Marc Liebman's Blog, page 4

Shanties of the Sea

 

Life aboard sailing vessels was hard and dangerous. There were no movies, radio or TV. Few rules, other than those regarding discipline, existed to protect the physical and mental health of the crews.

On merchant ships, hardships were endured because the pay was such that if one survived until one’s 30s and didn’t blow one’s wages on wine, women, and song, one could live a comfortable retirement. Plus, one was fed three meals a day while at sea or in port.

If one served in the Royal, French, Continental, and later the U.S. Navy, you were paid less in wages, but there was often the lure of prize money. From one prize, even the lowest seaman on a frigate would earn enough to live modestly for one or two years. Prize money, three square meals a day, excitement and adventure, and even a modicum of medical care offset the risk of being injured in battle or an accident.

Hauling braces – the ropes that hauled the yards from which the sails hung – was hard and very strenuous work. Generally, on each mast of a square-rigged ship, from top to bottom, there was a yard (also known as a spar) for the royal, top-gallant, topsail, and main sail. These yards were heavy and made from oak. Yards for the royals were often 100 feet or more above the main deck. Then, each sail had lines that were sheeted home (tied) to fittings or racks of belaying pins mounted port and starboard.

There were halyards on which one raised flags, staysails, and jibs. They, too, were tied down by lines.

Since there were no electric motors, anchors had to be raised from the bottom by hand. Heavy ropes were wrapped around capstans into which heavy wooden bars were mounted. By pushing on the bars, the anchor would be pulled up.

All of this was hard, physical work that had to be performed in all sorts of weather. What evolved to help get the men pulling together was a series of work songs called Sea Shanties.

The emphasis in the Sea Shanty was not singing but chanting of words to get the sailors hauling on a brace or pushing on a bar to raise an anchor to work in unison. Shanties comes from the French verb for singing, chanter.

However, if you served in the Royal Navy under Lord Nelson, shanties were banned. Instead, one chanted a sequence of numbers in a cadence, each with a specific meaning, to the music from another sailor playing a fiddle. In the Continental/U.S. and French Navies, ships had a Shantyman who called out the words, and those doing the heavy work sang the chorus.

A good “Shantyman” was a highly regarded recruit, and really good ones had a repertoire akin to a band. What evolved were two kinds of shanties. Those for work were further divided into shanties for specific tasks such as hauling braces or raising an anchor.

The second group was shanties, through which the sailors could express themselves about life at sea and the hardships they endured every day. Through the shanty, they could do this without fear of being punished. There are also shanties to help sailors remember and even celebrate a historical event.

However, with the end of the Age of Sail in the 1860s, the shantymen disappeared from the scene. However, the lyrics and songs they sang still live on. If you are interested, check out this website – https://brethrencoast.com/Sea_Shanties.html .

Image is George Cruikshank’s 1822 painting of sailors singing shanties. © The Trustees of the British Museum.

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8 Ways One Can Lose One’s First Amendment Rights

Recently, what is covered and what is not protected by our First Amendment rights has been in the news. For the record, the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution reads:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

This right, which some correctly call a privilege of being a citizen or legal resident of the United States, has limits. Twice in the 300+ posts of this blog, the origins of the First Amendment and to whom it applies and doesn’t were covered.

On March 21st, 2021, Origin of the Scope of the First Amendment – https://marcliebman.com/origin-of-the-scope-of-the-first-amendment/ – was posted. Two years, eight months later, on November 25th, 2023, the subject was revisited in the post titled The First Amendment Has Limits – https://marcliebman.com/the-first-amendment-has-limits/ .

While they are not prerequisites for reading what follows, they may help you understand the current debate over what is allowed under the First Amendment and what is not.

In our 249-year history, our court system, led by the Supreme Court, has established where a citizen or legal alien is protected by the First Amendment. Some are blatantly obvious, some not so and are complex legal issues. And others will surprise you.  are complex legal issues. What follows are eight ways (there are many more) one can lose First Amendment protections for not only speech but also the right of assembly:

Incitement – if one – citizen or non-citizen – encourages another individual to commit a crime. This also includes encouraging a person to commit suicide.False Statements of Fact – by making false statements in public (on the Internet, newspapers, magazines, radio, TV, etc.) that are libelous or slanderous, or affect another’s civil liberties, or are based on a false factual connotation.Fighting Words – individuals cannot utter words publicly that could cause a “breach of the peace” or cause a brawl or riot.Threatening the President of the United States – making a written or verbal threat against the President of the United States may cost one their First Amendment protection.Obscenity – shout obscenities in a public gathering or on a media outlet, and it could cost you First Amendment protection. Educator – what one can say as an educator when employed by a government-run institution or one that receives Federal funding is limited.Public speaking – ditto reasons 1 through 6. Non-citizens – if one is not a citizen and has made statements in the past that are not protected by the First Amendment, the Federal government is permitted to deny the person entry into the U.S.

To bring this to March 2025. Holding a protest against Israel at Columbia University is protected by the First Amendment if the organizers follow the rules the university has for governing them. However, what is not protected is shouting “From the River to the Sea,” holding signs “Kill all the Jews,” occupying campus buildings without permission, vandalizing and/or destroying university property.

And, if one’s student visa or green card granting residency was based on an application containing false information, one loses one’s First Amendment protection. Why? All of the above actions make you a criminal subject to arrest and prosecution. For those, the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendments apply. All we need now are prosecutors who wants to enforce the law.

1885 Cartoon by Joseph Keppler called Attack on Our Ramparts.

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The Enemies Act of 1798 – Redux

Recently, pro-Hamas and pro-PLO and very anti-Semitic and anti-Isreal demonstrators were arrested at Columbia University in New York. In doing so, the Department of Justice Federal Government used the powers given to the Federal Government under The Alien Enemies Act of 1798.

The Alien Enemies Act of 1798 was just one of four pieces of legislation passed by Congress in that year. The other three were The Alien Friends Act of 1798, the Naturalization Act of 1798, and the Sedition Act of 1798. Together, they are known as the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798.

For more information on their history and why these laws came about, see Origins of the Sedition Act of 1798 – https://marcliebman.com/origins-of-the-sedition-act-of-1798/ posted on July 3rd, 2022 and The Legacy of the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798 – https://marcliebman.com/the-legacy-of-the-sedition-and-alien-acts-of-1798/ .

The mere dates of these acts tell us that the issue of immigration is not new. Back when these acts were passed, the United States was at war with France, and immigrants fleeing the French Revolutionary Wars in Europe were flooding into the country.

During the Quasi-War with France, We the People wanted our leaders to provide solutions. If one studies the immigration laws passed since the founding of the United States, Congress tried pass laws that answer four questions:

Who do we let into the country?How do we vet them?What is the path to citizenship?How do we deal with those on our soil who do not obey our laws?

Does any of this sound familiar? In the 249 years of our country’s history, We the People have struggled with how to write laws and procedures that also encourage legal immigration.

Looking back over our history, immigration to the U.S. has been steady but has also increased significantly due to events outside the control of the U.S. The first surge came as a result of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars.

Then there was the famine in Ireland. After that came the mass migration from Eastern and Central Europe beginning in the early 1870s, coupled with the importation of Chinese laborers to work on the railroads in the west.

After World War II, we absorbed a flood of refugees from Europe, and then in 1953, they came from Korea. In the mid-1970s, we took in hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese fleeing the Communist regime. Since the 1980s, we’ve seen a flood of immigrants coming from Central and South America and all over the world.

Each wave stressed our immigration and naturalization processes, laws, policies, etc. About every 20 – 30 years, Congress updated our immigration and naturalization laws which led to new policies and procedures.

Over time, these immigrants and their descendants assimilated and contributed to the fabric of our diverse society. We are one of the few countries that has successfully accomplished this feat.

However, there are instances where we, as a country, must take a stand. We do that through our elected officials.

It is the duty of the Department of Justice and Department of Homeland Security to enforce our immigration laws. Through Title 50 Section 21 and other portions of Federal law, law enforcement officials have the legal power to arrest and deport those deemed to not meet the criteria for the privilege of living in the U.S., either as a citizen, a resident alien, or visitor.

As footnote, if you have not seen it, watch the recently released documentary called October 8th. It provides a sobering picture of what has and is happening on our college campuses because we have failed to answer the four questions listed above.

Land of Promise, 1884 painting by Charles Frederic Ulrich.

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Haiti – Birth of a Land Sale`

For geography nerds, Haiti is the western portion and roughly one-third (10,700 square miles) of the island that used to be known as Hispaniola. The 18,700 square miles of the eastern two-thirds is the former Spanish colony we know as the Dominican Republic. In Haiti, the languages are French and Creole, and Spanish is spoken in the Dominican Republic.

In 1697, Spain ceded the island’s western half to France, which named it Saint Dominique. The island’s plantations produced sugar, a valuable commodity, to make rum and molasses along with cocoa, coffee, and indigo were also grown on farms that used slave labor.

Inspired in part by our Founding Fathers’ success in winning independence and a desire to free themselves from the yoke of slavery and French rule, Saint Dominique’s slaves revolted in 1791. Led by Toussaint Louverture, himself an ex-slave, this was the largest slave uprising since Spartacus fought Rome around 103 B.C.E. Not only did Louverture want an end to slavery, but he wanted independence from France.

Within weeks, plantations and crops were destroyed, and white plantation owners were killed. Casualties on both sides were horrific.

Independently, the Spanish and British sent armies to put down the revolt because they feared it would spread to their colonies, but both withdrew. France abolished slavery in 1793, but the war for independence, which killed 350,000 whites and blacks and another 50,000 French, British, Spanish, and Polish soldiers, went on.

By 1802, the French Army had lost 37,000 men either from disease or battle. This was more than twice its casualties on the killing fields of Europe and Egypt, causing Napoleon to decide to wash his hands of North America and the Caribbean.

In the United States, the fight for independence by Haitian slaves presented a conundrum for President Washington and then President Jefferson. Both were slave owners, yet both led the American Revolution, which gained the same freedoms the Louverture and his followers wanted. Both dithered between supporting the Haitian Revolution and supporting France and the slave owners.

When Adams, who was in the anti-slavery camp, took office in 1796, he faced a growing refugee crisis. Thousands had packed into French ships in Port-au-Prince and other island harbors. They were offloaded in Baltimore, New York, and Philadelphia.

The difficulties of determining who the U.S. should let in; how they would be vetted; and what the path was to citizenship helped force Congress to pass The Naturalization Act of 1795, The Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798, and The Naturalization Act of 1798. All were designed to clarify U.S. citizenship laws.

Adams wanted to maintain trade with Saint Dominique/Haiti but also did not want to support the French. He sent military aid to Louverture in the hopes of encouraging him not to support piracy or the French Navy during the Quasi-War.

Once in office, Jefferson cut off aid to Louverture. However, Jefferson had long coveted the Louisiana Territory. Strategically, he wanted to remove a potential European power from the Western boundary of the U.S. and gain control of the port of New Orleans and the Mississippi River. Napoleon needed money for his wars in Europe, and he was smarting from the defeat of his army in Haiti.

In France, James Monroe and Robert Livingston found a pair of receptive ears in France’s Finance Minister, François Barbé-Marbois. Discussions went quickly from purchasing the area around the city of New Orleans to the entire Louisiana Territory.

After Haiti became independent, Jefferson, with the acquiescence of the Federalists, refused to recognize Haiti primarily because Jean Jacques Dessalines, Louverture’s successor, ordered the execution of any whites who supported France during the Haitian Revolution. The U.S. did not recognize Haiti until Lincoln ordered it in 1862.

Map of Hispaniola copied from the World Atlas.

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Return to the Status Quo Ante Bellum

For the non-Latin speakers reading this post, the title translates to “the situation as it existed before.” The “before” refers to the years leading up to the War of 1812, and the “after” begins in 1815.

Confused? Don’t be! The Treaty of Ghent, signed on December 24th, 1814, went into force on February 17th, 1815, and ended the War of 1812. Less than five months after the Treaty of Ghent went into force, the Treaty of Commerce and Navigation between the U.K. and the United States was signed on July 3rd, 1815, and immediately went into force.

Negotiations on this treaty began almost immediately after the fighting between the U.S. and Great Britain ended. Even though it was not ratified by the U.S. Congress and signed into law by President Madison until December 21st, 1815, U.S. and British merchants were already taking advantage of the treaty’s terms. The impact on the British and American economies was almost “instantaneous” since the commercial ties strained during the years leading to Madison’s declaration of war in June 1812 and then cut during the war were resumed.

The American negotiators were John Quincy Adams, Henry Clay, and Albert Gallatin. As treaties go, the 1815 Treaty of Commerce and Navigation is a relatively short document with only five articles summarized below.

Article One. The citizens of both countries have the right to ship their cargo to any port in either country, territory, or colony without restriction. Thus, endeth the tariffs and rules that were one of the causes of the War of 1812.

Article Two. No higher duties shall be placed on produce, growth (i.e., timber, cotton, coal, etc.), or manufactured goods entering either country. Any duty or fee must be charged to other countries with which the parties traded. In other words, Parliament or the U.S. Congress could not impose higher tariffs on cargo coming from the other. Nor could either country impose port fees on vessels from the other except for those that were “normal and customary.”

The restrictions on duties also include goods in transit, i.e., if the ship stopped in Bristol, England, and part of its cargo was destined for Rotterdam, special duties couldn’t be placed on the Dutch cargo.

Article Three. U.S. vessels and their cargo would be welcomed in all British colonies, where U.S. citizens were free to “carry on trade.” In other words, U.S. businessmen could hire agents, build or rent warehouses, open factories, and buy and sell goods throughout the British empire. The only exceptions were China, what was called the Cape Colony (South Africa), and the island of St. Helena. This latter location was understandable since Napoleon was held captive on the island.

Article Four. Not only did the treaty allow for commerce, but it also gave the U.S. the right to establish consulates in ports to facilitate trade. However, any individual assigned to a consul was subject to local laws, meaning diplomatic immunity was not provided.

Article Five. The last term states that the treaty will be signed by the President of the United States and by His Britannick Majesty (note the spelling is Britannick, not Britannic) and ratified by Parliament and the Congress.

While the treaty’s term was only four years, it was a formal acknowledgment by the U.K. that the U.S. was an equal trading partner of Great Britain. The U.S. economy, which had been struggling before the war, almost immediately began to improve.

Lost in history is that this treaty restored the trading relationship between the U.S. and the U.K., in which Britain was the U.S.’s largest trading partner, and we were England’s biggest customer. While the status quo in the early 1800s was restored, combined with the Treaty of Ghent and other treaties signed in the years following other War of 1812, the United States was now seen as a potential major trading partner. This treaty is also significant because it laid the economic groundwork for what became the “Special Relationship” between the U.K. and the U.S.

1798 painting of Wall Street by Archibald Robertson

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The Rebels Were a Literary Lot

When the “Shots Heard Round the World” were fired on April 19th, 1775, our Founding Fathers in the Thirteen Colonies had just committed to a war with the richest nation in the world. England also had a well-trained army and the best, and largest navy in the world.

But the men and some women who harassed the British Army that fateful day were not an uneducated mob. They were, on average, far more educated than the men wearing redcoats that they faced.

Literacy rates from the late 18th Century are not precise, and governments weren’t interested in that data. However, there’s enough information researchers have compiled to be directionally correct.

Education in Europe at the time was dependent on class. Members of the nobility, particularly men, went to school as did some women. The rest of the population, particularly farmers and tradesmen in rural areas, rarely did.

What follows is a quick tour of European literacy in the 18th Century, starting with England. Depending on the source, the literacy rate for men could be as low as 30 – 40% for those living in the country to 60% for men living and working in the city. Women, the range is narrower at 40 – 50 %. Note that 100 or so years before the American Revolution, the literacy rate for men was around 30%.

Three factors drove the increase in England. One, schools were run by churches, and they wanted their congregations to be able to read the bible. Two, as books became more prevalent, Englishmen and women wanted to read them. Third, and probably the most significant, was England’s economy depended on overseas trade and required educated men to function.

Crossing the channel into France, the picture is grimmer. At the beginning of the 18th Century, only about 29% of the men and 14% of the women in the country could read and write. By 1800, the numbers had improved markedly to about 47% for men and 27% for women. It was not until Napoleon set up public lycées that the literacy rate in France increased dramatically.

Of the major European powers, Spain lagged the most. Most historians set men’s literacy rate at between 10 and 20%.

The Prussians, however, were well ahead of the rest of Europe. Fredrick the Great created a nationwide public education system that mandated schooling for all children regardless of class. By the end of the 18th Century, about 70% or more Prussian men and women could read, write, and do basic math.

However, during the same period in the Thirteen Colonies, the picture is much different. In the New England states, data suggests that 85% of the men were literate, while some sources suggest that it was as high as 95%. In the agrarian south, the number dropped to about 48%. A study by Colonial Williamsburg found that the literacy rates in that colony were about 94% for males and 54% for women.

There are other indications of literacy amongst the citizens who rebelled against England. In the blog Founding Fathers Valued Education –

https://marcliebman.com/founding-fathers-placed-value-on-education/ – posted on 11/23/24, you’ll find that there were 37 newspapers in the Thirteen Colonies when the fight for independence began. By 1800, the number surpassed 200.

Another indicator is the number of copies of Thomas Paine’s pamphlet Common Sense that were sold. One hundred thousand were printed and sold, roughly one for every 25 residents.

The point is this. The men who led the rebellion against England were educated men. Most of those who followed were also, for the time, well-educated. Many spoke several languages and were well-read.

It is no wonder that shortly after independence was won, they passed legislation in the Continental Congress that required land to be set aside for public education of all U.S. citizens. (See the 4/28/2024, post

Land Ordnance of 1785 Facilitates Public Education –

https://marcliebman.com/land-ordinance-of-1785-facilitates-public-schools/ )

These men and women who fought for our independence knew what they were doing. They were an educated lot who were the intellectual equals of their enemy.

Image was taken from the National Children’s Book and Literary Alliance website.

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Gaining Access to the Pacific

Although the Lewis & Clark Expedition made its way to the Pacific Ocean, the boundaries of what was acquired from France were, at best, ill-defined. The British claimed the area of what are now the states of Idaho, Oregon, and Washington and called it Columbia. The eastern boundary of the area was a vague line that ran through Western Montana.

The point is that no country had surveyed the land well enough to accurately set the boundaries of the Louisiana Territory or Columbia. The Treaty of Ghent, which ended the War of 1812, caused a sea change in the relationship between the United States and our mother country, Great Britain. It was as if British politicians suddenly realized that their 32-year-old son (born in 1783) was about to make a name for himself. During the U.S. first 32 years, we fought the British twice, and each time, the Brits came up a cropper.

For the record, the first war – 1775 – 1783 – gained our independence. In the second that lasted between 1812 and 1815, we smacked the Brits in the face to force them to respect our rights and freedoms. Yeah, the British Army burned Washington. But, after the Battle of Plattsburgh in September 1814, they finally realized they would never be able to conquer us and came to the negotiating table in Ghent, Belgium.

This brings us to 1818 when the British and the U.S. negotiated the little-known Treaty of 1818, a.k.a. The London Convention of 1818 or The Anglo-American Convention of 1818. In it, both parties wanted something of value in terms of territory and rights. Note that every land acquisition by the United States that became a state or part of a state was the result of a treaty. For the list, see the 8/22/2022 post – Jefferson’s Constitutional Gamble Jefferson’s Constitutional Gamble – https://marcliebman.com/jeffersons-constitutional-gamble/ .

Article I of the treaty restates or re-iterates the fishing rights off Newfoundland and Labrador. These were given to us in the 1783 Treaty of Paris that ended the American Revolution but were clarified in this treaty.

Article II reset the northern boundary of the United States along the 49th parallel. When the 1783 Treaty of Paris and the Louisiana Purchase were signed, politicians drew lines on a map based more on guesswork than actual data. The accompanying map shows the sliver of land given to Canada and the western edge of Minnesota, which is the only portion of land in the contiguous 48 states north of the 49th parallel.

Article III gave the U.S. and British joint control of what was known as Oregon Country (modern British Columbia, Oregon, and Washington) for 10 years.

Article IV restated the commitments of the Anglo-American Convention of 1815 which was a commercial treaty. It was signed in June 1815, less than six months after the Treaty of Ghent.

Article V was a vague clause that allowed a neutral government to adjudicate property claims. At the core of this issue were the return slaves who joined the British Army or Royal Navy or escaped to British Territory and whom their former owners claimed as property.

Article VI required both parties to ratify the treaty within six months.

The treaty was negotiated by Albert Gallatin, the U.S. Ambassador to France, and John Robinson, a member of the U.K.’s Privy Council.

While the intentions of both parties were above reproach, the reality on the ground was far different. The British charted Hudson Bay Company began expanding its network of trading posts well below the 49th Parallel in Puget Sound, along the Columbia River into eastern Washington and Idaho. They tried and failed to restrict U.S. fur traders from doing business in the area.

Ultimately, two things occurred. One, the tide of immigrants to the U.S. moving west began to settle areas and diminish the power of the Hudson Bay Company and British influence. Two, the British realized its position in the area was untenable and agreed to cede what is known as the Oregon Territory to the U.S. in the Oregon Treaty of 1846.

Map is from the National Atlas of the United States.

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Acquiring, But Not Buying Florida

Long before Florida became a favored vacation destination, the U.S. government wanted to acquire Florida. In 1763, 12 years before the American Revolution began, the Spanish traded their colonial possession called Florida for Cuba. Once in position of the territory, the British promptly divided Florida into East and West Florida.

Because most of the settlers in Florida were Loyalists, the colony did not join the others in the rebellion. In fact, Florida became a haven for Loyalists in South Carolina and Georgia who wanted to remain British citizens.

However, in 1781, Spanish troops captured Pensacola, and in the 1783 Treaty of Paris, Britain ceded Florida back to the Spanish. By this time, the territory, whose northern border was the 31st parallel, had been flooded by American settlers who were a mix of Loyalists and Patriots.

The desire for independence festered for almost two decades. The Loyalists and Patriots did not want to be ruled by the English or the Spanish. In October 1810, the Republic of West Florida was declared and was ultimately annexed by the United States in January 181 (See 2/2/25 post – Revolt of the Floridians – https://marcliebman.com/revolt-of-the-floridians/ ).

Unfortunately, annexing another country’s territory generally does not make the owner happy. Madison took the gamble that the Spanish could not force the American settlers to submit to its rule. The American president suspected Spain, which had its hands full in Mexico and its Central and South American colonies, didn’t have the resources or the will to contest the American actions.

Spanish power in Florida was reduced to its enclave around St. Augustine and a few other coastal towns. The interior was now controlled by the Seminole Indians, who were routinely raiding U.S. settlements in Georgia and what was the Republic of West Florida.

Then in March 1812, a year after West Florida was annexed by the U.S. George Matthews and a band of settlers took Amelia Island in Northern Florida and declared the Republic of East Florida. However, the raids by Seminoles into Georgia didn’t stop, and Andrew Jackson led a series of raids into Florida to defeat the Seminoles.

This 1818 campaign, known as the First Seminole War, gave the U.S. control of Florida. However, the seat of government was still in Georgia. In protest, the Spanish government asked the British for help in the negotiations, but Britain declined.

John Quincy Adams was sent to negotiate a settlement with Spain that gave the U.S. Florida in exchange for an agreement by the U.S. to pay claims of up to $5,000,000 ($124,253,937 in January 2025). The treaty signed on February 22, 1819, didn’t go into effect until February 22, 1821. Why? The Spanish hoped the delay would keep the U.S. from interfering in their South and Central American pacification efforts.

What is not widely known is that the Adams-Onís Treaty – named after John Quincy Adams and the Spanish negotiator Luis de Onís – gave the U.S. far more than just Florida. In the agreement, Spain gave up all claims to its territory in North America other than Mexico and Texas. It established the western border of the U.S. This meant that under the Anglo-American Convention of 1818, U.S. settlers could move into a jointly U.S.-British controlled region on the Pacific Ocean we called the Oregon Country (Later it would be called the Oregon Territory), and the British called Columbia District. What was now most important was that the U.S. had control of territory from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean.

Image shows the Western border of the U.S. defined by the Adams- Onís Treaty.

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Revolt of the Floridians

During the American Revolution, many Loyalists in Georgia and South Carolina fled to the Royal Colony of Florida. At the end of the American Revolution, Spain received both East Florida and West Florida from the British for their part in helping us rebels win our independence from Great Britain.

However, the territory from the Atlantic Coast to the Mississippi South of the Canadian border and north of the Florida border was largely surveyed. In true Imperial or Colonial fashion, diplomats in Europe drew lines on the map that were often unrelated to the realities of the terrain or the people who lived there. Florida was no different.

The northern border of Florida was established by the Pickney Treaty with Spain in 1795. East of the Apalachicola River, the border was set at 310 North, and west of the river it was 320 22’ North. How and why, this came about is beyond the scope of this post.

In 1803, the U.S. acquired the Louisiana Territory from France. Now, there was U.S. turf to the west and north of Florida. The U.S. claimed West Florida, which ended at the Pearl River, was part of the Louisiana Purchase, and, understandably, the Spanish disagreed.

After a series of secret meetings, a group of rebels under the leadership of Philemon Thomas attacked the Spanish Fort San Carlos on September 23rd, 1810. They captured the fort and Spanish Governor Carlos de Hault de Lassus. Thomas immediately declared himself as the president of the independent Republic of West Florida.

There was a minor problem. The Spanish still had troops near Mobile and Pensacola. Thomas’s soldiers tried to take Mobile and failed.

In Washington, President Madison had taken an interest in the revolt and sent two agents, William Claiborne and David Holmes to gather intelligence. Madison was in a governmental and geopolitical quandary. He could not order the U.S. Army to march into West Florida in support of the rebels without Congressional approval. Congress would not be back in session until December 1810.

Within the population of West Florida, four factions competed for power. Some wanted to join the United States. Others wanted to remain Spanish citizens. Still others wanted to return to being British citizens. At the same time, there was a fourth group that wanted to be independent of every country.

On October 27th, 1810, Madison issued a proclamation of annexation of the territory of the Independent Republic of Florida. This made West Florida part of the U.S. And, as such, Madison could use military force and changed the role of Claiborne and Holmes.

Shortly after Madison’s proclamation, Fulmar Skipwith, who helped negotiate the Louisiana Purchase and was once the U.S. Ambassador to France, was elected governor of the Republic of Florida. He was inaugurated on November 29th, 1810.

Now Claiborne and Holmes had to deal with Skipwith and keep Thomas’ army from taking control of all the territory claimed by the new Republic of Florida.

Initial negotiations with Skipwith failed. He contended that after seven years of Spanish rule, the U.S. had given up its right to the territory of West Florida. However, on December 9th, when Holmes arrived with 600 men, Skipwith told Holmes that he would not resist but would not order his soldiers to surrender.

Holmes then went to the commander of the republic’s forces in Fort San Carlos, John Ballinger, who surrendered after being assured that they would not be punished and would be welcomed as U.S. citizens.

Thus ended the revolt. West Florida on January 15th, 1811, Congress authorized the occupation of West Florida. It would officially become part of the United States of America as part of the Adams-Onís Treaty signed with Spain on February 22nd, 1819. It would become effective two years later.

Henry E. Chambers Map of the disputed Florida Territory in 1810.

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Mass Media Inauguration Firsts

Initially, the inaugurations of U.S. presidents were a relatively private affair usually witnessed by members of Congress and the immediate family. Now, however, the inauguration of the President of the United States is a major, worldwide media and political event. Besides swearing-in U.S. presidents, inaugurations have represented many firsts in mass communications.

So, thanks to Wikipedia, here’s the list of 11 “firsts” which you may find interesting. It is much more than trivia; it is an interesting history that follows the development of the communication technology we enjoy today.

1801 – After the most contested election in history that required 37 votes in the House of Representatives before Jefferson was confirmed as president, The National Intelligencer, a D.C.-based newspaper that went out of business in 1870, ran the first “extra,” i.e., special edition on Jefferson’s election. For a refresher on what happened, read America’s Most Contested Election  https://marcliebman.com/americas-most-contentious-election/ posted way back on November 6th, 2022.

1845 – The news of the swearing-in of James K. Polk was the first to be sent around the world by telegraph. Polk’s swearing-in on March 4th, 1845, was captured in the first known illustration of an inauguration printed in a publication. The image, which accompanies this post, appeared in the April 19th edition of The Illustrated London News, which published its first edition in 1842 and ceased publication in 2003.

1857 – The inauguration of James Buchanan was the first to have been photographed.

1897 – McKinley’s swearing-in was the first to be filmed, i.e., as a motion picture.

1905 – At Teddy Roosevelt’s second inauguration, telephones were installed so reporters could more rapidly report the news.

1925 – Calvin Coolidge’s second swearing-in was the first to be broadcast nationwide by radio.

1929 – Herbert Hoover’s was the first presidential inauguration recorded as a talking newsreel.

1949 – Harry Truman’s second inauguration was the first to be televised.

1961 – JFK’s was the first to be televised in living color.

1981 – Closed captioning of the TV broadcast was added to Ronald Reagan’s first inauguration.

1997 – Bill Clinton’s second swearing-in was the first in history to be broadcast live and in living color on the Internet.

Just thought y’all might want to know.

Engraving that appeared in the April 19th, 1845, edition of The Illustrated London News.

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