Eric Flint: 1824: The Arkansas War

Not that the issue would really be decided in Congress. Jackson, a firm advocate of states' rights, was adamant that no emancipation program of any kind could be applied to the nation as a whole. The new party could legitimately use Congress only as a podium from which to expound its views. The battles themselves would have to be won in the separate states, one at a time.

In practice, that meant Tennessee and Kentucky within a year or two, with Missouri to come later. The issue of slavery was still a sore point in Missouri because of the Missouri Compromise. Benton warned them that it would take, in his estimate, at least four years before any Missouri legislature would be willing to seriously contemplate the notion.

You never knew, though, he added. More and more German immigrants were coming into the state, and wherever Germans went, support for slavery was sure to drop. Drastically, at times. What was perhaps more important, however, was the uncertain variable of the Arkansas War.

Arkansas had forced the issue-and Arkansas might very well continue to set the pace and determine the parameters. If for no other reason than the simplest and crudest. The longer and more successfully a mostly black nation could defend its independence, the more difficult it became for any white man in America-even John Calhoun-to persist in the claim that black people were incapable of managing their own affairs.

That was the ancient formula, even older than the dangers of a Praetorian Guard. A nation might produce no poets, no philosophers, no inventors, no scientists, no statesmen, no theologians, no sculptors-no barbers and butchers and bakers, for that matter. But if it could beat down anyone who tried to conquer it, no one could claim that it didn't produce men.

Poets and philosophers might weep over that crude arithmetic. But Andrew Jackson was neither, whatever John Quincy Adams's pretensions might be. He had no trouble with it at all. He had subscribed to the formula in full since the age of thirteen, when he told a British officer who commanded him to shine his boots that he'd not do it. He still had the scar on his forehead from the officer's ensuing saber cut-but he'd never shined the boots.

1824: TheArkansasWar

On the following day, having settled the core question, the founders of the new National Democratic-Republican Party-such was the title they decided upon-were seized by a bolder spirit. Or perhaps it was simply that they could calculate a different arithmetic. That was certainly true of Van Buren.

With the political authority gathered at that founding convention of the new party, its leaders were quite confident that they could win in Tennessee, Kentucky, and Missouri. Not easily, no, but win they would. And they'd win Delaware, too, perhaps even sooner than Missouri. The Quakers and Methodists were influential in that state. The Quakers had long been antislavery, and the Methodists had been moving steadily in that direction. Arkansas Post-the whole Arkansas situation-was turning the Methodist drift into a powerful current.

That aside, the new party's program of gradual emancipation was sure to lose them all of the South itself, with the possible exception-over time, not quickly-of Maryland and the Old Dominion. That was sure to be true, even though the rest of their program would generally appeal to the poorer classes of white Southerners.

That meant, whatever else, that they needed to seize and keep the allegiance of New England-and New England would chafe at too many compromises. Outright abolitionism was growing by leaps and bounds in the region after Second Arkansas Post. A current in Delaware, it was a tide in New England.

The same was true in Pennsylvania, perhaps even more so. If Pennsylvanians were not given to Puritan posturing, they were considerably more iron-headed than New Englanders. Abolitionists might pour into meetings at Faneuil Hall in their thousands. Pennsylvania had already sent a Lafayette Battalion to Arkansas. A small one, granted, according to the news reports. More in the way of a company than anything a military man would call a battalion. But there would be more coming, if the same accounts were accurate.

Needless to say, countermoves were being planned, beginning in South Carolina and Georgia. Calls had already been issued for the formation of Cavalier Brigades to show Brown's Raiders and the so-called Lafayette Battalions what was what on the field of valor. Even allowing for the usual Southron bombast, no one had much doubt that private military forces from Southern states would be entering the fray by next year. "Bleeding Arkansas" would soon be more than an abolitionist's histrionic slogan.

So, for the rest-with the obvious exception-they swung over to the Vermont road. The "high road," as Quincy Adams persisted in calling it, much to the irritation of his colleagues.

No disenfranchisement due to race or color.

No restrictions of property due to race or color.

No restrictions of movement or residence due to race or color.

In short, in one fell swoop-with the obvious exception-they proposed to eliminate the middle ground between slavery and freedom. Strike down any and all forms of exclusion laws. A black man might be a slave, or he might be free. But if he was free, he would have-legally, at least-the rights of any white citizen.

The work done, they basked in self-esteem.

For perhaps three minutes, until Richard Mentor Johnson finally spoke after days of almost unbroken silence.

John Coffee had been afraid he would.

"Gentlemen, I can't go along with this any longer." The Kentucky senator's face seemed more homely than ever. But it was also set as stubbornly as any mule's. "Not without the rest. It just sticks in my craw."

Jackson was back at the window. The others were in their usual seats.

No one said anything. Their faces were stiff, wooden. With the exception of the two border states' governors, anyway. Their expressions were back to that rabbit-staring-at-a-viper look.

"To Sam Hill with all of you," Johnson said tonelessly. "I don't care what you think. I've been in love with my wife since I was eighteen years old. She's the mother of my two children. And I find, when all is said and done, that I just don't see where all the rest means a good God-damned thing if a man can't marry his own wife and claim his children for his own. Which I would surely like to do some time before I die. Let that hypocrite Tom Jefferson explain Sally Hemings and his bastards to the Lord when his time comes. I don't want to have to do the same."

"Well said," stated Quincy Adams. "My salutations, sir."

Coffee looked to the window. After a moment, Jackson turned around. "Yes. I agree. Add it to the list."

Carroll threw up his hands. "Andy, for the sake of-tarnation! We throw in amalgamation, we may as well just fold up our tents right now."

"Oh, bullshit." Jackson nodded at Johnson. "He's been married in all but name to a nig-negress-for a quarter of a century. And if there's anybody-any voter-in the state of Kentucky who don't know it, I'd like you to show me where they're hiding. And how many times has he gotten elected, Bill? And reelected?"

The governor of Tennessee tightened his jaws. But they weren't any tighter than those of the state's senator. The next words from Jackson almost came through gritted teeth.

"Besides, it doesn't matter. The thing that separates our party from-whatever you want to call that pack of scoundrels who don't agree on much of anything except they want power-is this, before it's anything else. You figure out what you think the republic needs. First. Then you figure out how to get enough people to vote for you. What you don't do-ever-is go at it the other way around. Leave that to the Henry Clays of the world."