The Burr in America's Back

Aaron Burr and the Burr Conspiracy was a interesting point in American history and may have narrowly occurred. Getting the book "American Emperor" by David O Stewart as my main resource I want to look into the actions of Burr and the state of the United States at the time period.

After the scandal of the Duel, Burr was pretty much a no body in the eastern, Atlantic States of the US. He was destitute and was reviled in New York and New Jersey in particular. There was though, one exception to this where his actions had not negatively impacted his reputation (and even increased): The West. Namely, Kentucky, Tennessee, and the territory west of the Appalachian Mountains. One senator even invited Burr to practically take a congressional seat. Though, Burr had other ideas. Much more grander ideas.

The divide of the Appalachian Mountains was very pronounced during this period, and Spain was the chief instigator at trying to stop American expansionism. Prior, to Burr and the Constitutional Convention they funded efforts by Rufus King to start New England secession and jump start Kentucky secession by getting the United States to not gain trade rights on the river and use it to give incentives to Kentuckians and gain the loyalty of American settlers.

In 1805 Burr took a tour with his wife through the western states and along the way he met various peoples and increased his fame as his plan for Louisiana grew and grew. From the Creole rulers of New Orleans to members of the Mexican Association (a society of American adventurers who wanted to take Louisiana and Mexico). He had high hopes and relations with such men as Andrew Jackson and Governor of Indiana, William Henry Harrison. He invested in naval shipbuilding along the Mississippi and even intrigued with the Ogden Family in New England for cash. He also intrigued with not only the British, but also the Spanish. The British were not so hard, a six month delay due to the illness of his representative may have made the difference, a buffer state against the Americans and the chance to go westward and claim Mexico (Burr's true prize) again Spain which was at the time Great Britain's enemy. He also intrigued with Spain claiming that he had no desire against Mexico (which he did very much want, but also Peru and all of Spanish America).

This is where he got into bed with Wilkinson. Wilkinson already a Spanish Informant and proposed Agent of Western Secession, was pretty much head of the United States Army. Though, he was a man of less then disciplined nature. Which lead to his betrayal of Burr as views that the United States and Spain were headed toward war. He blinked and sold Burr down river just as Burr was gathering his militia and allies to start a war with Spain and begin the effort for secession.

The timing sadly was perfect, Jefferson was at the time in a deep state of depression over the death of his mentor, but even so it wasn't like he made much effort to stop Burr as rumors and word of his intrigue were already widespread.

Now, it seems that Wilkinson is the lynch pin in a POD for a successful Burr Conspiracy. For this I think their are two capable PODs. Namely, that the British throw their support earlier behind Burr (he wanted a loan and two British warships to stop any effort by the US to blockade New Orleans). Also, the United States needs to go to War with Spain, if this had happened a week or two earlier then events may have moved fast enough to prevent Wilkinson from having second thoughts and throw in Western support for Burr (they all wanted western land). Things were several times very close to bloodshed, soldiers on the Sabine River if they had gone to bloodshed or if agents of Burr had done so or even Settlers with Spanish Grants who were coming into conflict with American Settlers (indeed at the time Burr was assembling his forces to attack the Bastrop Tract).

Another possible point would be if Jefferson had not purchased Louisiana, this may have sped up Burr's support and plans.
 
Intriguing.

I am not sure if Burr could pull it off, Western Secession I mean. But even an unsuccessful war would have a major impact on the way the USA develops, and its relations with other nations.

Would the USA have the strength of national will at this point to commit to opposing a secession? The Revolution is fresher than it was during the ACW, and States have more power as I recall.
 

Wolfpaw

Banned
Burr had no desire nor design to effect a secession of Western states. His goals were explicitly to take over Mexico, traveling by way of New Orleans. The original plan had called for a conquest of Nueva Orleans and Louisiana pre-purchase, but there were never plans to steal away Tennessee or Kentucky.
 
Intriguing.

I am not sure if Burr could pull it off, Western Secession I mean. But even an unsuccessful war would have a major impact on the way the USA develops, and its relations with other nations.

Would the USA have the strength of national will at this point to commit to opposing a secession? The Revolution is fresher than it was during the ACW, and States have more power as I recall.

During this time frame the mindset of many Americans and leaders was heavily influenced by Montesquieu's book of "Spirit of Laws". Very few believed that one republic or power could possibly come to dominate all of North America. For example Rufus King was very big during this early time frame for supporting New England secession and keeping the Mississippi closed. "The feeble policy of our disjointed government will not be able to unite them...the states situated on the Atalntic are not sufficiently populous and loosing our men, is loosing our greatest source of wealth".

John Jay feared that those moving westward would not consider themselves American "To govern them will not be easyand to whether after two or three generations they will be fit to govern themselves is a question that merits consideration."

Vermont and Kentucky were particular cases. Kentucky had to go trough half a dozen constitutional conventions before being accepted as a state.

Further life after the Revolution was not easy as ironically the US government was in so much debt they taxed their ciizens higher then the British. Further many 'late loyalists' moved to Canada because taxes were much cheaper and so was the land.

Jefferson at this time also shared the above views and as I have mentioned was not a big supporter of bloodshed. Though he did do it against the far off Barbary Pirates to do it on the very home ground of America might have influenced him more to let the West go.
 

Wolfpaw

Banned
Jefferson at this time also shared the above views and as I have mentioned was not a big supporter of bloodshed. Though he did do it against the far off Barbary Pirates to do it on the very home ground of America might have influenced him more to let the West go.
The idea that Jefferson supported or would have taken a single decision that might decrease US power and size is complete nonsense. He was an arch-imperialist who played the Great Powers with a Leninist virtuosity to expand and advance US interests at every turn.

While many New Englanders saw an inevitable separation between a Mississippi and Atlantic republic, Southerners like Jefferson ever had their eyes on absorbing the Mississippi Valley into America.
 
The idea that Jefferson supported or would have taken a single decision that might decrease US power and size is complete nonsense. He was an arch-imperialist who played the Great Powers with a Leninist virtuosity to expand and advance US interests at every turn.

While many New Englanders saw an inevitable separation between a Mississippi and Atlantic republic, Southerners like Jefferson ever had their eyes on absorbing the Mississippi Valley into America.

Heh. Leninist. EDIT: His agricultural fixation would probably make him more Maoist, but then again he did not like the uneducated masses.

Though to go to war would starkly go against his own principles and his own campaign and presidential promises to Cut Taxes and Keep the Army small.

Though even at this time frame the United States simply could not effectivly put down a major revolt of any kind within its own borders. Espeially if the British supported Burr. The Northeastern states would cry foul and so would the remaining Atlantic States if Britain outright blockaded them. While certainly you wouldn't see British troops matching from Canada you wouldn't see American troops go north. Even without the British the Western-Eastern, Northern-Southern sectionalism was at its peak during this time frame. Only simmering down after the war of 1812 and growing back leading up to the OTL Civil War.

While many Southerners desired to go westward that doesn't necessarily mean they would carry their state loyalties with them. Whiskey Rebellion.
 

Wolfpaw

Banned
Though to go to war would starkly go against his own principles and his own campaign and presidential promises to Cut Taxes and Keep the Army small.
So? It's not like he ever asked Congress about these things. Jefferson was able to wear the medals of his defeats; he fought against an Adamite navy and a Hamiltonian economy. He got both and used them to wage a war against the Barbary pirates, without Congressional consent, not informing the Congress until it was too late to recall the fleet sent to North Africa. So much for that "no war" bit.

And he would not go to war, he would take advantage of a border incident to be sparked against the Spanish by the craven, corrupt, treacherous Gen. Jamie Wilkerson. This incident would be used to unleash the bubbling American enthusiasm for the Mississippi Valley and the lush lands of Louisiana in a rush of land-grabbing and colonization. Jefferson unilaterally annexed Spanish land that was not granted to the US in any treaty because he felt it was American by right. This is not a man of principle but a ruthless, calculating maestro who was determined to forge an empire.
 

Wolfpaw

Banned
While many Southerners desired to go westward that doesn't necessarily mean they would carry their state loyalties with them. Whiskey Rebellion.
That was not a revolt of Southerners, that was a revolt of Appalachians, who are of very different culture and stock and had a very different relationship with the Federal government than the South ever did.

And while you are quite right that they do not carry their state loyalties, the overwhelming majority do carry their kinship, religious, and national loyalties (in that order) with them.
 
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That was not a revolt of Southerners, that is a revolt of Appalachians, who are of very different culture and stock and had a very different relationship with the Federal government than the South ever did.

Many settlers came from southern states, Virginia in particular.

Anyway I do wonder if the call to arms would actual cause the Northerner split. Certainly with no Army the mainstay of American forces would be militia. I could see the Northern states refusing to send soldiers and so New England leaders would go about a earlier Hartford Convention.


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As for Kinship and such I don't think it would matter that much. As during the American Revolution, War of 1812, and the Civil war American fought American for ideological reasons, wealth, or happenstance. Be they Northern or Southern, From the Same State or even being kin having immigrated to Canada. Reading from "The Civil War of 1812" by Alan Taylor their were many accounts of this (one direct example was apparently William Elliot who has lost hi position in the army due to Dem-Rep political purges had moved to Canada to Amherstburg and ironically one of his brothers was in an army poised to attack the town in 1812).
 
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Wolfpaw

Banned
Many settlers came from southern states, Virginia in particular.
Virginia east of the Alleghenies really isn't the same culture as the South. (I'd even argue that Virginia isn't really a part the South, but that's for another rant). West of the Alleghenies (and well up into Pennsylvania, especially Donegal, PA) the settlers were overwhelmingly Protestants from North England, North Ireland, or the Scottish marches. They were dirt-poor borderlanders who carried their lives on their backs and staked out their claims as they rafted down the Ohio and conquered their way across Kentucky and Tennessee (which they called Transylvania). They did not care for Indians, they did not like outsiders at all, and were equally suspicious of Yankee reformers and Southern aristocrats. A longstanding tradition is the use of corn liquor as currency.

They shared naught but a language with the manorial lords of the Tidewater, the New English magistrates, or the Southern planters. And their early attempts to join the Constitutional Convention in 1774 were rejected by the Atlantic states.
Anyway I do wonder if the call to arms would actual cause the Northerner split. Certainly with no Army the mainstay of American forces would be militia. I could see the Northern states refusing to send soldiers and so New England leaders would go about a earlier Hartford Convention.
Why? If it it is "established" that Spain attacked first (that was the whole plot; a false-flag), that a foreign empire attacked Americans citizens and American property on American soil, of course people will rally to the flag. New Englanders loathed the Spanish and their Popery and wanted them expelled from the hemisphere like every good American back then.
 

Wolfpaw

Banned
As for Kinship and such I don't think it would matter that much. As during the American Revolution, War of 1812, and the Civil war American fought American for ideological reasons, wealth, or happenstance. Be they Northern or Southern, From the Same State or even being kin having immigrated to Canada. Reading from "The Civil War of 1812" by Alan Taylor their were many accounts of this (one direct example was apparently William Elliot who has lost hi position in the army due to Dem-Rep political purges had moved to Canada to Amherstburg and ironically one of his brothers was in an army poised to attack the town in 1812).
I can point you to the thousands of New Englanders and Maritimers who refused to war on one another during the War of 1812 because of shared kinship and culture, despite orders from London or Washington.

And kinship was far more important to the Appalachian settlers (definitions of "immediate family" typically extended to second-cousins) and was seriously riven only once; the Civil War, in which the great majority of Appalachians supported the Union over the Confederacy, as they had (and have) unquestioningly supported the United States in every war since 1830.
 
They shared naught but a language with the manorial lords of the Tidewater, the New English magistrates, or the Southern planters. And their early attempts to join the Constitutional Convention in 1774 were rejected by the Atlantic states.
Why? If it it is "established" that Spain attacked first (that was the whole plot; a false-flag), that a foreign empire attacked Americans citizens and American property on American soil, of course people will rally to the flag. New Englanders loathed the Spanish and their Popery and wanted them expelled from the hemisphere like every good American back then.

Hardly, and even if they may have not been fans of the Catholic Church, they were certainly BIG fans of the wealth offered by the Spanish Empire. The books "American Emperor" and "A Wilderness So Immense" both point this out. The Spanish diplomat to the US dazzles everyone with Spanish wealth and intrigued with Rufus King and other North Eastern notables to secession or delay American efforts for the Mississippi, the later he did greatly. The North Eastern merchants wanted access to Spanish and British markets. As I have cited above they wanted to halt settlement of the West for fear of losing population and economic opportunity with the Mississippi area open for its people.

There was also a great deal of accusation against Jefferson as many accused him of wanting to weaken the North East given regional differences. This view soared during the Embargo Act period.

This time frame is well before 1830. In this period the issue of slavery was not something to secede over, but the rivalry between states and the Dem-Republicans and the Federalists and economic influence was.
 
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