USA > Louisiana > Brief history of the Louisiana territory > Part 7
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8
Such was the attitude of Federalist agitators; but happily their rantings were of no avail. The mass of the people consid- ered the purchase a bargain and the Senate ratified the treaty on the second day of the session by a vote of twenty-four to seven. Napoleon's ratification was already in the hands of the French charge and on October 21, ratifications were exchanged and Louisiana was ours.
74
Brief History of the Louisiana Territory.
The President had now done his part, and it became the duty of Congress to provide for the immediate occupation and tem- porary government of the new territory. Congress acted promptly, and a bill with that end in view was introduced into the House.
The discussion of this bill brought forth one of those pe- culiar paradoxes that occasionally appear in political life. The Republicans who had so strenuously objected to the Presidential prerogative and loose construction in 1798, now advocated the widest extension of the treaty-making power and the placing of autocratic authority over the new territory in the hands of the President. The New England Federalists, led by the Griswolds and Timothy Pickering, took the extremest ground in favor of strict construction and state rights. The bill for a provisional government passed both houses by large majorities and became a law on October 31. The victory of the Republicans left the Federalists and New England full of discontent and nearly ready for secession; but the victory had been at the ex- pense of their old Republican theory of constitutional interpre- tation. The Constitution had become enlarged, elastic, adapt- able, and henceforth was to be interpreted according to the spirit and not the letter. The Federalist idea of nationality had gained ground while Republican common sense had triumphed over her earlier theoretical pedantry and ushered in a new era of wiser and broader constitutional development.
No sooner was the purchase of Louisiana complete than people began to inquire what this new province was-what were its boundaries, its extent, its nature, and its value. As a matter of fact no one knew. Not a boundary was fixed. Its north- eastern limit was muffled in the ignorance that hid the source of the Mississippi; its southeastern boundary was concealed in the sinuous diplomacy that enveloped the mouth of that river. The southern boundary was the Gulf of Mexico but just how much of the coast was included no one could say. The Western limit sank away into the unknown prairies toward the Pacific while
75
Louisiana Territory Under the United States.
its northward projection remained to be outlined by a convention with England. When Barbe Marbois had been pressed to make definite boundaries, he had gone to Napoleon only to be told that if an obscurity did not exist it would be well to make one.
The first difficulty arose with Spain over the boundary be- tween Louisiana and the Floridas. Livingston and Monroe claimed the purchase included West Florida, as far east as the river Perdido, and had been encouraged by Napoleon in this claim. But Spain obstinately refused to admit the claim to any territory east of the Mississippi, and it remained to be settled by the purchase of Florida. The westward extension along the Gulf should have included part of Texas, but was finally fixed at the Sabine river; while the western boundary followed that river northward, thence along the 94th parallel of longitude to the Red river, followed that river to the 100th parallel, thence north to the Arkansas, trailed that river to the Rockies, thence along the crest of the mountains to the British border. The boundary line along the north was determined by a treaty with England in 1818 fixing it along the 49th parallel from the Rockies to the Lake of the Woods.
This vast extent of territory embraced nearly 900,000 square miles of the richest land the earth affords. Its area was greater than that of the whole thirteen original states or than Great Britain, Germany, France, Spain, Portugal and Italy combined. Tales of its wonderful resources that fell far short of the truth were regarded as absurdly extravagant by the incredulous inhabi- tants along the Atlantic slope. Federalist cynicism was encour- aged by the report of the country sent in to Congress by Jeffer- son who collected the tales and traditions of hunters and trappers along the upper Mississippi and the Missouri, and transmitted them to Congress in a message. This wonderful message told of Indians of gigantic stature; tall bluff's faced with stone and carved by the hand of nature into a multitude of antique towers; and reached a climax of myth in describing a huge mountain of pure rock-salt towering above the earth, one hundred and eighty
76
Brief History of the Louisiana Territory.
miles long, and forty-five miles broad, all glittering white, with streams of saline water flowing in fissures down its barren slopes. The Federalists bubbled over with ridicule, but specimens of the · salt were shown and bushels of it were reported on exhibition at St. Louis and Marietta. If such things were not true, others not less remarkable were, and an expedition sent out by Jefferson was already far away in the western wilds exploring the vast plains and tortuous defiles of the Rockies.
It is now time to turn to New Orleans and see what was hap- pening at the capital of Louisiana during these months big with the fate of empire. When Napoleon had planned to seize Louis- iana, he had sent out Pierre Clement Laussat as civil agent to . prepare the way for the arrival of General Victor with the mil- itary force and to co-operate with him in effecting the transfer. Laussat had arrived in New Orleans March 26, 1803, and promptly set about preparing the people for the French occupa- tion. He issued a proclamation filled with honied words, in which he stated the benevolent intentions of France, and wearily waited for the arrival of General Victor and his army. The French creoles were filled with a delirium of joy at the prospect of res- tored French citizenship, and presented an address of congratu- · lation to the "Citizen Prefect." But replying to his denuncia- tion of the Spanish régime, they declared: "We should be un- worthy of what is to us a source of much pride if we did not acknowledge that we have no cause of complaint against the Spanish Government. We have never groaned under the yoke of an oppressive despotism." In fact a majority of the people had become thoroughly reconciled to Spanish control. They had taken little part in the government, and desired little. Hence they looked upon a change of rulers with a surprising indiffer- ence and self-abnegation.
On April 10, Marquis de Caso Calvo arrived from Havana to act as joint commissioner with Governor Salcedo in delivering the province to France. A proclamation was then issued by the Spanish authorities assuring to the inhabitants the protection and
77
Louisiana Territory Under the United States.
favor under French control which they had enjoyed under Spain. While these things were occupying the attention of the public about New Orleans, a rumor was spread abroad that France was about to transfer her title to the United States. Laussat en- deavored to silence this rumor, but it persisted. In the latter part of July he wrote to his government concerning it, but hardly was his letter started when he received a dispatch announcing his appointment as the commissioner of France to receive the prov- ince of Louisiana and deliver it to the United States. Following his instructions, a day was set for the first transfer. On No- vember 30, 1803, Calvo, Salcedo, and Laussat, accompanied by all the French and Spanish officers of the province, and a large retinue of clergy and leading citizens, assembled in the old Ca- bildo, a building that probably surpassed in picturesque and im- posing dignity any other civic structure in America at the time, and there went through the ceremonial of transferring the control of Louisiana from Spain to France. The subjects of his Cath- olic Majesty were absolved from their allegiance and turned over to the authority of the French republic, while the Spanish flag was lowered from the pole in front of the city hall, and the French tri-color hoisted to take its place. A temporary French government was organized, and on the same day Laussat pro- ceeded with his disagreeable task by announcing in a proclama- tion that the French control was only a preliminary step to its transfer to the commissioners of the United States who were soon to arrive.
The commissioners appointed by Jefferson to receive the territory on the part of the United States were William C. C. Claiborne and Gen. James Wilkinson. The selection of these two men was one of expediency rather than wisdom since neither was particularly fitted for the position. In the face of a threat- ened war with Spain Jefferson was anxious to get possession at the earliest possible moment, and these men were in the neigh- borhood at the time. Claiborne was in his twenty-eighth year. He was descended from an old Virginia family, had long been in
78
Brief History of the Louisiana Territory.
the government service, and had been a member of the Supreme Court of Tennessee, as well as a Congressman from that State while yet under the age limit of twenty-five years. In 1802 he was sent to govern the Mississippi Territory, and was from there transferred to the governorship of the new possession. He was a man of fair ability and agreeable personal qualities, but knew nothing of the French or Spanish language, or of the Spanish law which he was called upon arbitrarily to administer. Wilkin- son was a wayward, blustering, drunken, intriguing, yet able and shrewd general, who was selected because he had control of the army in the West, which Jefferson made ready to use if the Span- iards should oppose the transfer with violence. A part of the militia of Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee was ordered to be ready to march at a moment's warning and troops were collected at Ft. Adams and Natchez.
December 20 was the day set for the final transfer. The Crescent City was to witness for the last time the ceremonial which had during the life time of some of the inhabitants, six times transferred their allegiance from one master to another. By nine o'clock of the appointed day the provincial militia began to gather on the Place d'Armes in front of the Cabildo. Just three weeks had passed since they had manoeuvered in the same place and saluted as the French tri-color mounted the flagstaff to replace the lowering Spanish ensign. It was the heart of their little city and the proud creoles assembled with mingled sadness and curiosity. How soon, some conjectured, would the restless energy of the American destroy the sentiment, the gaiety, the idyllic ease and festive life, which they so much enjoyed?
At noon the signal guns announced the approach of the Americans and a salute of twenty-four guns greeted the caval- cade at the gate of the city. At the head rode Wilkinson and Claiborne, followed by the dragoons in red uniform, the artillery, the infantry, and the French escort. The American troops drew up opposite the French and Spanish on the Place d'Arms and the ceremonies took place from the facing balcony of the Cabildo.
79
Louisiana Territory Under the United States.
. Laussat opened the ceremonies from the chair of state. The treaty of cession was read in both English and French. Laussat read his credentials for alienating the Territory and Claiborne read Jefferson's command to receive it. Laussat then made the formal announcement of the alienation and presented the keys of the city to Claiborne, at the same time absolving the inhabi- tants of Louisiana from their oath of allegiance to the French republic. Claiborne then took the chair of state and congratu- lated the people that their political existence was no longer "open to the caprices of chance" and bade them welcome as citizens of the United States. He assured them that their liberty, their property and their religion were safe; that their commerce would be favored, their agriculture encouraged and that they should never again be transferred.
While these things were taking place men of no less than six nationalities crowded the vacant spaces below eager to witness the closing ceremony. For twenty days the symbol of French supremacy had fluttered from the top of its tall staff overlooking the city. It was with sinking hearts that the loyal creoles now saw it slowly descend as the stars and stripes started upward. They met midway of the staff and were saluted. Then, flutter- tering in the breeze, the stars and stripes climbed to the top, amid the ringing cheers of the few Americans present, there to remain. The French flag descended, trembling to the ground never more to wave above the continent of North America. The dream of the high-souled Champlain as he braved death in the wilds .of Canada; the hope that had sustained the chivalric La Salle when treachery and calamity hung like a pall over his soul ; the gallantry of Montcalm whose blood helped to sanctify the Plains of Abraham; the iron resolution of Napoleon Bona- parte aided by fifty thousand martyred men in the island of St. Domingo ;- all these came to naught and registered failure when the French flag touched the earth on that bright December day in 1803.
The United States was now in possession; the next thing nec-
80
Brief History of the Louisiana Territory.
essary was to provide for the government of the new Territory. Congress had passed a law November 30, giving to the President full power to take possession of the purchased territory and govern it until a new act could be passed. Claiborne as governor, aided by Wilkinson, had in his control for the time being, the whole authority and responsibility of the government. The con- ditions were peculiar and the situation difficult and if Claiborne frequently erred in the exercise of his autocratic powers it was no more than others would have done. He was honest, sincere, and generous in his aims and succeeded in avoiding any serious complication.
In the succeeding March Congress passed an act for the or- ganization and government of the acquired territory for one year. So much of Louisiana as lay south of the 33rd parallel was cut off and named the Territory of Orleans. The remainder was to be called the District of Louisiana and was placed under the jurisdiction of the Governor and judges of the Indiana Territory. Orleans was organized into a separate province with a regular territorial government. The administrative authority was to be placed in the hands of a governor, a secretary, and a council of thirteen members, all appointed by the President. One superior court and such inferior courts as the council should see fit to create were to be established. Slave importation was limited to those brought in by American immigrants, and jury trial was limited to criminal prosecutions and civil suits in which the sum involved was not less than one hundred dollars. This plan met severe opposition in Congress, on account of the lack of a share in the government by the governed, but was held to be necessary by reason of the heterogeneous character of the population, their disaffection to the transfer, and their lack of political training in self-government. They were to receive liberty only as they proved themselves worthy of it and be introduced gradually to the- beneficent effects of free institutions.
As the one year limit of the above government neared its end new acts were passed. An independent government was granted
81
Louisiana Territory Under the United States.
to the District of Louisiana which was now organized as the Ter- ritory of Louisiana, with a governor, a secretary and three judges of its own. Orleans was given a General Assembly of twenty- five delegates, to be elected by the people and was promised that when her free inhabitants numbered sixty thousand, she should be made a State and admitted into the Union.
Turning now to the internal history of the purchase terri- tory, it may be observed that the international diplomatic struggle and the political ferment at Washington affected the inhabitants of Louisiana but little. They were used to a transfer of their allegiance and had become hardened to changes of government. Never having had a share in the management of affairs, a ma- jority of the people looked with indifference at the changes going on. The French and Spanish population hated the Americans, but at the same time envied their freedom and liberty and were partially reconciled to the supremacy of their government by the prospect of the inheritance of its blessings. Their attitude as well as that of many prominent foreigners may be gleaned from the dispatch of the French commissioner Laussat. "The Amer- icans," said he, "have given $15,000,000 for Louisiana; they would have given $50,000,000 rather than not possess it. In a few years the country as far as the Rio Brazos will be in a state of cultivation. New Orleans will then have a population of from 30,000 to 50,000 souls, and the country will produce enough sugar to supply America and part of Europe. . What a magnificent New France have we lost! The people are naturally gentle though touchy, proud, and brave. They have seen themselves rejected for a second time from the bosom of their mother-country. Their interpretation of the ces- sion, and their comments on it, show too clearly the extreme bit- terness of their discontent. Nevertheless, they have become tol- erably well disposed toward passing under the new government. . There are advantages in the Constitution of the United States of which it will be impossible to prevent them from ex- periencing the benefit. And being once freed from colonial fet- 6
82
Brief History of the Louisiana Territory.
ters, it would be unnatural to suppose that Louisiana would ever willingly resume them."
At the time of the transfer the population of the whole ter- ritory was about 50,000. Of these the French and Spanish cre- oles (people of French and Spanish descent born in Louisiana) formed the aristocracy and the ruling caste. In smaller numbers were Americans, Englishmen, Frenchmen, Spaniards, Irish, in- deed stragglers from many nations. Immigrants from Acadia, Germany, the Canaries, and the West Indies had formed settle- ments. A goodly proportion of the inhabitants were negroes, slaves and freedmen, while the mulattoes, quadroons, and octo- roons, played a part in creole society not found elsewhere in the United States. Their strain of white blood raised them above the negroes and their strain of negro blood dragged them below the whites. Law and custom forbade social equality with the one, while pride and intelligence kept them from free admixture with the other. A peculiar set of regulations and customs grew up, galling but not altogether dishonorable, giving them a recog- nized place in the social scale.
Under the Spanish regime the province was divided into upper and lower Louisiana-New Madrid at the southern ex- tremity of Missouri, being the dividing point. Below New Mad- rid were three-fourths of the population and seven-eighths of the wealth of the province. The most considerable places were Point Coupé, Baton Rouge, Opelousas, Natchitoches,. Tchoupi- toulas, and New Orleans. New Orleans was the capital and one of the most interesting cities in America. "Travelers," says Mc- Masters, "filled their letters with accounts of the wide, yellow, tortuous river rushing along for hundred of miles without a trib- utary of any kind; of the levees that shut in the waters and kept their surface high above all the neighboring country; of the bayous where the alligators basked in the sunshine; of the strange vegetation of the cypress swamps and the palmettos; of the hang- ing moss, of the sloughs swarming with reptiles, of the pelicans, of the buzzards, of the herons, of the fiddler crabs, of houses
83
Louisiana Territory Under the United States.
without cellars, and of cemeteries where there was no such thing as a grave which had been dug." The town had been laid out with all the regularity of a military camp. The Place d'Armes formed the center of the city and was overlooked by the Cabildo and many aristocratic residences. The streets were narrow, un- paved, forming a pond of mud and water after each rainstorm, and were named after the dukes of France-Chartres, Orleans, Maine, Bourbon, Toulouse. The rude fortifications surmount- ing the city were composed of a rampart of earth, and a wooden palisade, skirted by a slimy ditch, surrounding the city. At each of the four corners was a huge bastion mounting some rusty can- non, with another to the rear of the city-all able to frown upon but scarcely to injure an intruder.
The buildings which fronted the filthy streets were the ad- miration of all spectators. The architecture presented endless variety and color. Adobe structures with tiled roofs, brick houses adorned with yellow stucco, stone cathedrals, public build- ings crowned by the magnificent Cabildo, elegent residences with arcades and inner courts, open galleries and porte-cochéres, ver- andas, lattices, dormer windows, and gateways, transoms, and balconies of the finest wrought-iron work to be found in America. . Social life centered in the coffee-houses, billiard-rooms, dance halls, the theater, and the levee. At twilight the levee swarmed with people, walking about in the fresh evening breeze, sitting under the orange trees that lined the river bank, or joining in the dancing, drinking, and singing on the decks of the vessels moored to the wharf. The high-spirited young creoles quarreled over their sweethearts, or their mistresses, or their games, and repaired at sunrise to The Oaks, which was the famous duelling- ground, where many a quarrel was composed at the ring of steel or the sight of blood, and many a life ruined by the conscious- ness of having killed a friend. The laws were cruel and irreg- ularly administered. Religion was not wanting but it did not take firm hold of the people. No finer church than the St. Louis cathedral existed on the continent. Education was neglected.
84
Brief History of the Louisiana Territory.
The brilliant, facile, gay creole led a life of semi-ease and luxury, indulged in a round of social pleasures and dissipations, and found little time to devote to the profounder problems of life.
Agriculture and commerce formed the staple industries of the people. Plantations, cotton-fields, and sugar fields lined the river banks above New Orleans, while down its tortuous channel floated the broadhorns steered by the picturesque Mississippi river boatmen. The once sleepy levee now thronged with scores of river and ocean-going craft. The year before the transfer two hundred and sixty-five vessels sailed from the Mississippi, nearly two-thirds of them being American. The exports were valued at two millions of dollars while the imports reached half a million more. The exports were chiefly flour, salt beef and pork, tobacco, cotton, sugar, peltries, and lumber.
To the creole Upper Louisiana was a distant, rather hazy and indefinite settlement, far away on the barbarian frontier. They knew of it from the boatmen who steered their flat-bot- tomed craft to the river bank near the warehouses at New Or- leans and told weird tales of the vast continent to the northward. The principal villages of the upper country were New Madrid, Ste. Genevieve, New Bourbon, Cape Girardeau, St. Louis, and St. Charles, all hard by the banks of the Mississippi and the Missouri. Of this territory St. Louis, a thriving village of one thousand inhabitants, was the capital, where resided the lieuten- ant-governor in control of Upper Louisiana, and the other lead- ing officers of administration. The fur trade was the chief industry of the region, although lead mining and grain raising were likewise pursued. The settlers were rather primitive and unsophisticated but hardy, energetic, and adventurous. It was nearly three months after the transfer of New Orleans to the United States that a similar ceremony took place in St. Louis from the old government building near the corner of Main and Walnut streets. Not until March 10, 1804, did Captain Amos Stoddard receive the territory of Upper Louisiana in the name of the United States and unfurl the stars and stripes to wave above the Upper Mississippi.
85
Louisiana Territory Under the United States.
For some months Stoddard kept charge without making any serious changes in the official staff or the regulations of the former Spanish governor, Delassus. The people in general were apa- thetic regarding their rulers and did not seriously object to the transfer as did the loyal creoles of Orleans. According to the Act of Congress of March 26, 1804, the District of Louisiana passed for one year under the jurisdiction of the Territory of Indiana, governed by General William Henry Harrison and his council of judges, whose headquarters were alternately at Vin- cennes, Cahokia, and Kaskaskia. In July 1805, the District was organized into Louisiana Territory, with an appointed governor, and a council of three judges. General James Wilkinson was chosen governor by President Jefferson and Frederic Bates sec- retary. Wilkinson was succeeded in 1807 by Captain Meri- wether Lewis who was in turn succeeded by General Benjamin Howard in 1809.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.