Marc Liebman's Blog, page 5

Inauguration Day Trivia

Anyone born after 1933 probably believes that Inauguration Day is around January 20th. ‘Twas not always the case.

Before the 20th Amendment to the Constitution was ratified in 1933, new presidents were sworn in on March 4th, or if that date was a Sunday, the day before or after. The rationale was that by moving the inauguration date to earlier in the year, it would eliminate the period the President was a lame duck. And by having the Congress opening on the January 6th, it could confirm the president’s nominees before he took office. In short, he Twentieth Amendment reorganized the government calendar.

Not only was Inauguration Day changed, but so was the Congressional calendar. Now, Congressional sessions were to begin on January 3rd.

So why March 4th? It was the first day that the new Constitution took effect in 1789. There was, before 1933, one exception – George Washington, who was sworn in on April 30th, 1789.

Washington’s first ceremony was held in New York City, the second in Philadelphia. Thereafter, all but one have been held in Washington, but not always on the steps of the Capitol building. When James Monroe was sworn in another building known as the Old Capitol Building because the Capitol that houses the Congress was being rebuilt, thanks to being burned by the British in 1814. There are other exceptions. One was Lyndon Johnson who, after Kennedy was assassinated, was sworn in on Air Force One.

The media likes to note that Trump’s second inauguration is being moved inside due to weather. Why?

William Henry Harrison, the 9th President of the U.S. has the shortest time in office of any U.S. president of one month. On March 4th, 1841, it was cold, windy, and damp on Inauguration Day. Harrison elected not to wear an overcoat, read, at 8,445 words, the longest inauguration speech in U.S. history, and then sat on horseback to watch the parade. He caught pneumonia, and a month later his vice president, John Tyler was sworn into office in the Brown’s Queen Hotel in Washington, D.C. This is another exception to a President being sworn in a place other than the Capitol Building or the White House.

FYI, William Taft’s inauguration and Ronald Reagan’s second were moved inside due to cold and/or inclement weather. Swearing in Trump for his second term will be the third.

Three presidential swearing-in ceremonies have been held in the Oval Office – FDR was sworn in for his fourth term in January 1945; Truman’s in April 1945 after Roosevelt died, and Gerald Ford’s in 1974 after Nixon resigned.

Inauguration speeches have run from Harrison’s 8,445-word monologue to Washington’s second speech which was just 135 words. The rest fall somewhere in between.

Supposedly, all living presidents, given health, attend the swearing-in ceremony of their successor. Many like to think that presidents could put their bitter rivalries aside during the peaceful transfer of power. However, that has not always been the case, and the list is longer than one may think.

John Adams left Washington rather than attend the inauguration of his successor, Thomas Jefferson. John Quincy Adams skipped town rather than sit through the swearing-in of Andrew Jackson. Martin van Buren elected to skip the inauguration of his successor, William Henry Harrison, for reasons unknown, but it could have been the weather.

The day before Ulysses Grant was sworn in, Andrew Johnson had a cabinet meeting to say good-bye to them and left D.C. Woodrow Wilson said he was ill and did not attend the swearing-in of Warren G. Harding. We are bombarded by reminders that Donald Trump was absent from the swearing-in of Joe Biden. On January 20th, 2025, we’ll see if this list expands.

1913 Bain News Service photo of the swearing in platform being built for Wilson’s Inauguration.

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The Unintended Consequences of the War of 1812

History is filled with wars that led to consequences that leaders on both sides would never have imagined. In this regard, the War of 1812 is one.

Understand that the United States came close to losing the War of 1812. Yes, the Navy did well, and privateers captured ~12 – 15% of the British merchant fleet, but we also lost many ships of all types.

The U.S. invasion of Canada was an unmitigated disaster, and even though the Navy won control of the Great Lakes and Lake Champlain, the northern border wasn’t secured until the August 1814 Battle of Plattsburgh (See blog Post 10/13/24 – Battle of Plattsburgh – https://marcliebman.com/decisive-battle-of-plattsburgh/) in August 1814 and their failure to capture Baltimore in September 1814 that the British realized they could not defeat us and the war was more costly and trouble than it was worth. Those two defeats led to the 1814 Treaty of Ghent.

Here’s a list of nine consequences in chronological order that neither James Madison or his Secretary of State James Monroe (Madison’s successor) nor Britain’s prime minister Robert Jenkinson, the Second Earl of Liverpool could have imagined in June 1812 when the war began.

One, the rapid demise of the Federalist Party after the Hartford Convention in the election of 1816. (see 12/29/24 Blog Post –Death Knell of the Federalist Party – https://marcliebman.com/death-knell-of-t…federalist-party/).

Two, the Democratic-Republican Party’s enactment of law in 1816 to permanently increase the size of the U.S. Navy to at least nine ships-of-the-line and 12 heavy frigates. This is the party that followed Jefferson’s lead in not funding a standing army and Navy that lead, in the first year of the war, disastrous consequences.

Three, the 1817 Rush-Bagot treaty that demilitarized the U.S. Canadian border. Many of its provisions are still in force today through a series of follow-on treaties.

Four, the invasion of Florida by General Jackson in 1817 led to the 1819 Adams-Onis Treaty through which Spain ceded Florida to the U.S.

Five, the London Convention of 1818 set the northern border of the U.S. along the 49th parallel from the western tip of Lake Superior to the Pacific Coast.

Six, the U.S. economy grew 3.7% each year from 1812 and 1815. Prior to this, Jefferson’s Embargo Act of 1807 and the Non-Recourse Act of 1809. This was fueled by American businessmen investing in manufacturing in the U.S. to sell to U.S. customers since trade with Britain was impossible.

The result was that the U.S. became one of the leaders of the Industrial Revolution. Within 30 years, textile mills in Massachusetts, Maine, and New Hampshire were producing 20% of the cotton and wool cloth produced in the U.S. Profits from these mills were put in investment banks such as the Suffolk Bank in Boston, which loaned money to businesses building railroads, ships, technologies, and factories for all types of goods.

Seven, many new banks were opened primarily to provide loans to new business ventures and finance the war, which ultimately cost the U.S. taxpayer $90 million ($1,843,790,260in January 2025).

Eighth, the end of the War of 1812 and the collapse of the Federalist Party led to the Era of Good Feelings. Thanks to winning our Second War for Independence, a.k.a. The War of 1812, the bitter party divisions that separated the Federalists and the Democratic-Republicans were over. With the Federalists out of power, a new generation of leaders on both sides of the aisle realized they needed to work together to build the country.

Nine and last. Without an opposition party, the United States was a one-party state. The Whigs, Anti-Masons, and the Free Soilers all failed to sustain themselves as viable political entities. This made our country’s leaders uncomfortable and led to the formation of the modern Republican Party that was founded in 1854.

Image is an 1819 painting by an unknown artist of an Independence Day Celebration in Philadelphia.

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Rodgers’ Reforms Created the Modern U.S. Navy

Once the Treaty of Ghent was signed on Christmas Eve of 1814, the Secretary of the Navy William Jones recommended to President Madison that what became the Board of Navy Commissioners be convened. The board’s tasking was to examine the Navy’s shore establishment and its performance during the War of 1812.

Jones was uniquely qualified to do this because, as Secretary of the Navy, he led the effort to create, literally from scratch, the Navy that defeated the Royal Navy on the Great Lakes and Lake Champlain. Under his leadership, shipyards were created or expanded, warships were built, naval stores – planking, spars, masts, rope, tar, pitch, etc., cannon and ammunition – were brought together to equip the ships. Then, Jones had to find the crews.

Given the underfunding of the Navy under Jefferson and the first two years of Madison from 1805 until just before war was declared on June 18th, 1812, the Navy was in bad shape. At the time, the service had experienced leaders and a cadre of trained crews from the Barbary Pirates War, but only a few ships.

During those lean years, money to train was scarce, and for the most part, the warehouses needed to support a sea-going navy were empty. So, while the U.S. Navy did well when it got to sea, it struggled against a Royal Navy blockade determined to keep its frigates in port.

Madison approved Jones’ recommendations, and the first members were a who’s who of successful naval commanders during the Quasi-War against the French, the Barbary Pirates War, and the War of 1812. John Rodgers (During the War against the Barbary Pirates, he commanded a task force with the ships Constitution, President, Constellation, Enterprise, Essex, Siren Argus, Hornet, Vixen, Nautilus, and Franklin and while commanding officer of President, his frigate captured 20+ prizes during the War of 1812), David Porter (Commander of Constellation when it defeated the French frigate L’Insurgente), and Isaac Hull (captained Constitution when it captured Guerriere).

The law was passed by Congress on February 7th, 1815, 10 days before the Treaty of Ghent went into force on February 17th, 1815. It gave the board the power to design and build ships, set standards for ship design, arm, equip, and repair them. The law also gave the board the power to establish and manage Navy shipyards as well as hiring civilian contractors. The broad power given to the Board of Navy Commissioners left personnel decisions – recruiting, retention, and promotion, tasking of ships, managing the budget, and any other functions not specifically given to the Navy Board with the Secretary of the Navy.

Their initial investigation found that only shipyards in Boston and Portsmouth, NH were capable of building ships for the Navy. The yards in Baltimore, Charleston, and Norfolk were to be closed due to both their performance and material condition. The report to Congress included a scathing report on corruption at the Washington Navy Yard which was not closed due to its location. However, reforms in the Washington Navy Yard were implemented.

The Board of Navy Commissioners continued to build an effective Navy and created bureaus within the Navy that concentrated on specific areas of need or required expertise. With the reforms of the board implemented, on August 31st, 1842, the Board of Navy Commissioners was abolished by the 27th U.S. Congress and through legislation the Department of the Navy’s bureau system that ran the U.S. Navy until the 1960s was in place.

1814 portrait of Commodore John Rodgers by John Wesley Jarvis.

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Death Knell of the Federalist Party

In the years leading up to the U.S. Declaration of War against Great Britain, in the 12th U.S. Congress, the Democratic-Republican party increased its majorities. In the House, 106 members were Democratic-Republicans, and 36 were Federalists. In the Senate, the split was 29 to 7 in favor of the Democratic-Republicans.

However, votes were not always along party lines. One of the most divisive issues was which course of action the U.S. would take against Great Britain. The economy in states like Massachusetts, where many merchants whose livelihoods were dependent on trade with England, the representatives of both parties opposed a war.

While there was near unanimous agreement something needed to be done, the disagreement as to what was the crux of the debate. Jefferson’s Embargo Act of 1807 and the subsequent Non-Intercourse Act of 1809 caused the economy to contract. Today, we would call the 10% reduction in U.S. GDP caused by these laws a severe recession bordering on depression.

War was declared on June 18th, 1812, and to be honest, it did not go well for the U.S. Our invasion of Canada failed, the dismal performance of the U.S. Army at Bladensburg, and then the burning of Washington were just three of our failures. Coupled with the British blockade of major U.S. ports caused severe hardship among merchants who depended on foreign trade.

The bright spot was that we gained control of the Great Lakes, and the small U.S. Navy was, when it could get to sea, effective. Along with privateers, the U.S. gave the Royal Navy a migraine headache.

By 1813 and early 1814, merchants in both parties, particularly the Federalists in New England, had had enough. In December 1814, 26 Federalists from Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont convened the Hartford Convention to lay out their grievances against the Federal government.

The meetings of the Hartford Convention were held in secret, and there is no official record of the debate, who voted for what proposal or who said what. What did come out was a report that demanded five changes to U.S. policies.

Congress shall not pass any trade embargo that would last more than 60 days.Amend the Senate and House rules so that a 2/3rds majority would be needed for any declaration of war, admission of a new state, and initiating a policy of prohibiting commerce with a foreign nation.Eliminating the three-fifths rule that allowed southern states to count 60% of their slave population to determine how many representatives in the House of Representatives a state would have.Limit future presidents to one term.Require each president to come from a different state than his predecessor.

The reaction was not what the Federalists intended. Their timing was terrible. By the time their report was released, Battle of New Orleans had been won, and the war was over because the Treaty of Ghent had been signed on December 24th, 1814

Democratic-Republicans pounced on the proposals. They used the event to position the Federalists as against the expansion of the United States, proponents of secession by the five states represented and downright treasonous.

Some of the loudest and most vehement protests came from the southern states with large slave populations. The three-fifths rule did give them an advantage with more members in the House of Representatives.

In the election of 1816, the Federalist Party was trounced and was no longer a viable force in U.S. politics.

Like any action of this sort, the Hartford Convention had an unintended consequence. Fast forward to the days leading up to the American Civil War. As Secessionist leaders in the states that became the Confederacy planned their secession, they looked carefully at the legal underpinnings of some of the Hartford Convention proposals and borrowed what they needed to support their argument.

Image is 1814 cartoon Leap or No Leap by William Charles, Jr. about the Hartford Convention.

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Dead Man’s Curve

Helicopters are the only aircraft with a chart in the flight manual unofficially known as Dead Man’s Curve. Fixed-wing airplanes don’t have one. 

One of the misconceptions about helicopters is that in the case of a total power loss, they glide. They don’t, they autorotate. 

Some fixed-wing airplanes have charts that show how the plane will glide at various airspeeds from a specific altitude. Helicopters don’t have one. If one must do an autorotation, you are looking at your landing spot between your feet. For more on autorotations, see the post – “Helicopters Don’t Glide, They Autorotate” – elsewhere in From the HAC’s Seat.

Officially, the chart pilots nicknamed Dead Man’s Curve is officially known as the Height Velocity Diagram (HVD). It is buried in every helicopter’s Pilot Operating Handbook, Air Force Dash-One, U.S. Navy/Marine Corps NATOPS Manual.

Since I began flying helicopters in 1969, the Height Velocity Diagram has evolved in that it has more data and is easier to read. However, the message is the same – pilots flying helicopters should stay out of the shaded areas on the chart. In Navy and Marine Corps NATOPS Manuals, they are noted with two words – Avoid Area.

Why is the chart necessary? In each helicopter’s flight envelope, there are flight regimes in which if something ugly happens, such as a sudden shift in the wind that reduces the lift that the rotors are generating, or an engine failure, or a hydraulic failure, the likelihood of a crash is high.

Accompanying this post is a copy of one of the HVDs from the NATOPS Manual for a Navy SH-3A/G, HH-3A and UH-3A helicopter dated 1 December 1975 with changes as late as June 1978. You’ll note that it is for single-engine operations. The logic is that if you are in the “Avoid Area” and an engine fails, you’ve got a big problem. 

Yes, I know, the chart is 47+ years old, but the format for all the HVD charts I’ve seen over the years hasn’t changed. What has is the amount of shading and the data which tells one a lot about the helicopter’s flight envelope.

When you look at the chart from the SH-3A/G, HH-3A, and UH-3A NATOPS Manual you can see the shaded section in the lower right where one shouldn’t fly the helicopter at those altitudes very fast. On the left, there is an area when one should avoid flying slow. 

The problem is that the left side is where helicopters spend much of their time operating, i.e., hovering at 80 feet over trees while a survivor is being winched up puts one in the heart of the shaded area on the left

This chart tells me if I am flying at 50 feet on a standard day below 17 knots true airspeed, and have an engine failure, unless I exhibit extraordinary skill and enjoy a lot of luck, I will not be able to fly out of this condition. In other words, I will probably land or worse, crash.

For the record, a standard day is 590 F with a barometric pressure of 29.92 and dry air. If you’re an experienced pilot, you probably can count on your fingers and toes the number of days you took off on a Standard Day. 

Why is HVD chart significant? Because the ability of a helicopter to hover or fly slow often puts one right into the heart of the left side of the HVD where it says “Avoid Area.” Here are some examples.

U.S. aircraft carrier decks are usually between 80 and 90 feet above the water. When landing on the forward part of the angled deck – the most common place one plunks a helicopter down on a Nimitz-class carrier – one slows to a creep to match the ship’s speed at about 100 feet over the water and at least a rotor blade and a half’s distance from the ship.

The pilot flying the helicopter “creeps” alongside the ship until the helicopter is slightly aft of the landing spot before sliding over the deck and landing with no forward airspeed. Until one is over the deck, you are in Dead Man’s Curve once you enter the “creep” phase of the approach. This is one technique.

Or, if one is hovering at 40 feet with a sonar dome a hundred or more feet below the ocean’s surface listening for a submarine, the helicopter is just below the Avoid Area of Dead Man’s Curve. This explains why if an engine fails, you may ditch. If you have burned off much of your fuel, or it is really cold, or a host of other factors that makes the air (and the amount of lift) different than on a standard day, you may be able to fly out of the hover.

Here’s how. As the engine starts to wind down, guillotine the sonar cable, dump the nose to reach 10 – 15 knots, and get into translational lift and ground-effect so you don’t hit the water. If you are lucky and good, you’ll be able to stay about 10 feet out of the water in ground effect. Translational lift occurs when the rotor blades act like a solid disk and generate 10 – 15% more lift. Ground effect is a cushion caused by the compression of the air but dissipates as one accelerates.

Or, if you are in a sightseeing helicopter on Maui in Waimea Canyon and the pilot is hovering several hundred feet off the bottom of the canyon, 100 feet from the rocks. While the view from the cabin may be spectacular, the pilot who does this puts the helicopter so far into Dead Man’s Curve, the chances of the pilot being able to fly it out if he has an engine failure are nil. 

Or, hovering over a house 100 feet in the air for 10 – 15 minutes while your aircrewmen hoists up all members of a family whose home has been flooded. Your passengers might now include pets. 

Or, while lifting an air conditioning condenser from the ground and then lowering it on the top of a 10-story building. 

Or, in an EMS helicopter landing on the helipad on the roof of the eighth floor of a hospital with an injured accident victim in the cabin. During the last 1/8th of a mile, the helicopter is in the Avoid Area of the HVD.

Or, flying a helicopter carrying a TV crew hovering or flying very slowly around a newsworthy event. Depending on how slow or high off the ground, the helicopter is in the shaded area of the HVD.

One could keep listing the flying evolutions in which the helicopter must be flown either well inside or on the periphery of the Avoid Areas in the HVD to complete the mission. 

To be fair, the performance of modern helicopters is better than those designed decades ago. Nonetheless, they all have their own Height Velocity Diagrams and the men and women flying helicopters accept the risks of flying in the “Avoid Areas.” Unfortunately, emergencies when flying inside Dead Man’s Curve can be, well, fatal.

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Helicopters Don’t Glide, They Autorotate

There’s a misunderstanding amongst the public and even pilots who have never flown a helicopter that if the engine(s) quit, the helicopter pilot can glide down and pick a small space to land. NOOOOO!!!

First misconception – helicopters don’t glide, they autorotate. In an autorotation, as the helicopter descends, the wind coming up through the rotor blades keeps them spinning. Suffice it to say the aerodynamics of how this occurs is well beyond the scope of this post.

Second misconception – in an autorotation, the helicopter can travel a significant distance. Not true. When you lose engine power in a single or twin-engine helicopter, you are looking at your landing spot between your feet. Since most helicopters are flown below 1,000 feet, that’s the reality. Above 1,000 feet, the landing area is at the tip of your toes.

So, let’s talk about what happens in an autorotation. Rates of descent helicopters I’ve flown range from about 2,000 feet per minute to 4,000 feet per minute. The rate you come down depends on the weight of the helicopter at the time of the autorotation, airspeed, angle of bank, etc.

To make it simple, assume your helicopter is flying level at 1,000 above the terrain and let’s translate that into time. At a 2,000 feet per minute, you have half a minute – 30 seconds – from the time the engine or engines quit – until your wheels or skids touch terra firma or the water. At a 4,000 feet per minute rate of descent, you have 15, count ’em, 15 seconds.

Here’s what must happen in those few seconds.

1. Bottom the collective immediately. If you don’t, you will lose precious rotor rpm which is a very, very bad thing because the rate of descent will increase to a point where you can’t cushion the landing.

2. Adjust the nose attitude to the best autorotation airspeed. In the helicopters I’ve flown, it is in the 70 – 80 knot range. If you are flying faster at the time of engine failure, you can translate that into distance. Slower, lower the nose to try to get close before you execute Step 4. Note, one tries to bank the helicopter the rate of descent with increase dramatically!

3. Somewhere around 150 feet above the ground, begin to ease back on the cyclic to slow the rate of descent. How high you do this depends on the helicopter and its rate of descent. As the cyclic comes back, keep the collective bottomed. Rotor rpm may increase. If it does, that is a good thing.

4. Around 50 feet altitude, you should be below 20 knots and slowing. At this point you raise the collective to reduce the rate of descent to trade rotor rpm for slowing the rate of descent.

5. Touch down with 3 -5 knots forward airspeed at less than 250 feet per minute rate of descent.

If the helicopter is at 500 feet, the time is much, much less. Simply bottom the collective and raise the nose at 150 feet to kill the rate of descent.

Yes, many helicopters today are twin-engine which mitigates the chances of having to do a full autorotation. However, there are many single-engine turbine-powered helicopters made today that have only one engine. 

Yes, helicopter engines are far more reliable than when I started flying helicopters. But the engines, gearboxes, driveshafts and transmissions are designed and made by man and therefore, subject to failure. Given the fact that most full autorotations happen after a major system, or engine failure, the pilot must do everything right in a very short time to avoid an ugly ending. 

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The Little Belt Affair

By 1811, relations between the U.S. and Great Britain had been deteriorating for years. The British were adamant about continuing their policy of impressing U.S. seamen, their insistence that any ship sailing to Europe had to stop in a British so its cargo could be inspected, and kept denying that British soldiers were helping Native-Americans attack U.S. settlers in the Northwest Territories.

The U.S., on the other hand, had responded with a series of laws – The Embargo Act of 1807, the Non-Intercourse Act of 1807, and Macon’s Law #2 – that prohibited U.S. businessmen from trading with either the British or French. The result of these three laws caused the U.S. economy to contract by 10% or more.

At sea, the Royal Navy became even more aggressive and stopped U.S. Navy ships. The first incident between the two navies took place in 1803 during the Chesapeake-Leopard Affair. You can read about this event in my 7/31/22 post The Chesapeake-Leopard Incident https://marcliebman.com/the-chesapeake-leopard-incident/ .

On May 1st, 1811, the 1,100-ton frigate H.M.S. Guerriere, 38 guns, stopped the 92-ton brig U.S.S. Spitfire, 3 guns, off the coast of New Jersey. Spitfire’s sailing master, John Diggio, from the part of Massachusetts that is now Maine, was taken on board Guerriere.

This led the Secretary of Navy Paul Hamilton to order the 1,600-ton U.S.S. President, 44 guns and the last of the original six frigates to be completed and the brig U.S.S. Argus, 30 guns to patrol the 780 miles of coastline between the Carolinas and New York. Hamilton’s orders – prevent any Royal Navy ship from taking sailors from U.S. merchant vessels.

President’s captain, John Rodgers, was acting as the commodore of the two-ship squadron when it spotted the Royal Navy sloop of war, the 460-ton H.M.S. Little Belt, 20 guns. Captain Arthur Bingham on Little Belt, turned away.

From this point on, the U.S. and Royal Navy accounts differ on what happened. Rodgers claims that he was trying to identify the unknown ship in American waters. Bingham claimed he was trying to avoid a collision with a larger ship.

With the moves and countermoves occurring at night, Rodgers managed to get President within hailing distance of Little Belt. When he asked Bingham to identify himself, i.e., what was the name of his ship and its nationality, Bingham refused.

At this point, a shot was fired. The American investigation determined that Little Belt fired first; the Royal Navy claims that the President shot first.

Within 15 minutes, the Royal Navy sloop of war was badly damaged. Rodgers asked Bingham if he had struck his colors. Bingham said no, even though nine of his crew were killed and 23 injured, two of whom would die shortly after the engagement.

The diplomatic row that followed went on for months, but nothing substantial happened. Rodgers retained his command, and during the War of 1812, President captured 23 prizes, a record for the U.S. Navy. Bingham managed to get Little Belt to its naval base in Halifax, Nova Scotia, for repairs and later was given command of a larger ship.

The footnote to this incident is that Rodgers was searching for Guerriere, which, 16 months later, went into action against Constitution on August 19th, 1812. Painted on Guerriere’s topsail on her foremast were the words “Not the Little Belt.”

1811 painting by William Elmes, engraving by Edward Orme.

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The Force Behind the Press Gang

Impressment, a.k.a. “the Press,” the Press Gang, and “Pressganged” are all terms used to describe the Royal Navy practice of forcing men to enlist in the Royal Navy. The British Army also had groups of soldiers sent out into the countryside, taverns, and jails to find men to serve in their service.

However, the Royal Navy is known for its practice and impressment of seamen. Between 1792 and 1812, the Royal Navy impressed ~25,000 American seamen. Assuming the average crew size of a Royal Navy frigate was about 250 officers and men, ~25,000 is enough men to man 100 frigates!

Taking ~1,250 men a year off American merchant vessels to serve on Royal Navy ships became one of the three primary causes of the War of 1812. For the record, the other two were the continued presence of the British Army in the Northwest Territories and their efforts to incite and arm the Native Americans to kill American settlers and British economic policy toward the United States.

The Press was not a concept new to the late 18th century. It began in 1594 when the British Parliament passed the Vagabonds Act. This enabled the Royal Navy to take any man not gainfully employed, i.e, a vagrant, into Elizabeth I’s navy.

Down through the centuries that followed, impressment was supported by English courts as a means of manning Royal Navy warships both in peace and war. Press gangs would be sent into towns and authorized to take men in the naval service. Courts offered men convicted of crimes a choice – prison or enlistment in the Royal Navy.

Service in the Royal Navy had some advantages, i.e., you were paid, had access to medical care, and were fed three meals a day. And, if you were lucky enough to be on a ship that took a prize or two that were sold in an Admiralty Court, you would be paid enough to live comfortably for several years.

On the negative side, discipline under the Articles of War was harsh. Almost any conviction by court-martial punishment by flogging or hanging was authorized. And, while you were accruing wages, they were often paid two to three years in arrears. Should you die of illness, accident, or in combat, your survivors receive nothing.

The negatives led to an average desertion rate between 20 and 25%, hence the need for Royal Navy captains to “replenish” their crews. Legally, Royal Navy captains were only allowed to take men with “seafaring experience,” which is one reason they often sent their press gangs into taverns and houses of ill repute in port towns.

When Royal Navy officers went to the local jail looking for men, they were supposed to ask the man if he had any naval experience before offering him a chance to join the Royal Navy. Most didn’t.

Sometimes, the inmates were offered a choice – stay in jail or serve in the Royal Navy. If you survived, then your sentence was considered served.

At the beginning of the French Revolutionary Wars in 1792, the population of Great Britain was, according to CensusUK ~10,242,000. By 1800, it had only risen to ~18,387,000. By contrast, France had a 1790 population of ~28,000,000; by 1812, it had grown to ~44,000,000.

Net net, England needed men desperately to fight the French. While most of the fighting during the Napoleonic Wars was on land, the Royal Navy’s role in blockading France and French-controlled ports, as well as supporting its army in the field, cannot be underestimated.

The Royal Navy needed people, and we, the United States, were a source of English-speaking mariners. Hence, impressment and damn the consequences.

Cartoon is titled Unknown Tar painted in 1800. Artist is unknown

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Importance of the First Bill Passed by the 1st U.S. Congress

In Article II (Executive), Section `1, Clause 8 of the U.S. Constitution states that before a newly elected president takes office, he must say before witnesses that “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

Our Founding Fathers wanted to send the right message to their fellow citizens that the new U.S. central government would follow the newly ratified Constitution. Once convened, the first act passed by the 1st U.S. Congress is known as “An act to regulate the time and manner of administering certain oaths.” It is Public Law 1-1 and passed the House on April 27th, 1789, the Senate on May 5th, 1789, and signed into law by President Washington on June 1st, 1789.

Before the bill passed, the Senate added a clause that state governors and legislators must take the same oath. The final bill stipulated that any Senator could administer the oath to the Vice President. In the House of Representatives, any Representative can administer it to the Speaker of the House.

Oaths of office are not new. Most attribute the Romans to be the first to create a standardized oath called the sacrementum militaire. It was taken annually, or when there was a new emperor, and often before each battle. It was a pledge of loyalty to the state that committed each legionnaire to faithfully execute the commands of their officers and never desert or run from the enemy.

When this bill was passed, our Founding Fathers had just fought the British for eight years and four months to gain independence and were intensely loyal to the republic which they just founded. They believed those employed or running the government had to be loyal to the country and its elected government, not a man.

If you were a member of the German Wehrmacht between 1934 and 1945, you would be required to state, “I swear by God this holy oath, that I will render to Adolf Hitler, Führer of the German Reich and People, Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, unconditional obedience, and that I am ready, as a brave soldier, to risk my life at any time for this oath.”

When members of the U.S. military are inducted into our Armed Forces, the oath of office is quite different from what the Nazis required one to say. We recite, “I, (your first and last name) do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the officers appointed above me in accordance with the Uniform Code of Military Justice, so help me God.”

Today, those taking this oath can change the word “swear” to “affirm” and drop the last phrase, “so help me God.”

Note the difference. In the Nazi oath, the soldiers were swearing allegiance to a man and the country. Members of the U.S. military swear allegiance to an institution – the president, a document – the Constitution, and a body of laws – the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

When one takes that oath, it is a seminal moment in one’s life. When men and women take this oath, we have signed a blank check to the government, payable sometimes in our own blood.

Official U.S. Army photo by Lara Poirrier.

 

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Our First Cabinet Post

The First United States Congress had a very full plate when it convened on March 4th, 1789. The new U.S. Constitution had just been ratified on June 21st, 1788, when New Hampshire’s legislature ratified the document. It was the ninth of 13 states to do so, and as a result, the Constitution that governs our country became the law of the land.

The Congress’ first act of business was to establish what the oath of office was to be and how it would be administered to members of the Senate and then the House. Then came the Tariff Act of 1789, which placed duties on goods coming into the country. It was followed by the Tonnage Act of 1789 that imposed duties on ships bringing merchandise into the U.S. Gotta have money to run the government, something the Continental Congress did not have under the Articles of Confederation.

However, the executive branch needed fleshing out so it could execute the duties assigned to it under the Constitution.

The first cabinet post established by the First U.S. Congress was the Department of Foreign Affairs. We know it now as the Department of State. This made it the most senior position in the presidential cabinet and established the line of succession as President, Vice President, and then Secretary of State.

This chain of command did not change until the Presidential Succession Act of 1947 which bumped the Secretary of State down a few notches. Today, the line of succession is the VP, Speaker of the House, President Pro Tempore of the Senate, then Secretary of State, then Treasury followed by the Secretary of Defense.

For the record, the Senate’s President Pro Tempore presides over the Senate’s deliberations when the VP is absent. He or she is elected by all the senators and is usually from the majority party but is not the Senate Majority Leader.

Back to the Department of Foreign Affairs. On September 1st, 1789, just a few months after the Department of Foreign Affairs was created on July 27th, 1789, the Congress changed its name to the Department of State. John Jay, the Secretary of State under the Articles of Confederation, continued as the first Secretary of State. Jay served from September 15th, 1789, to March 22nd, 1790, when Thomas Jefferson took over as the first Secretary of State appointed and approved by the Senate under the new Constitution.

Its first offices were on Broadway in New York City until it moved to 307 Market Street in Philadelphia from October 1st, 1790, to November 10th, 1790. Then it moved to Washington D.C. in June 1800 and shared a building with the Treasury Department.

The Department of State was given a variety of tasks and responsibilities outside diplomacy. It was originally tasked with minting money, designing and caring for the Seal of the United States, managing the approval and enforcement of patents, and conducting the census mandated by the Constitution. Other than caring for the Seal of the U.S., all these other tasks have been farmed out to other parts of the Executive Branch.

Oddly enough, one task remains from the original duties of the Senate. If a President or Vice President chooses to resign, he or she is required to deliver the written document to the President Pro Tempore of the Senate.

Image is of the Great Seal of the United States

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