circles the earth [65] with one continuous and unbroken strain of the martial airs of England.’ No nation has reached, or can reach power and greatness, until it rests upon the strong foundation of a wide extent of territory. Had the United States been confined to the limits proposed at the treaty of Paris, accepting the Alleghany mountains for its western boundary, or the Ohio river for its northern boundary; had its progress been arrested at the Mississippi river or at the Florida line; this country might have become a prosperous and happy people, but it would not have been a great and powerful nation. With due respect for the opinions of those who opposed the territorial expansion, experience now enables us to point out their error of judgment, and all should rejoice that the wiser policy prevailed. 3. It is idle to disguise the fact that this country is divided by natural laws into geographical sections differing in soil, climate and domestic interests. ‘Let there be no North, no South, no East, no West,’ is a figure of speech used to convey the sentiment that there should be no hostility between the sections. In its figurative sense, this is a patriotic expression worthy of all praise. Taken literally, it would be an absurd protest against the laws of nature. The State lines are political and may be changed. The geographical divisions are natural and ineffaceable. Although the irritating cause, slavery, has been removed, yet other causes remain which must ever render the sections geographically distinct, and must lead to conflicts of interest. Stronger causes bind them together, and enforce conciliation and compromise. This division into geographical sections need not be deplored by the patriot, and cannot be disguised by the historian. It constitutes the peculiar strength of American institutions. These differences of interest are implanted by nature and must exist whether the several sections are organized into separate nations, or united [66] under one government. Wide extent of territory involves the union of these several sections under better safeguards for the protection of their conflicting interest than could be obtained under separate governments. No lover of mankind could wish to see them united upon the plan of the spoliation of one section, or the neglect of its interests, for the aggrandizement of the other sections. Our ancestors did not rush into union blindly. They pondered deeply and cautiously, often hesitating over the questions at issue. Gradually and firmly there grew up an abiding confidence in the benevolence, moderation and good faith of the several States and sections. A confederated republic, with its limitations and ‘checks and balances,’ was the result. The Union was built by many factors. No one factor could have built it; neither the North, nor the South, nor the East, nor the West. It needed the distinctive genius of each, and the combined energy of all. No similar spectacle of national development has ever been presented to the world; so vast, so excellent, so progressive, so permanent. Even its internal struggles are evidences of its strength, and its powers of recuperation prove its healthy constitution. Every step in the formation, growth and preservation of the Union has been almost a historical miracle. It is wonderful that thirteen separate and independent sovereignties, scattered over a wide extent of territory, should voluntarily unite themselves under one government. It is no less wonderful that such a union should survive the reaction of local jealousies and conflicting interests in the earlier periods, when no effort at coercion would have been entertained. The first century of national government witnessed many tests of the relative strength of its centrifugal and centripetal forces. In the first reaction, in the early periods of the government, there were minor insurrections. They were easily quelled. As the government [67] progressed, there were serious conflicts of interest and opinion, leading to fierce political strife, and ending in concession and compromise. The territorial acquisitions, becoming alternately the cause and effect of political contests, and complicated with questions of foreign policy, have applied the most severe tests to the centrifugal and centripetal forces of the Union. Questions growing out of the organization of acquired territory disturbed the federal relations when about to settle into quiet and routine. Each section in turn became dissatisfied, and threatened secession. The South, although making an early protest, was the last section to threaten secession, and the only section to carry its threats into execution. The Civil war applied the crucial test, and almost broke the cohesion of the parts. The South, which had made so many sacrifices to establish the Union, was required to make fresh sacrifices for its restoration. The equilibrium of these forces could not have been maintained, or when disturbed, could not have been restored, without the constant operation of a silent force, operating upon the minds of men unexpressed, sometimes unconsciously, but always controlling the hearts of the American people. It was the same centripetal force which held together the thirteen sparsely settled colonies and enabled them, without constitution or government, to contend successfully against the greatest power of the world on land and sea, to win the battles of the Revolution and the liberties of America. It was the same force which attracted together the scattered elements, and organized them into a confederated republic, which brought to the Union prosperity and expansion, and which has made the United States the only great power whose boundaries have never receded. This force is the sentiment, deep-seated in the heart of every American, the feeling of American brotherhood, a love for the American system of government, and confidence [68] in American institutions. This sentiment led to the magnanimous cession by Virginia of the Northwest Territory, appeasing jealousy and establishing the confederation. It brought the reluctant state, Rhode Island, finally to ratify the Constitution, controlled the West in the crisis of the Spanish intrigues, restrained New England at the Hartford convention, and made the Confederate soldier ‘love the Star Spangled Banner while he fought it.’ This sentiment led to the offer and acceptance of honorable terms of surrender, and to the restoration of peace, and now disposes the hearts of the American people to recall the Civil war with emotions of national pride, rather than sectional malice. This war did, indeed, arouse deep passions, and threatened to implant sectional animosities which time could never heal, but it was fought on questions of principle and public policy; it did not spring from feelings of mutual antipathy. During its progress, resentments were aroused, but the sentiment of American brotherhood was never destroyed, and feelings of fixed hatred were not engendered. The American people belong to a race of strong passions, but not of sullen temper. They belong to the great Anglo-Saxon-Norman race, the race of heroes, of warriors and of statesmen. After the conquering races had commingled their blood in the British Isles, the nursing ground of the heroic English race, their descendants began to spread over the world, and have everywhere been its leaders. The Southern people inherit the strong passions of their ancestors. They know how to love, how to hate and how to forgive. They could be bound permanently to no country by humiliating ties. The only ties which can bind people of English blood are the ties of love and pride. The Southern people love American institutions, and they are educating their children to be patriots. If any one doubts the patriotism of the Southern people, let him visit their schools, and listen to the lessons [69] which they teach their children, or let him attend the annual reunions held by the soldiers who fought the Confederate battles. Here are some of their expressions, taken from the report of the committee on history, unanimously adopted by the United Confederate Veteran Association at its annual reunion at Richmond, Va., June 30, 1896: ‘Our children and our children's children, trained by us to sentiments of patriotism, will grow up with love and admiration for the institutions of the United States —those munificent institutions to which their fathers have contributed so much.’ Referring to the Confederate soldier: ‘He surrendered as the brave surrender. His surrender meant peace and conciliation.’ * * * ‘He returned to the Union as an equal, he has remained in the Union as a friend. With no humble apologies, no unmanly servility, no petty spite, no sullen treachery, he is a cheerful, frank citizen of the United States, accepting the present, trusting the future, and proud of the past.’ * * * ‘He must love some country, and he has no other country to love.’ * * * ‘He learned to love that flag when he was a boy. He loved it even when he fought it.’ * * * Referring to the Confederate historian the report says: ‘Then let the Confederate historian be like his model, the Confederate soldier. He must be patriotic, for he is representing the cause of patriots. He must be candid, for a partisan work will not live in history, and will fail to convince the world.’ * * ‘He must be bold and fearless, but always liberal. He must be eloquent, for he is dealing with a lofty theme—the most gigantic internal struggle which history records—the grandest contribution which the nineteenth century has made to human greatness—America's proudest title to martial glory. He is painting for future ages the picture of that eventful epoch, whose memories are the joint heritage of all Americans, and which is destined to occupy in American history the pathetic place [70] which the Wars of the Roses now occupy in the annals of England, and in the hearts of Englishmen.’ Such are the sentiments expressed by Confederate soldiers. Has the great centripetal force, the sentiment of American brotherhood, the love for the American system of government, and confidence in American institutions, yet lost its power over the hearts of the American people? There is one irritating cause, too petty to exert any controlling influence, but which tends to keep alive passions which war and political strife have failed to perpetuate. A class of partisan writers have attempted to ignore the South as a factor in American institutions, and persist in representing the Southern section as inferior or hostile to the other sections, and have even stained the page of history by false pictures of its people, representing them as drones in the national hive, ungrateful participants in the blessings which other sections have conferred. Such writers deserve rebuke at the North as well as at the South. Their partisan coloring fades in the light of facts. The patriot who loves his country is just to all its sections, and finds in its history abundant reason to rejoice that each factor has performed a distinctive part in its upbuilding. The above digression, it is hoped, will indicate to the reader that a cordial admiration for the joint work of all the sections in building the greatest nation of the world, is in harmony with an analysis of the distinctive work of each. A calm review of the development of the United States cannot fail to disclose to the candid mind that the South was the leading factor in promoting the territorial expansion, at each period of acquisition, unless the acquisition of Alaska be excepted. This discussion must be sectional, as it is written in vindication of a particular section; it must also be national, since it deals with that section as one of the factors of the nation; it must be patriotic as well, for it [71] relates the history of patriotic devotion and sacrifice. If any apology were needed, it would be found in the fact that this distinctive work of the South, although no new discovery, has not received due recognition. This is not surprising. The sections whose genius has made them leaders in commerce, manufactures and internal improvements, while contributing to the greatness of the whole country, have in the same work built up their own wealth. The evidences are visible on their soil, and attract the eye of the observer. They may be verified in statistics, population, products and tax lists. The results of the Southern policy of territorial expansion have accrued to the whole country, but have left no mark or memento on Southern soil. The controversies to which the organization of the several territorial acquisitions has given rise, have been mingled with collateral questions, leading to the slavery agitation, and culminating in the Civil war. These collateral questions have been of such immediate and absorbing interest as to divert attention from the due consideration of the causes and effects of the several acquisitions. Discussion has been directed rather to the contests which arose over the assimilation of the territory acquired, its organization into States, and the relations of the new States to the contending political parties. In the contest for control of the acquired territory, the South was outstripped in the race, and its agency in the acquisition has been ignored. Let us now consider each acquisition in chronological order. [72]
Chapter II
- The extension of the territory of the United States from the Alleghany mountains to the Mississippi river and North of the Ohio river.
the consideration of this subject involves a discussion of the title of all claimants to the territory between the Alleghany mountains and the Mississippi river from the Florida line to the Great Lakes, and the final cession to the United States of all this territory, except Kentucky, which was erected into an independent state by consent of Virginia. There were three distinct classes of claimants. First.—The charter claimants: Second.—Claimants by virtue of alleged grants or purchases from the Indians. Third.—Foreign claimants. There was, also, a class of indirect claimants who urged the United States to set up a claim of original right to the jurisdiction and soil of this entire region. It was urged that the United States ought to seize this entire country as the property of the general government; that this territory, ‘if secured by the blood and treasure of all the States, ought in reason, justice and policy to be considered a common stock.’ This agrarian argument aroused the indignation of the charter claimants and threatened to prevent the formation of the Union. Congress, however, was not deceived by the fallacy, and acted with wisdom and justice. By no act or declaration, under the Continental Congress, or under the Confederation, or under the Constitution, did the United States ever assert such a claim, or sanction the policy of [73] spoliation. Since the United States never appeared as a claimant, the consideration of such claims might be dismissed, were it not for the fact that the persistence with which they were urged upon Congress by outside parties has made the controversy historic, and led to important results. It will, therefore, be necessary at the proper place to trace the origin, progress and final defeat of an effort which, if it had been successful, would either have prevented the Union or would have engrafted upon its fundamental law a pernicious and fatal doctrine. The charter claimants were six in number: Virginia, Massachusetts, Connecticut, the two Carolinas and Georgia. Their several charters constituted the only legal and valid titles to any portion of this western country. Their conduct was eminently wise and patriotic through the whole controversy. They engaged in no unseemly squabbles, and met with dignity the noise that was made by those who had neither legal title nor equitable rights. They ended the controversy by the patriotic cession of the whole country to the United States. Virginia claimed the whole territory from her southern boundary line extending to the Mississippi and up northward to the Great Lakes, including Kentucky and all the country which afterward became the Northwest Territory. This claim was based upon her charter of 1609, and upheld by actual possession and by civil and military occupation. She remained in actual possession until the country was ceded to the United States. Her claim was undisputed by any charter claimant as far north as the 41st parallel. Massachusetts and Connecticut claimed that their charters extended westward to the Mississippi, covering the narrow belts running across the territory in possession of Virginia, and embraced in the westward extension of their respective northern and southern boundary lines. Neither of these States had ever occupied any portion of the territory up to the time of the cessions, and neither [74] made any attempt to occupy it. Had either of them desired to test their claims, the tribunal was within easy reach, to which Georgia and South Carolina referred their territorial dispute—the tribunal provided under the ninth article of the confederation. There was no necessity, however, as they all contemplated ceding their claims to the United States. North Carolina, alone, possessed an undisputed claim. Her western territory was co-extensive with the present State of Tennessee. A conflict of title between South Carolina and Georgia was submitted to Congress under the ninth article of the confederation, but was settled by friendly compromise before the court appointed by Congress was ready to begin the trial. It was decided that a strip about twelve miles wide, extending from the present limits of the State westward to the Mississippi, and running along the southern border of Tennessee, should belong to South Carolina. All south of this strip to the Florida line should belong to Georgia. The second class of claimants, under alleged grants and purchases from the Indians, were the State of New York and several land companies. The claim of New York was vague and shadowy, covering a large and indefinite tract of country without specified boundaries, and based upon no acknowledged principles of custom, law or equity. New York made skillful use of this claim, and did the only thing which it was possible to do with it, except to abandon it. She ceded it to the United States. The land companies, especially the Indiana and the Vandalia companies, proved to be arrogant, persistent and aggressive claimants. Hoping to realize immense profits from the lands which they had pretended to acquire for a trifle, they resorted to all the arts of the lobbyist. Having acquired an undue and sinister influence in Congress, they used it to promote discord, and even to imperil the Union. They were ultimately defeated, and their claims justly ignored. [75] The foreign claimants were Great Britain and Spain. Spain proposed as the price of alliance with the United States, that the region from the Alleghany mountains to the Mississippi river, and from Florida to the Ohio river, should constitute an Indian reservation, of which the western half should be under the protection of Spain and the eastern half under the protection of the United States; that Spain should be permitted to occupy this country with her troops, so that she could claim it from Great Britain under the principle of uti possidetis. This reservation would have covered the present States of Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee and Kentucky. France sustained Spain in this demand and urged it upon Congress. Great Britain, in addition to her ancient title to the entire territory of the colonies, laid especial claim to the country northwest of the Ohio river, by virtue of her act of parliament in 1774, commonly known as the ‘Quebec Act,’ by which she had annexed all that region to Canada. In assertion of this claim, she took possession of the country early in the war, and occupied it with British troops. At the suggestion and under the guidance of her illustrious citizen, General George Rogers Clarke, Virginia organized an expedition composed of Virginia soldiers, in Virginia pay, without assistance from the United States, expelled the British from the territory, and held it at the close of the war, in the name of the State. These foreign claims came up for settlement, not before Congress, but by treaty with foreign nations; yet the uncertainty served to render the whole question still more complicated. The two charter claimants, Virginia and North Carolina, were the only States who supported their titles by actual settlement, and by civil and military occupation. The settlements along the Mississippi, the Wabash and the Ohio, and in Kentucky, and the military occupation by George Rogers Clarke, on the part of [76] Virginia; and the settlements along the Watauga and the Cumberland, and the operations of Robertson and Sevier on the part of North Carolina, supported and maintained the charter rights of all the claimants to the western lands. The cabin and the rifle of the pioneer guarded the charters of the States, and enabled our commissioners in negotiating the treaty of peace to add to the abstract charter titles the plea of possession, and thus to prevent the limitation of the boundaries to the Alleghany mountains or the Ohio river. （Roosevelt's Winning of the West, Vol. 2., p. 373; Vol. 3, p. 243.) At the treaty of Paris, the United States was fortunate in the services of three of her ablest diplomats, John Adams, John Jay and Benjamin Franklin. After Great Britain signified her willingness to grant independence, negotiations were delayed on several important questions, the most important of which was the question of boundary. The three commissioners were united in demanding boundaries which should include every foot of land within the charter limits of every State. They differed only in the methods of negotiations to secure the end. Dr. Franklin was disposed to confide in France, and to work in harmony with her representatives. Jay was distrustful of the designs of France, and favored direct negotiations with England without the privity of France. Adams, upon his arrival, warmly sided with Jay, and Franklin yielded. Whether the course favored by Franklin would have been successful, can only be conjectured. The course pursued at the suggestion of Jay and Adams was eminently successful, and achieved a brilliant diplomatic victory. The purposes of Spain, though aided by France, were thwarted, and Great Britain acceded to the demands of the United States. (See Narrative and Critical Hist. of Am., VII. 2, and Lecky's Hist. of Eng., Vol. 4.) After the fortunate expedient of Jay in sending Vaughan to confer with Lord Shelburne, Great Britain [77] seemed suddenly to adopt a policy at variance with her former obstinate and haughty tone toward America, and there was no longer any trouble about the western boundaries. In addition to the views which the British negotiators expressed, we may well conjecture that there were others to which no public expression was given. It was no part of British policy to build up either France or Spain in America, and it was, perhaps, fortunate that France took a decided and active part in urging the claims of Spain. The British leaders saw in it an attempt to gain a foothold east of the Mississippi over territory which Great Britain had been accustomed to regard as her own. It was less galling to her pride to yield it to America than to extend the dominions of Spain at the demand of France. In addition to this, the British statesmen believed that the American republics could not hold together, and confidently expected that in a short time some, if not all of them, would return to the mother country. They were already quarreling among themselves over this very territory, and doubtless the quarrel was considered abroad as more dangerous than it really was. Was it not better for Great Britain to leave them this bone of contention than to cure their quarrels by removing the cause? It had already delayed the Union for many years and was still an unsettled question. Would not the quarrel be renewed with greater violence as soon as the pressure of a foreign war was removed? If these states should return they would bring this territory back with them. Besides, a liberal policy and the decision of this point in her favor against the wishes of France and Spain, would tend to detach America from her allies, and restore confidence in the mother country. On the other hand, Great Britain could not hope, and perhaps did not wish, to establish permanently cordial relations with France and Spain. Influenced by considerations of this nature, and in accordance with the heroic [78] British character, which is as positive and magnanimous in concession as it is bold and haughty in aggression, Great Britain consented that the boundaries should be established in accordance with her charters to the several States, and in the case of the northwestern boundary, yielded her claims under the ‘Quebec Act’ to the principle of uti possidetis, which Virginia so happily supplied by the success of her expedition under George Rogers Clarke. The boundaries were established to extend to the Great Lakes, the Mississippi river and the Florida line, embracing all the western territory within the charter claims of Georgia, the Carolinas, Virginia, Connecticut and Massachusetts, the claim of Virginia alone extending to Lake Superior. Let us now review the controversy which a few of the States without color of title and the land companies so long waged in Congress against the charter claimants, especially against Virginia, and let us begin at the beginning. This controversy started in 1776 between Maryland and Virginia, and grew out of the proceedings connected with the instructions to the Virginia delegates to move in Congress for independence, confederation and foreign alliances. Virginia was the leader in these three propositions. Maryland instructed her delegates to oppose them all. The conventions of the two States were in session at the same time. Let us examine their proceedings to arrive at the origin of the controversy. The Virginia convention met at Williamsburg, May 6, 1776. Some of her leaders were absent. Washington was in command of the army. Jefferson, Richard Henry Lee and George Wythe were in Congress. Yet many of her ablest men were present, some of whom were already famous, and others were to gain fame in this assembly. Patrick Henry was there in the plenitude of his powers, the ruling spirit of the convention. Edmund Pendleton. presided over the deliberations. [79] Thomas Nelson was the mover of its most important resolutions. George Mason was the author of its ‘Declaration of Rights.’ Other delegates, scarcely less illustrious, were among its members. Two young men, James Madison and Edmund Randolph, here began their careers.2 May 15th the following resolutions were adopted:
These resolutions, prefaced by a strong preamble, were offered by Thomas Nelson, and were seconded by Patrick Henry in words of burning eloquence. Copies were sent to the several colonial legislatures and were presented to Congress May 27th. In obedience to these instructions, Richard Henry Lee, on behalf of the Virginia delegates, offered the following resolutions in Congress June 7, 1776: [80]Resolved, unanimously, That the delegates appointed to represent this colony in General Congress, be instructed to propose to that respectable body to declare the United Colonies free and independent States, absolved from all allegiance to, or dependence upon, the crown or parliament of Great Britain, and that they give the assent of this colony to such declaration, and to whatever measures may be thought proper and necessary by the Congress for forming foreign alliances, and a confederation of the colonies, at such time, and in the manner, as to them shall seem best; Provided, that the power of forming government for, and the regulations of the internal concerns of each colony, be left to the respective colonial legislatures.
Resolved, unanimously, That a committee be appointed to prepare a Declaration of Rights, and such a plan of government as will be most likely to maintain peace and order in this colony, and secure substantial and equal liberty to the people.Life of Patrick Henry, by W. W. Henry, Vol. I, Ch. 16; American Archives, Fourth Series, Vol. 6, p. 1524.
That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown, and all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved. That it is expedient forthwith to take the most effectual measures for forming foreign alliances. That a plan of confederation be prepared and transmitted to the respective colonies for their consideration.Thus was outlined the policy of Virginia. By the adoption of the motion of her delegates, July 2, 1776, it became the policy of the United States. (Am. Arch., Fourth Series, Vol. 6, p. 1699.) Let us now examine the policy of Maryland. Her state convention met May 15, 1776, the day on which the convention of Virginia adopted the instructions in favor of independence. May 21, 1776, the Maryland convention gave to its delegates the following instructions: ‘Resolved, unanimously, That, as this convention is firmly persuaded that a reunion with Great Britain on constitutional principles would most effectually secure the rights and liberties, and increase the strength and promote the happiness of the whole empire, objects which this province has ever had in view, the said deputies are bound and directed to govern themselves by the instructions given to them by this convention in its session in December last, in the same manner as if said instructions were particularly repeated.’ (Am. Arch., Fourth Series, p. 463.) The previous instructions to her deputies in Congress, adopted January 12, 1776, and referred to above, contained strong expressions of attachment to Great Britain and the ardent desire for reconciliation. They comment on ‘the mildness and equity of the English Constitution, under which we have grown up to, and enjoyed a state of felicity not exceeded among any people we know [81] of, until the grounds of the present controversy were laid by the ministry and parliament of Great Britain.’ After these preliminary expressions, the legislature proceeds to give explicit instructions on three points: independence, foreign alliance and national union. These instructions are so interesting that they are quoted below, as follows: ‘As upon the attainment of these great objects, we shall think it our greatest happiness to be thus firmly united to Great Britain, we think proper to instruct you that, should any proposition be happily made by the crown or parliament that may lead to, or lay a rational and probable ground for reconciliation, you use your utmost endeavors to cultivate and improve it into a happy settlement and lasting amity; taking care to secure the colonies against the exercise of the right assumed by parliament to tax them, and to alter and change the charters, constitution and internal policy without their consent—powers incompatible with the essential securities of the colonists.’ (American Archives, Fourth Series, p. 463.) ‘We further instruct you, that you do not, without the previous knowledge and approbation of the convention of this province, assent to any proposition to declare these colonies independent of the crown of Great Britain, nor to any proposition for making or entering into alliance with any foreign power, nor to any union or confederation of these colonies which may necessarily lead to a separation from the mother country, unless in your judgment, or in the judgment of any four of you, or a majority of the whole of you, if all shall be then attending in Congress, it shall be thought absolutely necessary for the preservation of the liberties of the United Colonies; and should a majority of the colonies in Congress, against such your judgment, resolve to declare these colonies independent of the crown of Great Britain, or to make or to enter into alliance with any foreign crown, or [82] into any union or confederation of these colonies, which may necessarily lead to a separation from the mother country, we instruct you immediately to call the convention of this province, and repair thereto with such proposition and resolve, and lay the same before the said convention for their consideration; and this convention will not hold this province bound by such majority in Congress, until the representative body of the province in convention assent thereto.’ The resolutions of the Virginia delegates, embracing the three propositions of independence, foreign alliances and confederation, were debated June 8, 1776. A report of these debates is given by Mr. Jefferson in the Madison papers, Vol. I, p. 9, etseq. Messrs. Wilson, Robert R Livingston, E. Rutledge, Dickenson and others, although personally favorable to the measures proposed, argued for delay. The middle colonies, they argued, ‘were not yet ripe for bidding adieu to Great Britain, but they were fast ripening;’ ‘some of them had expressly forbidden their delegates to consent to such a declaration;’ ‘that if such a declaration should now be agreed to, these delegates must retire, and possibly their colonies might secede from the Union.’ The other side was argued by J. Adams, Lee, Wythe and others, who urged prompt action, and argued: ‘There are only two colonies, Maryland and Pennsylvania, whose delegates are absolutely tied up, and that these had by their instructions, only reserved the right of confirming or rejecting the measure;’ ‘that the backwardness of these two colonies might be ascribed partly to the influence of proprietary power and connections, and partly to their having not yet been attacked by the enemy;’ ‘that the conduct of some colonies, from the beginning of this contest, had given reason to suspect it was their settled policy to keep in the rear of this Confederacy, that their particular prospect might be better even in the worst event.’ [83] It was decided to wait for the colonies ‘not matured for falling from the parent stem.’ So the final decision was postponed to July 1, and a committee was appointed to prepare a ‘Declaration of Independence.’ Fortunately for the country, the deliberations in regard to independence came to a speedy conclusion. All opposition vanished. July 4, 1776, the remarkable result was reached, which was ultimately attained by every vital issue of the ‘Critical Period’—unanimity. Before this result was achieved, and closely connected with it, an event occurred which hastened the Declaration of Independence, and delayed the consummation of confederation. This event led to acrimonious controversy, and the revival of the old colonial feud between Virginia and Maryland. This feud originated with the settlement of Maryland. The grant to Lord Baltimore was made by the crown out of lands within the charter limits of Virginia. It was regarded by the colonists as an arbitrary violation of their charter rights, against which they made unavailing protest. In addition to this they were indignant that a colony of Catholics should be established in their vicinity. Partaking in the prejudices of the times, they felt indignation and feared danger at the prospects of papists for neighbors. They were, also, jealous of certain commercial privileges accorded to this new colony in which they were not permitted to share. When the new settlers arrived to take possession of their grant, they were not received with the proverbial Virginia hospitality. The Marylanders were not slow to resent this unfriendly disposition, and the relations between the two colonies assumed a hostile aspect. Acrimonious controversies and personal encounters marked its earlier stages. Virginia never relinquished her claim to the territory during her whole colonial life, and made several efforts to recover its possession. Before the Revolution, however, her people had become accustomed to the situation, and cordial [84] relations began to grow up between the two colonies. These relations were strengthened by their mutual participation in the Revolution. These old quarrels are now happily healed, and the people of no two states in the Union are now bound by ties of more cordial friendship than the people of Virginia and Maryland. The mention of this historic feud now excites a smile rather than angry sentiments, because it long ago reached friendly adjustment, and its solution produced results beneficial to the whole country, and of which both states are proud. The event alluded to, which revived this colonial feud, was the capture by Virginia of letters from Lord George Germaine, the English secretary of state, addressed to ‘Robert Eden, Esq., deputy governor of Maryland.’ Governor Eden was the brother-in-law of the last proprietor of Maryland. （Maryland, William Hand Brown.) The sixth Lord Baltimore, dying in 1771, leaving no legitimate issue, bequeathed Maryland to his natural son, Henry Harford. After the beginning of the Revolutionary war, Governor Eden occupied a peculiar position. He remained as governor of Maryland, and exercised his functions as the representative of the proprietary interest, with the concurrence of the convention, and enjoyed a high degree of confidence and popularity, although making no secret of his attachment to the interests of England. The exemption of Maryland from British attack was attributed to his presence, and excited the suspicion of the other colonies. Lord George Germaine, under date of December 23, 1775, wrote to Governor Eden two letters which were captured by Captain Barron on the Chesapeake bay, from a British vessel, some time in April, 1776, and were delivered to the Virginia committee of safety. These intercepted letters were forwarded to the authorities of Maryland, and their contents communicated to Congress. Thereupon, the president of Congress wrote [85] to the Maryland council of safety, urging the immediate arrest of Governor Eden and inclosing the ‘Resolve of Congress’ to the following effect:
About the same time, General Charles Lee ordered the commanding officer of the troops at Annapolis to arrest Governor Eden. This order was conveyed through Mr. Samuel Purviance, chairman of the Baltimore committee, and steps were taken for the arrest. The Maryland council of safety interposed at this point, and prevented further proceedings. The matter was referred to the Maryland convention, which, May 24, nine days after the instructions of Virginia to move independence, took action censuring Mr. Purviance, and adopting resolutions containing, among others, the following:That information had come to Congress that the governor carried on a correspondence with the ministry highly dangerous to American liberty, which was confirmed by some letters to him from Lord George Germaine, lately intercepted and sent up to Virginia, by which it appears to them that the public safety requires his person and papers to be seized; that they recommend it to this council of safety to secure him and them immediately and send them to Philadelphia.
Am. Arch., Fourth Series, Vol. 6, p. 735.
[86] To this communication, after some delay, Governor Eden replied, declining to accept the terms proposed, and requesting permission to return to England. To this communication the convention replied, commending the course of the governor, granting the request and inviting his services in behalf of reunion with England. A committee was appointed to wait on him and present the following address:It is the intention of this convention to preserve, as far as may be, the ostensible form of government, in hopes it may have some influence toward a reunion with Great Britain. * * *
Therefore, the request is, that the governor will not take an active hostile part; or, until the event of the commissioners is known, that he will not correspond with administration, or those who may be carrying on hostilities in America, directly or indirectly. If the governor thinks himself at liberty to enter into such engagement, it is much the inclination of the convention that he should continue in the province in his station.Am. Arch., Fourth Series, Vol. 6, p. 736-7.
[87] A copy of the proceedings of the convention relative to Governor Eden, together with a request for a passport from Virginia, were sent to the president of the Virginia committee of safety, in a letter from the president of the Maryland convention, dated May 25, 1776. This letter was laid before the Virginia convention May 31, and aroused a strong feeling of indignation. This sentiment will be readily understood when it is remembered that the letters of Lord George Germaine to Governor Eden had been intercepted by the Virginia authorities and by them conveyed to the authorities of Maryland and to Congress. These intercepted letters furnished indubitable evidence that Governor Eden had heretofore conveyed to the British ministry information which they deemed valuable, and that he was expected by them to use the anomalous official position in which the Maryland convention persistently retained him, to furnish information to Great Britain, and to aid in measures for the subjugation of Virginia and other Southern colonies, while Maryland was left free from invasion. The letters did not prove that Governor Eden assented to the Southern invasion, but they did show that the British government relied on him to aid in such purposes, and that he had heretofore furnished important information. This is clearly shown in the following intercepted letter:To his Excellency Robert Eden, Esq., Governor of Maryland:
May it please your excellency: We are commanded by the convention to wait upon your excellency, and to communicate to you the resolutions they have this day entered into; and we are instructed to assure your excellency that the convention entertains a favorable sense of your conduct, relative to the affairs of America, since the unhappy differences have subsisted between Great Britain and the United Colonies, as far as the same hath come to their knowledge, and of their real wish for your return, to resume the government of this province, when we shall happily be restored to peace, and that connection with Great Britain, the interruption and suspense of which have filled the mind of every good man with the deepest regret. From the disposition your excellency hath manifested to promote the real interest of both countries, the convention is induced to entertain the warmest hopes and expectations that, upon your arrival in England, you will represent the temper and principles of Maryland with the same candor you have hitherto shown, and that you will exert your endeavors to promote a reconciliation, upon terms that may be secure and honorable both to Great Britain and America. To which his excellency returned no answer, but received assurances that he might send down to the Capes for a man-of-war, having engaged by letter to Mr. Carroll, that it should commit no hostilities whilst up for him.Am. Arch., Fourth Series, Vol. 6, p. 737-8.
When, therefore, the action of the Maryland convention was announced to Virginia, accompanied with a request for passports to enable Governor Eden to join Lord Dunmore and the British fleet, it is not, surprising that the proposition excited surprise and alarm. The Virginia convention, May 31st, took the following action:
This protest of Virginia was timely. Its publication produced important effects, all of which were ultimately salutary, though exciting temporary irritation. June 11th the delegates of Maryland in Congress wrote to the Maryland council of safety: ‘We are astonished at the ungenerous and malevolent turn given to the proceedings of our convention by that of Virginia, and hope that they will be as unsuccessful in their nefarious attempt to stir up the people of Maryland against their representatives as they have hitherto been in their endeavors to render the councils of that province suspected.’ They thought it important, however, in the same letter to urge advice similar to the suggestion of Virginia, though not couched in the same plain language. They say: ‘It will be necessary that the convention of Maryland should meet as soon as possible to give the explicit sense of the province on this point (the Declaration of Independence); and we hope that you will accordingly exercise your power of convening them at such time as you think the members can be brought together.’ The council of safety had already acted, and by circular of June 9th had summoned the delegates to meet in convention at Annapolis June 20th, and to be punctual, ‘as the business is very urgent and will not admit of a moment's delay.’ The convention met at the time appointed. Their action is thus described in the interesting history of Maryland by William Hand Brown. (Commonwealth Series, p. 280.) ‘They summoned their deputies back from congress, and then laid the question before the freemen. These, meeting in their sovereign political capacity in their several counties, instructed their representatives in the convention to rescind the restrictions imposed upon the [91] deputies in Congress, and to allow them to unite with those of the other colonies in declaring independence and forming a confederation.’ The Maryland convention defended its previous action upon the ground of lack of authority, claiming that its powers were limited to carrying out the non-importation agreements; ‘that it had been empowered to exercise its functions with a view to reconciliation with Great Britain, and that it had no power to declare independence —for that it must go to the people.’ This view of passive obedience does not accord with the vigor and warmth of the instructions to her delegates, issued by the convention in the previous month, nor with the earnestness with which they implored the offices of Governor Eden with the British ministry. How far the convention was influenced by the proprietary interests, as charged by Virginia, cannot be determined. One thing, however, is clear: The convention had been very slow ‘to go to the people.’ The blunt letter of Virginia, rebuking not the people of Maryland but its convention, was an important factor ‘to stir up the people’ as well as the convention. As soon as the opportunity was afforded them, the people of Maryland responded nobly, and the convention caught their spirit. Action was prompt. There was no quibbling or shuffling to preserve consistency. The convention went to the people and obeyed their voice. The policy was instantly reversed, and Maryland's vote was made ready for independence. July 1st her delegates laid before Congress the resolutions of the Maryland convention, adopted June 28th. By these resolutions the previous instructions were revoked, and the restrictions therein contained removed; and the deputies were ‘authorized and empowered to concur with the other United Colonies, or a majority of them, in declaring the United Colonies free and independent States, in forming such further compact and confederation [92] between them, in making foreign alliances, and in adopting such other measures as shall be adjudged necessary for securing the liberties of America; and that said colony will hold itself bound by the resolutions of a majority of the United Colonies in the premises, provided the sole and exclusive right of regulating the internal government and police of that colony be reserved to the people thereof.’ The next day, July 2d, the motion of the Virginia delegates of June 7th was adopted in Congress, and the vote of Maryland is recorded in the affirmative. Thus, the first effect of the revival of the old colonial feud was beneficial to the country. But the feud did not end here. The Maryland convention having obeyed the voice of the people and placed the State in its true position, now turned attention to censure Virginia for what they styled the appeal ‘to the good people of this province against their convention.’ Waiting two days for the rejoicings of July 4th to subside, the Maryland convention, July 6th, adopted a series of resolutions defending their own course with regard to Governor Eden, and censuring Virginia for publishing the resolutions of May 31st. These resolutions of Maryland are too long to quote. They are strongly worded, and, though courteously expressed, evince a feeling of deep resentment. (American Archives, Fourth Series, vol. 6, pp. 1506, 1727.) The opportunity to repay Virginia in kind was now at hand. The convention of Virginia did not stop with instructing her delegates in Congress to move for independence and confederation. Without waiting on the result, the convention entered upon the work of preparing the State for independence and union. Her ‘Declaration of Rights’ was adopted June 12th, and her ‘Constitution or form of government’ was adopted, with like unanimity, June 29th. Article XXI of this instrument was intended to pave the way to confederation by releasing all title to [93] the territory of other States, which had been carved out of her territory by grants of the crown, and which had occasioned colonial disputes, especially with Maryland. This article reads as follows: ‘The territories contained within the charters erecting the colonies Maryland, Pennsylvania, North and South Carolina, are hereby ceded, released and forever confirmed to the people of those colonies respectively, with all the rights of property, jurisdiction and government, and all other rights whatsoever which might at any time heretofore have been claimed by Virginia, except the free navigation and use of the rivers Potowmack and Pohomoke, with the property of the Virginia shores or strands bordering on either of the said rivers, and all improvements which have been made or shall be made thereon. The western and northern extent of Virginia shall in all other respects stand as fixed by the charter of King James the First, in the year one thousand six hundred and nine, and by the publick treaty of peace between the courts of Great Britain and France in the year one thousand seven hundred and sixty-three; unless, by act of legislature, one or more territories shall hereafter be laid off, and governments established westward of the Alleghany mountains. And no purchase of lands shall be made of the Indian natives but on behalf of the publick, by authority of the general assembly.’ （Henning's Statutes of Virginia.) Judge Haywood remarks on this action: ‘Here was magnanimously cut off and surrendered all the territory which had been taken from Virginia to satisfy the grants to the Lords Proprietors.’ ( Haywood's Hist. of Tenn., p. 6.)3 Haywood is just in calling this action magnanimous. While Virginia could not, perhaps, have maintained a [94] successful claim to the possession of those territories to which her abstract prior title had so long lain dormant, and had been weakened, if not destroyed, by so many capricious grants from the same power by which it was created, yet her position offered strong temptations to pursue the time sanctioned European policy, the policy which European statesmen consider sagacious, which has built up all the great powers of Europe at the expense of their neighbors, and which is pursued now and ever has been pursued throughout the whole history of their diplomacy. That policy would have been to nurse her claims, to hold them as a perpetual thorn in the side of her neighboring States, to prevent the formation of the union, to make herself the great central absorbing power, and gradually to encroach on the lesser States. Such a policy was feared by several of the smaller States, especially by Maryland. Had a monarch ruled the destinies of Virginia, such would have been the inevitable tendency of events. With wealth, population and resources then superior to any of the States, the prospect was certainly alluring, had the ambition of Virginia aimed at empire. But a far different spirit animated her people. Fired with the love of liberty, and struggling for their own freedom from the grasp of Great Britain, no thought entered their minds of aggression against the brethren fighting by their sides. Impelled by this spirit of her people, she devoted her efforts to bind the States in a fraternal compact, to remove all causes of jealousy, and to build up a great and permanent Federal republic, and she hastened to surrender all claims to the territory of her sister States. The Maryland convention, however, was in no frame of mind to recognize the magnanimity of Virginia. On the 29th of October the Maryland convention entered upon its journal the following note: ‘This convention, being informed that in the constitution or form of government agreed upon by the delegates of Virginia, a claim is made by them injurious to the inhabitants of [95] this state,’ (American Archives, Fifth Series, vol. 3, p. 133), ‘Ordered, That the same be read, and the same was read, as follows, to wit:’ The twenty-first section of the Virginia constitution, as above quoted, was then read, and the convention resolved to consider the matter on the next day, October 30th. The consideration was resumed at the time appointed, whereupon a series of three resolutions was adopted. These resolutions make no acknowledgment of the effort of Virginia to terminate the old colonial disputes by the cession of her charter claims, but seem rather to resent it. The first resolution is in the following words: (Ibid., p. 134.) ‘Resolved, unanimously, That it is the opinion of this convention that the State of Virginia hath not any right or title to any of the territory, bays, rivers, or waters included in the charter granted by His Majesty Charles the First to C$acilius Calvert, Baron of Baltimore.’ (Am. Arch., Fifth Series, vol. 3, pp. 133, 134.) The second resolution is devoted to boundary claims, asserting ‘sole and exclusive jurisdiction over the said river Potowmack,’ etc. The third resolution is the one which demands our attention. It is as follows: ‘Resolved, unanimously, That it is the opinion of this convention that the very extensive claim of the State of Virginia to the back lands hath no foundation in justice, and that if the same or any like claim is admitted, the freedom of the smaller States and the liberties of America may be thereby greatly endangered; this convention being firmly persuaded that, if the dominion over those lands should be established by the blood and treasure of the United States, such lands ought to be considered as a common stock, to be parceled out at proper times into convenient, free and independent governments.’4 This resolution marks the beginning of the controversy [96] which delayed the formation of the Confederation for nearly five years, and threatened, at one time, to defeat it. The spirit of retaliation against Virginia is manifest upon its face, yet it ultimately led to good results. Just as the timely thrust of Virginia had awakened the people of Maryland to the patriotic action which hastened the Declaration of Independence, so the retaliation of Maryland, though failing signally, as we shall hereafter see, in the measures proposed by the State, yet had the effect to draw attention to the subject, and ultimately induced Virginia to reconsider the territorial policy announced in her constitution, and to make the voluntary cession of her western possessions the most magnanimous act of history. The territorial policy of Virginia had been foreshadowed in her constitution of June 26th, 1776, which was passed by the unanimous vote of her convention. This instrument declares that her western and northern extent shall stand as fixed by her charter, ‘unless by act of legislature one or more territories shall hereafter be laid off and governments established west of the Alleghany mountains.’ This policy, so solemnly incorporated into her fundamental law, although the purpose of organizing the territory into new States is contingently expressed, furnishing the first official suggestion of additional States, was voluntarily made without pressure from others, and has been faithfully carried out. In one respect alone has Virginia departed from the policy outlined in her constitution. Instead of organizing all of her territory ‘west of the Alleghany mountains’ into States by the direct agency of her own legislature, she subsequently committed a portion of that duty to the United States by ceding the Northwest Territory, under express stipulations that it should be organized into States. She reserved the portion south of the Ohio, and, by direct action of her own legislature, erected it into the State of Kentucky in 1792, ten years before the United States [97] was able to begin redeeming its pledge of organizing the Northwest Territory into States by creating the State of Ohio in 1802. Maryland's resolution of October 30, 1776, contained the excellent suggestion that Congress could make good use of these western lands, and would be the best agent for organizing them into independent States; but her reasoning as to any title of the United States was fallacious, and the coercive measures hinted at, and subsequently urged, were unwarrantable. The resolution was speedily followed up by bringing the matter before Congress. November 9th, 1776, the convention took up the consideration of a letter from the president of Congress, urging them to rescind the action of Maryland ‘to pay ten dollars in lieu of the hundred acres of bounty land determined by Congress to be given to such noncommissioned officers and soldiers as shall inlist to serve during the war.’ In reply to this letter the convention resolved that the president of the convention be directed to write to Congress and inform them that Maryland had no public lands which could be pledged to the soldiers, and knew of no such lands owned by Congress; that Maryland declined to pledge the faith of the State to offer one hundred acres as bounty for enlistment until ‘the honourable Congress will specify any Land belonging to the United States as common stock to be divided among the soldiery.’ Then comes the climax: ‘That this convention are under the strongest impression that the back Lands claimed by the British Crown, if secured by the blood and treasure of all, ought, in reason, justice and policy, to be considered as a common stock, to be parceled out by Congress into free, convenient and independent governments, as the wisdom of that body shall hereafter direct; but if these (the only lands as this convention apprehend that can) should be provided by Congress at [98] the expense of the United States to make good the proffered bounties, every idea of their being a common stock must thereby be given up; some of the states may, by fixing their own price on the Land, pay off what of their quota of the public debt they please, and have their extensive territory settled by the soldiery of the other states, whilst this state and a few others must be so Weakened and impoverished that they can hold their liberties only at the will of their powerful neighbors.’ (Am. Arch., Fifth Series, vol. 3, p. 1569.) This letter was read in Congress November 13, 1776, and elicited no action except an order that the president inform Maryland that the faith of the United States is pledged for the bounty land. to the soldiers. But Maryland was resolute to follow up the attack. October 15, 1777, her delegates moved in Congress ‘that the United States, in Congress assembled, shall have the sole and exclusive right and power to ascertain and fix the western boundary of such states as claim to the Mississippi or South Sea and lay out the land beyond the boundary so ascertained, into separate and independent States, from time to time, as the numbers and circumstances of the people may require.’ (Journals, vol. 2, p. 290.) This motion fully developed the Maryland idea. Coercion was to be used. This was proposed even before a confederation was established. The unorganized United States should seize the territory of the States, and deprive them of jurisdiction and property. The argument was, that some of the smaller States did not own public land, and felt it to be a hardship to lack this resource while others possessed it; that this land, if secured by ‘the blood and treasure of all,’ should be a ‘common stock’; therefore, the United States should arbitrarily limit the western boundaries of the claimant States without regard to their charter rights, and take possession of all territory which they saw fit to sequester. No wonder that such a proposition received only the vote of Maryland, [99] and neither then nor subsequently obtained the sanction of the United States. It was abhorrent to all the principles so recently announced in the Declaration of Independence, the only charter under which the United States could, at that time, claim existence. When the thirteen colonies became States by the Declaration of Independence, their several territorial limits remained unchanged. ‘These United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States.’ What colonies? ‘These.’ The several colonies as they were on the 4th of July, 1776, with their respective boundaries and charter rights, became States. What defined ‘these’ colonies? Their several charters. In the same series of resolutions of October 30, 1776, in which Maryland began the assault on the rights of Virginia, she asserted her own territorial rights, and based them upon ‘the charter granted by His Majesty Charles the First to Caecilius Calvert.’ The declaration to which the several States plighted ‘our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor,’ bound them to respect and defend each other's chartered rights by ‘the blood and treasure of all.’ But for whose benefit were these chartered rights to be respected and defended? Was all the territory of the States to become the property of Congress, and form a common stock? Every sentiment of justice revolts at the thought. Had the war been unsuccessful, each State would have returned to its colonial condition without change of boundary. Had independence been achieved, and no union established, certainly each State would have retained its charter boundaries. In the case of conflict of title under charter claims, as in the case of Virginia's conflict with Massachusetts and Connecticut, the matter would have been settled between the claimant States, either by war or by treaty. When independence was achieved and union was esablished, the charter rights of the claimants were in no [100] way affected, except that a tribunal was provided for the peaceable adjustment of conflicting claims. This was done by the unanimous consent of the States, and was carefully guarded to prevent the United States from abusing the position of umpire. But it was argued that these western lands were unoccupied and unsettled, and therefore different from other lands; that the settled lands, although ‘defended by the blood and treasure of all,’ were not claimed as a common stock, but inured to their respective States and were covered by their respective charters; these lands, however, were different, and the charters of their States did not protect them. The fallacy of this argument appears on its face. The charter protected the entire jurisdiction of the State. The war was undertaken to secure to each State its rights of person and property. No right accrued to the United States to usurp the jurisdiction and abridge the charter limits of any State. Later on, New Jersey, Rhode Island and Delaware, though not going to the extreme position of Maryland, came to her aid. The land companies, which had been repudiated by Virginia, joined the alliance, and the argument was revived in a modified form. Conceding that the jurisdiction of the several States was protected by their charters, it was urged that the property rights in the soil were not thus protected; that the King of Great Britain owned the property right to all ungranted lands within the charter limits of the several colonies until they became States, and therefore the general government, as the successor to the king, became at once the owner of these unoccupied or ‘crown lands,’ holding them within the jurisdiction of the several States. This argument, yielding half the controversy, was more plausible and less repulsive than the former, but was totally unsound. If it applied to the unoccupied lands in the west, it must apply with equal force to all unoccupied lands in all [101] portions of the United States, yet it was proposed that this rule should be applied only to ‘the western boundaries of such States as claim to the Mississippi or the South Seas.’ In its general application it would have been resisted by every State, and even by Maryland itself. If it applied to the crown lands, it must equally apply to proprietary rights; yet Maryland confiscated the proprietary rights and quit rents, and never proposed that the United States should inherit them. If it applied to lands, it must apply to all other species of property. If it applied to property, it must apply to all other rights and powers of the crown, and a general government, as yet unborn, was heir to all the rights and powers of the British crown. If this doctrine prevailed, what was the use of framing articles of confederation? Why was unanimous consent required? There was already a nebulous sovereignty whom nobody could locate, inheritor of the crown, and king of America. The sentiments of the people of the United States could be reconciled to no such doctrine, in whole or in part. The strong common sense of their representatives had declared, not that all political connection between the states and Great Britain has descended to an heir, but that it ‘is totally dissolved.’ They inherited no general government, they created one, and took five years to frame one to suit them. After a discussion as to whether it were better to form a confederation before declaring independence, it was decided to declare independence first; in order that the free and independent States, and not the English colonies, might determine the conditions of permanent union. When this Confederation was established, it was vested with rights and powers conferred and defined by the States, and possessed not a trace of hereditary rights or powers descended from the British crown. The claim that Congress inherited from the British crown the right to limit the boundaries of the several States or to sequester lands, whether [102] settled or unsettled, covered by their several charters, was, therefore, untenable, and was never sanctioned or seriously contemplated by the United States. On the contrary, the recognition of the jurisdiction of the several States over all land, settled or unsettled, within their respective charter limits, some of which has never been ceded to, and none of which has ever been claimed by, the United States; the repeated invitations to the States to make cessions of their western lands; the care with which the terms of each cession were scrutinized; the scrupulous observance of the stipulations of these cessions, especially in the cases of Georgia and Connecticut, and of the request to Virginia to amend the terms of its cession so as to permit the Northwest Territory to be organized into more than three States; the incorporation into the articles of confederation of the provision by which the United States can take cognizance of the boundaries or jurisdiction of States only as ‘the last resort on appeal,’ when the case shall be brought before Congress by ‘the legislative or executive authority or lawful agent’ of one of the States ‘in controversy’; the adoption of the guarding clause, ‘No State shall be deprived of territory for the benefit of the United States’; the language of the ordinances of 1784 and 1787; subsequent decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States on collateral questions growing out of the cession; all abundantly show that the United States has uniformly respected the charter titles of the States to their western territory. The events connected with the origin of this dispute have been given in some detail, for the reason that, although essential to a just estimate of the acts and motives of the leading parties to the controversy, they have not been adequately set forth by previous writers. The events which follow have been discussed by many historians, who agree on the main facts but differ in their opinions and reflections. [103] The motion of the Virginia delegates, offered June 7, 1776, embraced a clause ‘that a plan of confederation be prepared and transmitted to the respective colonies for their consideration.’ July 11th Congress resolved to create a committee for the purpose, which was appointed the next day, consisting of one member from each State. This committee reported a plan of confederation July 12th, which was debated at intervals until August 20th, when the committee presented an amended report. April, 1777, it was decided to devote two days in each week to the consideration of the subject. It was during the progress of these debates that Maryland offered, October 15, 1777, the motion heretofore quoted. The Articles were adopted by Congress November 15, 1777, not to be valid until ratified by all the States, and a circular was addressed to the States urging ratification. (Journals, vol. 1, pp. 408, 507, 618; vol. 2, p. 598.) While the ratification was pending, Maryland continued her contest relative to the western lands by offering, June 22, 1778, a series of amendments to the Articles. Among these was an amendment intended to break down the safeguard which guaranteed to the States the protection of their territory from infraction by the United States. The proposed amendment was in the following words: ‘Article 9; after the words “shall be deprived of territory for the benefit of the United States,” insert “the United States, in Congress assembled, shall have the power to appoint commissioners, who shall be fully authorized and empowered to ascertain and restrict the boundaries of such of the confederated States which claim to the river Mississippi or South Sea.” ’ This amendment was rejected, receiving five votes, Maryland, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Delaware and Pennsylvania. Against it were New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Virginia, South Carolina and Georgia. New York was divided, and North Carolina absent. July 9, 1778, the delegates of all the States in accordance [104] with instructions, signed the articles in ratification of their respective States, except the delegates of New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland. Rhode Island, although signing in ratification, proposed an amendment, that the crown lands ‘shall be deemed, taken and considered as the property of these United States, and be disposed of and appropriated by Congress for the benefit of the whole Confederacy, reserving, however, to the States within whose limits such crown lands may be, the entire and complete jurisdiction thereof.’ New Jersey presented a memorial setting forth the views of her legislature on a number of matters. On the subject of the western lands New Jersey expressed views similar to those of Rhode Island; that the crown lands belong to the United States, the jurisdiction being reserved to the States within whose charter limits the land may lie. New Jersey acceded to the Confederation November 25, 1778. Delaware acceded February 23, 1779, but filed a protest, affirming the right of Delaware and all the other states to a share in the western lands. Congress permitted this protest to be filed with a condition ‘that it shall never be considered as admitting any claim by the same set up or intended to be set up.’ Maryland refused to become a member of the Confederation unless the articles should be amended to contain a provision in conformity to her views in reference to the western country. She seemed to persist in her course, notwithstanding that she had been defeated at every step. December 15, 1778, her legislature adopted ‘A declaration and a letter of instructions to her delegates in Congress,’ both of which were devoted to the subject of the western lands and were laid before Congress May 21, 1779. (Journals of Congress, vol. 2, pp. 601-605; vol. 3, pp. 281-2-3, 289. Henning's Statutes of Virginia, vol. 10, appendix.) These documents reiterate the former claims and arguments of Maryland, extending and elaborating them. [105] They complain that ‘the alterations and amendments proposed by our delegates to the Confederation in consequence of the aforesaid instructions by us to them given, were rejected, and no satisfactory reason assigned for the rejection thereof.’ They declare that unless amendments be made to ‘the third article of the Confederation, and the proviso to the ninth (according to which no State is to be deprived of territory for the benefit of the United States),’ that ‘we mean not to subject ourselves to such guaranty.’ * * * ‘We declare that we will accede to the Confederation, provided an article or articles be added thereto, giving full power to the United States, in Congress assembled, to ascertain and fix the western limits of the States claiming to extend to the Mississippi or South Sea, and expressly reserving or securing to the United States a right in common in and to all lands lying to the westward of the frontiers as aforesaid, not granted to, or surveyed for, or purchased by individuals at the commencement of the present war.’ Allusion is made to States ‘grasping for territories to which, in our judgment, they have not the least shadow of exclusive right.’ A picture is painted of the great advantages Virginia would enjoy by selling these lands, and attracting the population of other States. The probability that Virginia would organize this territory into independent States is made the occasion of severe arraignment, and the charge of establishing a ‘sub-confederacy,’ an ‘imperium in imperio,’ and of a movement ‘to lull suspicion to sleep, and to cover the designs of a secret ambition.’ Her former allies in the effort to establish the western limits, who had subsequently joined the Confederation, are touched up as follows: ‘Although the pressure of immediate calamities, the dread of their continuing from the appearance of disunion, and some other peculiar circumstances, may have induced some States to accede to the present Confederation contrary to their own interests and judgments, it [106] requires no great share of foresight to predict that when these causes cease to operate the States which have thus acceded to the Confederation will consider the first occasion of asserting their just rights and securing their independence.’ Her delegates are instructed ‘not to agree to the Confederation unless an article or articles be added thereto in conformity with our declaration. Should we succeed in obtaining such article or articles, then you are hereby fully empowered to accede to the Confederation.’ While very desirous to complete the Confederation, Congress would not and could not surrender the great principles at stake. The coercive measures of Maryland had failed. What was to be done? Neither Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia, Massachusetts nor Connecticut would submit to have their charter rights invaded, nor would Congress consent to invade them. Virginia and Connecticut had instructed their delegates to proceed to form the Confederation without waiting longer on Maryland. These instructions were presented on the same day with the Maryland memorial, and the Virginia delegates presented resolutions in pursuance thereof. More patient councils prevailed, and the Confederation remained in suspense. At this stage the land companies, which, since the refusal of Virginia to recognize their claims, had been operating unseen in the effort to wrest these lands from Virginia and place them in the hands of Congress, where they hoped to have more weight, threw aside the cloak and appeared as open antagonists. Virginia had, May 18, 1779, passed an act to open a land office and sell a portion of the land claimed by these companies. The land companies now addressed memorials to Congress, September 14, 1779, in which they claimed that the western lands were the property of the United States as successors to Great Britain, and prayed Congress to decide their controversy with Virginia These memorials [107] were referred to a committee, before which the delegates of Virginia indignantly refused to appear or plead. The movement was followed up by a motion introduced by two delegates of Maryland, which, after amendment, was adopted, and was as follows:Resolved, unanimously, That the committee of safety be directed to write a letter to the president of the convention of Maryland in answer to his letter of the 25th inst., expressing the deepest concern at the proceedings of that convention respecting Governor Eden, and our reason for not becoming accessory thereto, by giving [89] him a passport through this colony or the bay adjoining. That we would with reluctance, in any case, intermeddle in the affairs of a sister colony; but in this matter we are much interested, and the convention of Maryland, by sending their proceedings of the committee of safety here, have made it the duty of the convention to declare their sentiments thereon. That, considering the intercepted letter from Lord George Germaine to Governor Eden, in which his whole conduct and confidential letters are approved, and he is directed to give facility and assistance to the operations of Lord Dunmore against Virginia, we are at a loss to account for the council of safety of Maryland, their having neglected to seize him, according to the recommendation of the general Congress, and more so for the convention having promoted his passage to assist in our destruction, under a pretense of his retiring to England, which, we conceive from the above letter, he is not at liberty to do; that, supposing he should go to Britain,, it appears to us that such voyage, with the address presented to him, will enable him to assume the character of a public agent, and, by promoting diversion and disunion among the colonies, produce consequences the most fatal to the American cause; that, as the reasons assigned for his departure, ‘that he must obey the ministerial mandates while remaining in his government,’ are very unsatisfactory, when the convention declare that in his absence the government, in its old form, will devolve on the president of the council of state, who will be under equal obligations to perform such mandates, we cannot avoid imputing those proceedings to some undue influence of Governor Eden, under the mask of friendship to America, and of the proprietary interest in Maryland, where the members of that convention were betrayed into a vote of fatal tendency to the common cause, and we fear to this country in particular, and feel it an indispensable duty to warn the good people of that province to guard against the proprietary influence. [90]
Resolved, That the foregoing resolution be forthwith published in the Virginia Gazette.Am. Arch., Fourth Series, vol. 6, pp. 1544-45.
The tone of Maryland was beginning to change. Her present motion does not ask Congress to use coercive measures to prevent Virginia from selling her lands. It is now a request or recommendation addressed to the State. Virginia made prompt and generous response by adopting, December 10th, her famous remonstrance. This able document so lucidly presents her case that the reader will be interested to peruse it in full:Whereas, The appropriation of vacant lands by the several States, during the continuance of the war, will, in the opinion of Congress, be attended with great mischiefs; therefore,
Resolved, That it be earnestly recommended to the State of Virginia to reconsider the late act of assembly for opening their land office; and that it be recommended to the said State, and all other States similarly circumstanced, to forbear settling or issuing warrants for unappropriated lands, or granting the same during the continuance of the present war.Journal, vol. 3, P. 335.
This remonstrance plainly showed that Virginia understood her rights and intended to maintain them. It further distinctly stated that Virginia was willing to make great sacrifices, and invited propositions for removing the ostensible cause of delay in completing the Confederation. In short, it showed plainly that Virginia might be persuaded, but could not be coerced. Maryland's plan of coercion having failed, Virginia having supplied the hint, New York now set the example of voluntary cession. She stepped forward as a mediator in the quarrel between her two Southern sisters. Her course was judicious, patriotic and adroit. Her legislature, by act of March 7, 1780, authorized her delegates in Congress to cede all her claims to the United States. This cession of New York could have no effect except the force of example. She assumed to give away what did not belong to her, yet she gave it with admirable grace and with suggestive purpose. Why could not the situation be relieved by voluntary cessions from other States? The effect was happy. The way was opened to a [111] friendly solution. The early suggestion of Maryland had drawn the attention of the whole country to the value of the unsettled western lands as a national domain, to be organized into new states by Congress, and her persistence had kept alive public interest in the matter. Her rashness in urging coercive measures had repelled confidence in the movement, and had left her no supporters except the land companies. Rhode Island, New Jersey and Delaware, declining to follow her into extreme measures, had acceded to the Confederation, leaving her in an awkward predicament. From this painful condition the judicious action of New York and the generous cession of Virginia came in time to extricate her. The Virginia statesmen had arrived at the conclusion that the purpose announced in their State constitution of 1776, of organizing their western possessions into independent States, could be better carried out by the United States than by the parent State. While irritated at the unjust assaults upon her title, and the threats of coercion, and while they could not concede that any portion of this land belonged to the smaller States, as a common stock, yet they recognized that these States were sadly in need of some such resource, which it was in the power of Virginia, by a wise and generous policy, to supply them. Such a policy would appease all jealousies, and would assure the great national purpose which Virginia had proposed and still ardently cherished, the completion of the Confederation. Now that all efforts at coercion had signally failed, Virginia could be magnanimous; yet there was necessity for caution. The Confederation was not complete, and it would manifestly be unwise to cede her territory to an inchoate government. This territory must be guarded from the grasp of the land companies, which had acquired a strong influence in Congress. The claim that the United States possessed title to any territory within [112] the charter limits of Virginia or any other State, to be enforced at the pleasure of Congress, upon the plea that it had been defended by the common blood and treasure, or upon any other specious plea, was a dangerous doctrine, and any concession of Virginia must be so guarded that it could not be construed into a precedent to sanction such a claim. Impelled by patriotic impulses, and restrained by wise considerations of caution, Virginia decided to cede to the United States all the territory within her charter limits north of the Ohio river, and to guard this cession by conditions to protect those principles which she had so firmly maintained. Congress was also now ready to act upon the hint supplied by New York. Resolutions were adopted, September 6, 1760, urging all the States who owned western lands to make ‘a liberal surrender of a portion of their territorial claims so necessary to the happy establishment of the Federal union,’ and earnestly requesting Maryland to accede to the Confederation. This was followed in Congress, October 10, 1780, by additional resolutions, providing that the territory ceded should be held for the common benefit of the Union, and formed into republican States. The response of Virginia was prompt. In fact, Virginia had informally invited this action of Congress, as may be seen from the letter of Colonel Mason, author of the ‘Remonstrance,’ written from the Virginia Assembly, July 27, 1780, to Mr. Joseph Jones, in Congress. (Life of Patrick Henry, by W. W. Henry, vol. 2, p. 85.) In this letter, Colonel Mason says that the members of the legislature ‘wish for such reasonable propositions from Congress as they can unite in supporting.’ Her general assembly entered promptly upon the discussion of the proposed cession of the western lands. After debating its provisions through the Christmas holidays, the legislative forms of the act were completed January 2, 1781, by which Virginia tendered to the United States the [113] most magnificent Christmas gift which history records, resigned the sovereignty of the largest tract of territory in the annals of the world ever voluntarily surrendered without price or bloodshed by a powerful state able to defend it. First of the States holding charter title to tender the jurisdiction and soil of her western lands, she invited the others to follow her example, and thus made possible the local governments and magical development of the West, averting the jealousy and possibly the anarchy and bloodshed that might have followed the assertion of her claims. As we see her thus voluntarily stripping herself of her territory until she shrinks up between the Ohio river and the Atlantic, shall we view her with that kindly pity which we feel for the man whose goodna-tured weakness has permitted greatness and fortune to fall from his grasp? Does not her course rather reveal a broad wisdom and a philanthropy which looked to the good of mankind, and not to the grasping of power or the extension of state lines? Whether we consider her magnanimous or weak, we cannot refuse the praise which poets and historians may bestow with kindling warmth, but which the world echoes with faint applause:The General Assembly of Virginia, ever attentive to the recommendations of Congress, and desirous to give the great council of the United States every satisfaction in their power, consistent with the rights and constitution of their commonwealth, have enacted a law to prevent present settlements on the northwest side of the Ohio river, and will on all occasions endeavor to manifest their attachment to the common interest of America, and their earnest wish to remove every cause of jealousy, and to promote that mutual confidence and harmony between the different States so essential to their true interest and safety. [108]
Strongly impressed with these sentiments, the General Assembly of Virginia cannot avoid expressing their surprise and concern upon the information that Congress had received and countenanced petitions from certain persons, styling themselves the Vandalia and Indiana companies, asserting claims to lands in defiance of the civil authority, jurisdiction and laws of this commonwealth, and offering to erect a separate government within the territory thereof. Should Congress assume a jurisdiction, not only unwarranted by but expressly contrary to the fundamental principles of the Confederation, superseding or controlling the internal policy, civil regulations and municipal laws of this or any other State, it would be a violation of public faith, introduce a most dangerous precedent which might hereafter be urged to deprive of territory or subvert the sovereignty and government of any one or more of the United States, and establish in Congress a power which, in process of time, must degenerate into an intolerable despotism. It is notorious that the Vandalia and Indiana companies are not the only claimers of large tracts of land under titles repugnant to our laws; that several men of great influence in some of the neighboring States are concerned in partnership with the Earl of Dunmore and other subjects of the British king, who, under purchases from the Indians, claim extensive tracts of country between the Ohio and Mississippi rivers; and that propositions have been made to Congress evidently calculated to secure and guarantee such purchases; so that, under color of creating a common fund, had those propositions been adopted, the public would have been duped by the arts of individuals, and great part of the value of unappropriated lands converted to private purposes. Congress has lately described and ascertained the boundaries of these United States as an ultimatum in their terms of peace. The United States hold no territory but in right of some one individual State in the [109] Union; the territory of each State from time immemorial hath been fixed and determined by their respective charters, there being no other rule or criterion to judge by; should these in any instance (when there is no disputed territory between particular States) be abridged without the consent of the states affected by it, general confusion must ensue; each state would be subjected in its turn to the encroachments of the others, and a field opened to future wars and bloodshed; nor can any arguments be fairly urged to prove that any particular tract of country, within the limits claimed by Congress on behalf of the United States, is not part of the chartered territory of some one of them, but must militate with equal force against the rights of the United States in general, and tend to prove such tract of country (if north of the Ohio river) part of the British province of Canada. When Virginia acceded to the Articles of Confederation, her rights of sovereignty and jurisdiction within her own territory was reserved and secured to her, and cannot now be infringed or altered without her consent. She could have no latent views of extending that territory, because it had long before been expressly and clearly defined in the act which formed her new government. The General Assembly of Virginia have heretofore offered Congress to furnish lands out of their territory on the northwest side of the Ohio river, without purchase money, to the troops on continental establishments of such of the confederated States as had not unappropriated lands for that purpose, in conjunction with the other States holding unappropriated lands, and in such proportion as should be adjusted and settled by Congress, which offer, when accepted, they will most cheerfully make good to the same extent, with the provision made by law for their own troops, if Congress shall think fit to allow the like quantities of land to the other troops on continental establishment. But, although the General Assembly of Virginia would make [110] great sacrifices to the common interest of America (as they have already done on the subject of representation), and will be ready to listen to any just and reasonable proposition for removing the ostensible causes of delay to the complete ratification of the Confederation, they find themselves impelled by the duties which they owe to their constituents, to their posterity, to their country, and to the United States in general, to remonstrate and protest; and they do hereby, in the name and on behalf of the Commonwealth of Virginia, expressly protest against any jurisdiction or right of adjudication in Congress, upon the petitions of the Vandalia or Indiana companies, or on any other matter or things subversive of the internal policy, civil government or sovereignty of this or any other of the United American States, or unwarranted by the articles of the Confederation.Henning's Statutes, vol. 10, pp. 557-559.
All thou hast been reflects less fame on thee,But all magnanimity was lost on the land companies. The conditions of this cession, if accepted by Congress, would forever preclude the recognition of their claims. They, therefore, set up a clamor to prevent the acceptance of the cession. The effect on Maryland was different. Just one month later, February 2, 1781, Maryland authorized her delegates to accede to the Confederation, and accompanied her act with a mild declaration that she did not thereby relinquish any rights that she might have in the western lands. Her delegates ratified the articles May 1st. As in 1776, so again in 1781, Maryland acted with [114] patriotism, and wisely receded from her former extreme declarations. She had notified Congress that she would not join the Confederation unless an article or articles should be added thereto limiting the boundaries of the States claiming to extend to the Mississippi river. Yet no such articles were ever added. In addition to this, the cessions of Virginia, New York and Connecticut had not been accepted, and no other charter claimant had even tendered a cession. Maryland had taken a sober second thought. She had discovered the impossibility of coercive measures and never afterward urged them, leaving the other claimant States to make cessions at leisure, or not at all, except of their own volition. The fact seems to be that she had nursed an unfounded suspicion of the ‘secret ambition’ of Virginia, and being now convinced of Virginia's patriotic intentions, she abandoned the contest, and her relations with Virginia became pacific and soon afterward cordial. The land companies, however, continued the fight against the acceptance of Virginia's cession, which contained conditions that would forever bar their claims. They obtained influence enough to procure the appointment of a committee favorable to their interests. Either through the exertions of the agent of the Indiana Land company, who was besieging Congress, or by some other means, a report was secured from this committee which was suspiciously favorable to the Indiana company. This report, made November 3, 1781, recommended that the title of the Indiana Land company be confirmed; that the cession of New York be accepted, as investing Congress with the jurisdiction of the entire western country; and that the cession of Virginia be rejected, for six reasons assigned, among which are the following: ‘First.—All the lands ceded or pretended to be ceded to the United States, by the State of Virginia, are within the claims of the States of Massachusetts, Connecticut [115] and New York, being part of the lands belonging to the said Six Nations and their tributaries.’ ‘Sixth.—The conditions annexed to the said cession are incompatible with the honor interests and peace of the United States.’ The report offers a series of resolutions, among other things, that Congress recommend to Virginia and other states to cede ‘all claims and pretensions of claims to said western territory without any conditions or restrictions whatever.’ This report was the nearest approach to recognition which the claims of the land companies ever received in Congress, but it was a victory of short duration, and destined to an ignominious end, as shown by the following extract from the Fourth volume of Journals of Congress: April 18, 1782.—* * * ‘The order of the day for taking into consideration the report of the committee on the cessions of New York, Virginia and Connecticut, and the petitions of the Indiana, Vandalia, Illinois and Wabash companies, being called for by the delegates for Virginia, and the first paragraph being read, a motion was made by Mr. Lee, seconded by Mr. Bland [both Virginia delegates], “That previous to any determination in Congress, relative to the cessions of the western lands, the name of each member present be called over by the secretary; that on such call, each member do declare upon his honor, whether he is or is not personally interested, directly or indirectly, in the claims of any company or companies, which have petitioned against the territorial rights of any one of the States, by whom such cessions have been made, and that such declaration be entered upon the journals.” ’ The intelligent reader will not be surprised to find that this resolution never came to a vote. On various pretexts, the consideration of this motion and the report of the committee were postponed from day to day until May 6, when it was indefinitely postponed. From this [116] date this committee disappears from the records of Congress. The portion of the report relating to the cession of Virginia was subsequently referred to another committee. Meanwhile a committee, called the Grand Committee, which consisted of one member from each State, appointed to consider the most effectual means of supporting the credit of the United States, made several ineffectual attempts to secure action on the cessions of Connecticut, New York and Virginia. A step forward was taken when Congress, October 29, 1782, on the motion of Maryland, accepted the cession of New York. June 4, 1783, Congress took up the report of a committee to which had been referred the motion of Mr. Bland, to accept the cession of Virginia. This committee recommended that Congress should take up the old report of November 3, 1781, which had slumbered on the journals since the effective narcotic administered by Mr. Lee. Whereupon Congress ordered: ‘That so much thereof as relates to the cession made by the Commonwealth of Virginia, on the 2d day of January, 1781, be referred to a committee of five members.’ This committee reported June 20, 1783, recommending changes in the cession of Virginia. Pending the proceedings, the delegates of New Jersey filed a remonstrance from the general assembly of their State, protesting against the acceptance of the Virginia cession, unless the said State will ‘make a liberal surrender of that territory of which they claim so boundless a proportion.’ This remonstrance revives the old claim of the rights which had accrued to the other States by reason of the defense of the country by the common blood and treasure, an argument which had lost what little plausibility it ever had, for Virginia had some time before rescued the territory from the British by the blood and treasure of Virginia alone. The committee to whom the cession of Virginia had [117] been referred, reported September 13, 1783, recommending the acceptance of the cession, as soon as the State should agree to repeal the seventh and eighth conditions of the cession. The remaining six conditions were approved, although the first was considered unnecessary, and an amendment was suggested to the second to more fully carry out its provisions. The seventh was considered to be really embraced in the sixth, but its repeal was urged. The real objection was to the eighth condition, which was wrong in principle, and its repeal was important. Of these two conditions whose repeal was desired, the seventh declared all purchases from the Indians void, and the eighth required the United States to guarantee to Virginia all her remaining territory. The report of this committee was decisive, and was adopted, September 13, by the votes of all the States represented, except New Jersey and Maryland. Virginia readily accepted the amendments proposed. The condition in reference to purchases from the Indians was unnecessary, being embraced in the other conditions which had been approved. The condition requiring that the United States should guarantee all remaining territory was intended to apply to Kentucky, and to operate as a contract with the United States to protect the State against claims that might arise under the cession of New York or the revival of the plea of ‘common stock.’ In her anxiety to put a quietus on all such claims, Virginia had gone too far, and had framed this condition at variance with her own theories. Maryland, in the instructions to her delegates to accede to the Confederation, had protested against this condition, and Maryland was right. Its acceptance would have operated as an ex parte adjudication or a prejudication of all claims against the State, and would have barred all proceedings under the ninth article of the Confederation, to which any claimant State might be entitled. There were no adverse charter [118] claimants, and the shadowy claims of New York had been ceded to the United States. There was no probability that any State would appear as a contestant. Still, it would besetting a precedent wrong in theory that any State might secure from Congress a guarantee to its territory, and thus acquire an exemption from the jurisdiction of the tribunal, provided by the ninth article of the Confederation for the trial of contests between the States. At the next meeting of her legislature, Virginia promptly instructed her delegates to execute to the United States a deed of cession conforming to the amendments proposed by Congress. This deed was accordingly executed by her delegates and accepted by Congress, March 1, 1784, New Jersey alone voting against acceptance; Maryland, Georgia and New York being absent, South Carolina divided; all the other States voting for it. The acceptance of the deed met with petty opposition from a peculiar source. Mr. George Morgan, the agent of the Indiana Land company, who had all along been besieging Congress, now appeared in a new role. He filed a petition in the name of the State of New Jersey, as its agent, praying Congress to take jurisdiction under the ninth article of Confederation and try the case as between two states. He recites that a hearing had been ‘obtained before a very respectable committee of Congress,’ alluding to the report of November 3, 1781, and presents his credentials as agent of New Jersey. A motion by Mr. Beatty, of New York, to refer this petition to a committee was voted down, as also a motion by Mr. Williamson, of North Carolina, to appoint a committee to prepare an answer to the State of New Jersey. It was immediately following this action that the deed of Virginia was presented and accepted, as above related. ‘Simultaneously with this acceptance,’ Jefferson submitted his famous plan for the subdivision and government of the Northwest Territory, and such other western [119] territory as might be obtained by cessions expected from the other states. The adoption of this report, April 23, 1784, and the subsequent acts of Congress, show that the main cause of jealousy was removed, and the title of the United States to the Northwest Territory was considered assured by this cession of Virginia and its acceptance. Virginia had fought and won the battle directed against her charter rights, and had made generous use of her victory. We hear no more of ‘common stock,’ ‘blood and treasure of all,’ and limiting the ‘western boundaries.’ As yet, however, the cession of Connecticut had not been accepted, while Massachusetts, the two Carolinas and Georgia were sleeping on their claims. All threats of coercion, all acrimonious controversy had ceased. The history of the subsequent cessions involves only the recital of successive patriotic acts, taken by the remaining charter claimants, at leisure. They were subjected to no pressure except the example of New York and Virginia, the force of public opinion, and their own patriotism. They seemed to be in no hurry. North Carolina vacillated, her legislature passing an act in June, 1784, to cede Tennessee, and repealing the same in November before Congress could accept it. November 13, 1784, Massachusetts authorized her delegates to cede her claims, and her cession was accepted April 19, 1785, the anniversary of Lexington. This cession was free from reservations or conditions of a selfish character, and bore on its face the evidence of its patriotic purpose. As early as October 10, 1780, Connecticut had offered to cede the rights of soil in a portion of her western claim, reserving to herself the jurisdiction to the entire claim. The acceptance of such a proposition would have had the effect of confirming her title and establishing her in jurisdiction. In May, 1786, her legislature modified the terms of the original offer, in accordance with which her delegates in Congress executed a deed of cession, [120] September 13, 1786. The next day Congress, in order to complete the title of the United States to the Northwest Territory, accepted the cession of Connecticut, notwithstanding the reservation by which that State sought to convert the surrender of her abstract claims into a real establishment of possession. Reserving both soil and jurisdiction to the strip of land about 120 miles long lying south of Lake Erie, she surrendered the rest of the territory to the United States. Thus she was the only state that gained possession of land by making cession to the United States. After granting a large portion of this reserve to her citizens, and selling the remainder for the benefit of her school fund, she ceded jurisdiction to the United States, May 30, 1800. The title to the Northwest Territory being now freed from all claimants, the pressure was directed against the Carolinas and Georgia. It is not surprising that Georgia should cling to her western territory with more tenacity and yield it with more reluctance than any of her sister States. Separated from it by no mountain barriers, and lying in immediate contact, these western possessions seemed more a part of herself, and no adverse interests urged her few western settlers to demand a separation. Besides all this, a new complication had now arisen, which disposed the Southern claimants of western territory to look with less favor upon a cession of their claims to the United States. This was the spirit manifested by the Northern States to concede to the claims of Spain the temporary control of the Mississippi river as high as Natchez, which was then occupied by Spanish troops. In August, 1786, panting for the revival of trade on any terms, seven Northern States, by their delegates in Congress, approved a plan submitted by Jay to yield to the claims of Spain temporary control of the Mississippi river, and the possession of the disputed territory. The five Southern States opposed it, and it was only defeated by lacking the constitutional majority of nine States. [121] Georgia and the Carolinas resented this disposition to abandon their territory to Spain, and refused to listen to any proposition to cede territory to the United States. These events occurring in 1785, and the sectional spirit which they aroused, put an end for the time to any cessions of southwestern territory. In 1787, after the excitement and sectional jealousy had been somewhat allayed, although the affairs with Spain were still unsettled, the pressure upon North Carolina and Georgia was revived by the first cession of any southwestern territory to the United States. This was the cession by South Carolina of a strip of land about 400 miles long and about twelve miles wide, lying along the southern boundary of the present State of Tennessee. It would seem that South Carolina desired to bring to bear on North Carolina and Georgia the same pressure which New York had so successfully exercised on Virginia. There may have been also some feeling of pique against Georgia in the action of the Hotspur State, caused by the suit then pending between the two States. The following are the circumstances of the cession: In the year 1785 South Carolina instituted suit against Georgia, before Congress, under the ninth article of the Confederation. On June 1, of this year, Georgia was summoned to appear on the second Monday of May, 1786. The following is a portion of the petition of South Carolina:
Far less, than all thou hast forborne to be!
To the United States of America in Congress assembled: The petition of the Legislature of South Carolina sheweth that a dispute and difference hath arisen and subsists between the State of Georgia and this state Concerning boundaries. That the case and claim of this state is as follows, viz.: Charles II., king of Great Britain, by charter, dated the 24th March, in the fifteenth year of his reign, granted, etc. * * * That on the 30th day of June, in the seventeenth year of his reign, the said king granted to [122] the said lords proprietors a second charter, enlarging the bounds of Carolina, etc. * * * That Carolina was afterward divided into two provinces called North and South Carolina. That by a charter dated the 9th day of June, 1732, George II., king of Great Britain, granted to certain persons therein named all the lands lying between the rivers Savannah and Altamaha, and lines to be drawn from the heads of those rivers respectively to the South Seas, and styled the said colony of Georgia. * * * That South Carolina claims the lands lying between the North Carolina line and a line to be run due west from the mouth of the Tugaloo river to the Mississippi, because, as the State contends, the river Savannah loses that name at the confluence of Tugaloo and Keowee rivers, consequently that spot is the head of Savannah river; the State of Georgia, on the other hand, contends that the source of Keowee is to be considered at the head of Savannah river.The petition recites other disputed points of boundary, and concludes with a prayer to Congress to take jurisdiction and try the case under the Articles of Confederation. The case was adjourned from time to time, until September 4, 1786, when both States appeared by their agents. Proceedings were then instituted and a court appointed to try the case, which was to sit in New York, June 4, 1787. No judgment was ever rendered by this court in consequence of the compromise of the suit between the parties. Both states appointed commissioners, who met at Beaufort, S. C., clothed with full powers to make a final settlement. And now comes a singular part of the history, and the origin of the twelve-mile strip. These commissioners—Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, Andrew Pickens and Pierce Butler, on the part of South Carolina; and John Habersham, Lacklan McIntosh, a majority of the commissioners, on the part of Georgia—April 28, 1787, signed an agreement and convention establishing [123] the line as it now exists between the two States, running along the Savannah river and its most northern branch, the Tugaloo, and the most northern branch of the Tugaloo, the Chatuga, to the point where it intersects the North Carolina line. This would have granted all the twelve-mile strip to Georgia. It so happened, however, that the legislature of South Carolina was at the same time in session. On March 8th of the same year, just one month and twenty days before the completion and signature of the convention at Beaufort, the South Carolina legislature passed a bill conveying to the United States the territory bounded by the Mississippi river, the North Carolina line, and a line drawn along the crest of the mountains which divide the waters of the East from the waters of the West, from the point where these mountains intersect the North Carolina line to the headwaters of the most southern branch of Tugaloo river, and thence west to the Mississippi river, thus mapping out the twelve-mile strip. The delegates of South Carolina were directed to make a deed conveying the same. These two apparently inconsistent acts of South Carolina both needed the confirmation of Congress. They were accordingly presented to Congress on the same day, accompanied by the deed of cession, August 9, 1787. The action of Congress bears marks of worldly wisdom. The cession to the United States was accepted on the same day. The motion to confirm the convention of Beaufort was referred to a committee which never reported. This report was, perhaps, prevented by the absorbing interest in the Constitutional Convention then in session, and which completed its labors in the following month by adopting the present Constitution, and the Congress of the Confederation soon after passed out of existence, and with it the ninth article, under which the suit of South Carolina was instituted. Thus, the twelve-mile strip became the territory of the United States, and [124] intervened as a wedge between Georgia and North Carolina, affording for several years a suggestive invitation to cede their western lands. The example was followed by North Carolina in 1790, when, after her patience was exhausted by the attempt to establish the State of Franklin, she ceded her froward daughter, Tennessee, to the United States; thus making the first cession under the Constitution. Kentucky anticipated the expected second cession of Virginia, and became a State in 1792, without undergoing the territorial apprenticeship. This left the full pressure of the demand for western cessions to fall on Georgia. This sturdy state resisted until 1802, when her cession, by no means a free gift, proved to be a shrewd bargain. She then ceded the Territory of Mississippi, nearly all of which was covered by Indian titles, and received in return that portion of the South Carolina cession immediately north of her boundary, $1,250,000 in money from the proceeds of the sale of public lands, and what ultimately proved very costly to the United States, a guarantee for the extinction of all Indian claims in her present limits. The remaining portion of the twelve-mile strip, all of which, after the admission of Tennessee, was styled in legislation the territory of the United States south of the State of Tennessee, was in 1804 added by Congress to Mississippi Territory, and now constitutes the northern portion of the States of Alabama and Mississippi. Thus, the whole territory west of the Alleghany mountains, embracing the portion north of the Ohio, which had been claimed by Great Britain, and the southern portion which Spain and France had attempted to erect into an Indian reservation, was now ceded to the United States by all claimants except the land companies. These companies continued the struggle until finally repulsed from the Supreme court of the United States. [125] The following conclusions seem to be irresistible: First.—The extension of the original United States beyond the Alleghany mountains, in opposition to the claims of Great Britain and the active efforts of France and Spain, was due alone to the titles of the charter claimant States, supported by an actual adverse possession on the part of Virginia and North Carolina. Second.—Virginia, by expelling the British from the country north of the Ohio, by her expedition under George Rogers Clarke, and by taking military possession of the country, not only maintained her own charter claims, but also supplied the United States with the argument of uti possidetis, which successfully met the claims of Great Britain under the Quebec Act. Third.—The whole country owes a debt of gratitude to all the charter claimants for ceding the only valid titles to this immense territory, and for their firmness and wisdom in resisting and defeating the effort to engraft on the fundamental law the dangerous principle that Congress should have power to abridge the limits of the States, invade their jurisdiction and sequester their territory. Fourth.—The territory ceded by all charter claimants amounted in area to 404,955.91 square miles, all of which was embraced in the cessions of the four Southern States, Virginia, the two Carolinas and Georgia. The claims of Massachusetts and Connecticut, extending in belts across the claim of Virginia, amounted to 94,315.91 square miles. Thus, the undisputed area of the cessions by the Southern States amounted to 300,640 square miles. If the area of Kentucky be added, which was erected into a State in 1792, before the completion of the western cessions, the undisputed contribution of the South was 361,040 square miles. The total contribution of the South, disputed and undisputed, including Kentucky, was 445,355.91 square miles. The cessions of all other charter claimants amounted [126] to 94,315.91 square miles, all of which was disputed. If the area of Vermont and Maine be added, which were independently erected into States, the total contribution of all other charter claimants, disputed and undisputed, would amount to 136,807.91 square miles. Fifth.—The four Southern States, Virginia, the two Carolinas and Georgia, were the only States which ceded a foot of land in actual possession and covered by actual jurisdiction. The other States, acting with patriotic motives, conveyed only unadjudicated claims—which was all they had to convey. The Southern States, being in possession, were able to confer possession on the United States. How different might have been the fate of America, had the four great Southern States adhered to their western territory with the tenacity usually shown by powerful states able to defend their possessions. In the language of the first great cession, ‘preferring the good of their country to every other object of smaller importance,’ they laid the foundation of national greatness by voluntary sectional sacrifice, and furnished history its most instructive lesson in the building of nations.
Reference is given to Madison Papers, Vol. 1; Benton's Thirty Years, Vol. 2; Narrative and Critical History of America. Vol. 7; Lecky's History of England, Vol. 4; American Archives, Fourth Series; on the cessions of western lands consult Journals of Congress, Vols. 1, 2, 3 and 4; for the acts of cession, Henning's Statutes, Vol. 10; for various deeds of cession, Public Domain; for Spanish intrigues, Roosevelt's Winning of the West; consult also Life of Patrick Henry, by W. W. Henry; Maryland, by Wm. Hand Brown; Haywood's History of Tennessee. A decision of the Supreme Court, touching on these cessions, was rendered as late as April 3, 1893, in the case of Virginia against Tennessee. relative to boundary. The court recites the titles of Virginia and North Carolina, as based upon their charters, extending to the South seas, and alludes to ‘the generous public spirit which on all occasions since has characterized her (Virginia's) conduct in the disposition of her claims to territory under different charters from the English government’ United States Reports, 148, October Term, 1892, p. 503. Among the older historians who have treated this subject are Bancroft, Hildreth and Pitkin. It has, also, been ably treated, in some of its aspects, by modern historians. Among the works which have touched upon the subject more or less in full, are the following: [127] The Old Northwest, by B. A. Hinsdale. Fisk's Critical Period of American History. The Narrative and Critical History of America contains, in Vol. 7, a lucid discussion of the several cessions, and a valuable list of references to various books and pamphlets which discuss phases of the subject. The Public Domain, Donaldson, is an invaluable government publication, in which important information on this subject is collected. The settlement and development of this territory are related and questions connected with the cessions are discussed by Mr. Theodore Roosevelt, in a work of great ability and lucid style, entitled ‘Winning of the West.’ Maryland's Influence on Land Cessions, by Mr. Herbert B. Adams, id the Johns Hopkins Papers published at Baltimore, Md., is an article eulogistic of Maryland, and attributing to that state the chief influence in establishing the Public Domain. Mr. W. W. Henry, in his Life of Patrick Henry, devotes Chapter 17 of Vol. 2, of his able and interesting work, to the Cession of the Northwest Territory. He clearly demonstrates Virginia's title to all the territory which she claimed.
[128]
Chapter 3:
Hostilities with France and the acquisition of Louisiana.
the acquisition of Louisiana was ‘an opportunity snatched from fate.’ This terse expression accurately defines the diplomacy by which Louisiana was acquired. The United States did not command the situation, but made skillful use of the opportunity. All the military power which the United States possessed in 1803, and all the diplomatic skill of her statesmen, would have been inadequate to create the conditions which resulted in the acquisition of Louisiana. Two simultaneous revolutions were necessary: a revolution in Europe and a revolution in America. Just in time, the French Revolution swept ‘like a meteor across the sky of Europe,’ so involving other nations that it might be called, with little impropriety, the great European Revolution. Simultaneously came the revolution of political parties in the United States. Napoleon Bonaparte became First Consul of France, and Thomas Jefferson President of the United States. Thus, the two great minds of the world turned at the same time to Louisiana. Napoleon saw in it the means of obtaining a navy, of strengthening the French party in America, and of restraining the power of Great Britain. When the treaty was completed he said: ‘I have just given to England a maritime rival that will sooner or later humble her pride:’ Jefferson saw in it the first giant stride of his country to the Pacific ocean, and the permanent triumph of the political party of which he was the father. It was, indeed, ‘an opportunity snatched from fate.’ [129] Yet, when the minds of these two great men turned to Louisiana its transfer to the United States was not the first thought that occurred to either of them. Napoleon first looked to it as a colony for France. When Jefferson learned of its acquisition by Napoleon it excited his gravest apprehensions. His first thought was to remove the French to the west bank of the Mississippi river, and to secure that river as the national boundary. He at once began the movement to acquire Florida and the Island of Orleans, and entered on the policy which was tenaciously pursued by himself and his political associates until its consummation in 1821. In pursuing this sagacious policy he took the initiative in the negotiations which led to the unexpected acquisition of Louisiana. Conditions beyond the control either of Napoleon or Jefferson conspired to render the transfer desirable to Napoleon and available to Jefferson. Attention has been heretofore called to the fact that all our acquisitions of territory, except those from Mexico, have been dependent upon the condition of affairs in Europe. In fact, these conditions have been so remarkable, that they seem to reveal a law of destiny. So peculiar were the relations of Great Britain, France and Spain, that while they all strongly desired to restrain the growth of the United States, yet each, in turn, made important contributions to its territorial expansion. In the peace negotiations at Paris, on the question of the extension of her boundaries beyond the Alleghanies and the Ohio, the United States found a friend in her enemy, Great Britain, and enemies in her friends, France and Spain. The liberality and magnanimity of Great Britain placed her almost in the light of a donor. In the crossing of the Mississippi in 1803, the positions of France and Great Britain were reversed. France was now the ceding power, while Great Britain looked on with polite envy, and Spain threatened to interfere. A few years later Spain became, in turn. the ceding power. [130] Strange, indeed, that these three European powers should find in their relations with each other, reasons which impelled each in succession to contribute to that expansion of the United States which they all desired to prevent. To trace the causes which led to this remarkable result, it is necessary to take a rapid review of the well known historical events following the close of the French and Indian war, when France retired from the contest for the possession of America. In the treaty of Paris, February 10, 1763, she ceded to Great Britain all of her American possessions east of ‘a line down the middle of the Mississippi river and through the Iberville lakes to the sea,’ and confirmed to Spain all her possessions west of that line, which had been previously ceded, November 3, 1762. (Public Domain, p. 91.) Louisiana thus became the property of Spain, and so remained for thirty-eight years. Of all the nations of Europe, Spain was the most opposed to the institutions and political doctrines of the United States. She would have repelled, as far as possible, all intercourse with the American people, and would have purposely maintained semi-hostile relations. Louisiana would, probably, have been held like her South American possessions, until filled with a population strong enough to rebel and shake off her nerveless grasp. Had it been slowly peopled, as would seem most probable, by emigrants from the United States, its future would have been uncertain. It would, perhaps, have been a refuge for ambitious men like Burr. It might have become a rival kingdom, or a rival republic, facing us across the Mississippi. It might have been broken into fragments, a multitude of petty states, blocking our expansion toward the Pacific. It might have been a means of detaching a portion of the western country from the Union. Such a result was feared about the time of the cession. It is certain that we would never have acquired it in a form so complete and so favorable [131] for assimilation to our institutions as by the cession of 803. In the fall of 1799, the French Revolution had assumed the phase which made Napoleon First Consul of France. He found France engaged in needless hostilities with the United States. He at once determined upon. a policy of conciliation, and appointed his brother Joseph Bonaparte at the head of a commission to treat with the newly arrived American commissioners, Murray, Ellsworth and Davie. The result was the treaty of Morfontaine, September 30, 1800, and the establishment of friendly relations. The election of Jefferson speedily followed, and Napoleon had the satisfaction of seeing the administration of American affairs pass into the hands of a political party deemed friendly to France. Let us recount the events which led to these results. Napoleon had taken Talleyrand into his cabinet, and Talleyrand had a bobby: the recovery of Louisiana, and its organization into a French province. Napoleon permitted Talleyrand to ride his hobby, yet he manifested no especial interest in the matter until the negotiations with America were approaching a crisis, and his brother Joseph had assured him of their friendly aspect, but that they were suspended on the question of indemnity for French spoliations. He then suddenly manifested an interest in Talleyrand's plans for the retrocession of Louisiana, and ordered communications to be immediately opened with the Spanish court. Without awaiting the routine course of negotiations which were progressing favorably under the French minister at Madrid, his impatience led him to send General Berthier to hasten them. Meanwhile, he seemed disposed to restrain his brother Joseph from concluding the American treaty. This course would indicate that he had secret views, connecting the retrocession of Louisiana with the American treaty. If he revolved in mind in 1800 the purposes which he carried into execution three years later, he did [132] not then express them. Often frank, and apparently imprudent in the expression of his purposes, no one knew better than Napoleon how to conceal them either by reticence or by dissimulation. The only hint that can be found of ulterior purposes is his caution to Joseph that better terms could be obtained from the United States at a later date, but he assented to the conclusion of a temporary treaty, September 30, 1800. He pressed negotiations with Spain so actively that Berthier signed the treaty for the retrocession of Louisiana the following day, October 1, 1800. In compensation to Spain for this cession France engaged to create the kingdom of Etruria, composed of Tuscany and adjacent territory, and to seat on its throne the son of the duke of Parma, who was son-in-law of the king of Spain. Napoleon was now master of the situation. Whatever plans he may have formed, it was in his power to execute. How far he agreed with Talleyrand in the policy of making Louisiana valuable to France by the slow process of colonial development is very doubtful. His temperament was too eager to await the tardy returns of invested capital. He needed all his resources for present gambling and quick profits. Europe was his battle ground, and the conquest of England his immediate object. All else was subsidiary. If England could be subdued he was then, indeed, master of the world. He was not indifferent to the glory of restoring to France the American possessions, the loss of which had been for many years a source of national humiliation. Neither was he insensible of the wisdom of Talleyrand's colonial policy, yet such a policy made peace with England a necessity. He knew that France had been compelled to give up her American possessions for lack of a navy, and his penetrating genius could not fail to see that France could not hold colonies across the ocean three thousand miles away, in the face of the navies of Great Britain. He had not forgotten the Egyptian campaign, which he [133] had warmly urged in its inception, but which .he had opposed at the last moment, even to the point of tendering his resignation, but to which he had been forced by Talleyrand's Directory, and which had taught him the power of the British navy. （Allison's History of Europe, vol. 6, pp. 241-2.) It is probable that before beginning negotiations for the retrocession of Louisiana, Napoleon contemplated an early war with England, and that he entertained the purpose of using Louisiana as a lever on the United States, though perhaps under conditions different from those which circumstances subsequently shaped. He began these negotiations just at the time when all indications pointed to the coming revolution in American politics, and the transfer of power to the Republican party. Affairs in America soon assumed a form to strengthen in his mind the conviction that the United States could be made a valuable ally. Whatever may have been his purpose in 1800, he was the engineer in 1803 who put in motion the train of events which, beginning with the cession of Louisiana, led the United States to the second British war. Let us now trace the political revolution in the United States. It is needless to recite that the Federalist party came first into possession of the government, and controlled its policy for twelve years. All are familiar with the quarrels in Washington's cabinet, and the rise of the Republican party, now generally designated as the Democratic-Republican party, to distinguish it from the Republican party of the present day. This new party differed from the Federalist party on the great question of State rights; the Federalist party favoring such a construction of the Constitution as would strengthen the power of the general government; the Republican party favoring such a construction as would protect the rights and powers of the States. There was another question of the day which touched [134] men's hearts. In the great contest that was going on across the water, England and France were about to engage in a death grapple. The sympathies of this country were aroused, one party favoring England and the other favoring France. We may well understand how deeply it stirred the sympathies of our ancestors. On the one side was France, our friend, the friend of our infancy; France, who stood by us in our conflict for freedom; France, the blood of whose sons was mingled with ours upon the plains of Yorktown; France, our sister republic, who had changed all her institutions in admiration and love for the institutions and people of America. Her cause was espoused by Jefferson, followed by his new party. On the other side was our mother country. The war was over, and its passions were subsiding. Our independence was established. Jay's treaty, although unpopular at first, had served to reopen the avenues of trade and communication with England, and to excite hostilities with France. The hearts of our ancestors were turning back with softened sentiments to the land of their fathers, and were renewing the associations of kindred and friendship. It seemed that the Federalist party, the friend of England, was striking the popular chord. Yet, just at this critical moment, the Federalist leaders committed a political blunder. They enacted what are known as the Alien and Sedition laws. The great political leader, Thomas Jefferson, skillfully seized the advantage. The tide was turned. Jefferson was elected President of the United States, and the Republican party, the friend of France, came into power. Looking over the field, the chief of the victorious party saw that the party triumph was but temporary, and he sought for means to render it permanent. The recent presidential election had assumed a sectional [135] aspect, as may be seen from the following table of the electoral vote of 1800:| States | Thomas Jefferson. | Aaron Burr. | John Adams. | Charles C. Pinckney. | John Jay. |
| New Hampshire | 6 | 6 | |||
| Massachusetts | 16 | 16 | |||
| Rhode Island | 4 | 3 | 1 | ||
| Connecticut | 9 | 9 | |||
| Vermont | 4 | 4 | |||
| New York | 12 | 12 | |||
| New Jersey | 7 | 7 | |||
| Pennsylvania | 8 | 8 | 7 | 7 | |
| Delaware | 3 | 3 | |||
| Maryland | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | |
| Virginia | 21 | 21 | |||
| Kentucky | 4 | 4 | |||
| North Carolina | 8 | 8 | 4 | 4 | |
| Tennessee | 3 | 3 | |||
| South Carolina | 8 | 8 | |||
| Georgia | 4 | 4 | |||
| —— | —— | —— | —— | —— | |
| Total | 73 | 73 | 65 | 64 | 1 |
| President. | Vice-President. | |||
| States. | Th. Jefferson. | C. C. Pinckney. | Geo. Clinton. | Rufus King. |
| New Hampshire | 7 | 7 | ||
| Massachusetts | 19 | 19 | ||
| Rhode Island | 4 | 4 | ||
| Connecticut | 9 | 9 | ||
| Vermont | 6 | 6 | ||
| New York | 19 | 19 | ||
| New Jersey | 8 | 8 | ||
| Pennsylvania | 20 | 20 | ||
| Delaware | 3 | 3 | ||
| Maryland | 9 | 2 | 9 | 2 |
| Virginia | 24 | 24 | ||
| North Carolina | 14 | 14 | ||
| South Carolina | 10 | 10 | ||
| Georgia | 6 | 6 | ||
| Tennessee | 5 | 5 | ||
| Kentucky | 8 | 8 | ||
| Ohio | 3 | 3 | ||
| —— | —— | —— | —— | |
| Total | 162 | 14 | 162 | 14 |
Chapter 4:
- The second war with Great Britain -- Spanish complications -- Spain cedes Florida, and her claims to Oregon.
In the Presidential election of 1800, which brought the Republican party into power, the majority was meager, and the contest was sectional. In the election of 1804, the vote was nearly unanimous, and the victory was national. Jefferson entered on his second term of office, March 4, 1805, as the leader of a party no longer sectional, and now instructed by the people to continue the same firm policy which had won public confidence. His foreign negotiations had been eminently successful, and at home his opponents had been baffled and disconcerted. He had secured the navigation of the Mississippi river, and had extended the western boundaries to the Rocky mountains. This western territory was an acquisition of immense value for future development. Still, another acquisition was needed for more immediate use. The rivers of Mississippi Territory flowed through Florida into the Gulf of Mexico. The advance of population rendered outlets to the gulf every day more necessary. The Indians inhabiting the country were a source of annoyance, continually committing depredations, and furnishing a refuge for runaway slaves. Florida acquirenda est. Two courses of procedure were open: 1st. To seize Florida by conquest. 2d. To acquire it by negotiation. If the first policy should be pursued, its natural result would be war with Spain and France, and its corollary would be offensive and defensive alliance with Great Britain. Such a policy would be an ungrateful return to Napoleon [161] for the recent signal mark of his favor. It would be a hazardous and costly experiment, an act of robbery, and even if successful, would disturb the repose of the country, now rapidly developing under the happy auspices of peace. Jefferson was unwilling to resort to a policy of war, and he was right. Adhering to the wise maxim of Washington to avoid entangling alliances with foreign nations, he continued the policy which had been so successful in winning Louisiana—peaceful negotiation. That the way was unexpectedly beset with obstacles, was no fault of Jefferson's. No human prescience could foresee the approaching insanity of Europe. Through the remainder of his administration, Jefferson appears in the light of a man in perfect possession of his senses, endeavoring to avoid a free fight with a party of madmen whom he tries to conciliate, waiting for their return to a lucid interval. To paint a picture of this period of European insanity, robbery and piracy, would require a lengthened treatise. Our space permits only a glance at the relations of the United States with the several European powers at the time when negotiations were in progress. Spain was irritated and sore at the loss of Louisiana, and had yielded possession under constraint. Napoleon was lukewarm. He was disappointed at the apparent indifference with which the United States had received what he esteemed a signal mark of his favor, and had evaded participation in European contests. America, however, was beyond his reach. He could use no direct coercion, and could only strive to involve her in hostility with his enemies. Great Britain had shown marked dissatisfaction with the retrocession of Louisiana to France. The Addington ministry had maintained friendly relations with the United States, and had expressed sentiments favorable to the efforts of the American commissioners to secure the Mississippi as the national boundary. Confident in [162] the opinion that the failure of negotiations would leave the United States the natural enemy of France, and the natural ally of Great Britain, the British statesmen used expressions of politeness and encouragement to the American negotiators, but prepared to execute secret purposes of their own. A British fleet was sent to the neighborhood, and was ready to seize New Orleans as soon as the impending war with France should justify the attack. Great Britain was astonished and disconcerted by the news that, at the critical moment, Napoleon had ceded the whole territory to a friendly power, whose negotiations had been submitted to her approval, and had received her sanction. Outwitted and overreached, she could not now pursue a hostile policy without perfidy, and without forcing a war with the United States while she was on the eve of a dangerous war with France. The British lion, in the act of couching for the spring, saw the prey escape, and for the moment was too much surprised to growl. But it was not long before the roar was heard across the Atlantic. Such were the conditions of Europe in the latter part of 1803, when negotiations for the acquisition of Florida were begun. Passing briefly over the diplomatic events previous to 1805,8 it may be sufficient to note that they were unsuccessful, and that the United States was repulsed at every court. These negotiations were addressed to asserting the claim that West Florida was included in the cession of Louisiana. This claim was disputed. France and Spain united in resisting it. Although Congress had authorized the occupation of West Florida, President Jefferson refrained from taking hostile possession. The negotiations, however, became acrimonious. Mr. Pinckney, the minister at Madrid, gave [163] notice that he would demand his passports, and matters assumed a threatening aspect. In November, 1804, Mr. Monroe, then at London, was ordered to Madrid. He passed through Paris to invoke the co-operation of Napoleon, but was coldly received. He somewhat defiantly took his departure for Madrid, which place he reached January 2d, and left May 26, 1805, having accomplished nothing. As yet, there seemed nothing to indicate danger to America. Before the close of the year, however, the war cloud of Europe burst, and events took a turn which rendered American relations precarious beyond all human foresight. The wonderful achievements of Napoleon caused European politics to vary with the rapidity and novelty of the shifting views of the kaleidoscope, leaving only one thing in Europe permanent—‘the naval supremacy of Great Britain.’ While adhering to the hope of wresting Florida from the necessities of Spain and France, Jefferson found his negotiations complicated with questions growing out of foreign hostility to the rapid development of the American merchant marine. Unexpectedly thrown on the defensive, his efforts must be directed to thwart the hostility of Great Britain against American trade, and his diplomacy must be adapted to meet the fleeting conditions of European politics; looking now to Spain, and again to France, and again to Great Britain. In the autumn of 1805 two great events disconcerted the policy of America as well as the relations of Europe. October 21st, the naval victory of Trafalgar confirmed Great Britain's supremacy on the ocean. December 2d, Austerlitz made Napoleon dictator of continental Europe, shattered the combinations of Pitt and caused his premature death. Both of these events were adverse to American interests. Napoleon had applied the purchase money of Louisiana to building a navy. The most magnificent army which [164] the world had ever seen was assembled at Boulogne, on the French coast of the English Channel. The French admiral, Villeneuve, was ordered to feign an attack on the West Indies and to decoy Lord Nelson across the ocean; then to evade him, and return to throw Napoleon's grand army across the channel for the purpose of moving upon London and destroying the power of Great Britain. Villeneuve moved as directed. Lord Nelson, completely deceived, crossed the ocean, and did not discover his mistake until he reached the West Indies. Villeneuve was in turn deceived. Rebuffed in an indecisive action with an inferior naval force under Sir Robert Calder, and deceived by the maneuvers of the English Channel fleet under Lord Collingwood, he steered for the coast of Spain in disobedience of Napoleon's orders. While waiting for reinforcements and repairing his vessels, he lost the favorable moment. Lord Nelson returned and was, indeed, before him. Then came the battle of Trafalgar, and the navy which the purchase money of Louisiana had helped to build was destroyed. Had the genius of Napoleon been able to reach out over the ocean as it reached out over the land, the history of the world would have been different. Hereafter his thunderbolts could reach only the continent of Europe. When he learned that Villeneuve had disobeyed his orders, he burst into a vehement passion: ‘What a navy! What sacrifices for nothing! What an admiral! All hope is gone. That Villeneuve, instead of entering the Channel, has taken refuge in Ferrol! It is all over. Daru, sit down and write.’ （Alison's History of Europe, vol. 9, p. 63.) Checking his anger, he was calm upon the instant and dictated to his secretary, Daru, the orders by which the entire force of France was thrown with rapidity and precision across the continent of Europe to meet the foes which the combinations of Pitt were accumulating in his rear. Ulm was captured and Austerlitz won. [165] The ocean having been now abandoned to Great Britain, Napoleon placed little value on the friendship of a nation without a navy, three thousand miles away, and determined on a policy of neutrality. Such a nation could be useful to him only in one way, and to a trifling extent. If America would buy Florida and pay for it in such a way that the money should come through his hands, he was willing to dictate a sale to Spain, and to intercept the purchase money. After abandoning the invasion of England, and just before Austerlitz, September 4, 1805, he signified his willingness to co-operate in the transfer of Florida, and suggested $7,000,000 as the price. The United States had heretofore demanded West Florida, without price, as part of Louisiana. This new proposition for its purchase must be referred to Congress. (Annals of Congress, 1805-1806, pp. 1226, 1227.) After violent opposition, in which many of the President's former friends participated, an act was passed February 13, 1806, appropriating the sum of $2,000,000 for foreign negotiations, and the President sent instructions to General Armstrong, the minister at Paris, to offer $5,000,000. The instructions reached Paris in May, 1806, eight months after Napoleon's suggestion had been made. Such dilatory proceedings were not fitted to keep pace with Napoleon's rapid combinations. In the meantime; he had formed new plans. He seemed now to desire that affairs between the United States and Spain should remain unsettled. Nothing could be obtained from him except peremptory refusal to decide the matter. Mr. Alison, the English historian, suggests that he was even then planning to place his brother Joseph on the throne of Spain. It is more probable, however, that he had now conceived a plan for exercising over the ocean an indirect control, which he had failed to acquire by naval force. In this purpose he hoped to make use of the United States. The cession of Louisiana had not forced the United States from neutrality. Perhaps [166] more might be accomplished by holding out Florida as a prize than by yielding it as a purchase. Napoleon now entered on the campaign in which he crushed the power of Prussia. November 21st he issued the famous Berlin decree, in retaliation for Great Britain's orders blockading the French and German coast. Great Britain replied by the ‘Orders in Council.’ These arbitrary proceedings violated every principle of justice, and especially affected the merchant marine of the United States, then the main carriers of the world. They fully justified war against either or both offenders. The orders of Great Britain bore with especial hardship against American trade, and were arrogantly enforced. In addition, the impressment of seamen from American vessels by British cruisers had long been a source of irritation and humiliation to the United States. An immense merchant marine, without a navy to protect it, and which was rapidly supplanting English commerce, excited both the envy and cupidity of Great Britain, and led to acts which differed from piracy only in being perpetrated under her title as ‘mistress of the seas.’ The remonstrances of the United States were unheeded either by France or Great Britain, and Jefferson was left to choose his remedy. Great Britain seemed to invite war, and Napoleon shaped his course with a view to force the United States into a war with Great Britain. To find redress without war was now the object of Jefferson's diplomacy. The aggressive character of American negotiation now gave way to the defensive. The acquisition of Florida yielded in importance to the protection of American shipping. Napoleon replied to every remonstrance, that as soon as the United States should declare war against the aggressor, England, he was ready to grant every demand. He was ready to withdraw the Berlin decrees, to assure the acquisition of Florida and Canada, to enter into an alliance against Great Britain. The temptation was great, but Jefferson adhered [167] to the policy of avoiding entangling alliances. Meanwhile, the outrages and insults of Great Britain became intolerable. The attack on the Chesapeake, the insolence of the British officers who were practically blockading the coast, the continued depredations on commerce, and the impressment of American seamen, had reached a pitch of arrogance and aggression to which even the pacific temper of Jefferson could no longer submit. It would appear the most obvious policy to accept the overtures of Napoleon. A powerful ally, ready to bestow the coveted prize, Florida, solicited friendship. Yet Jefferson declined. Something, however, must be done. He decided on the policy which he believed best for his country, though not for himself. He believed that the United States was not prepared for war. The end of his term of office was approaching. He had ardently hoped to be the instrument for acquiring Florida He must now sacrifice this cherished purpose. He turned from the beckoning hand of Napoleon with a pang, and resigned the acquisition of Florida to his successors in office. The final success of his policy was reserved to crown the presidential administration of the able negotiator who had borne so many disappointments in urging it in foreign courts. Yet Jefferson laid the foundation of the foreign policy which finally gained Florida, and through the whole course of his administration adhered to it with a firmness which neither the taunts of political enemies nor the alienation of political friends could shake. No man ever followed the convictions of his judgment with more tenacity than Jefferson. Courteous to others from the native kindness of his heart, he never obtruded a display of obstinacy. His judgment was illuminated by the most profound intellect in America; his firmness was that of conviction, and not of self-will. Pliant in matters of minor import, he was as inflexible as Napoleon [168] in his fixed purposes. He marked out for his country during the trying period which convulsed Europe, the most judicious course possible to pursue. While the statesmen of Europe were daily making disastrous mistakes, Jefferson might be accorded the post of honor if he made but one. If the embargo was a mistake, which is by no means certain, the mistake consisted in overestimating the willingness of all the sections to submit to temporary sacrifices for the best interests of their country. After the resistance of the mercantile sections had been demonstrated, the embargo was repealed. It may not have been as good a recourse as war, but it was better than submission. It wrought no permanent disaster. What injury it caused has been greatly exaggerated for party purposes. It produced some permanent benefits. The course of those who resisted it was less patriotic than the course of those who enacted it. This persistence in the policy of neutrality with the European powers, while all Europe was at war, rendered Jefferson and his diplomatists unpopular in European courts. They came to be regarded with jealousy, as seeking to pick up advantages from the quarrels of other nations. This jealousy was inflamed by the efforts to acquire Florida, and by the wonderful growth of the American merchant marine, which thrived on European wars and American neutrality. Jefferson, Madison and Monroe, the exponents of this policy, endeavored to promote this growth by preserving peace. When it was unjustly assailed by European aggression, they tried to protect it with the shield rather than the sword. This course subjected them to the sneers and sarcasm of foreign courts, courtiers and writers. Such taunts are not surprising from European sources. Europe was intoxicated, and hurled the reproaches which persons in such condition are accustomed to visit upon those who decline to take part in their excesses. It is not surprising that political adversaries at [169] home should have joined in the cry. The calm American historian, however, should not be misled to censure as ‘timid,’ ‘weak,’ ‘vacillating,’ ‘feeble,’ ‘subservient to Napoleon,’ etc., the great and patriotic men who guided the country with honor and safety through the most dangerous period of modern times, and brought it from the conflict more than doubled in territory, and ready to enter upon the growing period of its history. None of these adverse critics have explained their own paradoxes: that the policy which they denounce as weak ultimately attained its object over the greatest maritime power of Europe, and over domestic factions; that the opponents of this policy could offer only obstructions but no substitute, and expressed sentiments tending to a course certainly more ‘timid’ and ‘feeble,’ if not unpatriotic; that the embargo, the only part of Jefferson's policy not followed to its complete conclusion, was supplanted, for the time, by a policy of despicable weakness and abject submission; that when resort was finally had to war, those who had denounced the embargo and all the measures of peace became violent opponents of war, and threatened the dissolution of the Union; that the party which sustained Jefferson's policy was endorsed at every presidential election by strong majorities, finally overwhelmed all opposition, and brought about the only period of American history which ever resembled a political millennium—‘The Era of Good Feeling.’ Such results are never accomplished by weak and vacillating men. They come only to those who, through the vicissitudes of fortune, pursue intelligent designs with fixed purpose. The truth is, the men who controlled American destinies during that eventful period were patriots and statesmen of the highest type. They clung with tenacity to the wisest policy pursued by any nation, and they deserve the gratitude and admiration of posterity. It is fashionable among a certain class of writers to comment [170] on affairs of state very much in the style of the bystanders at a game of chess. They point out moves which might be made, congratulating themselves on the brilliancy of their own combinations, but forgetting that these combinations are not subjected to the test of an adverse player. It is, also, a modern fashion to underestimate the intelligence of the American people in the early part of the nineteenth century, and to represent them as inferior to the people of Europe, or to the Americans of the present day. This is a serious mistake. There has never been a period of history when any people evinced greater native sagacity. This is especially true of the Western people. Their strong common sense made them competent judges of their own affairs. They comprehended the wisdom of their leaders, and by judicious support enabled them to carry their measures to successful conclusion. Their contemporaneous verdict is a vindication of the policy pursued, which carries a weight more convincing than theoretical criticism. They were voting for the protection of their best interests, and they were in earnest. The verdict is given in the electoral vote of 1808, according to the following table, one elector not voting:
| President. | Vice-President | |||||||
| States | James Madison. | George Clinton. | C. C. Pinckney. | George Clinton | James Madison. | James Monroe. | John Langdon | Rufus King. |
| New Hampshire | 7 | 7 | ||||||
| Massachusetts | 19 | 19 | ||||||
| Rhode Island | 4 | 4 | ||||||
| Connecticut | 9 | 9 | ||||||
| Vermont | 6 | 6 | ||||||
| New York | 13 | 6 | 13 | 3 | 3 | |||
| New Jersey | 8 | 8 | ||||||
| Pennsylvania | 20 | 20 | ||||||
| President. | Vice-President | |||||||
| States | James Madison. | George Clinton. | C. C. Pinckney. | George Clinton | James Madison. | James Monroe. | John Langdon | Rufus King. |
| Delaware | 3 | 3 | ||||||
| Maryland | 9 | 2 | 9 | 2 | ||||
| Virginia | 24 | 24 | ||||||
| North Carolina | 11 | 3 | 11 | 3 | ||||
| South Carolina | 10 | 10 | ||||||
| Georgia | 6 | 6 | ||||||
| Kentucky | 7 | 7 | ||||||
| Tennessee | 5 | 5 | ||||||
| Ohio | 3 | 3 | ||||||
| —— | —— | —— | —— | —— | —— | —— | —— | |
| Total | 122 | 6 | 47 | 113 | 3 | 3 | 9 | 47 |
| President. | Vice-President. | |||
| States | James Madison | DeWitt Clinton. | Elbridge Gerry. | Jared Ingersoll. |
| New Hampshire | 8 | 1 | 7 | |
| Massachusetts | 22 | 2 | 20 | |
| Rhode Island | 4 | 4 | ||
| Connecticut | 9 | 9 | ||
| Vermont | 8 | 8 | ||
| New York | 29 | 29 | ||
| New Jersey | 8 | 8 | ||
| Pennsylvania | 25 | 25 | ||
| Delaware | 4 | 4 | ||
| Virginia | 25 | 25 | ||
| North Carolina | 15 | 15 | ||
| South Carolina | 11 | 11 | ||
| Georgia | 8 | 8 | ||
| Kentucky | 12 | 12 | ||
| Tennessee | 8 | 8 | ||
| Ohio | 7 | 7 | ||
| Louisiana | 3 | 3 | ||
| Maryland | 6 | 5 | 6 | 5 |
| —— | —— | —— | —— | |
| Total | 128 | 89 | 131 | 86 |
| President | Vice-President. | ||||||
| States | James Monroe. | Rufus King. | P. P. Tompkins. | J. E. Howard. | James Ross. | John Marshall. | R. G. Harper. |
| Connecticut | 9 | 5 | 4 | ||||
| Delaware | 3 | 3 | |||||
| Georgia | 8 | 8 | |||||
| Indiana | 3 | 3 | |||||
| Kentucky | 12 | 12 | |||||
| Louisiana | 3 | 3 | |||||
| Maryland | 8 | 8 | |||||
| Massachusetts | 22 | 22 | |||||
| New Hampshire | 8 | 8 | |||||
| New Jersey | 8 | 8 | |||||
| New York | 29 | 29 | |||||
| North Carolina | 15 | 15 | |||||
| Ohio | 8 | 8 | |||||
| Pennsylvania | 25 | 25 | |||||
| Rhode Island | 4 | 4 | |||||
| South Carolina | 11 | 11 | |||||
| Tennessee | 8 | 8 | |||||
| Vermont | 8 | 8 | |||||
| Virginia | 25 | 25 | |||||
| —— | —— | —— | —— | —— | —— | —— | |
| Total | 183 | 34 | 183 | 22 | 5 | 4 | 3 |
| President. | Vice-President. | ||||||||
| States. | James Monroe. | John Q Adams. | Vacancies. | D. D. Tompkins. | R. Stockton. | D. Rodney. | R. G. Harper. | Richard Rush. | Vacancies. |
| Alabama | 3 | 3 | |||||||
| Connecticut | 9 | 9 | |||||||
| Delaware | 4 | 4 | |||||||
| Georgia | 8 | 8 | |||||||
| Illinois | 3 | 3 | |||||||
| Indiana | 3 | 3 | |||||||
| Kentucky | 12 | 12 | |||||||
| Louisiana | 3 | 3 | |||||||
| Maine | 9 | 9 | |||||||
| Maryland | 11 | 10 | 1 | ||||||
| Massachusetts | 15 | 7 | 8 | ||||||
| Mississippi | 2 | 1 | 2 | 1 | |||||
| Missouri | 3 | 3 | |||||||
| New Hampshire | 7 | 1 | 7 | 1 | |||||
| New Jersey | 8 | 8 | |||||||
| New York | 29 | 29 | |||||||
| North Carolina | 15 | 15 | |||||||
| Ohio | 8 | 8 | |||||||
| Pennsylvania | 24 | 1 | 24 | 1 | |||||
| Rhode Island | 4 | 4 | |||||||
| South Carolina | 11 | 11 | |||||||
| Tennessee | 7 | 1 | 7 | 1 | |||||
| Vermont | 8 | 8 | |||||||
| Virginia | 25 | 25 | |||||||
| —— | —— | —— | —— | —— | —— | —— | —— | —— | |
| Total | 231 | 1 | 3 | 218 | 8 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 2 |
Chapter 5:
- Annexation of Texas -- war with Mexico -- Mexican cessions -- Oregon treaty with Great Britain.
Even before the treaty with Spain had been concluded in 1821, the slavery agitation had begun. The question of slavery will be discussed here only so far as its agitation became a factor in the contending forces which caused or obstructed territorial expansion. In its first stages, the slavery agitation was not directed towards the abolition of slavery. It was a contest for the balance of power between the States. On the question of territorial expansion, the Northeastern leaders had fought and lost. The result had been to isolate their section. Each new State entered the Union as the friend and ally of the Republican party, to whose favor they owed existence. The immense area of territory, soon to be organized into States, seemed to offer permanent control to the allied South and West, and to leave New England a helpless faction in the government. No people of English blood have ever rested content with such a condition. The Northeastern leaders did what all sections have done when placed in similar circumstances. They looked about for some means of relief. Having studied the matter profoundly, they comprehended the situation. The Northern States had abolished slavery, and the geographical line of separation left the greater area to the north. Some political issue must be found which would force a new alignment of parties. This issue must be geographical and aggressive. It must be one on which the entire North could unite in sympathy. [206] With great sagacity the issue was chosen—an issue which could unite all states East and West, which were north of the slave line, and which could strike a blow at Southern supremacy on its most vulnerable point—the institution of slavery. Public sentiment had already undergone important changes with regard to this institution. The inexorable operation of the laws of nature had made slavery sectional. It now remained to force the division of political parties on the same sectional line. All the original thirteen States had been partners in the introduction and existence of slavery and its protection by the Constitution; each section taking such part as best suited the peculiar interests and characteristics of its people. The Northeastern States took the commercial part, and were largely instrumental in the slave trade, for the reason that they were the chief commercial section. Thus they became the carriers for imported slaves as for other articles of merchandise. The Southern States furnished the market and were the buyers. The slave trade and the institution of slavery had been reprobated by good men of all sections from the time of the revolution. The sentiments of Washington, Jefferson and other Southern leaders are well known. The first movement to exclude slavery from the territories came from the South. (See Journals of Congress; Benton's Thirty Years, vol. 1; Donaldson's Public Domain.) March 1, 1784, Mr. Jefferson submitted to Congress his famous plan for the government of the Northwest Territory, being the same day on which Congress accepted the cession of Virginia. This plan, with a few amendments, was adopted April 23d, and became ‘The Ordinance of 1784.’ The ordinance, as offered by Mr. Jefferson, contained the clause: ‘That after the year 1800 of the Christian era there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in any of the said States (formed out of Northwest Territory) otherwise than [207] in punishment of crimes, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted to have been personally guilty.’ This clause was stricken out before the passage of the ordinance on the motion of Mr. Speight, of North Carolina. Mr. Benton explains the reason. The Southern States demanded that a clause should be inserted in reference to fugitive slaves, which being refused, they voted against the whole provision in reference to slavery. The first movement, then, to limit slavery was proposed by a Southern delegate. At a later period it was renewed by the South and passed by Southern votes. July 11, 1787, Mr. Carrington, of Virginia, chairman of the committee on the Northwest Territory, submitted the report of that committee. The other members were Mr. Dane, of Massachusetts, Mr. R. H. Lee, of Virginia, Mr. Kean, of South Carolina, and Mr. Smith, of New York. A majority of this committee were Southern men. Their report, after amendment, was adopted July 13th, and became the ‘Ordinance of 1787.’ Article sixth of this instrument is as follows: ‘There shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said territory, otherwise than in the punishment of crimes whereof the party shall have been duly convicted; provided, always, that any person escaping into the same, from whom labor or service is claimed in any of the original States, such fugitive may be lawfully reclaimed and conveyed to the person claiming his or her labor or service as aforesaid.’ There were present eight States, four Northern and four Southern. The ordinance was passed by the unanimous vote of these States, viz., Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia. One individual vote was cast against it, and that by a Northern member. Mr. Yates, of New York, voted ‘No,’ but being overruled by his colleague, the vote of New York was counted ‘Aye,’ and the vote by States was unanimous. Thus, in 1787, the provision offered by Jefferson in [208] 1784 was adopted nearly in his original language by the unanimous vote of all the States present, and the first legislative restriction of slavery by the general government was enacted. The evidence is conclusive that the question was not, at that time, sectional, and elicited no acrimony. A striking example is furnished in 1802 in the convention for forming the first constitution of Ohio. On the question of admitting negroes to the right of suffrage the vote stood 17 ayes, 17 nays. (Life of Nathaniel Massie, p. 87.) ‘This convention was controlled by men from the slave-holding States of Kentucky and Tennessee, yet we find them badly divided on this question—one of their own leaders, Charles Willing Byrd, a Virginian of the Virginians, standing steadily for the right of the negro to vote. On the other hand, Messrs. Huntington, of Trimble county, and McIntosh, of Washington county, scions of New England stock, were with Massie and Worthington against negro suffrage.’ Thomas Worthington, although opposed to negro suffrage, had emancipated his slaves on leaving Virginia. The following quotation from an author of accuracy and ability shows that the slavery question had not taken a form entirely sectional even as late as 1824:
One thing is remarkable; East Tennessee had an abolition paper nine or ten years before the advent of Garrison's paper. As early as 1814 or 1815 an abolition society, perhaps the first in the United States, had been formed in East Tennessee. See article by S. A. Link, American Historical Magazine, October, 1896, p. 333.In April, 1820, the first number of The Emancipator was issued at Jonesboro, by Elihu Embree. After the death of Embree, The Genius of Universal Emancipation was published at Greenville by Benjamin Lundy. This lived until 1824. Lundy induced Garrison to enter the field of editorial effort in behalf of emancipation. * * * (See Article by Rev. E. E. Hoss, entitled ‘Elihu Embree, [209] Abolitionist,’ in April number, 1897, of the American Historical Magazine.) When the slave trade was abolished in 1808, the Northern States had already found slavery unprofitable. There was no cogent interest to withhold them from yielding to sentiments of philanthropy or from following sound principles of public policy in abolishing slavery and transferring their slaves to the South. They got rid of slavery and they got rid of the slaves. In the South a very different question was presented. Slave labor had been found profitable, or at least convenient, by the Southern planters. Slaves had accumulated on their hands in large numbers. Even if they should be willing to abolish slavery, there was no means to get rid of the slave population. Thus, in 1819, all the States north of Mason and Dixon's line and the Ohio river to the Mississippi were Free States, and all south of that line were Slave States. Simultaneously with the transfer of slavery to the South, a steady stream of foreign population began to flow to the North and to move over to the northwest. This was due to two causes. The North Atlantic coast was the commercial section and immigrants were landed at the Northern ports, and naturally followed the lines of latitude in moving West. It was soon found that these immigrants, by a natural instinct, avoided slavery. (American Politics, Johnston, p. 334.) In 1816, the representation in Congress stood: In the Senate, Free States, 24, Slave States, 24; in the House, Free States, 105, Slave States, 82. The number of States was twenty-four, of which 12 were Free and 12 were Slave States. The preponderance of population and of representation was in favor of the Free States. Party divisions, however, were not drawn on the same lines. Slavery had followed the geographical lines, but politics had not. Shrewd political leaders were now planning to divide political parties along the same geographical [210] line which slavery had followed from natural causes. If this could be done, the control of the Southern party would be broken, the balance of power would be restored, and the united North would have a preponderance of the House of Representatives and of the electoral vote. Yet, this was no easy task, and it could not be performed by the Federalist party. It must be done by new men, under new names; for the hold of the Republican party on the affections of the people was too strong to be easily loosened. The opportunity came when Missouri applied for admission in December, 1818. In the House, Mr. Tallmadge, of New York, offered an amendment, February 13, 1819,to the bill for Missouri's admission, imposing the restriction that all persons born in the State should be free, and providing for the gradual emancipation. After an exciting debate, in which Mr. Tallmadge pressed his amendment with signal eloquence and ability, it was adopted February 16th by a vote of 87 to 76, and the amended bill passed by vote of 97 to 56. （Benton's Abridgment, vol. 6, pp. 333, 356.) All party ties were discarded, and new bonds of sympathy were suddenly formed. The Free States were temporarily arrayed on one side and the Slave States on the other. The bill went to the Senate, where the slavery restriction was stricken out. The House refused to concur, and the door of admission was closed to Missouri for the present. The news produced intense excitement throughout the country and came to Jefferson ‘like a fire-bell in the night.’ The action of the House was indorsed strongly at the North and created alarm at the South. The first effort to destroy old political ties and array parties on sectional issues had been successful on an important measure, but the party lines had not yet been permanently changed. The contest was to be renewed in the next Congress. Up to this time each State had been allowed to prescribe [211] its own domestic government, and no restrictions had been placed on any State as a condition of admission except the adoption of a constitution in conformity with the Constitution and laws of the United States. Slavery had not been prohibited in any portion of Louisiana Territory, and many persons had moved into Missouri with their slaves, and their interests had been identified with slavery. They were now holding slaves under the direct authority of Congress, and it seemed to the people of Missouri a hardship that they should suddenly be subjected to a rule which had been applied to no other State. The South fully sustained Missouri in this view. The people of the North felt differently. The extension of slavery must be stopped. The greater part of Missouri lay north of the line which divided the present free and slave area. Slavery must not be permitted to cross that line. When the next Congress assembled, the Missouri question became complicated with the question for the admission of Maine. In the Senate, the South could put a veto on the admission of the Northern applicant, while the Northern majority in the House could veto the admission of the Southern applicant. Massachusetts had already assented to the separation, and Maine had formed a constitution. The petitions for admission, one from Maine and one from Missouri, were presented to the House in December, 1819. A bill for the admission of Maine speedily passed and was sent to the Senate, while the petition of Missouri was left without action. The Senate very properly amended the Maine bill by adding to it clauses admitting Missouri. This action plainly indicated that the South understood the Northern purposes and did not intend to submit to the policy of admitting Northern States while admission was refused to Southern States. If Missouri was admitted, the South would gladly admit Maine. If the North chose to block the further admission of States, the South could not help [212] it. This judicious action forced the admission of Missouri, but not until the South yielded to the Missouri compromise. Looking at the matter in the light of experience, we can now see what the Southern leaders of that day could not foresee. The wisest course for the South to have pursued would have been to offer an amendment to the Constitution, providing for the gradual abolition of slavery, the value of emancipated slaves to be paid by the United States. Such a proposition would have tested the sincerity of Northern philanthropy, and would either have produced a revulsion of Northern sentiment, or better still, might have averted the calamity and greater expense of the Confederate war. But at that time no such thought entered into the minds of the Southern leaders. The final result is well known. Our space does not permit us to follow the proceedings of Congress in detail.11 The amendment offered by Mr. Thomas, of Illinois, became the ultimate basis of compromise. Maine was admitted. The act enabling Missouri to form a constitution without restriction passed the House by a vote of 90 to 87, and the famous Compromise clause was enacted by a vote of 134 to 42. This compromise provides that in all portions of the Territory of Louisiana, lying north of 36° 30′ of latitude, slavery shall be forever prohibited, but fugitive slaves shall be restored to their owners. It follows closely the language of the ordinance of 1787. Upon this compromise being assured, the acts were separated, and the Maine bill became a law March 1, 1820. No further act of Congress being necessary, Maine became a State at once. Missouri was doomed to further trials. The enabling [213] act of Congress became a law March 6, 1820. It was necessary for Missouri to adopt a constitution which must receive the approval of Congress. The territorial convention adopted a constitution sanctioning slavery and prohibiting the legislature from ever abolishing it, and containing a further clause empowering the legislature to prohibit the immigration of free negroes into the State. These two provisions were made the occasion for violent opposition to the admission of the State and gave rise to other acrimonious discussion, in which the opponents of admission were charged with bad faith. The Senate and House again disagreed. Finally, a conference committee was appointed by the House on the motion of Henry Clay. This committee met a similar committee from the Senate and agreed upon a joint resolution which is sometimes called the Second Missouri Compromise. This resolution provided for the admission of the State as soon as her Legislature should, by law, declare that the clause in her constitution relative to the immigration of free negroes ‘shall never be construed to authorize the passage of any law, and that no law shall be passed in conformity thereto, by which any citizen of either of the States of this Union shall be excluded from any of the privileges and immunities to which such citizen is entitled under the Constitution of the United States.’ Upon such action of her Legislature being duly certified, the President was authorized to declare the admission of the State. This resolution passed the Senate 28 to 14 and passed the House by the slender majority of four, the vote being 86 to 82. The entire Southern delegation, with the exception of a few members led by John Randolph, voted throughout the controversy for the Missouri Compromise. In this they were aided by a small party of Northern Republicans. Mr. Benton, than whom there is no higher authority, either in point of accurate judgment or truthful testimony, says of the effort to prevent the admission: [214] ‘It was a political movement for the balance of power, balked by the Northern Democracy, who saw their own overthrow and the eventual separation of the States in the establishment of geographical parties divided by a slavery and anti-slavery line.’ He says in another place: ‘The restriction came from the North—the compromise came from the South. The restriction raised the storm—the compromise allayed it.’ The required action having been taken by its legislature, and approved by the President, Missouri became a State August 10, 1821. After the compromise had been concluded the slavery agitation assumed, for a while, a calmer aspect. The line of 36° 30′, which had been made the dividing line between the Slave and Free States, left by far the greater area of unsettled territory to the North. There remained now to the South only the territories of Arkansas and Florida and what has since become the Indian Territory. North of this line lay the immense stretch of country which embraced the present States of Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, the two Dakotas, Montana, Idaho, Washington, Oregon, Nebraska, Kansas, part of Colorado, and part of the territory of Wyoming. In addition to this, as the claim of the United States to Oregon extended to the parallel 54° 40′, a large and indefinite area might become Northern territory. It required no great prescience to foresee that, if political parties should ever come to be arrayed on the geographical line which divided the Free and Slave States, the time was near at hand when the South would become what New England had been, a helpless faction in the government. It was plain that slavery agitation was the strongest lever for the hands of those who wished to promote the geographical alignment, and the efforts of those who desired to prevent such a result must be devoted to allaying the slavery excitement. As yet, the Republican party, though rudely shaken, was too deeply rooted in [215] public confidence to be overthrown. The Missouri Compromise, which was mainly a Southern measure, had allayed the storm. A majority of the Northern Republicans exerted their influence to quiet the agitation, but all felt that the hold of the Republican party had been loosened. In the subsequent readjustment of parties under the new names of Democrat and Whig, while sectional influences may be traced through the several Presidential elections, yet the complete division on the slave line was averted until the triumph of the new Republican party in 1860. Meanwhile, the slavery agitation, though not brought to issue by any decisive political crisis, was continued both by discussions in Congress and by irritating publications. The North went to work systematically to stimulate immigration. Societies, known as Immigration Aid societies, etc., devoted organized efforts to attract immigrants and to control them. The effort was soon visible. The Northern area increased in population until in 1844 its representation in the popular branch of Congress was 135, while the number of representatives from the Slave States was only 98. So far, the number of States on each side was equal, but the Southern supply was exhausted. On the Northern side of the line, a formidable array were approaching readiness for admission. The slavery agitation was becoming more threatening in tone. Beginning as a movement to limit the area open to slavery and to retard Southern emigration into the territories by rendering the removal of their slaves unsafe, it now began to assume the form of hostility to the institution of slavery, and to threaten abolition by act of the Federal government. Though in 1844 the organized movement in favor of abolition was incomplete and powerless, yet it was growing, and the immense expanse of territory north of the line pointed out that the balance of power would soon be in the hands of those who threatened the Southern institution. [216] The South saw no resource. As a section it was sparsely peopled, and could neither supply from its own population nor attract from abroad a sufficient emigration to compete in the settlement of the territories. Besides, the restricted area south of the compromise line of 36° 30′ had been still further diminished in 1832 by the adroit policy of Northern members of Congress. When Georgia demanded the removal of the Indians from her borders in compliance with the contract made by the United States in 1802 in accepting the cession of Mississippi Territory, it was decided to provide an Indian reservation west of the Mississippi. Mr. Benton has recorded the fact that the party in power was relieved from an annoying position by the generous co-operation of Northern members. This co-operation, however, had the effect of settling these red men upon the Indian Territory, and thus cutting off at least one State from the area which had been left to the South by the Missouri compromise. Florida alone remained as a Southern resource. In this extremity, the Southern States clearly saw that the time was drawing near when they must lose their last hold on the balance of power—the Senate. The Northern territories were rapidly approaching statehood; the sentiment against slavery was growing in intensity and power and was already portentous. They must prepare either for the surrender of slavery or for disunion, or they must find some resource to avert the danger. Their thoughts turned to revive the policy which they had engrafted on the institutions of the United States and which had been the foundation of their long lease of power—territorial expansion. They called to mind that Texas had been a part of the Louisiana cession and had been bartered away to appease Northern jealousy. It was now sorely needed to protect Southern equality. It was larger than the whole of New England, and could be made into five or six States. [217] The people of the whole country had watched with sympathy the efforts of the Spanish-American provinces toward establishing themselves as independent republics. The Southern people viewed with deep interest the efforts of Texas to throw off the yoke of Mexico. Propositions had been made by the United States in 1827, during the Presidency of Mr. Adams, for the purchase of Texas, which had been emphatically declined by Mexico. The next move was in Jackson's administration. Says Mr. Schouler (Schouler, vol. 4, p. 249): ‘The vigilant Jackson, during his first presidential term, negotiated with Mexico for amity, commerce and navigation. But he soon saw that the Southern bent was for territorial extension, and all the more eagerly now that the Northern abolition movement and British emancipation in the West Indies showed that there was danger of a conscience crusade against the very heart of their social system.’ In 1835 overtures were made to Mexico for the purchase of Texas and the territory north of the 37th parallel from the Rio Grande to the Pacific. These overtures were declined. Meanwhile, flourishing settlements were established in Texas by emigrants from the United States, mainly from the Southwest. When Mexico revolted against Spain, a number of ardent young men, impelled by the same spirit which stirred Lafayette to fight for American liberty, tendered their services to the struggling Mexicans. Among these a large number were from Tennessee, descendants of those pioneers who had won the West. Reuben Ross, a native of Virginia, who had removed to Tennessee, gained the commission of Colonel in the Mexican army, and received for his gallantry an extensive grant of land. Similar grants were made to other American volunteers and were located in Texas. Thus, the American colony gained a strong foothold. Their growth was promoted by the action of the Mexican government encouraging immigration by offering for sale large tracts of land to immigrant societies. Companies [218] were formed in various parts of the United States for the purchase of these lands. Mr. Huntsman mentions some of the companies formed in Tennessee, and gives the names of their managers or representatives: Colonel Andrew Erwin, Doctor Douglass, Colonel John D. Martin, all men of standing and influence. These Texas settlers took part in the internal struggles of Mexico during the rapid succession of revolutions which placed at the head of Mexican affairs Iturbide, Victoria, Pedrazza, Guerrero, Bustamente and Santa Anna. During all this time, the American settlers displayed the same heroic characteristics which had distinguished their fathers as the pioneers of the West. They were the bulwark against attacks by the Comanches and other Indian tribes, and against despotic government. Thoroughly identified with their new home, they resisted the tyrannical measures of Santa Anna. The Mexican government determined to subdue them, and made war upon Texas and Coahuila. Being for the time compelled to submit, the Texans soon revolted. In this revolt they were aided by the sympathy of the United States and by many volunteers from the South. Among these volunteers were two famous men from Tennessee; David Crockett, whose tragic death at the Alamo has been made the theme of song and story, and Sam Houston, who, having resigned his office as governor of Tennessee, and spent a short time with the Indians, suddenly reappeared as a Texas volunteer. General Cos, with a large Mexican army, moved under the orders of Santa Anna into Texas to subdue all resistance and to enforce the edict forbidding further immigration from the United States. On the 28th of September, 1835, the Texans defeated a body of Mexican troops at Gonzales, and the war for independence began. Being defeated in a number of battles, at Goliad, Conception, Sepanticlan and San Antonio, General Cos was forced to surrender. [219] The Texan Congress declared that the Mexican government had forfeited the allegiance of Texas, invited the co-operation of other Mexican States and organized a provisional government, with Henry Smith as governor and Samuel Houston commander-in-chief. A convention was called, to meet at Washington, on the Brazos river. While this convention was in session, Santa Anna, in person, with a force of 10,000 troops, began the invasion of Texas. As soon as information of this invasion reached them, the Texas Convention, March 2, 1836, made a formal declaration of independence and adopted a constitution. The boundaries of Texas were defined in this constitution, and the southern boundary was declared to be the Rio Grande. Santa Anna made war in the most barbarous manner. Confident of crushing the Texans, he seemed determined to exterminate the rebels. The massacre at the Alamo and the inhuman murder of 500 soldiers, who surrendered under Colonel Fannin, at Goliad, aroused the Texans to efforts almost superhuman. At San Jacinto, April 21st, 800 Texans under General Sam Houston defeated over 1600 Mexicans under Santa Anna, destroying his army and capturing the leader. A treaty was speedily made with Santa Anna while a prisoner of war. The independence of Texas was acknowledged and the southern boundary established at the Rio Grande. In the meantime, there was another revolution in Mexico. Bustamente came to the head of affairs. He and his Congress repudiated the treaty and declared the intention of prosecuting the war. Texas remained practically an independent State for nine years. Her independence had been acknowledged by the leading powers of the world. It was natural for the ruling element of her people, the same race of hardy pioneers who had carried the American flag to the coast of the Gulf of Mexico and to the shores of the Pacific—it was natural that these people should long to see that [220] beloved and familiar flag float over their newly formed republic, the emblem of patriotism and the guarantee of protection. Why should this be refused them? It was the ardent desire of a free people. It would add to the greatness and luster of the United States; it would assure, at least for a time, the balance of power between the States. It would reunite with the growing United States a people of kindred blood who would otherwise found a rival republic, and were already invited to form European alliances which, in a few years, might become dangerous. What reason of justice, broad philanthropy, or true patriotism could be alleged against the annexation? It was thought sufficient by many, in the diseased state of the public mind, to utter the portentous word—‘Slavery!’ ‘It will extend the slave area and prop the tottering slave power.’ It is needless to our purposes to follow the negotiations for the annexation of Texas through all the details of diplomacy, Congressional debate and popular discussion. It is sufficient to note that annexation was favored almost universally at the South and strongly opposed by Northern abolitionists. Texas applied for annexation in 1837. The application was declined by President Van Buren, but gave rise to animated discussion in all parts of the country. Congress was flooded with petitions and memorials. The State legislatures of Vermont, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Ohio and Michigan passed resolutions opposing annexation; while the legislatures of Tennessee, Alabama, South Carolina and Mississippi passed resolutions strongly urging it. The question meanwhile remained in abeyance. But matters were brought to a crisis by the presidential election of 1844, in which the questions of the annexation of Texas and the exclusive occupation of Oregon were made the leading issues. The Texans had begun to show some resentment at the reception of their overtures, and entertained propositions [221] for the acknowledgment of their independence and a friendly treaty with Mexico, on the condition that they should bind themselves never to become a part of the United States. It was believed that Mexico was instigated to demand this condition by Great Britain, who was also believed to be offering inducements to Texas to accept the condition by tendering favorable commercial privileges. There was, also, a rumor to the effect that Great Britain was endeavoring to acquire a protectorate over Texas. This rumor proved to be without evidence, but it served to draw attention to the danger of European interference in American affairs. It called forth meetings in the South, some of which passed resolutions looking to a convention of the Southern States to consider the question of a peaceful dissolution of the Union in the event of the refusal of Congress to annex Texas; other meetings in the South expressed strong opposition to the disunion movement and gave utterance to sentiments of warm attachment to the Union. A meeting held in the Barnwell district of South Carolina passed resolutions advocating ‘a convention of the Slave States’ in which ‘the final issue shall be made up and the alternative distinctly presented to the Free States either to admit Texas to the Union, or to proceed peaceably and calmly to arrange the terms of a dissolution of the Union.’ Another convention at Beaufort, in the same State, resolved ‘that we will dissolve this Union sooner than abandon Texas.’ Still another convention in the same State resolved, ‘and we hold it to be better and more to the interest of the Southern and Southwestern portions of this confederacy to be out of the Union with Texas than in it without her.’ Similar resolutions were adopted in other portions of the South. On the other hand, the idea of disunion was repelled with equal emphasis by other Southern States. Nashville, Tenn., and Richmond, Va., having been suggested as suitable places for holding the proposed convention, [222] these two cities expressed their indignant dissent The Richmond newspaper press vehemently opposed the convention and its object. Said the Richmond Enquirer: ‘There is not a Democrat in Virginia who will encourage any plot to dissolve the Union.’ A meeting of citizens in Nashville protested against ‘the desecration of the soil of Tennessee by having any convention held there to hatch treason against the United States.’ A general meeting of the citizens of Tennessee, numerously attended, passed resolutions which struck the keynote of Southern sentiment. These resolutions are quoted at length by Mr. Benton. The following extract will be sufficient to show their spirit: ‘The citizens here assembled are Tennesseeans; they are Americans. They glory in being citizens of this great confederated republic; and whether friendly or opposed to the immediate annexation of Texas, they join with decision, firmness and zeal in avowing their attachment to our glorious and, we trust, impregnable Union, and in condemning every attempt to bring its preservation into issue or its value into calculation.’ （Benton's Thirty Years, vol. 2, pp. 617, 618.) Could words be stronger? Such were the sentiments of a State which had contributed more than any other to the colonization of Texas and to its ultimate independence. Meanwhile, the annexation was vehemently opposed at the North. The main argument used against it was ‘slavery.’ The general Northern sentiment expressed opposition to the extension of slavery, but behind this was the vehement abolition party, stimulating the growth of a public sentiment in favor of forcible emancipation. The logic of the entire Northern opposition tended to tie the hands of the South to await the admission of the coming Northern States, when the South would be helpless in the government, with the subversion of its domestic institutions threatened by an aggressive party. Those who expected the South to rest quiet with such a condition of affairs staring them in the face surely did not [223] comprehend the spirit of people of English blood. If there be two distinct, well-defined characteristics which have distinguished the English race wherever found, these two characteristics are submission to authority which they recognize, and resistance to authority which they do not recognize. The Southern people recognized no authority in the Federal government to interfere with their domestic institution of slavery. There was no such right in 1844 nor in 1861. They did not intend to submit to it at either date. It could be accomplished only by force of arms. In 1844, as in 1861, the Southern people loved the Union, and resisted only what they believed to be an arbitrary invasion of their rights. In 1844 they saw a mode of maintaining the equipoise of the government in the admission of Texas, and they eagerly seized it. The aggressive abolition faction of the North endeavored to shut the door. Fortunately for the country they were unsuccessful for the time, and the ‘irrepressible conflict’ was delayed until after the United States was enabled to complete the extension of its territory to the Rio Grande and the Pacific. The arguments on both sides show that the question was regarded as a contest for the balance of power in the Senate, and that the slavery question was injected into the discussion to promote a geographical division of parties. Said the New York Evening Post in 1844 (as quoted in Ladd's History of the War with Mexico, p. 29): ‘The issue is whether this government shall devote its whole energies to the perpetuation of slavery; whether all sister republics on this continent which desire to abolish slavery are to be dragooned by us into the support of this institution.’ Said the New Hampshire Patriot: ‘Slavery and the defense of slavery form the controlling considerations urged in favor of the treaty by those who have engaged in its negotiations.’ Such arguments found favor with those who had been [224] sedulously promoting the policy of immigration, territorial settlement and slavery agitation. Their territories were ready for admission as States, and public sentiment was pressing the alignment of political parties on the geographical line of slavery. A majority in the Senate and entire control of the government was almost within their grasp. Should the South be permitted to bring in new territory and thus escape the net which had been so ingeniously spread? They argued that the annexation of Texas was a conspiracy to extend slavery. It would be robbing Mexico. It would be bad faith. It would be a violation of the Constitution. It would involve war. It would be a ruinous policy. It was morally wrong. The advocates of annexation used arguments much stronger and more patriotic. They demonstrated the right of Texas to seek annexation, the right of the United States to accept it. They pointed out the many advantages of union both to Texas and to the United States, commercial, social and political; and the many disadvantages to both in remaining apart. They showed that Texas could never again become a part of Mexico, and if not annexed to the United States must become a nucleus of European influence in America. Every motive of interest and sentiment prompted a union with a free people of our own blood who were already assimilated to our institutions. It was argued that those who opposed annexation under the guise of a newly aroused moral crusade against slavery were mainly those who had always obstructed territorial acquisition in every form. If the South should gain the immediate advantage in a political point of view, yet it was no dangerous advantage, and could only enable that section to maintain an equipoise of power; while those who opposed annexation so vehemently were striving to attain a complete and dangerous control of every branch of the government. This reason ing convinced the American people, as the verdict of the [225] election of 1844 plainly demonstrated, and the following table of the electoral vote of that year will show:
| President. | Vice-President. | |||
| STATES | James K. Polk. | Henry Clay. | G. M. Dallas | T. Frelinghuysen. |
| Alabama | 9 | 9 | ||
| Arkansas | 3 | 3 | ||
| Connecticut | 6 | 6 | ||
| Delaware | 3 | 3 | ||
| Georgia | 10 | 10 | ||
| Illinois | 9 | 9 | ||
| Indiana | 12 | 12 | ||
| Kentucky | 12 | 12 | ||
| Louisiana | 6 | 6 | ||
| Maine | 9 | 9 | ||
| Maryland | 8 | 8 | ||
| Massachusetts | 12 | 12 | ||
| Michigan | 5 | 5 | ||
| Mississippi | 6 | 6 | ||
| Missouri | 7 | 7 | ||
| New Hampshire | 6 | 6 | ||
| New Jersey | 7 | 7 | ||
| New York | 36 | 36 | ||
| North Carolina | 11 | 11 | ||
| Ohio | 23 | 23 | ||
| Pennsylvania | 26 | 26 | ||
| Rhode Island | 4 | 4 | ||
| South Carolina | 9 | 9 | ||
| Tennessee | 13 | 13 | ||
| Vermont | 6 | 6 | ||
| Virginia | 17 | 17 | ||
| —— | —— | —— | —— | |
| Total | 170 | 105 | 170 | 105 |
Chapter 6:
- Confederate war -- acquisition of Alaska.
In 1860 the Presidential election showed that political parties were at length arrayed on the geographical line which divided the Free and Slave States. (American Politics, Johnston, p. 334.) The representation in Congress stood: In the Senate, Free States, 36, Slave States, 30; in the House, Free States, 147, Slave States, go. Thus, the Free States cast an electoral vote of 183 and the Slave States a vote of 120. The South had been outstripped in the race for winning political control of the territories. The slavery agitation had assumed the form of a movement for forcible abolition. The election of Mr. Lincoln by a vote of 180 in his favor to 123 against him, placed the entire machinery of government in the hands of the Free States. The South was now in the position which New England had occupied in 1814. There were in the positions of the two sections two important points of difference: 1st. In 1814, the South was in possession of the legislative and executive branches of the government, but made no effort to disturb the domestic institutions of New England; now, when the Free States were in power, an aggressive party threatened the overthrow of the institution of slavery, which was the foundation of the industrial system of the South. 2d. In 1814, New England would have been permitted to leave the Union had she persisted in carrying out her threats of secession, and no efforts at coercion would have been attempted; now, a national sentiment in favor of coercion had developed. This sentiment was the unforeseen outgrowth of the Southern policy of [240] territorial expansion. The thirteen original States had existed as separate and independent sovereignties before the completion of the general government, and their people had not forgotten that they were the makers of the Constitution and of the United States. The new States, however, had been severally carved out of Federal territory, had been nurtured under the paternal colonial policy of the United States, and had received statehood as a gift from Congress. The people of these created States, therefore, looked to the general government as the source of power and the creator of States. Thus, the theory of ‘consolidated government,’ aided by the progress of the slavery agitation, ignoring the testimony of history and the deductions of logic, grew as a national sentiment. In 1861, the Southern people realized that their equality in the Union was lost, that their domestic institutions were threatened, that the construction of the Constitution on which they relied for protection was overthrown. The alternative was presented of secession from the Union, or a precarious dependence on the justice and forbearance of the hostile party about to assume the reins of government, with every prospect of permanent control. The South chose the first alternative. Then came the great American tragedy—secession—coercion—war—emancipation—reconstruction. It does not pertain to the purpose of this chapter to discuss either the causes or the conduct or the consequences of the Civil war. It was certainly not undertaken for foreign conquest; yet, it was followed by the uniform result of all our wars—the acquisition of foreign territory. It was concluded in 1865, and was followed in 1867 by the acquisition of Alaska Shall we assign to the chronological sequence between the war of 1861-65 and the acquisition of Alaska the logical relation of cause and effect? It was certainly not an accidental coincidence. The acquisition of Alaska was [241] not altogether a new idea. Negotiations for ceding it to the United States were begun at the instance of Russia in 1854, during the Crimean war, and in the administration of President Pierce. They were renewed by the United States during President Buchanan's administration, but were then declined by Russia. In 1867 negotiations were renewed between Secretary of State William H. Seward, and Baron Edouard Stoeckl, minister of Russia, which resulted in the cession of Alaska by the treaty made at Washington, March 30, 1867, which was ratified and proclaimed on the 20th day of June following. Russia had long evinced the purpose of curbing the territorial acquisitions of Great Britain. Alaska was not useful as a possession, and any hope that Russia may have ever entertained of acquiring valuable American possessions was frustrated by the Monroe doctrine. Alaska had been retained for many years only to keep it from the grasp of Great Britain. The wonderful power displayed in the Confederate war had the effect of allaying any apprehension which Russia may have entertained that the cession of Alaska to the United States might result in its ultimate acquisition by her rival, Great Britain. The cordial relations established between Russia and the United States during the progress of the Confederate war also contributed to the same result, and inclined Russia to entertain views similar to those expressed by Napoleon after the cession of Louisiana. The peculiar relations of the European powers to each other made this war, like all our other wars, the cause and occasion of the cession of territory. Great Britain, France and Austria seized upon the American war as the opportune time to establish the monarchy of Maximilian upon ‘the ruins of the Mexican republic.’ In pursuance of this policy it was suspected by the United States that these powers would acknowledge the independence of the Confederate States and would form an [242] alliance for the purpose of breaking the blockade of the Confederate coast and of supporting Maximilian. At this point Russia sent a large naval force to winter in American waters. The presence of this Russian fleet in American harbors was a menace to the European powers and perhaps defeated the combination. Great Britain and Spain withdrew their support and the empire of Maximilian remained under the protection of France. The close of the Confederate war left the United States free to act. France withdrew her troops and Maximilian was left to his fate. Those who controlled the policy of the United States at this critical juncture, believed that the timely interposition of Russia had averted a serious danger. Says a distinguished participant in the affairs of this period:
The above quotation clearly sets forth the connection between the Civil war and the acquisition of Alaska. This acquisition, then, followed the remarkable general law of American territorial expansion. It was the corollary of a great war, and it came to the United States as a result of the peculiar complication of European affairs. In one respect it differed from the other acquisitions; it was the only acquisition in which the South was not the leading factor. The South was then powerless, and if [244] not hostile, certainly not influential in national affairs. The foundation was laid by President Lincoln and his advisers in the conduct of the war and the foreign policy of the United States. The consummation was effected by the diplomacy of Secretary William H. Seward. Yet, by a remarkable coincidence, when the treaty came to be approved, it bore the signature of a Southern president —Andrew Johnson.Russia was our friend and the only friend we had among the great nations of Europe during the War of the Rebellion.
When Great Britain, France and Austria confederated for the purpose of establishing a monarchy in Mexico on the ruins of the Mexican republic, and as subsidiary thereto had secured, as was believed, the consent of the so-called ‘Confederate States of America,’ on condition that their independence as a nation should be speedily acknowledged by the great powers, who were being urgently pressed for concurrence by these triumvir States, Russia not only refused to sanction our humiliation, but promptly, and, as it were, in the ‘nick of time,’ sent part of her great navy to winter in our harbors, which resulted in the decisive defeat of this adverse diplomacy, a result most gratifying to our government; achieved by the expenditure of large sums of money for the maintenance of her navy in foreign waters in excess of what would have been needed at their home stations. Russia may have had, and probably did have, other reasons for this naval campaign than a simple manifestation of friendship for the United States, but the benefit [243] derived by us was the same as if done solely on our account. It was, therefore, natural that our government should feel a desire to return, in some inoffensive method, to our benefactor at least the pecuniary cost of the benefaction. The cession of Alaska furnished this opportunity. Russia possessed almost boundless tracts of this sort of uninhabited (if not uninhabitable) territory in the north of Europe and Asia; she could spare Alaska without inconvenience, and probably needed ready money; and the United States may have seen some possible future advantage in becoming the owner of the territory lying north of British Columbia and stretching northwest to the Straits of Bering, and accepted the cession at the price named without reference to the commercial value of the territory acquired. In fact, its intrinsic commercial value was hardly alluded to during the discussion of the treaty in the Senate. It is not probable that any formal treaty or bargain, express or implied, was ever made between the United States and Russia on this subject, * * * that is not the way in which great nations manifest and reciprocate sentiments of friendly regard for each other. To presuppose that Russia had to be bargained with and promised remuneration for the moral support of her navy, would have robbed this friendly act of its imperial grandeur.From Mss. letter of Hon. James Harlan—with consent to use.
Conclusion.
Whatever criticisms or eulogies, just or unjust, patriotic or partisan, may be pronounced upon the actors or the agents in our several wars and acquisitions of territory, all must recognize the hand of destiny which led America through the several steps of development to her present sublime position among the nations of the world. None can deny, perhaps none will wish to deny, that the corner stone in the foundation of the greatness of our country is its wide extent of territory. Beginning with the sparse settlements stretched along the Atlantic coast, the thirteen original States, born in revolution, and unwilling to surrender their separate existence, were drawn together by a wonderful law of attraction. They founded a government of which the vital principle was compromise. This principle, not deduced from the formulas of philosophers, but evolved from the logic of events, and utilized by the practical common sense of the American people, has demonstrated itself to be the true principle of free government. The Union, thus constructed, owed its marvelous development, and the catholicity of its institutions, to the compromise of the varied interests and diverse sentiments of its constituent sections. The people of this self-made nation have cause to rejoice that the United States was built by many factors, each of which has performed a distinctive, honorable, and necessary part in its [245] upbuilding. History, while dwelling with admiration on the grand result, the joint work as well as the joint heritage of all, should accord to each factor the appropriate meed of praise. To the South belongs the award of being the leading factor in territorial expansion. Beginning with the sacrifice of any plans they may have formed for State aggrandizement, the Southern States surrendered their extensive western possessions to the general government. Advocating the policy of expansion at each stage of growth, overcoming the obstacles of sectional opposition and foreign diplomacy, persistently and successfully the South has forced the United States to all its acquisitions of territory, except Alaska. At this day, few persons will be found to dispute the wisdom or the justice of this policy. Sending forth its missionary pioneers to win the wilderness, the great Republic, following their footsteps, received the adopted territories, reared them into statehood under the nurture of its beneficent institutions, and protects them with the shield of a nation whose boundaries have never receded.note. The foregoing chapter was completed by the author and delivered to the publishers more than a year before the beginning of the Spanish war of 1898. It is limited to the discussion of the South as a factor in the territorial growth of the United States from the formation of the Union to the end of the Confederate war, and therefore closes with the acquisition of Alaska as a corollary of that war. All events subsequent to that period pertain to another chapter. The Spanish war, accompanied by the acquisition of Hawaii, Puerto Rico, the Philippines, and the liberation of Cuba, will not, therefore, be discussed here. It is, however, proper to note: 1. The Spanish war has been attended by the uniform result of all our wars—the acquisition of foreign territory. 2. The period of 3 years, from the acquisition of Alaska in 1867 to the acquisition of Hawaii in 1898, is the longest period between [246] the acquisitions of foreign territory in the history of the United States, as will appear from the following:3. The Spanish war differs from all our wars, since the Revolution, in its inception and in its effects. All our other wars have been conceived in sectional policy, and have produced the effect of alienating the sections. The Spanish war was inspired by the spontaneous outburst of patriotism of a reunited people. No voice of sectional strife was heard, and no sectional advantage was sought Its effects have been happy in restoring confidence and cordiality between the sections. 4. The acquisitions of 1898 mark the adoption by all sections of the beneficent policy of expansion so early instituted and so persistently pursued by the South, and at one time so violently opposed by other sections. The great object lesson has been learned. The success of our territorial policy, the prosperity and grandeur which our acquired territory has brought to the United States, have demonstrated the wisdom of the policy of expansion, and have allayed all apprehensions founded upon sectional jealousy. Whatever opposition is now offered is free from sectional rancor and is based on broad, national grounds. 5. The Spanish war has furnished to the people of the South the opportunity to demonstrate to all the other sections, and to the world, that they have always loved the Union as it was established by their fathers, and that they are as ready now to fight its battles as their fathers were in the early days of its history, when Southern influence dominated its policy, and Southern men directed its destinies and expanded its territory.
Date. Period. Final Treaty of Paris 1783 Acquisition of Louisiana 1808 20 years Acquisition of Florida and Oregon 1821 18 years Acquisition of Texas 1845 24 years Acquisition of Mexican Cessions 1848 3 years Acquisition of Gadsden Purchase 1853 5 years Acquisition of Alaska 1857 14 years Acquisition of Hawaii, etc 1898 31 years —— Total 115 years
