ADAMS FIGHTS CONGRESSIONAL "SLAVE POWER"

 

[Published in Essay 10-B: John Quincy Adams and the Fight Against The Gag Rule - Constituting America]

John Quincy Adams was America’s most impactful former President. His most important accomplishment was risking scorn and even death to defend free speech and constitutional liberties.

Adams was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1830, the only former President to serve in that chamber. He would win election to nine terms, serving from 1831 until his death in 1848.

After one reelection victory, Adams said that he must “bring about a day prophesied when slavery and war shall be banished from the face of the Earth”.

As the abolitionist movement grew, the American Anti-Slavery Society filed over 1,000 petitions, with 130,000 signatures, focused on abolishing slavery in the District of Columbia since it was under federal jurisdiction. In 1836, in response to Adams’s consistent presentation of these citizen petitions, Southern Democrats imposed a Gag Rule that immediately tabled any petitions about slavery.

The Gag Rule prohibited anti-slavery petitions from “being printed, read, discussed, or voted on, stating that the effect of these petitions was to create much irritation and ill feeling between different parts of the Union”.

Prior to the Rule’s vote, Adams rose from his seat to protest. When House Speaker, James Polk, refused to recognize him, Adams yelled, “Am I gagged?” He argued that the Gag Rule was a “direct violation of the Constitution of the United States, the rules of this House, and the rights of my constituents.” He declared it a threat to free, deliberative government: “The freedom of debate has been stifled in this House to a degree far beyond anything that ever has happened since the existence of the Constitution.”

This was the beginning of Adams’s relentless campaign to overturn the Gag Rule, waged in an increasingly dangerous political environment:

Joanne B. Freeman’s book, The Field of Blood; Violence in Congress and the Road to Civil War, documents the deterioration of representative government and civil discourse. As she writes, “Between 1830 and 1860, there were more than seventy violent incidents between Congressmen in the House and Senate Chambers or on nearby street…armed groups of Northern and Southern Congressmen engaged in hand-to-hand combat on the House Floor….fighting became endemic and Congressmen strapped on knives and guns before heading to the Capitol every morning.”

A core of members of Congress from slaveholding states countered Adams’s increasingly creative parliamentary maneuvers with physical threats. Rep. Thomas Arnold (Whig-Wisconsin) defense of Adams provoked Rep. John Dawson (D-Louisiana) to brandish a large knife and threaten to cut his throat. Once, when Adams’s remarks “put slaveholders in blaze”, scores of slaveholders “shouted points of order, every now and then screaming at the top of their voices”. This was followed by a gang of Southern members surrounding Adams, threatening physical violence. Adams rose to his feet and shouted, “I see where the shoe pinches, Mr. Speaker, it will pinch more yet!”

Adams led the ban of dueling to stop Southerner members using deadly force (the assassination of abolitionist Rep. Jonathan Cilley by Southern Rep. Willam Graves occurred on February 24, 1838 was orchestrated and covered-up as a duel).

Adams asserted the dueling ban “goes to the independence of this House; it goes to the independence of every individual Member of this House; it goes to the right of speech and the freedom of debate in this House.”

Adams continued to present hundreds of petitions with the signatures of citizens opposed to slavery, only to be shouted down. He then avoided the word “petition”, saying instead that he was introducing a “prayer” that all would enjoy their God-given rights. “Petition was prayer,” he argued. “It was the cry of the suffering for relief; of the oppressed for mercy.”

Adams received numerous death threats. “I promise to cut your throat from ear to ear,” read one. Another had a picture of a large Bowie knife and threatened “Vengeance is mine, say the South!” Adams confided to his diary, “I walk on the edge of a precipice in every step that I take.”

Adams introduced thousands of petitions, including 511 on March 30, 1840, alone. All were tabled without debate. Proslavery representatives then instituted a harsher gag rule to shut Adams up. The House agreed it would not receive any petitions. Adams saw a “conspiracy in and out of Congress to crush the liberties of a free people of the Union.”

In a bold act of defiance, Adams had the clerk of the House read the Declaration of Independence aloud to his fellow representatives, stating, “I rest that petition on the Declaration of Independence.”

Adams’s crusade drew increased media coverage of the Gag Rule and congressional violence, which “exposed the tyrannical force of the Slave Power for all to see”. In 1842, Southern members overplayed their hand by censuring Rep. Joshua Giddings over his resolution congratulating Adams winning the freedom of the Amistad ship slaves in a case before the U.S. Supreme Court.

Media coverage raised American awareness of, and opposition to, the Gag Rule. Northern voters increasingly supported candidates who demanded the right of representation, petition, and free speech. This new generation of Northern Democrats were unwilling to embrace Southern intimidation tactics.

After these election reversals, Rep. Henry Wise (D-Virginia), the leading Gag Rule supporter and Adams’s nemesis, announced to reporters that he “ceased to contend in the war which is being carried on in the House by certain men against the South”. Wise ceded that the Gag Rule “roused Northern fury over violated rights”.

The Gag Rule was finally rescinded on December 3, 1844, by a vote of 108–80, with all Northern and four Southern Whigs voting for repeal, along with 78% of Northern Democrats.

Congress never again attempted to silence dissent among its members.

ASSAULT ON JULY 4th

Erasing celebrating the 4^th of July and replacing it with Juneteenth is the Left’s Holy Grail.

Denigrating the American Flag, removing our National Anthem, and ending the 4^th of July are the Left’s trinity for destroying America’s civic culture.

Changing calendar references eradicates the old order to establish a new radical one. The Bolsheviks replaced Christian holidays with May Day (May 1) and their October Revolution (November 6).  The French Revolution zealots went so far as to rename the months of the year.

Making an obscure moment in the Civil War our new “more inclusive” national holiday is fundamental to shifting the inspiring narrative of America’s founding in 1776 to the darker, anti-American, narrative of the 1619 movement.

Just before the 4^th of July, Senators Ron Johnson (R-WI) and James Lankford (R-OK) called for establishing Juneteenth as “a national holiday to remember the 1865 emancipation of slaves in the United States”.   They eliminate the Columbus Day holiday, because “as a holiday that is lightly celebrated, and least disruptive to Americans' schedules”.  Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) co-sponsored Juneteenth legislation with Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX).

The moment Juneteenth is in and Columbus is out, the Left will move to eliminate the July 4^th holiday as being just two weeks apart and “disruptive” to summer work schedules. 

Nikole Hannah-Jones, the intellectual force behind eliminating the 4^th of July and the 1619 movement, barnstormed cable news to assert, “Independence Day does not mean the same thing to everybody.  We are forcing white people to confront what this holiday has meant to black people”.

On one show, Hannah-Jones’ assault was supported by historian Jon Meacham, who reported that the 4^th was “only about a document not about shaping a nation”, while Juneteenth is a fully inclusive culminating moment in America’s story.  They both recommended that Americans “evolve”, and to end the “divisive” and racist 4^th in favor of the “more inclusive and accurate” Juneteenth:  “For generations we have looked at 1776 as our founding moment, our “nativity”, when it was actually 1619… For too long we have taught this one narrative that glorifies white supremacy, glorifies colonization.”

Attacking July 4^th began on July 1, 2011.  That was when Harvard University released a study revealing that “children who attend July 4 celebrations are more likely to identify themselves as Republicans in life”.  The study observed, “The political right has been more successful in appropriating American patriotism and its symbols during the 20th century. Survey evidence also confirms that Republicans consider themselves more patriotic than Democrats”.

The study continued, “attending one rain-free July 4 celebration before the age of 18 increases the likelihood that children will identify as Republican by two percent, and increases the likelihood that they will vote for a Republican candidate by the time they turn 40 by four percent”.

Overnight, patriotism became partisan. 

During the summer of 2019, the New York Times, armed with the revisionist history of Nikole Hannah-Jones, launched the 1619 history curriculum. 1619’s goal is to completely recast America as the most demonic, racist, destructive nation that has ever existed.  According to the 1619 narrative, America began when a ship with African slaves arrived at Jamestown during the summer of 1619.  Everything since is a steady march of white racism destroying dark skinned people and polluting the world with white supremist and white privilege dogma, as embodied in the Declaration of Independence and U.S. Constitution.

 

Since the 1960s, colleges and universities have indoctrinated students with anti-Americanism.  K-12 is the next battleground. A recent study found that 66 percent of high school students believe America is exceptional, and 70 percent look favorably on America’s history.  Only 47 percent of College students think America is exceptional, and 44 percent are favorable to our nation’s history.

 

The 1619 curriculum is already being used in over 3,000 schools.  Changing history to eliminate July 4^th, and replacing it with Juneteenth, is a critical part of 1619’s anti-Americanism strategy.

Juneteenth is based on the false narrative that slavery in America ended on June 19, 1865.  That was the day a Union General marched into Galveston, Texas and announced the Civil War was over and the slaves being held in the region were free.

It took ratifying the 13^th Amendment on December 6, 1865 to officially free all of America’s slaves.  Border states were not included in the Emancipation (Kentucky still had 40,000).  Over the next year, Federal officials had to personally enforce the Amendment as some slaveholders withheld news of Emancipation so their slaves could be used for additional harvests.

Elevating Juneteenth as the end of slavery and the Civil War is like celebrating the end of World War II based on Japanese soldiers surrendering on isolated Pacific islands in the 1950s.

Making Juneteenth a national holiday must be opposed at all costs.

HOW ANTIETAM CHANGED EVERYTHING

[Part of Constituting America’s 90 Day Study - Days that Shaped America]

America’s bloodiest day was also the most geopolitically significant battle of the Civil War.

On September 17, 1862, twelve hours of battle along the Antietam Creek, near Sharpsburg, Maryland, resulted in 23,000 Union and Confederate dead or wounded. Its military outcome was General Robert E. Lee, and his Army of Northern Virginia, retreating back into Virginia. Its political outcome reshaped global politics and doomed the Southern cause.

The importance of Antietam begins with President Abraham Lincoln weighing how to characterize the Civil War to both domestic and international audiences. Lincoln choose to make “disunion” the issue instead of slavery. His priority was retaining the border states (Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, and Missouri) within the Union. [1]

The first casualties of the Civil War occurred on April 19, 1861 on the streets of Baltimore. The 6^th Massachusetts Regiment was attacked by pro-South demonstrators while they were changing trains. Sixteen dead soldiers and citizens validated Lincoln’s choice of making the Civil War about reunification. Eastern Maryland was heavily pro-slave. Had Maryland seceded, Washington, DC would have been an island within the Confederacy. This would have spelled disaster for the North.

To affirm the “war between the states” nature of the Civil War, Lincoln’s Secretary of State, William Seward, issued strict instructions to American envoys to avoid referencing slavery when discussing the Civil War. [2]

Explaining to foreign governments that the conflict was simply a “war between the states” had a downside. England and France were dependent on Southern cotton for their textile mills. “Moral equivalency” of the combatants allowed political judgements to be based on economic concerns. [3]

On April 27, 1861, Lincoln and Seward further complicated matters by announcing a blockade of Southern ports.  While this was vital to depriving the South of supplies, it forced European governments to determine whether to comply. There were well established international procedures for handling conflicts between nations and civil wars. Seward ignored these conventions, igniting fierce debate in foreign governments over what to do with America. [4]

England and France opted for neutrality, which officially recognized the blockade, but with no enforcement. Blockade runners gathered in Bermuda, and easily avoided the poorly organized Union naval forces, while conducting commerce with Southern ports. [5]

Matters got worse. On November 8, 1861, a Union naval warship stopped the Trent, a neutral British steamer travelling from Havana to London. Captain Charles Wilkes removed two Confederate Government Commissioners, James Mason and John Slidell, who were on their way for meetings with the British Government. [6]

The “Trent Affair” echoed the British stopping neutral American ships during the Napoleonic Wars. Those acts were the main reason for American initiating the War of 1812 with England.

British Prime Minister, Lord Henry Palmerston, issued an angry ultimatum to Lincoln demanding immediate release of the Commissioners. He also moved 11,000 British troops to Canada to reinforce its border with America. Lincoln backed down, releasing the Commissioners, stating “One war at a time”. [7]

While war with England was forestalled, economic issues were driving a wedge between the Lincoln Administration and Europe.

The 1861 harvest of Southern cotton had shipped just before war broke out. In 1862, the South’s cotton exports were disrupted by the war. Textile owners clamored for British intervention to force a negotiated peace.

In the early summer of 1862, bowing to political and economic pressure, Lord Palmerston drafted legislation to officially recognize the Confederate government and press for peace negotiations. [8]

During the Spring of 1862, Lincoln’s view of the Civil War was shifting. Union forces were attracting escaped slaves wherever they entered Southern territory. Union General’s welcomed the slaves as “contraband”, prizes of war similar to capturing the enemy’s weapons. This gave Lincoln a legal basis for establishing a policy for emancipating slaves in the areas of conflict.

Union victories had solidified the Border States into the North. Therefore, disunion was not as important a justification for military action. In fact, shedding blood solely for reunification seemed to be souring Northern support for the war.

Lincoln and Seward realized emancipating slaves could rekindle Northern support for the war, critical for winning the Congressional elections in November 1862. Emancipation would also place the conflict on firm moral grounds, ending European support for recognition and intervention. England had abolished slavery throughout its empire in 1833. It would not side with a slave nation, if the goal of war became emancipation. Lincoln embraced this geopolitical chess board, “Emancipation would weaken the rebels by drawing off their laborers, would help us in Europe, and convince them that we are incited by something more than ambition”. [9]

On July 22, 1862, Lincoln called a Cabinet meeting to announce his intention to issue the Emancipation Proclamation. It was framed as an imperative of war, “by virtue of the power in me vested as Commander-in-Chief, of the Army and Navy of the United States in time of actual armed rebellion against the authority and government of the United States, and as a fit and necessary war measure for suppressing said rebellion.” [10]

Seward raised concerns over the timing of the Proclamation. He felt recent Union defeats outside of the Confederate Capital of Richmond, Virginia might make its issuance look like an act of desperation, “our last shriek, on the retreat.” [11] It was decided to wait for a Northern victory so that the Emancipation could be issued from a position of strength.

Striving for a game-changing victory became the priority for both sides. The summer of 1862 witnessed a series of brilliant Confederate victories. British Prime Minister Palmerston agreed to finally hold a Cabinet meeting to formally decide on recognition and mediation. [12]

General Lee wished to tip the scales further by engineering a Confederate victory on northern soil. [13] Lee wanted a victory like the 1777 Battle of Saratoga that brought French recognition and aid to America. [14]

The race was on. General Stonewall Jackson annihilated General John Pope’s Army in the Second Battle of Manassas (August 28-30, 1862).  Lee saw his opportunity, consolidated his forces, and invaded Maryland on September 4, 1862.

After entering Frederick, Maryland, Lee divided his forces to eliminate the large Union garrison in Harpers Ferry, which was astride his supply lines. Lee planned to draw General George McClellan and his “Army of the Potomac” deep into western Maryland. Far from Union logistical support, McClellan’s forces could be destroyed, delivering a devastating blow to the North. [15]

A copy of Special Orders No. 191, which outlined Lee’s plans and troop movements, was lost by the Confederates, and found by a Union patrol outside of Frederick. [15] On reading the Order, McClellan, famous for his slow and ponderous actions in the field, sped his pursuit of Lee.

Now there was a deadly race for whether Lee and Jackson could neutralize Harpers Ferry and reunite before McClellan’s army pounced. This turned the siege of Harpers Ferry (September 12-15, 1862), the Battle of South Mountain (September 14, 1862), and Antietam (September 17, 1862) into the Civil War’s most important series of battles.

While Antietam was tactically a draw, heavy losses forced Lee and his army back into Virginia. This was enough for Lincoln to issue his Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, five days after the battle, on September 22, 1862. When news of the Confederate retreat reached England, support for recognition collapsed, extinguishing, “the last prospect of European intervention.” [17] News of the Emancipation Proclamation launched “Emancipation Meetings” throughout England. Support for a Union victory rippled through even pacifist Anti-Slavery groups who asserted abolition, “was possible only in a united America.” [18]

There were many more battles to be fought, but Europe’s alignment against the Confederacy sealed its fate. European nations flocked to embrace Lincoln and his Emancipation crusade. One vivid example was Czar Alexander II, who had emancipated Russia’s serfs, becoming a friend of Lincoln. In the fall of 1863, he sent Russian fleets to New York City and San Francisco to support the Union cause. [19]

Unifying European nations against the Confederacy, and ending slavery in the South, makes America’s bloodiest day one of the world’s major events.

REFERENCES

[1] McPherson, James, Battle Cry of Freedom (Oxford University Press, New York, 1988) pp. 311-312.

[2] Foreman, Amanda, A World on Fire; Britain’s Crucial Role in the American Civil War (Random House, New York, 2010) p.107.

[3] Op. cit., McPherson, p. 384.

[4] Op. cit., Foreman, page 80.

[5] Op. cit., McPherson, pages 380-381.

[6] ibid., pages 389-391.

[7] ibid.

[8] Op. cit., Foreman, page 293.

[9] Op. cit., McPherson, page 510.

[10] Carpenter, Francis, How the Emancipation Proclamation was Drafted; Political Recollections; Anthology - America; Great Crises in Our History Told by its Makers; Vol. VIII (Veterans of Foreign Wars, Chicago, 1925) pages 160-161.

[11] Op. cit., McPherson, page 505.

[12] Op. cit., Foreman, page 295.

[13] Op. cit., McPherson, page 555.

[14] McPherson, James, The Saratoga That Wasn’t: The Impact of Antietam Abroad, in This Mighty Scourge: Perspectives on the Civil War (New York: Oxford University Press, 2007), pages 65-77.

[15] Sears, Stephen W., Landscape Turned Red (Ticknor & Fields, New York, 1983) pages 66-67.

[16] Ibid., pages 112-113.

[17] Op. cit., Foreman, page 322.

[18] ibid., page 397.

[19] The Russian Navy Visits the United States (Naval Historical Foundation, Annapolis, 1969)

CIVIL WAR's ORIGINS - JOHN BROWN

[Part of Constituting America’s 90 Day Study - Days that Shaped America]

On the evening of Oct. 16, 1859, John Brown and his raiders unleashed 36 hours of terror on the federal armory in Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia).

Brown's raid marked a cataclysmic moment of change for America and the world. It ranks up there with Sept. 11, the Dec. 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, and the shots fired on Lexington Common and Concord Bridge during the momentous day of April 19, 1775. Each of these days marked a point when there was no turning back. Contributing events may have been prologue, but once these fateful days took place, America was forever changed.

Americans at the time knew that the raid was not the isolated work of a madman. Brown was the well financed and supported "point of the lance" for the abolition movement.

He was a major figure among the leading abolitionists and intellectuals of the time. This included Gerrit Smith, the second wealthiest man in America and business partner of Cornelius Vanderbilt. Among other ventures, Smith was a patron of Oberlin College, where Brown's father served as a trustee. Thus was born a 20-year friendship.

Through Smith, Brown moved among America's elite, conversing with Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson, journalists, religious leaders and politicians.

Early on, Brown deeply believed that the only way to end slavery was through armed rebellion. His vision was to create a southern portal for the Underground Railway in the Blue Ridge Mountains.

The plan was to raise a small force and attack the armory in Harpers Ferry. There Brown would obtain additional weapons and then move into the Blue Ridge to establish his mountain sanctuary for escaping slaves.

Brown anticipated having escaped slaves swell his rebellious ranks and protect his sanctuary. He planned to acquire hundreds of metal tipped pikes as the weapon of choice.

The idea of openly rebelling against slavery was an extreme position in the 1850s. Abolitionist leaders felt slavery would either become economically obsolete or had faith that their editorials would shame the federal government to end the practice.

For years Brown remained the lone radical voice in the elite salons of New York and Boston. He looked destined to remain on the fringes of the anti-slavery movement when a series of events shook the activists' trust in working within the system and shifted sentiment toward Brown's solution.

The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 forced local public officials in free states to help recover escaped slaves. The federally sanctioned intrusion of slavery into the North began tipping the scales in favor of Brown's agenda.

The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 destroyed decades of carefully crafted compromises that limited slavery’s westward expansion.  The Act ignited a regional civil war as pro-slavery and anti-slavery settlers fought each other prior to a referendum on the state’s status – slave or free.  Smith enlisted the help of several of the more active abolitionists to underwrite Brown's guerilla war against slavery in Kansas in 1856-57. This group, including some of America’s leading intellectuals, went on to become the Secret Six, who pledged to help Brown with his raid.

The Supreme Court's Dred Scott decision in 1857, and its striking down of Wisconsin's opposition to the Fugitive Slave Act in March 1859, set the Secret Six and Brown on their collision course with Harpers Ferry.

Today, Harpers Ferry is a scenic town of 300 people, but in 1859 it was one of the largest industrial complexes south of the Mason Dixon Line. The Federal Armory and Rifle Works were global centers of industrial innovation and invention. The mass production of interchangeable parts, the foundation of the modern industrial era, was perfected along the banks of the Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers.

Brown moved into the Harpers Ferry area on July 3, 1859, establishing his base at the Kennedy Farm a few miles north in Maryland. The broader abolitionist movement remained divided about an armed struggle. During August 19-21, 1859, a unique debate occurred. At a quarry outside Chambersburg, Pa., Frederick Douglass and Brown spent hours debating whether anyone had a moral obligation to take up arms against slavery. Douglass refused to join Brown but remained silent about the raid. Douglass’ aide, Shields Green, was so moved by Brown’s argument, he joined Brown on the raid, was captured, tried, and executed.

The American Civil War began the moment Brown and his men walked across the B&O railroad bridge and entered Harpers Ferry late on the evening of Oct. 16, 1859. Brown's raiders secured the bridges and the armories as planned. Hostages were collected from surrounding plantations, including Col. Lewis W. Washington, great grandnephew of George Washington. A wagon filled with “slave pikes” was brought into town.  Brown planned to arm freed slaves with the pikes assuming they had little experience with firearms. 

As Brown and his small force waited for additional raiders with wagons to remove the federal weapons, local militia units arrived and blocked their escape. Militia soldiers and armed townspeople methodically killed Brown’s raiders, who were arrayed throughout the industrial complexes. 

Eventually, the surviving raiders and their hostages retreated into the Armory’s Fire Engine House for their last stand.  Robert E. Lee and a detachment of U.S. Marines from Washington, DC arrived on Oct. 18.  The Marines stormed the Engine House, killing or capturing Brown and his remaining men, and freeing the hostages.  The raid was over.

Brown survived the raid. His trial became a national sensation as he chose to save his cause instead of himself. Brown rejected an insanity plea in favor of placing slavery on trial. His testimony, and subsequent newspaper interviews while awaiting execution on Dec. 2, 1859, created a fundamental emotional and political divide across America that made civil war inevitable.

Fearing that abolitionists were planning additional raids or slave revolts, communities across the South formed their own militias and readied for war. There was no going back to pre-October America.

Edmund Ruffin, one of Virginia's most vocal pro-slavery and pro-secession leaders, acquired several of Brown's "slave pikes." He sent them to the governors of slave-holding states, each labeled "Sample of the favors designed for us by our Northern Brethren."  Many of the slave pikes were publicly displayed in southern state capitols, further inflaming regional emotions. 

On April 12, 1861, Ruffin lit the fuse on the first cannon fired at Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina.  The real fuse had been lit months earlier by Brown at Harpers Ferry.

CIVIL WAR's ORIGINS - KANSAS

[Part of Constituting America’s 90 Day Study - Days that Shaped America]

The cascade of events leading to John Brown’s Harpers Ferry raid, and 700,000 dead on countless Civil War battlefields, began with a cynical ploy by Illinois Senator Stephen Douglas to help land speculators and political donors.

America’s founding was an intricately crafted series of compromises and rules of engagement to balance regional interests.  One of the fundamental points of conflict was slavery. 

Slavery was integral to the economic vitality and culture of southern states. As America expanded westward, increasingly complex arrangements maintained the North/South regional political balance.  Western settlers quickly became a third regional interest. 

For decades, three titans of the U.S. Senate: Daniel Webster representing Northern interests, John Calhoun representing Southern interests, and Henry Clay representing the West debated and compromised to keep America united.  Their agreements were tested as the Louisiana Purchase, and then the Mexican War, created vast land masses for settlement, economic development, and political power.

Slavery became the epicenter of regional rivalries. The South wanted to maintain parity in the Senate, balancing adding a new free state with a slave state.  The Missouri Compromise of 1820 and the Compromise of 1850 maintained the political balance while avoiding confronting slavery.  Most Americans, even Southerners, hated the institution.  They hoped that slavery, if left alone, would somehow fade away over decades to come.

In the minority were Northern abolitionists, who wanted to end slavery in their lifetime.  There were also Southern slavery advocates, who hoped to expand slavery westward and even southward by annexing Caribbean and Central American lands to bolster their power.  The moderates held off both factions until the lure of land speculation, government contracts, and quick profits were added into the mix.

It began with the proposed trans-continental railroad to California. Southerners wanted the rail line to take a southern route. James Gadsden, President Franklin Pierce’s Ambassador to Mexico, negotiated the purchase of Mexican lands in what is now the southern border of Arizona and New Mexico on December 30, 1853 to assure sufficient railroad rights-of-way through less mountainous terrain.

The North wanted a northern route that began at St. Louis, Missouri and linked to Chicago, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York City. Most northern business leaders favored the northern route and felt that organization of the Nebraska Territory would facilitate this decision. However, rival business factions within Missouri wanted control of the route and the potential fortunes to be made from land speculation. Pro-slave forces threatened to block any efforts to organize Nebraska because Missouri would then be surrounded on its west, east, and north by free states.

Senator Stephen Douglas was a key architect of the Compromise of 1850 and Chairman of the Senate Committee on Territories.  Douglas already had presidential aspirations, having lost the 1852 Democratic Party nomination to Franklin Pierce.  He was preparing for another run in 1856.  He wanted to help his Missouri-based political and financial allies, while avoiding a confrontation with Southerners. [1]

On January 4, 1854, Douglas introduced the Kansas-Nebraska Act. This act repealed the Missouri Compromise of 1820 and the Compromise of 1850.  It opened the entire territory to popular or “squatter” sovereignty for determining whether the territories would be free or slave. At this time the Nebraska Territory encompassed the entire Louisiana Purchase from the Missouri Compromise line to the Canadian Border. Indiana Representative George Washington Julian, who would serve as the Chairman of the Committee on Organization for the 1856 Republican Convention, commented, “The whole question of slavery was thus re-opened.” [2]

The Congressional debate on the Kansas-Nebraska Act was tumultuous. Ohio Senator, Salmon Chase, published, "The Appeal of the Independent Democrats in Congress to the People of the United States", in the New York Times on January 24, 1854. He declared the abandonment of the Missouri Compromise a, “gross violation of a sacred pledge” and an “atrocious plot” to convert free territory into a “dreary region of despotism, inhabited by masters and slaves.” [3]

Northerners, and many Westerners, felt Southern politicians were dealing in bad faith.  The “Nebraska Act” was viewed as a bold Southern power grab that threatened the nation’s future. Protests against the “Nebraska Act” spread throughout the North.  Highly charged emotions fractured the Democratic Party, destroyed the Whig Party, and launched the Republican Party. Sixty-seven-years of America’s civic culture was falling apart.

The Kansas-Nebraska Act passed the Senate in March and the House of Representatives in early May. President Pierce signed the bill into law on May 30, 1854.

New York Senator William H. Seward responded to victorious Southern Senators by stating, “Since there is no escaping your challenge, I accept it in behalf of the cause of freedom. We will engage in a competition for the virgin soil of Kansas, and God give the victory to the side which is stronger in numbers as it is in right.” [4]

Both pro-slavery and anti-slave forces moved into the Kansas territory engaging in brutal guerilla warfare over the next five years. This sporadic civil war became known as “Bleeding Kansas”.  It even spilled into the U.S. Senate Chamber. On May 22, 1856, South Carolina Representative, Preston Brooks assaulted Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner in the Senate Chamber, bludgeoning him into unconsciousness. [5]

The regional civil war that erupted among Kansas settlers attracted the attention of John Brown, a key leader within the abolitionist movement.  Wealthy and politically connected abolitionists funded and armed Brown, his many sons, and a growing number of paramilitary units, to enter the Kansas maelstrom.

Kansas became a killing ground, and a proving ground for Brown’s violent approach to ending slavery.  The nation had embarked on a path leading to the most cataclysmic event in American history

REFERENCES

[1] Mayer, George H., The Republican Party 1854-1966 Second Edition (Oxford University Press, New York, 1966) page 25.

[2] Julian, George Washington, Political Recollections; Anthology - America; Great Crises in Our History Told by its Makers; Vol. VII (Veterans of Foreign Wars, Chicago, 1925) page 212.

[3] McPherson, James, Battle Cry of Freedom (Oxford University Press, New York, 1988) page 124.

[4] Ibid., page 145.

[5] Ibid., page 150.

WEST VIRGINIA's PERPETUAL STRUGGLE

West Virginia Convention - Wheeling 1861

CONSTITUTING AMERICA'S SERIES ON LOCAL GOVERNMENT

The origins of West Virginia, its current challenges, and its political dynamics are all embodied in a unique case decided by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1870.

In Virginia v. West Virginia, 78 U.S. 11 Wall. 39 39 (1870) 78 U.S. (11 Wall.) 39 two counties demanded to be reinstated into Virginia.  The Court ultimately prevented Berkeley and Jefferson Counties from returning to Virginia.  In the process, the Civil War and the battlefield origins of West Virginia were reviewed in detail.  Three Justices dissented, asserting that the birth of West Virginia was chaotic and violated the rights of local citizens in the Eastern Panhandle.

The three judge dissent reveals origins of the state’s current political tensions.  Citizens in the Eastern Panhandle continue to agitate against the highly centralized state government.

Virginian political leaders initiated a process to succeed from the Union in January 1861.  As a Commonwealth, Virginia gave deference to county representation.  Initially, the 152 delegates were solidly pro-Union.  However, old regional rivalries surfaced.

Delegates from the western counties of Virginia raised the issue of unequal political power with the eastern sections of the state.  This east-west divide had been simmering since the Virginia Constitutional Convention of 1829.  That State Constitution required a property qualification for voting. This disenfranchised many yeoman farmers in the more mountainous western counties. It also embraced counting slaves on a three-fifths basis for apportioning representation. Every county beyond the Alleghenies, except one, rejected the 1829 constitution, which still passed with overwhelming eastern support. The issue of regional inequality erupted again during the Virginia Constitutional Convention of 1850-1851.  

On the morning of April 12, 1861, Confederate cannons opened fire on Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina. After the Fort’s surrender on April 13, President Lincoln issued a call for 75,000 volunteers to forcibly return the rebellious states to the Union.  This was enough for the succession proponents in the Virginia Convention to prevail on April 17, 1861.

A formal vote, by county, was scheduled for May 23, 1861. 

Successionists took matters into their own hands and attacked the Federal Arsenal in Harpers Ferry on the evening of April 18.

The Eastern Panhandle became the site for over 60 Civil War Battles.  Local communities descended into chaos as Union and Confederate armies competed for control of this critical north-south gateway.  Some towns changed hands dozens of times.   

Pro-Union forces in western Virginia formed a separate state in June 1861.  Former Virginia Governor, and Confederate General, Henry Wise reported that, “The Kanawha Valley is wholly traitorous…You cannot persuade these people that Virginia can or ever will reconquer the northwest.”

Early in the Civil War, Union forces solidified control of northern Virginia (Arlington, Alexandria, and Fairfax). President Lincoln and the U.S. Congress merged this Unionist beachhead with the western counties as the “free” state of Virginia. 

On August 20, 1861, Lincoln empowered this military-backed civilian entity to establishment the separate state of West Virginia from the pro-Union western counties that opted-out of the Succession Convention.

A “free” state convention met in Wheeling, November 26, 1861, and drafted the "Constitution of West Virginia". It designated forty-four counties, "formerly part of the State of Virginia," to be "included in and form part of the State of West Virginia." The Counties of Pendleton, Hardy, Hampshire, Morgan, Frederick, Berkeley, and Jefferson were not named as part of the state.

The new West Virginia constitution left open the possibility of adding additional counties:

“if a majority of the votes cast at the election or elections held as provided in the schedule hereof, in the district composed of the Counties of Pendleton, Hardy, Hampshire, and Morgan, shall be in favor of the adoption of this constitution, the said four counties shall be included in and form part of the State of West Virginia, and if the same shall be so included, and a majority of the votes cast at the said election or elections, in the district composed of Berkeley, Jefferson, and Frederick, shall be in favor of the adoption of this constitution, then the three last-named counties shall also be included in and form part of the State of West Virginia."

Under the terms of this Constitution, an inclusion vote was held on the first Thursday in April,1862, for citizens in the original forty-four counties, and those living in Pendleton, Hardy, Hampshire, and Morgan.

Significantly, no one in the counties of Berkeley, Jefferson, or Frederick voted on the matter, because:

"from the 1st of June, 1861, to the 1st of March, 1862, during which time these proceedings for the formation of a new state were held, those counties were in the possession and under the absolute control of the forces of the Confederate States, and that an attempt to hold meetings in them to promote the formation of the new state would have been followed by immediate arrest and imprisonment."

A series of laws were passed within the “free” state of Virginia authorizing the military-backed State Legislature to certify popular support for counties being added to the new state of “West Virginia”. On January 31, 1863, the “free” state of Virginia gave consent for the counties of Berkeley and Jefferson to be transferred to the State of West Virginia.  Frederick County, still under Confederate control, remained in the old Virginia.

At the national level, an enabling act was approved by President Lincoln on December 31, 1862 for admitting West Virginia, on the condition that a provision for the gradual abolition of slavery be inserted in the state constitution.

The West Virginia state convention reconvened on February 12, 1863, and passed a new constitution including the abolition provision. The revised constitution was adopted on March 26, 1863.  On April 20, 1863, President Lincoln issued a proclamation admitting West Virginia as the 35^th state effective on June 20, 1863.

West Virginians in the eastern panhandle bridled under being forcibly included in a Union state.  Rumors were rampant that the owners of the B&O Railroad engineered their inclusion because they did not want their rail line going through a southern state.  This led to the 1870 Supreme Court decision. As recently as the 1990s, the Mayor of Charles Town, the county seat of Jefferson County, explored reopening the case.

Unlike its origins, West Virginia choose not to be a Commonwealth.  It remains one of the most centralized state governments in America, possibly for maintaining unity among entrenched regional interests.  Only recently did the West Virginia legislature authorize limited home rule for certain municipalities.  The power of counties to control growth and levy impact fees is less than 20 years old.

West Virginia’s turbulent genesis, and its Charleston-centric political power, has led to the state earning a reputation for corruption and incompetence.  “Democrats are controlled by the coal mining unions; Republicans are controlled by the coal mining executives” observed a Republican legislator. 

The state is challenged in finding its economic bearings as coal use declines.  It lacks internet access (West Virginia has the worst connectivity of the fifty states, while neighboring Virginia has the best).  Teacher unions and a bloated state bureaucracy make West Virginia one of the most expensive per-student school systems in the country, while consistently placing 49 or 50 in academic achievement.  The state steadily loses population, except for the eastern panhandle and the state Capitol of Charleston. 

Except for recent Presidential elections, Democrats dominate the state.  In 2016, Republicans won control of both the House of Delegates and the State Senate for the first time in 82 years.  In Jefferson County, formed in 1803, it took until 2004 for the first Republican Clerk to be elected. The first Republican Jefferson County Prosecuting Attorney was elected in 2018.

HILL TOP REALITIES

SWaN Investors have done a masterful job orchestrating an “echo chamber” of positive media.  Countless Letters to the Editor purportedly from Harpers Ferry “residents”, news releases, and unsubstantiated assertions, have flooded local media.

SWaN’s goal is to stampede four of the seven voting Members of the Harpers Ferry Town Council to ignore, bend, and invent rules in order to give the out-of-state billionaires everything they desire as quickly as possible.

Facts and laws must drive the decision that will shape the next century of Harpers Ferry. 

The first reality check is to remember that the Hill Top Hotel was fully operational the day SWaN bought it.  Tour groups filled its rooms, hungry customers lined up for Hill Top’s famous fried chicken and buffet, and community groups regularly met there. 

The second reality check is to remember that it was SWaN, no one else, who closed the Hill Top Hotel. They asserted that Hill Top must be completely torn down.  To validate their assertion, SWaN allowed Hill Top to become derelict.  No repairs occurred, windows were broken, and water seeped in, collapsing the hotel’s front facade.  Those saddened by Hill Top’s current state of disrepair should remember who is responsible.

The third reality check is that the Town of Harpers Ferry owns the roads and undeveloped paper streets that SWaN so desperately craves.  These streets were laid out by War Department engineers under President George Washington.  They were officially documented in the 1869 War Department plat.  These streets are not “fake”.  They contribute to the integrity of Harpers Ferry’s Historic District, which was established by the Department of Interior in 1976.  Harpers Ferry’s Town Ordinances do not allow for the sale or transfer of these streets to anyone. The 2016 Ordinance amendment was only intended for disposing of Personal Property. No street has ever been given, sold, or ceded to anyone since 1790.  No amount of undocumented assertions changes this.

The fourth reality check is SWaN’s heavy-handed efforts to control public access to the Promontory.  Armed thugs brandishing guns have accosted members of the community when they are on paved portions of East Ridge and Columbia Streets.  In one instance, Harpers Ferry police had to order a SWaN thug to “stand down” and retreat to actual SWaN property.  SWaN refuses to release its “Security and Safety” Policy that will dictate when the community can access the Promontory.  Their secret policy could all but eliminate access. 

SWaN’s proposed land swap of their nearly vertical property for all the adjoining paper streets would bankrupt Harpers Ferry.  Accessing the Promontory using a massive zig-zagging wooden stairway would generate lawsuits and costs for making the 45% incline comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act.  No-one in a wheel chair, on crutches, or infirm may be able to enjoy one of our region’s greatest vistas.

The fifth reality check is that the number of Harpers Ferry visitors has increased since Hill Top Hotel closed in March 2008.  That year 260,000 visitors entered the Park.  In 2017, there were 342,534 Park visitors, an increase of 31.7 percent.  Since Hill Top closed, Harpers Ferry has been listed as one of America’s top tourist destinations in countless travel magazines and websites.  Harpers Ferry is certainly not a dying ghost town portrayed by SWaN’s acolytes.

The final reality check is about the true nature of SWaN and its proponents.  None of those appearing at Town meetings, or writing as “residents”, were involved, in any way, with the thirty preservation initiatives, since 1988, that saved the historic and scenic resources of the Harpers Ferry area from being destroyed. None of SWaN’s “community” proponents helped with the 50^th Anniversary of the Park, the Centennial of the Second Niagara Movement, or any of the Sesquicentennial commemorations of the John Brown Raid or the area’s Civil War battles. 

No one from SWaN even had the decency to attend the funeral of Bill Stanhagen, the person who sold Hill Top to SWaN.

These are the realities of the Hill Top project, and its supporters. 

Hopefully, they will be aired during the March 9 Town Workshop on the Concept Plan.

Scot Faulkner is President of Friends of Harpers Ferry National Historical Park and co-chaired the Fiftieth Anniversary of the Park.