Land Ownership and the Foundations of Democracy, Part Two (Westward, Ho!)

When my kids were little, we used to go to Bishop’s Cafeteria to eat with my dad. He was old, and old people like cafeterias – so we went. 

My son would fill his tray with everything he could fit in, including that cafeteria classic – brightly colored, cubed Jello. My daughter was much pickier, but inevitably she chose the wiggly cubes as well. The boy would snarf down his selections in minutes; the girl would take hours if we let her. 

It is worth noting that she didn’t usually eat the Jello. 

She liked to look at it. The table would inevitably get jostled a bit, or otherwise nudged, and the Jello would wiggle. It’s what Jello does. She loved that. And, to be fair, that’s just as valid a use for Jello as any other. (Just because something is edible doesn’t mean it serves no other function – otherwise, neither houseplants nor family pets would be around long.) 

But that’s not how my son saw it.

“Sis, you gonna eat that Jello?” 

“No.” 

“Can I have it, then?” 

“No.”

“Why not?” 

“It’s my Jello.” 

“Are you serious?” 

Of course she was serious. I had to question his bewilderment, given that this scene was played out repeatedly over the years. Still, his outrage seemed to build quite genuinely, every time… 

“Come on, Sis – you’re not going to eat it!” 

“No.” 

“But WHY?!?” 

“It’s MY Jello.”  And at this point, she’d usually give it an extra lil’ nudge – *wigglewigglewigglewigglewiggle*  

“DAD!” 

“Yes, Son?” 

He’d explain, as if perhaps I’d been abroad on business the whole time, rather than sitting there at the same table while things unfolded according to sacred family tradition. I’d express my condolences, but had to concur with Sis that the Jello at issue was, in fact, HER Jello. It didn’t help his case that he’d snarfed an entire platter of foodstuffs only moments before – including a very similar chalice of… cubed Jello. 

It never went well. 

As the United States began to expand west, its people encountered numerous native tribes who were – to be blunt – in the damn way. Our national sin in regard to Amerindians is not that we overcame them, it’s that we did so bathed in such hypocrisy. Rather than declare war, we declared eternal friendship. We killed them in the name of peace and in pursuit of a faith built on martyrs. We took everything from them while demanding their gratitude – for our civilization, our religion, and our pitiless modernity.

To be fair, we needed the land. They had it, but… well, they weren’t really using it properly. The Plains tribes especially were the worst sort of land-wasters – hunting when hungry, gathering when gathering was useful, hanging out, carousing and eating and socializing and such… 

We lacked the words to declare them hippies, but ‘utopians’ didn’t seem harsh enough. Not one single factory. Very little organized agriculture. No hospitals. No schools. Just relationships alternating with quiet reflection.

I’m overgeneralizing, of course – there were hundreds of tribes and cultures and such – but by and large, they weren’t doing proper America things with the lands they claimed as theirs. And, as with the Jello, subjected to repeated wiggling but remaining unconsumed, our frontiersmen forebears weren’t impressed by the arguments of those claiming that land ownership requires neither cultivation nor mall-building.  

(And don’t even try to pretend there was no such thing as ‘owning land’. That doesn’t even make sense. That’s like saying you can’t own people – ridiculous.)

It was genuinely maddening. Let’s not overlook that. Mixed in with the greed and selfishness and prejudice and maybe even some dark damnable thoughts was palpable frustration – an almost holy outrage – that this land was being denied them by a people unwilling to do more than jiggle their Jello.

We needed that land – we deserved that land (because if having it allows us to establish worthiness, then we should have it BECAUSE we’re worthy – it makes perfect sense, if you don’t think about it too closely).  

This is not just about me and mine – although it IS very much also about me and mine. We’re here as part of something bigger – something important – something holy – something democratic – something special. 

Killing Indians for personal reasons wasn’t considered particularly onerous by the standards of the day. Most of the civilized world was still pretty comfortable with what would today be condemned as racial and cultural elitism. This was beyond that, though – this was brushing aside a backwards culture and a darkened people (figuratively?) to make room for progress. Light. Democracy. The New Way. 

Because we NEEDED this land for settlers. For homesteaders. For citizens. Without it, there’s no progress. Without sufficient land, the whole of-the-by-the-for-the concept clogs up – it could even fail. And if American democracy fails, the new nation fails. If it fails here, it fails everywhere. Tyranny returns, darkness wins, and monsters rule the earth.

Conflict with Mexico was not much different. Their culture was nothing like most Amerindian peoples, but neither did we particularly fathom or appreciate their social structure, economic mores, or anything else – nor they ours. Perhaps outright disdain for one another played a different role than with the Natives, and certainly by that point the sheer momentum of Westward Expansion eclipsed whatever underlying values or beliefs had fueled it a generation prior, but whatever the immediate motivations, the same conviction of absolute rightness oozed from the words and letters of those pinche gabachos manifesting their destiny.  

It’s not logical, but it is very human to devalue how others process their world and the goals they choose to pursue. The Natives had every opportunity to make themselves productive – to get a little schooling (hell, we offered it to them FOR FREE), learn proper civilization, even to take care of themselves through the miracles of modern agriculture. The Mexicans had plenty of chances to be, um… less Mexican.

But let’s set aside for a moment that we were inflicting antithetical values and lifestyles on a diversity of proud peoples. We’ll ignore the generations of broken treaties and outright deception. I’d like to focus on the third element of the equation – the rigged game, even should the Locals choose to play our way. 

Poor tools. Bad soil. Spoiled supplies. If there’s such a thing as a “level playing field,” this wasn’t it.

They were assigned a value system and lifestyle they didn’t want, with the full weight of state and federal governments forcing compliance. They were assigned the worst land on which to practice this new system, and given inadequate tools and other supplies. The stakes were incredibly high – at best, they were expected to emulate those with the right equipment, in which case they could perhaps almost survive as second-class citizens. More likely, they would fail, starve, or simply give up – this not being a game they’d wished to play anyway. The dominant citizenry would then point to this “failure” and label them as lazy, incompetent, or otherwise flawed.

(If you didn’t know better, you’d think I was talking about how conservatives manage public education, wouldn’t you? There may be many reasons to study and enjoy history, but the last thing we want to do is to begin recognizing the variety of ways in which humanity manifests the same tendencies and plays the same games across time and place. We might have to learn from it and confront it in real life, and let’s face it – that’s awkward for everyone.)

After the Civil War, many Freedmen believed they deserved – that they had in fact been promised – “40 Acres and a Mule.” Some had actually been granted such at the unauthorized discretion of Union generals who, reasonably enough, took land from defeated plantation-owners and redistributed it to former slaves.

These few instances were reversed to smooth the transition into Reconstruction and maintain the almost cultish commitment Americans had to property rights – and, apparently, to irony. The freedmen received nothing.

Well, that’s not entirely true. They received freedom. That was a pretty big deal. But freedom to do… what? With no education, no land, no resources, no momentum – what, exactly, were their options?

Many stayed where they were, working the same land they’d been working, in exchange for food and shelter. Others left their former “masters” and wandered, either seeking loved ones from whom they’d been separated or simply wanting to go… somewhere else.

Many ended up working for white landowners under various arrangements. The South had just lost a rather brutal war – they didn’t have money to pay anyone. But food, shelter, a place to be… that they had. Eventually sharecropping and tenant farming were ubiquitous. 

Freedmen didn’t have any land, or a realistic way to obtain land. Carpetbaggers from the North began establishing schools, the government had a few agencies, but overall opportunity was… limited. Just over a decade after the South surrendered the war, the North surrendered Reconstruction and brought their troops home in exchange for the Presidency of Rutherford B. Hayes.

You all remember Hayes, right? A President for whom it was worth giving up the closest the nation had ever come to realizing its founding ideals?

Yeah, me neither.

The freedman had gained everything – in theory. On paper, they were free! The men could vote! Land ownership! Education! Equality before the law! Unalienable rights, in your FACE!

But without land, or a practical way to obtain land, they couldn’t provide for themselves. The system didn’t facilitate advancement via laboring for others – just ask the Lowell Girls, the Newsies, or any ox. Freedmen (or others without land) couldn’t do the things people had been conditioned to expect as a prerequisite for suffrage – for being a ‘full American’.

Despite written law, it was ridiculously difficult for freedmen to vote. It was impossible to gain economic ground, individually or as a community. Expression is severely limited when any unpopular thought can result in loss of livelihood. How does one maintain a sense of self against so much negation? At what point do we become our labels?

That’s the suffrage part. If Jefferson was correct about the spiritual and moral benefits of “laboring in the earth,” working land belonging to another may or may not have been worth partial divine credit. In terms of vested interest in our collective national success, whatever support black Americans lent to their country came without terrestrial reciprocation.

White men who succeeded under the system believed they deserved to succeed. Most had genuinely worked hard and made good choices by the standards of the time. It was not entirely logical to see those who did not flourish as clearly undeserving – but it was entirely human. We are not, after all, overly rational beings.

We all want to be part of a meaningful system, an ordered universe, and to be justified in whatever satisfaction we draw from our efforts. Generally, ‘facts’ adjust themselves to fit our paradigms rather than the reverse. That’s not specifically a white thing – that’s a people thing.

What began as a checklist for civic participation became the default measure of a man. What was intended to protect representative government from the incompetent or slothful became an anchor on those who didn’t fit certain checklists as of 225 years ago. They were unworthy. Not quite full Americans – and thus not quite real people. Not in the ways that counted.

The issue became your state of being rather than your efforts, choices, or abilities. It was self-perpetuating and self-reinforcing. It became circular.

Eventually land would lose its status as the ultimate measure and cure-all, and we’d find something new which absolutely must be made theoretically available to all for ‘democracy’ – such as it is – to survive. This new ‘golden ticket’ would replace land in terms of both the opportunity it purports to provide and the gage by which we rank value and ability. As with land, many will feel compelled to force the façade of equity into the equation while denying the risk of large-scale success by undesirables. {Hint: it starts with an ‘E’ and rhymes with ‘zeducation’.}

But that’s a few generations away. For now, men were looking west and feeling the pull of its potential – and of theirs. 

None of our Founders or Framers could have anticipated just how quickly this baby nation would begin filling up – the locals spawning and immigrants flowing in as fast as boats could carry them. Nor is it fair to judge their worldviews and prejudices entirely by the standards of our own times. We can recognize their shortcomings and even their sins without completely demonizing them. 

It did mean, however, that the ideals on which the nation had been founded quickly proved problematic in their implementation. Even in the limited, white male paradigm of the day, fulfilling those ideals seemed to require more territory than we’d realized. And yet… they still seemed like such promising ideals.

We were going to need even more land, or this wasn’t going to work.

Land Ownership and the Foundations of Democracy, Part One (What Made This Particular Destiny So Manifest?)

Land was a big deal when our little experiment in democracy began. Why?

Let’s ask the Founding Fathers. They seemed bright. 

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed… 

(Declaration of Independence, 1776)

Consent of the governed? As in, the people being ruled make the rules, and all that? Huh – big responsibility. Harder than it sounds.

Given the number of reality shows based on the challenges of a dozen or so people living together in a free house with unlimited alcohol and no jobs, running an entire country based on the collective will of the masses seems… problematic. “Come at me, IDAHO!”

And the rallying cry had been “No taxation without representation!” The phrase has survived, but over the years we’ve lost sight of something rather obvious in these words, and inherent to our founding ideology: If paying taxes means you deserve to have a voice in your government, then it’s not unreasonable to suggest that having a voice in your government is contingent on your willingness and ability to pay taxes. 

In other words, you have to own something valuable enough to be taxed. Like, say… land.

So we have two issues in play as the Founders wrestle with outlining this new government – the connection between paying into the system and thus earning a voice in the running of that system, and the practical challenges of who exactly “consents” to that government on behalf of the whole. Little wonder our progenitors might try to reconcile them in concert – hopefully without overtly dialing back those fancy new ideals they’d been proclaiming to justify the entire project. 

They weren’t starting from scratch. There were some longstanding assumptions about land ownership – or the lack thereof – with which they could begin. 

If it were probable that every man would give his vote freely, and without influence of any kind, then, upon the true theory and genuine principles of liberty, every member of the community, however poor, should have a vote…

You gotta pay close attention when any argument begins with “in theory…”

But since that can hardly be expected, in persons of indigent fortunes, or such as are under the immediate dominion of others, all popular states have been obliged to establish certain qualifications, whereby, some who are suspected to have no will of their own, are excluded from voting; in order to set other individuals, whose wills may be supposed independent, more thoroughly upon a level with each other.” 

(Alexander Hamilton, Quoting Blackstone’s Commentaries on The Laws of England, 1775)

So, in order to assure that everyone’s political voice is more or less equal, we’re going to have to deny a political voice to some – to those without the ability to provide for themselves. Otherwise, the entire representative system may be undermined through the ability of the wealthy to manipulate the indigent.

Ironic, huh?

Then again, Hamilton was kinda Machiavellian about such things. Maybe someone less… cynical?

Viewing the subject in its merits alone…

That sounds a whole lot like “in theory” again…

…the freeholders of the country would be the safest depositories of republican liberty. In future times the great majority of the people will not only be without landed, but any other sort of property. These will either combine under the influence of their common situation, in which case the rights of property and the public liberty will not be secure in their hands; or, which is more probable, they will become the tools of opulence and ambition, in which case there will be equal danger on another side. 

(James Madison, Speech in the Constitutional Convention, August 1787)

No help here from the ‘Father of the Constitution’. Apparently handing power over to men without land leads to either a tyranny of the masses (mob rule) or a system in which the ignorant and easily agitated are led about by the manipulations of the wealthy and power-hungry.

My god, we wouldn’t want that. Can you imagine?

It appears that while our new nation was taking the concept of self-rule well beyond anything previously attempted, there were still substantial concerns over appropriate limits. This isn’t a dilemma unique to starting new nations. It’s one thing to talk about student-directed learning, for example, but quite another to hand them the chalk and the wifi password and tell them you’ll check back in May.

Get too idealistic, and the system devolves into chaos. Maintain too much structure – aka, limitations – and you quickly become just like whatever system you were trying to get away from. It’s like trying to balance Jello on your nose while you learn to unicycle. 

Hey – you know who we didn’t ask? Jefferson! I mean, you can find quotes from Jefferson to prove just about anything, right?

You have lived longer than I have and perhaps may have formed a different judgment on better grounds; but my observations do not enable me to say I think integrity the characteristic of wealth. In general I believe the decisions of the people, in a body, will be more honest & more disinterested than those of wealthy men: & I can never doubt an attachment to his country in any man who has his family & peculium in it…

(Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Edmund Pendleton Philadelphia, Aug. 26, 1776) 

I had to look up ‘peculium’. It means ‘stuff’ – including family, income, etc. Not quite the same as land, but still property – still evidence of competence via one’s successful estate. In other words, no help from T.J.

Jefferson here confesses to a sort of paradox – he doesn’t believe for a moment that wealth indicates personal integrity or even political wisdom. At the same time, he finds it easier to trust the input of someone who’s invested in the success of the nation of which they’re a part. 

It’s the difference between shopping at Bobo’s Grocery Extravaganza and working there, or between working at Bobo’s and investing your life savings in Bobo stock. If I’m a shopper and Bobo’s fails, it’s merely inconvenient. If I work there and it fails, it’s a problem.

But if my kids’ college savings and my retirement are all tied up in Bobo’s, I’m going to go above and beyond to do a great job every time I’m there. I may clean up even when that’s not part of my job, or study up on products I’m not actually required to know about. I’ll certainly be ultra-friendly to every customer who walks in the door. Heck, I may come in on my day off just to kinda help out. 

Because I’m invested. 

Land ownership suggests one is not only capable, but invested in the nation’s success. If I’m a landowner, I care very much about the next election, the local statutes, the state questions. Crazy Harold who lives under the bridge talking to his urine may be a nice guy, but he’s not overly concerned with researching the finer points of foreign policy. 

Well, unless his pee tells him to. 

So it seems that whatever else they argued about, our Founding Fathers were largely in agreement about one thing. Landowners were reliable, and self-sufficient. Their voice was their own. Those without? Not so much.

Keep in mind this was a new country – a baby nation. The Declaration was as much a birth certificate as a break-up letter, and our forebears were trying something entirely new. They were idealists, sure – but they were also educated, and realists, and had some idea of the ways in which people tend to behave.

If this ‘self-government’ thing didn’t work, America would fail. If America failed, then democracy had failed. And if democracy failed here, it effectively failed everywhere – in many cases it would never even begin.

The Dark Ages would return – tyranny and ignorance. Monsters once again rule the earth. It would be what we in the social sciences call “bad.”

It was John Adams (of all people) who best explained how the young nation could be both a land of opportunity and pragmatically defend itself against fools and freeloaders.

It is certain in Theory, that the only moral Foundation of Government is the Consent of the People.

There’s that “in theory” again…

But to what an Extent Shall We carry this Principle? Shall We Say, that every Individual of the Community, old and young, male and female, as well as rich and poor, must consent, expressly to every Act of Legislation? No, you will Say. This is impossible…

Adams probably talked too much, but I do love how he steps his audience through his reasoning. It’s very Socrates, very Holmes, very Bill Nye the Government Guy. Franklin may have been the poster child of the Enlightenment in the New World, but Adams was its lesson-planner and incessant blogger.

But why exclude Women? You will Say, because their Delicacy renders them unfit for Practice and Experience, in the great Business of Life, and the hardy Enterprizes of War, as well as the arduous Cares of State. Besides, their attention is So much engaged with the necessary Nurture of their Children, that Nature has made them fittest for domestic Cares. And Children have not Judgment or Will of their own…

How did Abigail not kill him regularly?

I know a number of impressive women both professionally and personally. They are varied and wonderful creatures, but very few qualify for the epithet ‘delicate’. Clearly John was not in the room during childbirth.

But will not these Reasons apply to others? Is it not equally true, that Men in general in every Society, who are wholly destitute of Property, are also too little acquainted with public Affairs to form a Right Judgment, and too dependent upon other Men to have a Will of their own? … Such is the Frailty of the human Heart, that very few Men, who have no Property, have any Judgment of their own…

There it is – the same basic argument which was made time and again by our Framers. You gotta pass the 8th grade reading test to take Driver’s Ed, you gotta keep a ‘C’ average or better to play football, and you gotta have your own land to vote. It’s nothing personal. It’s simply an imperfect indicator of minimal competence.

Doctors gotta have degrees to doctor on you. Accountants have to be certified to do spreadsheets on your behalf. Barbers have to have special certificates confirming their competence to snip your hair off with scissors. None of these hold the power over the vast numbers of people a voter does. None could do the damage possible at the hands of the unqualified citizen.

Or so they reasoned. Personally, I think they were overreacting. I mean, pretty much everyone can vote today, right? And things are going –

OK, maybe they weren’t overreacting. 

But Adams doesn’t leave it at that. He elaborates on a solution, a counterbalance. He looks at the long game.

Power always follows Property. This I believe to be as infallible a Maxim, in Politicks, as, that Action and Re-action are equal, is in Mechanicks. Nay I believe We may advance one Step farther and affirm that the Ballance of Power in a Society, accompanies the Ballance of Property in Land.

The only possible Way then of preserving the Ballance of Power on the side of equal Liberty and public Virtue, is to make the Acquisition of Land easy to every Member of Society: to make a Division of the Land into Small Quantities, So that the Multitude may be possessed of landed Estates.

If the Multitude is possessed of the Ballance of real Estate, the Multitude will have the Ballance of Power, and in that Case the Multitude will take Care of the Liberty, Virtue, and Interest of the Multitude in all Acts of Government. 

(Letter to James Sullivan, May 1776) 

It’s all kinda understatement to say that the first century of American history was largely shaped by this need for land. 

Some of it was primal and selfish, of course. At times, shiny rocks were in the ground or particularly nice lumber stuck up out of it. But those were the temporal motivators. The ethical Under Armour of expansion as a whole was this political – almost spiritual – paradigm. 

To be a City on a Hill, one must have a hill. To be a republic – a government of-the-by-the-for-the – one must have qualified voters. The most universal way to demonstrate basic responsibility, competence, and character, was land ownership. Thus the almost sacred role of land in both the founding and expanding of this new democracy. It was, to many Framers, the most obvious and tangible measure of a man’s legitimacy, his investment, and his potential value as another voice in the national discussion. 

Without widespread, relatively easy access to land, democracy wasn’t possible, and this grand experiment would fail. If democracy failed here, it effectively failed everywhere – it would, in fact, never even begin elsewhere.

Dark Ages. Tyranny and ignorance. Monsters rule the earth.

Every homestead was a 160-acre, individually-sized portion of national ideals. Its role was not asserted so much as perceived – much like many other “self-evident” truths bandied about in those days. And as if that weren’t enough, the issue wasn’t solely terrestrial.

Those who labor in the earth are the chosen people of God, if ever He had a chosen people, whose breasts He has made his peculiar deposit for substantial and genuine virtue. It is the focus in which he keeps alive that sacred fire which otherwise might escape from the face of the earth. Corruption of morals in the mass of cultivators is a phenomenon of which no age nor nation has furnished an example. 

(Thomas Jefferson, Notes on Virginia, 1782)

I’m no authority on Jefferson, but you don’t know that – so let’s just play along and not make trouble, alright?

“Those who labor in the earth…” 

I suppose he could have just said “farmers,” but this paints a more vivid picture to set up where he’s going. It’s not about a role in the economy or the food chain – it’s about the agency of individuals, applied not merely to ground or soil but to the “earth”. It’s a wide-angle lens on an idealized way of life – Jefferson’s strength.

“…the chosen people of God, if ever He had a chosen people…” 

Wow. Jefferson getting all allusion-y up in here. The most obvious antecedent would be the Israelites of the Old Testament. Jefferson wasn’t a huge fan of biblical literalism, but that wouldn’t negate its value as a frame of reference. 

The addition of “if ever he had a chosen people” may be read as emphasis (“that’s a miracle if ever I saw one!”) or a touch of skepticism (“if there are such things as miracles, this would be one”) – an ambivalence consistent with his few recorded thoughts on scripture. But the power of the image – the holy role of the Hebrew children –he utilizes quite intentionally.

It wasn’t much of a leap from Old Testament progenitors to fresh young Americans – the City on a Hill, the people whose destiny was quickly becoming manifest, and a culture who a century later would carry their “white man’s burden” well past the boundaries of the continent.

But for now the issue was land – or at least the way of life it promoted.

Farmers worked 365 days a year. Soil still needing tilling on your birthday, cows needed milked on Christmas, and no matter how sick you might be, those crops weren’t going to reap themselves. It was labor-intensive and the hours were long, and yet after doing all you could do, all day every day – you waited.

You waited for the rain. You waited for the growth. You waited for the births. You waited for the universe to do its part.

Sometimes it didn’t. Often, even when it did, it took too long and was too slow and there was no way to rush it, but many ways to ruin it. This combination of intense human application and eternal patience is inconceivable generations later. Almost nothing works that way anymore – at least not the sorts of things to which you set your hand on purpose, to carry proudly from cradle to grave.

Sometimes enough years and sufficient survival teach similar lessons in the 21st century – but they come too late to shape much more than our troubled reflections. The laboring Jefferson extols, however, produced “substantial genuine virtue” – a type of perspective and wisdom unavailable minus the requisite experiences.

You won’t find accounts of farmers going rogue in meaningful numbers, he claims. Presumably this is related to all that “virtue” and “sacred fire,” but it also seems unlikely that any successful farmer could have found the time or energy to be particularly corrupt. The natural consequences of immorality or irresponsibility would be an immediate, self-inflicted deterrent. Like playing in the traffic or juggling chainsaws, any screw-ups would be painfully self-correcting.

Agriculture… is our wisest pursuit, because it will in the end contribute most to real wealth, good morals and happiness.  The wealth acquired by speculation and plunder, is fugacious in its nature, and fills society with the spirit of gambling.  The moderate and sure income of husbandry, begets permanent improvement, quiet life, and orderly conduct both public and private.”  

(Thomas Jefferson, Letter to George Washington, 1787)

Jefferson had a distrust of bankers, stock markets, or anything financial industry-ish – so much so that he took great personal pride in never having the foggiest idea how to make his estate solvent. (He died in substantial debt.) Farmers raised essentials. They produced raw materials which could be woven into clothing, smoked for pleasure, eaten to survive. “Real wealth.”

Bankers scribbled numbers in little books, in stuffy rooms, producing nothing, but somehow always taking from you. Farmers dealt in uncertainty, but financiers gambled. While farmers produced, money men “plundered.” The soil, properly tended, would always be there – would always prove reliable. Paper numbers and percentage points never were.

Jefferson is claiming an essential role of land beyond voter qualifications. He’s claiming it as a lifestyle – a moral anchor, social stabilizer, and the only true source of economic security. Husbandry grows in men the essential traits of a fledgling democracy – applied labor, determination, patience, and pragmatism. It’s the wisdom of the earth in the hands of the earth’s masters.

Those Enlightenment-types thought science-y thoughts, but they were still quite comfortable with a little melodramatic sheen to their carefully chosen words. I can’t imagine what it must have been like to spend twice as much time on how you say something as you did on what you were actually saying. Sounds tiring. 

*ironic yawn* 

I think our governments will remain virtuous for many centuries as long as they are chiefly agricultural; and this will be as long as there shall be vacant lands in any part of America. When they get piled upon one another in large cities as in Europe, they will become corrupt as in Europe.” 

(Thomas Jefferson, Letter to James Madison, 1787)

Uh-oh.

As yet our manufacturers are as much at their ease, as independent and moral as our agricultural inhabitants, and they will continue so as long as there are vacant lands for them to resort to; because whenever it shall be attempted by the other classes to reduce them to the minimum of subsistence, they will quit their trades and go to laboring the earth.” 

(Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Mr. J. Lithgow, 1805)

So let’s recap…

Land ownership allows the property owner to demonstrate his capability, his competence, his potential to be a useful voice – a valid voter. It suggested he was invested in the success of the nation. 

Land ownership promotes solidity, character, ethereal virtues reflected in wise words and actions – valuable in and of themselves, sure, but especially necessary in a nation relying on the people themselves to provide effective leadership – directly or through their choices regarding representation.

Land must be available to meet the demands of an expanding nation. Without sufficient, arable land, the ideals on which the nation was founded lack the requisite elements to survive. It’s not an optional ingredient – it’s the eggs in the democracy omelet, the flour in the ‘Mericake. 

Finally, in a nod to inconveniently unfolding realities, Jefferson argues that even the POTENTIAL of land ownership – its availability – provides an essential safety valve, a check on the industrializing leaven of Europe as it attempts to leaven the entire American loaf. That he so easily adjusts his faith to accommodate current events I leave to you to interpret as you see fit.

None of our Founders could have anticipated just how quickly this baby nation would begin filling up – the locals spawning and immigrants flowing in as fast as boats could carry them. If these fancy new ideals were going to expand with them, we needed to act quickly.

Opportunity. Responsibility. Chosen people. If it fails here, it fails everywhere. Darkness. Tyranny. Monsters rule the earth.

They were going to need more land. And looking west, it was largely taken…

The “Mourning Wars” – from “Have To” History

Stuff You Don’t Really Want To Know (But For Some Reason Have To) About the “Mourning Wars”

Three Big Things:

Mourning Wars1. Eastern Amerindians in colonial times practiced a very different sort of warfare than the large-scale, mass destruction favored by European powers.

2. One of the primary goals of this sort of warfare was to replace lost loved ones with captives taken from enemy tribes.

3. Captives not used as faux family members were generally executed, sometimes after long ritual torture. It was… harsh.   

Eastern Amerindian Warfare

The Amerindians whom northern American colonists were most likely to encounter weren’t necessarily more peaceful than Europeans, but the type of warfare in which they most often engaged and the goals of such hostilities were substantially different.

East of the Great Plains, all the way to the Eastern Seaboard, numerous tribes (the Iroquois are the best remembered, but there were dozens of others) were locked into perpetual retaliation, each act of aggression requiring response. Every death of a loved one or tribal member demanded retribution; each raid required a counter. These weren’t the sort of extended, large-scale undertakings common in European conflicts. Tribes struck quickly, inflicted what damage they could, often taking captives and leaving behind a few casualties, then retreated to their own settlements. 

There was little interest in taking over your enemy’s entire land, if such a thing were even possible. What would you do with it? Besides, while the thirst for requital was no doubt genuine, warfare served multiple other roles – a uniting cause for the communities involved, a sense of justice or closure for those mourning loved ones lost to previous conflicts, a road to honor and status for young warriors seeking to establish their manhood, and – depending on the tribe – a supply of victims for whatever ritual tortures and sacrifice were thought to please the gods or placate the beyond.

What’s perhaps most foreign to the western worldview, however, is what else they provided – substitutes for family members taken or killed by the tribe now under attack.

Like, literally.

The “Mourning Wars”

These “mourning wars” – often initiated at the behest of tribal matriarchs still grieving the loss of sons, brothers, or husbands – were particularly focused on taking captives from enemy tribes. Some of these captives would be tortured, many killed, but a significant number would be inserted into the roles left open by previous raids or other misfortune. This was, in fact, often the central motivator – not a certain number of enemy deaths, and certainly not captured or destroyed villages, but warm bodies of roughly the same age and potential of those lost. If they looked similar, well… bonus!

There was thus no shame in avoiding open confrontation whenever possible, as the resulting death toll was counterproductive to the purposes of the attack. Ambushes were far preferable, as were relatively low risk hit-n-runs. While more than willing to face suffering or death, warriors weren’t exactly seeking it out.

The glory of martial self-sacrifice is a culturally constructed phenomenon – it’s not inherent to all times and places. Our veneration for violent death may be laudable, but it’s not universal. To quote the fictional George S. Patton in his ‘Ode to Enormous Flags’… “No dumb bastard ever won a war by going out and dying for his country. He won it by making some other dumb bastard die for his country.”

All these years later and that bit still brings a tear.

This aversion to violent death wasn’t mere cowardice. It was largely spiritual – many tribal belief systems consigned victims of such hostility to wander the earth eternally seeking vengeance, or otherwise unable to find peace. It was intensely practical as well – these were relatively small tribal units in which every member played an essential role. Even should a warrior or two wish to seek status via bravado or reckless tactics, doing so would have been irresponsible and borderline disloyal to the community who would lose his presence and his support as a result.

Which brings us back to the captives – the ‘replacements’, if you will.

Being taken captive could be terrifying, even if you had some idea what to expect. Anyone perceived as potentially more trouble than they were worth – women or children of the wrong age or build, or warriors capable of fighting back even after captured – were more often than not scalped and killed on the spot. Most, though, were bound and led back to the village, where they would be forced to walk among the tribe while being hit, insulted, and otherwise abused. Sometimes they were cut or burned. It sounds nasty.

Captured warriors were likely to face extended torture and public humiliation – often in retribution for similar offenses by their own tribe. They were expected to endure such suffering stoically, which most apparently did, although it’s difficult to discern too many details from surviving records – most of which come down to us through the occasional white folk involved for one reason or another, their very presence no doubt altering the experience. These same accounts suggest it was common to eat the condemned afterwards, which makes a certain amount of symbolic sense, but which might also be the sort of thing added to further ‘other’-ize or demonize native populations.

Surviving women and children were assigned to families based on their general age, appearance, or skill set, as were young men who were found to be particularly handsome or potentially useful. They were given the name of the person they were intended to replace, along with any title or position that person had held, and over time generally ‘became’ that person – to the point of becoming a very real part of their new family, and eventually loyal to their adopted tribe.

This apparently provided a sort of comfort to mourning family members, along with whatever sense of justice or restitution they craved, and the community was reinforced in both numbers and spirit as a result. However foreign it may seem to western norms, it was practical and effective. No one wanted to be on the losing end of these bargains, but there’s no indication that anyone involved protested or found a problem with the system itself. Over time, it maintained balance and numbers among the various tribes – unlike, say, European style warfare, whose entire purpose was to destroy and eliminate the enemy, whatever the cost on both sides.

Upsetting Balance

It’s most likely with this guiding balance in mind that tribal leaders discouraged young men from taking matters into their own hands and initiating raids on their own. While strict hierarchical rule was not in the nature of most Amerindian cultures, community members generally deferred to the wisdom and wishes of those who’d proved themselves capable and wise. In return, leadership avoided anything approaching dictatorial control, steering the community instead by example and clearheaded thinking.

Through subtle combinations of gifts or other gestures of goodwill, peace could be established and maintained with some – if not all – neighboring tribes. For tribes who developed trade with one another, peace was not only desirable but likely. And if there were even distant kinship connections, well… besties! Conversely, groups with particularly fierce reputations were able to maintain a degree of peace and security via fear – they simply weren’t worth tangling with. Losses and suffering would outweigh gains and glory.

Despite the seemingly brutal and unforgiving nature of the “mourning wars,” there were rules – however informal. Then, as now, young men out to establish a reputation for themselves did not always defer to the wisdom of their elders. Among the eastern tribes of pre-colonial and colonial times, this was especially unfortunate since the overarching purpose of warfare was to stabilize and preserve one’s own people; unprovoked or reckless raids set off a chain of reprisals which of course did quite the opposite.

As with so many other elements of Native American culture, the arrival of white folks, their weaponry, their land hunger, and of course their arsenal of diseases, completely overturned whatever “stability” had been maintained by these “mourning wars.” Efforts to replace those lost to smallpox or other epidemics quickly destroyed weaker communities, while guns and other technology spread unevenly through the mix, making previous realities unsustainable.

You Wanna Sound REALLY Smart? {Extra Stuff}

If you need to sound thoughtful about the “mourning wars”, consider some comparisons to other systems of maintaining population or community balance which also strike modern western readers as a mite odd.

There are numerous examples of polygamous cultures – from the Latter Day Saints in the 19th century U.S. all the way back to the Old Testament Jews (think King David and such). Multiple wives was one way to promote rapid reproduction and maintain population, especially for marginalized or otherwise endangered groups. It’s a great example of morality being shaped by need and circumstance.

The age at which young women are considered marriable (and thus, appropriate sexual partners) has varied widely from culture to culture over the centuries. The shorter the lifespan and harder the living, the younger the appropriate age tends to be.

One of the most interesting customs related to reproduction was described by Marco Polo as he traveled across Asia. High in the mountains he encountered isolated communities in which he was welcomed into every home and encouraged to stay as long as he liked – in the daughter’s room, in the sister’s room, even in the master bedroom while the husband was suddenly called away on business. Polo feigns moral shock on behalf of his reading audience while exploiting the salaciousness for a page or two before explaining that because these communities were so isolated, they relied on random travelers to inject much-needed variety into their gene pools. Western morality could very well have crippled or destroyed them within a few generations.

The other direction you might consider if called upon to discuss the “mourning wars” is to focus on the contrast between Amerindian warfare and “white guy” warfare. The long traditions of independence – even during battle – among the majority of tribes worked poorly against strict hierarchical military structure of the west. Generations of limited warfare prioritizing glory or capture or territory ran into a military tradition of capture and destroy, with predictable results.

The Civil War in I.T. (From “Well, OK Then…”)

The time between Indian Removal in the 1830s and the outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861 was a comparatively peaceful – almost prosperous – era for the Five Civilized Tribes (5CT). 

Then again, when you have a century of suck on either side of a generation, the bar for “Golden Age” status isn’t particularly high. 

Historical Divisions

Despite our tendency to speak of the 5CT as a single entity, they were different tribes composed of individual people – and people never quite fit the generalizations we impose in retrospect. Within each tribe there were mixed-bloods and full-bloods, progressives and conservatives, slave-owners and those with little interest in the practice. Every society has those resistant to change and those quick to rebuke their own culture and the ways of their forebears. Every community has outspoken members and those who simply wish to be left alone. The details may vary, but the same was true of the relocated tribes. 

The full-bloods tended to be conservative and – having no desire for cash crops – had little interest in owning slaves. The mixed-bloods tended to speak more English and interact with whites – being family and all – and were more likely to participate in the larger economy. They were far more likely to own slaves, although many did not. 

There were exceptions to these generalizations, the most obvious of which was John Ross – a mixed-blood Cherokee who spoke perfect English and had been educated in white-run schools. He was nevertheless considered overall “Chief” of the Cherokee, with his most loyal followers being the older, full-blood members of the tribe. 

The greatest bitterness, though, came from divisions during Indian Removal. The “Western Cherokee” who’d moved in 1817 had largely embraced the New Echota group, led by Stand Watie and others, upon their arrival in the early 1830s. Those arriving on “Trail of Tears” several years later felt betrayed on the deepest level by those who’d signed the treaties trading away their homelands. Several “Treaty Party” leaders had been assassinated in response.

The Creek experienced a similar split, aggravating issues predating removal. They emigrated to I.T. in waves, beginning with supporters of William McIntosh – another leader executed for his compromises. The Choctaw and Chickasaw had their own struggles with removal, but they stayed largely united during the experience. And the Seminole…

The Seminole are just always hard to pin down in regards to anything. They fought removal and never actually lost, even though many moved. They had “slaves” that weren’t quite actually “slaves” – just… not quite new additions to the tribe. And they… 

I’m not really sure what to tell you about the Seminole. 

Nevertheless, the Tribes largely rebuilt their worlds in the generation after removal. They established new schools, churches, communities, and in some cases even printed their own newspapers. What would later be named “Oklahoma” was, for a generation, truly a “Land of the Red Man,” although it was largely a “Land of the Black Man” as well. Slavery among the Tribes was still slavery, but it was rarely as brutal or dehumanizing as it was in the South. In some cases it was essentially independent living in exchange for a share of whatever they’d grown or produced. 

And then the white people got into a war. With themselves. 

Bringing I.T. Into the War

By and large, the 5CT were more than happy to learn that white people were shooting at one another. This was a win-win for them. They weren’t in a geographically essential location – that was part of the reason it was chosen, after all – and had little interest in involving themselves in the white man’s war, at least at first.

Until Albert Pike arrived. 

Pike was a Hagrid-looking character, a southerner who’d been born and raised in the north. He began his professional life as a reporter in Arkansas, then a lawyer, and became a strong advocate for various southeastern tribes over the years – minus time in the military fighting in the Mexican-American war. A staunch defender of slavery, he became a loyal Confederate when sides were chosen. 

Pike was an ideal choice of ambassador to the 5CT. He was familiar and trusted, and he made compelling arguments why they should support the South in this war.  

The Choctaw and Chickasaw signed up with little debate. They were already more like the American South than the remaining tribes, more agricultural and owning more slaves than the rest. The remaining tribes split over the issue – often along lines lingering from previous disputes. While officially all Five of the “Civilized Tribes” joined the Confederacy, substantial minorities of the Cherokee, Creek, and Seminole fought for the Union. That whole “brother against brother” thing was brutal for everyone involved, but in some ways it hurt the 5CT most. 

At first gander, the preponderance of support for the South seems surprising – the Tribes had been ejected from the south, and harassed by southern states prior to that. But that’s not how most viewed the situation. It’s almost certainly not how Pike framed it. 

So why join the Confederacy?

First and foremost, the Tribes owned slaves. Most individuals did not, but that was true of the American South as well. The culture supported it, and the same folks who tended to be fiscally ambitious enough to need slaves tended to be politically active as well. Leaders who weren’t slave-owners weren’t exactly abolitionists either, so there was little in the way of a “balancing viewpoint.” There were pro-slavery voices, and there were those who had other concerns instead.  

Second, Indian Removal was remembered as a betrayal of the “Great White Father” in Washington, D.C. – not so much as a conflict with individual states. Their treaties had been made with federal power, and either enforced or broken by federal soldiers taking federal orders. It didn’t help that the same federal government wasn’t particularly consistent following through with promised supplies and other resources. 

Third, the Union soldiers who’d been stationed in and around I.T. as part of the Tribes’ latest treaties with the U.S. had been pulled and reassigned as soon as it became clear war was coming. It’s not that the Tribes were such great buddies with the soldiers, but plenty of Plains Indians who hadn’t earned the sobriquet “Civilized” were still active in the region, and the U.S. military provided a decent buffer against their brutality. 

Fourth, the 5CT had more in common with Americans in the south than they did those in the north. Friends or not, many Amerindians practiced agriculture – none owned factories. Many lived on farms or in what white culture would see as ‘semi-rural’ settings – none lived in tenements. Many relied on themselves and their traditions to guide them – few saw value in reform movements, technological progress, or ‘Great Awakenings.’ While the federal government had let them down repeatedly, the largely sympathetic ‘Indian Agents’ with whom they dealt and through whom they processed white society were mostly from the south. 

Finally, with no way to predict the outcome of the conflict, the South offered them a better deal. The North – in the form of the federal government – had already lost whatever credibility they might have had, while the South promised the Tribes more protections, greater autonomy, and all those “states’ rights” kinds of things that would become so prominently recalled after the war. The South also promised to assume commitments made under previous treaties with the U.S., including the annuities the North had ceased as soon as distracted by conflict with the South. The North and their President Lincoln, meanwhile, were aggressively promoting westward expansion. If you don’t see an immediate problem for the tribes in that, look at any map. 

So, despite the splits described previously, the Confederacy it was.

It wasn’t going to work out as well as they’d hoped. 

Red, White, and War 

Like anything in history – especially when that anything is a war – the depths into one might plunge are limitless. I generally limit myself to four key events when covering the Civil War in I.T. 

1. Opothleyahola

Opothleyahola – or “Opie” as we end up calling him in class if we ever wish to get past the ongoing struggle to pronounce his name comfortably – was a Creek leader who’d been fighting the federal government and white encroachment as far back as the War of 1812. He was a wealthy landowner, a Baptist, and a Freemason (all the cool kids were back then). 

By the time the Civil War came to I.T., Opie was so over white guys and their talent for disrupting and diminishing the Tribes. He was unwilling to join the Confederacy, but no fan of the Union. Others of similar mind found their way to his plantation in fits and starts, and he soon found himself the default leader of several thousand Creek, Chickasaw, Seminole – even some runaway slaves and other miscellany. The unifying characteristic was their desire to stay out of this war. 

Opie received permission from President Lincoln to lead this amalgam to Kansas. There were fewer than 2,000 warriors, but they hoped to avoid conflict with either side. The majority of their band were women, children, old men, and livestock – little threat to anyone. 

It didn’t work out that way, and troops were sent by the Confederacy to persuade them to change their mind. The first “Red on Red violence” of the war took place against a group trying to do what they’d all wanted to do initially – just stay out of it. 

Opothleyahola began his trek with somewhere in the area of 9,000 wanderers, and arrived in Kansas with less than 2,000 by most estimates. War, winter, hunger, and disease did their damage just as they had a generation before. The Union encampment there was completely unprepared for even these diminished numbers, and were of little help. After doing what he could to secure assistance for his people, Opie led those still able to fight back into I.T. to war against the Confederacy. He’d die in one of the Kansas refugee camps before the war was over. 

2. The Battle of Pea Ridge (March 1862)

Early 1962 was not going well for the Confederacy in the Western Theater. Ulysses S. Grant was making a name for himself and captured Ft. Henry and Ft. Donelson along the Mississippi River, nearly cutting the South in two and enabling the Union to squeeze the secesh into submission. The Confederacy saw St. Louis – right there where the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers converge – as the key to reversing this trend. 

General Albert Pike was called to I.T. to take command of Amerindian troops there, primarily Cherokee. They were poorly supplied and barely organized, and many weren’t enthused about supporting the Confederacy. Nevertheless, Pike led them into Arkansas (despite initial guarantees they would fight only to defend I.T.) where they joined in the Battle of Pea Ridge in March of 1862. 

The Battle of Pea Ridge could fill an entire History Channel special. For our purposes, there are three things worth remembering. 

First, this was the first time Cherokee troops fought on this scale in a white man’s battle. The Amerindian ways of fighting were dramatically different than white guys’ methods – the goals, the strategies, and especially the command structure. The U.S. and Confederate militaries were organized along a strict hierarchy. While not as loosely organized as the Plains Tribes, the Cherokee simply didn’t work that way – not socially, not politically, and certainly not militarily. By white military standards, they were a mess. 

Second, most of Pike’s Amerindian troops fought with bows and arrows, or with tomahawks. That’s what they had, and what they knew how to use proficiently. Unfortunately, against somewhat trained soldiers with guns, they were of limited impact in this situation. 

Third, and most importantly, the Cherokee were accused of scalping some of their Union victims. While this apparently did actually happen, the details are a bit vague. What is certain is that knowledge of this spread widely and quickly, growing and distorting in ways you wouldn’t think possible before Facebook. White soldiers on both sides were horrified – that is NOT how civilized men behaved! Kill and maim one another PROPERLY! 

Pike was outraged at the treatment of the Amerindian troops in his command and excoriated in press and popular opinion for “allowing” scalping and general savagery to take place. He was the only white commander on either side to so vigorously advocate for them, albeit unsuccessfully, and he paid the social and political price for doing so. His Cherokee withdrew to I.T. where they were left unsupported and unprotected. 

Oh, and by the way – the Union won. 

3. The Weer Expedition 

The Union had two goals for I.T. in 1862 – push back against Confederate advances in the region, and restore the pro-Union Amerindian refugees to their homes. Seemed simple enough, and the goals certainly complimented one another. 

Colonel William Weer was appointed to command several white and two “Indian Regiments” along with supporting artillery. Pike was so annoyed at this point he refused to even lead the Confederate opposition, although Weer would face sporadic resistance along the way, especially from Cherokee forces led by Stand Watie.

They got as far as Locust Grove, about halfway between modern Tulsa and the Arkansas border. There they defeated some Missouri rebels and captured their supplies, but decided to wait for their own supply train to catch up as well. (It’s not like an army can forage its way through Oklahoma – if the land were that rich, we’d never have sent the Indians here.)

During the wait, Union forces fell apart all on their own, without the Secesh having to do much to help. It was July by then, and hot. Really hot. Too hot. Supplies were running low again, and soldiers with nothing to do and no real fortifications had plenty of time to worry about Confederate counterstrikes. To top it all off, Weer was apparently quite a drinker. Like, crazy useless drunk pretty much full-time by this point. Underlings swore he’d genuinely lost his mind as a result and was no longer fit to lead even when he was sober. 

His second-in-command arrested him and took over, ordering a withdrawal of the white troops but leaving the Amerindians behind without orders. Had the Confederates been in a position to take advantage of this, it could have shifted the balance of power in I.T. back in their favor. But they weren’t, so it didn’t. Those locals who’d been “resettled” were nevertheless nervous about the withdrawal and complete lack of a Union strategy, and most began heading to Kansas yet again, where they spent another winter in refugee camps, suffering from cold, hunger, and disease. 

Overall, the expedition was not considered a huge success. 

4. The Battle of Honey Springs

July of 1863 was arguably THE turning point of the entire Civil War. In the Eastern Theater, Lee’s second and final effort to bring the war to the North was thwarted at the three-day Battle of Gettysburg. In the Western Theater, the nearly two-month-long Siege of Vicksburg perpetrated by U.S. Grant finally ended, securing control of the Mississippi River for the Union. The ‘Anaconda Plan’ was complete (although Winfield Scott had since passed away and thus missed his opportunity to gloat). 

In the same month, the Massachusetts 54th Infantry – the first substantial use of Black troops in the war – made their dramatic but costly charge on Fort Wagner in South Carolina. While a strategic defeat, the performance of the 54th settled for the remainder of the war the question of whether or not Black troops should be allowed to fight as relative equals. Finally, in Indian Territory, the Battle of Honey Springs – the “Gettysburg of the West” – secured Union control of I.T. for the remainder of the war. 

OK, no one outside of Oklahoma teaches Honey Springs as the “Gettysburg of the West.” Most people inside of Oklahoma don’t either. But when you’re Oklahoma, you grab on to whatever validation you can get, kids. 

Did you know Carrie Underwood is from here? And several astronauts? We matter! Shut up! 

A year after the Weer debacle, Union forces had successfully occupied Fort Gibson and were maintaining a limited military presence in I.T. once again. Being how it was a war and all, the Confederacy hoped to drive them out, and assembled about twenty miles away at Honey Springs Depot. From there they sent out cavalry to harass and attack Union supply lines and take advantage of whatever other opportunities presented themselves without fully engaging. 

Honey Springs had already become an important location to the Secesh in Indian Territory. Troops came there for medical attention, to get whatever limited supplies were available, etc. It was essentially “home base” for the South. General Douglas Cooper, a veteran of the Mexican-American War and former Indian Agent to the Choctaw and Chickasaw, was in command. 

It was hard to keep secrets in wartime, and Colonel Phillips, in command of Union forces at Fort Gibson, was well-aware an attack was imminent. Rather than wait for the Confederates to receive reinforcements, Phillips decided to take the war to them. He was joined by Major General James Blunt from Kansas, who brought additional troops and artillery, and who would thenceforth be in charge. 

As mentioned earlier, war aficionados can stay all tingly for days over the details of this or that battle, strategy, or new bridle design. Here are the key points I consider worth remembering about Honey Springs – other than that “Gettysburg of the West” thing, I mean. 

First, it was arguably the most racially diverse battle of the Civil War. Blunts troops were a mixture of white, Black, and Amerindian forces, while Cooper’s troops were mostly Amerindian with a few white regiments. Whites were in the minority on both sides. 

Second, it rained. In addition to the general unpleasantness of marching and fighting over wet ground, the Confederates discovered their cheap gunpowder had absorbed too much moisture and wouldn’t fire. At the risk of getting all technical, it turns out it’s hard to win battles when you can’t shoot the other guy. 

Third, the battle’s outcome turned on an error – a beneficial blunder, as it were. After several hours of intense battle, including serious cannon action, Blunt (Union) orders the First Kansas Colored Voluntary Infantry Regiment to capture some Confederate artillery which had been giving them trouble. Confederate forces had a decisive advantage in terms of manpower, but the Union had more toys – and they didn’t appreciate the South challenging them when it came to things that go ‘boom.’ 

As the First Kansas Colored pressed towards their goal, a regiment of Union Amerindian troops unintentionally moved between them and Confederate forces. As they realized their error and withdrew, Confederate leaders assumed the Union was falling back in general, and enthusiastically ordered pursuit. 

They ran right into the First Kansas and their fancy Springfield rifles, and bad things ensued. A mix of Black, White, and Red troops drove the Southerners back, but in all the chaos failed to capture those cannons. The Confederates tried to torch Honey Springs in order to keep the goodies there from falling into Union hands, but Northern soldiers managed to extinguish most of the fires and everyone had extra bacon and sorghum biscuits for a few days. 

The First Kansas Colored Volunteers earned high praise for their bravery and composure throughout the battle, news of which made it into the papers right as the Massachusetts 54th was proving a similar point much further east. 

Most of the fighting in I.T. after Honey Springs was hit-and-run, guerilla warfare. Stand Watie and other Amerindian leaders couldn’t turn the tide of the war on their own, but they did make things mighty inconvenient for the Union for its duration. Watie was the last Confederate General to surrender when the war eventually ended. 

Aftermath

The damage to I.T. as a result of the Civil War is difficult to overstate. Like much of the south, the loss of property and destruction of land was dwarfed only by the loss of life. 

As people began to return to their homes rebuild their lives, a Radical Republican Congress was trying to build on this victory to make some major changes across the country. The 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments were soon passed, ending slavery, giving Freedmen the right to vote, and declaring for the first time ever that a citizen is a citizen is a citizen, and that neither state nor nation can presume otherwise – at least according to written law.  

The South would resist these changes for another century, but there was one group already so beaten and misused by the U.S. that they were in no position to make a similar stand. Besides, they’d officially chosen the wrong side in the recent war. 

The U.S. Congress was about to impose their will yet again on the citizens of Indian Territory, in ways they were unable to do anywhere else. Reconstruction is coming. Hard.

NOTE: A more easily printable version of this post is available on “Well, OK Then…” 

A Chance In Oklahoma, Part II

Helen Churchill CandeeI may have mentioned how giddy I was to come across a wonderful piece by Helen Churchill Condee in Harper’s Weekly, from way back on February 23, 1901. When you combine insight, knowledge, and pithy writing, you have my heart forever.

Even if you’re long-dead, I suppose.

Condee is actually Helen Churchill Candee, but from time to time the ‘a’ becomes an ‘o’ in her writing credits. (I kept the ‘wrong’ spelling with the document since that’s how it appeared in Harper’s originally.)

Helen was a New York girl who grew up in Connecticut, eventually marrying a successful but abusive man. After their separation, she began writing articles for several ladies’ magazines to support herself and her two children.

Women’s magazines in the late 19th century tended to focus on household tips, womanly etiquette, and taking care of your man, but over time she went a bit Hillary Rodham and wandered into women’s rights, raising children, and even local politics. 

Give them a pen and a paycheck, and it’s all over, boys. 

Harpers1901Candee moved to Guthrie, Oklahoma, for several years, writing regularly for periodicals back east. It was around this time she published her first two books – How Women May Earn A Living and An Oklahoma Romance. The first became a landmark in women’s literature (a subject for another time) and the second – her only work of fiction out of the many successful books she’d continue to write – helped publicize and glorify life in the recently opened territory. 

It may have been based on personal shenanigans as well, but it used to be a lady didn’t come out and confess such things, so…

Somewhere in the midst of this she wrote the piece with which I’m so enamored, along with numerous others I’m currently tracking down. 

She went on to become an expert on world travel and, um… tapestries… and served as a volunteer nurse in the Great War overseas. She passed just short of her 91st birthday in 1949. 

The event for which she’s most remembered is not one directly related to her writing, however glorious. She was on the Titanic when it sank on April 15, 1912. Her written recollections are some of the most memorable and quoted of various survivor accounts, and her unpublished memoirs seem to have inspired a few of the key scenes in that DiCaprio film some of you may recall. 

HCC Titanic

There was this younger man, see, and a love triangle, and this glorious epiphany standing on the bow…

None of which, in my humble opinion, compare to the glory of her account of opening the Unassigned Lands in O.T.  I mean, that flashy stuff is all fine and well, but anyone can break their ankle leaping onto a lifeboat. Few can capture so much humanity in so few words as a passage like this:

The lands about to be opened are some that have long been coveted by the white men. Greed of land grows on those who hold it.

Oooohhhh… do you feel the truth tickling your innards? I sure do. 

The Wichita Mountains have long been like the promised land to the people of the Southwest, and as a rider reaches a hill-top of the rolling prairie, he exclaims, with extended arms: “See! That’s the Wichita range!  Beautiful mountains, and they say they’re full of gold and silver, copper and zinc, with some outcroppings of coal and traces of oil.” 

‘Full of gold and silver’ might have been a bit optimistic, but copper and zinc was spot on. Can’t believe she didn’t work in something poetic about lead as well. Hello!

Ironically, it would be coal and oil – here almost afterthoughts – which would soon thereafter drive the mineral boom in Oklahoma.

But not yet. 

Pres HarrisonAt that moment, it was still all about land – farming, growing, raising, living land. And this was it. Everything else was pretty much taken. The bar was closing and the men outnumbered the women 3 to 1. Time to make your play. 

And so, to get these lands, a bill was formed, but it stuck in the process at Washington. Then one day, as a surf-boat rolls safely up the beach on a big comber, the bill went through as a “rider” on a greater bill, and the opening of the new lands was made a certainty. 

If there’s one thing that resonates with Oklahomans, it’s a good boating metaphor. Must be a Northeasterner thing.

And imagine a time period in which major acts of Congress were unable to get passed the traditional way, so they were stuck onto completely unrelated legislation no one could afford to vote against and passed without some even realizing what they were supporting!

Back in the day, I mean. Long, long ago.  

Surveyors have been all over their surface now, and it is marked off into a checker-board of squares miles, each one containing four farms of one hundred and sixty acres – or a quarter-section, after the manner of the West.

Homestead Act SignThe allotment size was consistent with the Homestead Act from way back in 1862, signed by Lincoln during the Civil War. This was considered a sufficient spread to allow a homestead and plenty of planting land. A free man working without modern equipment would be unlikely to cultivate more than this productively. 

It was this same Homestead Act which the ‘boomers’ had repeatedly referenced as evidence they deserved a shot at the ‘surplus’ lands in Indian Territory. 

The size of the Kiowa and Comanche tract is 2,968,893 acres. This, as the merchants say, is gross: the net number of farms which are offered to those who wish to make a hazard for new fortunes is about 10,000 of a quarter-section each. That means the redemption of ten thousand men, their fortune assured if they are made of the stuff that can labor and struggle for two or three initial years.

Redemption. That’s what it was all about for many. 

Three-quarters of a century before, Mexican Texas had been the land of new beginning – escaping your own past, whether it meant legal entanglements, failed relationships, or political embarrassment, and starting anew in a seemingly unlimited Eden. The glories of Manifest Destiny had carried others to California, Oregon, and gradually filled in even much of the Great Plains.

Now the frontier was ‘closed’, or at least not nearly as frontier-ish as it had been, and hungry homesteading eyes turned to Oklahoma.

Middle Ages TapestryHow many others in that generation and prior had taken their shots, staked their claims, virtually everywhere else in the West? Those waiting now were the also-rans, the coulda-beens, desperate for one last chance at stepping into the role of Yeoman Farmer in the most democratic manifestation of the ideal. Redemption? Maybe so. 

‘Their fortune assured’? The American Dream was immutable law still at this late date. Perhaps some of this faith was galvanized by desperation, but it guided both policy and personal choices well into the 20th century.

It won’t last – at least not in the same form. The Dust Bowl and Great Depression would contradict all holy truths about hard work and good choices leading to independence and relative prosperity. But not yet.

They still believed.

The remaining acres of the reservation, amounting to nearly half, are disposed of in a way which treats considerately both Indian and white settler. Each of the 2,900 Indians is to have an allotment of one hundred and sixty acres, and these Indians are to choose themselves before the gates of the country are opened for the rush. In addition, 480,000 acres are allowed for Indian pasture. Fort Sill has a front lawn and back yard of 60,000 acres out of the tract, and about three hundred and thirty thousand acres make up the amount of land set aside for the support of schools and colleges. This disposes of the Kiowa and Comanche country.

‘Disposes’ is right. The issue of land allotment among the tribes deserves a separate post. It is difficult for Anglo minds to fully process why this was effectively the final wave of cultural genocide. “Oh my god – they gave the Indians title to their own property! How horrible!”

Yeah, yeah, white boy. Your culture is awesome, Indians were stupid, you were doing them a favor, blah blah blah. More on that next time. 

Note, that ‘these Indians’ get to ‘choose themselves’ before everyone else – almost like it’s an unfair advantage of some sort. Hey – what can go wrong when you have a choice?

[[{“type”:”media”,”view_mode”:”media_small”,”fid”:”1573″,”attributes”:{“alt”:””,”class”:”media-image”,”typeof”:”foaf:Image”}}]]

“It’s the Stay Put Landalot Man.”

Everything is now in readiness, and awaits the proclamation of the President, which is to declare the gates open, and which will say in effect, “Run in, my children, and help yourselves, but remember that only one grab is allowed for each.”

*pause*

Cynical as I am, I’m not entirely immune from the gilded glory inherent in a good land run. Condee gives me chills with this one. 

Then reality comes back.

RELATED POST: A Chance In Oklahoma, Part I

RELATED POSTS: 40 Credits & A Mule, Parts I – VII

RELATED POSTS: Boomers & Sooners, Parts I – V