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To: H-OIEAHC <H-OIEAHC@H-NET.MSU.EDU> Reply-to: vze2t297@verizon.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.73 [en]C-CCK-MCD BA45DSL (Win98; U) X-Accept-Language: en Delivered-to: H-OIEAHC@H-NET.MSU.EDU Original-recipient: rfc822;john.saillant@vmh.cc.wmich.edu From Don Williams, small.corgi@verizon.net Re Mr. Hardwick's comment (June 7) that Arming America does not stake out a position on the Second Amendment, I again point to Chapter Seven of Arming America. As noted, page 214 /paragraph one of Arming America confirms that the "point" of Chapter Seven is "the historical context" of the Second Amendment. Yet an examination of the primary points made in Chapter Seven show that it is an incomplete and misleading historical narrative which is heavily slanted against the “individual right” interpretation of the Second Amendment. 1) On page 217 (para 4), Bellesiles says re Bill of Rights :"Madison rejected all changes to the Constitution that would weaken the federal government, including its control over the militia." I disagree. As I noted in my earlier post, Congress acknowledged in the Preamble that the Bill of Rights were a response to the States' demands that: " in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its [Constitution's] powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added " http://www.archives.gov/exhibit_hall//charters_of_freedom/bill_of_rights/preamble.html It is not reasonable to argue that the Bill of Rights, including the Second Amendment, were not restrictions on the power of the federal government. 2) On page 213 (para3) , Bellesiles notes "Some modern observers argue that the framers perceived the militia as a check on governmental power; yet the Constitution accomplishes the exact opposite, making the militia a potential tool of the central government for the repression of any challenge to federal authority." As explained in my post of 3 June, the Constitution gives Congress control of the militia. The militia protects Congress from multiple threats -- including threats from officers of the Executive Branch who command the military. As noted earlier, Bellesiles ignores the latter threat -- Arming America does not discuss the Newburgh Conspiracy within the Continental Army's officer corps. Bellesiles repeatedly quotes Alexander Hamilton --without mentioning that a number of early political leaders feared that Hamilton was a potential tyrant. In his book John Adams , David McCullough quotes the following opinions from early political leaders: a) Page 518, Abigail Adams feared "That man [Hamilton] would ...become a second Bonaparte." b) Page 550, Noah Webster accused Hamilton of ambition to become "the American Caesar" c) Page 522. After meeting with President John Adams circa Christmas 1799, Elbridge Gerry writes: "[Adams] thought Hamilton and a party were endeavoring to get an army on foot to give Hamilton the command of it, and thus to proclaim a regal government and place Hamilton as the head of it, and prepare the way for a province of Great Britain." d) Page 521, late 1799: Thomas Jefferson "feared a federal army under Hamilton might march on the South at any time." The Constitutional Convention of 1787 was conducted in secret. Attendees of the Convention knew (as the rest of the country did not) that Hamilton had proposed a US government based on Britain's monarchy, arguing that Britain's government was "the best in the world". (See "Hamilton's Plan at http://www.archives.gov/exhibit_hall//charters_of_freedom/constitution/constitution_history.html ) In quoting Alexander Hamilton's criticism of the militia, Bellesiles fails to realize that Hamilton wanted a standing army instead of the militia because a standing army would be a better instrument for protecting the wealth of Hamilton's rich patrons and for keeping the mass of common citizens under control. 3) Strangely enough, Bellesiles sees the militia's reluctance to oppress fellow citizens to be a major shortcoming. On page 210, He notes that the idea of an universal militia ran up against "elite fears that poor whites might put such weapons to an incorrect, class-based use... Nationalists found ample justification for their fears in Shay's Rebellion. " In pages 211-212, he depicts Shay's followers as domestic insurgents--an example of the militia out of control -- and notes "the unreliability of the militia when confronted with internal disorder." Bellesiles fails to note that Shay's followers had justification for their protest. As Charles Beard has noted, political leaders in the 1780s were wealthy men who looked out for the interests of their class -- at the expense of the common laborers and farmers who had fought in the Revolution. As an example, Alexander Hamilton-- originally a penniless clerk of illegitimate birth-- did not marry into New York's wealthy and powerful Schuyler family by being an advocate for the common man. In “A People Numerous and Armed”, John Shy notes that some merchants made a lot of money in war profiteering during the Revolution. The wealthy ruled state legislatures and Congress by disenfranchising large groups of people with poll taxes and property requirements. The Senate, of course, was appointed -- not elected by popular vote. There was also corruption in the courts. Shay's Rebellion occurred because Boston bankers were demanding hard currency from debtors in the midst of a depression caused by Congress's mismanagement. Large numbers of farmers were being thrown off their farms and into debtors prison. The army that put down the rebellion was financed by Boston merchants. What probably dismayed wealthy Federalist bondholders was not just the Rebellion but that Massachusetts citizens subsequently voted a new state legislature into office which granted debtors relief from creditors. Bellesiles fails to realize that eighteenth century Congressmen sometimes promoted their own selfish interests --and the interests of rich patrons. The early Congresses did not have the disdain for wealth, the indifference to the lobbying of the rich, the devotion to the general welfare, and the concern for the poor and unfortunate that is so characteristic of today’s Congresses. 4) Bellesiles acknowledges that a number of political leaders ,especially the Anti-Federalists, had concerns about the threats to liberty posed by a federal army. Yet Bellesiles gives biased support to the Federalists in dismissing the Anti-Federalist concerns: a) Page 216: “This fear that the central government would either send the militia into one state at a time to attain supremacy or disarm the militia through inaction struck many Federalists as absurd.” Bellesiles then goes on to quote Oliver Ellsworth’s criticism of Luther Martin’s concerns but does not give Luther Martin’s clear reply. b) Page 216: “The Federalists also pointed out another obvious flaw in Anti-Federalist logic: the militia remained under the direct control of the states when not in national service” Actually , this was not a “flaw” the Anti-Federalists were correct to point out that the Constitution clearly gives Congress control of the militia state command is subordinate to the will of Congress. States were also forbidden to have military forces without the permission of Congress. c) Page 217: “Though the Anti-Federalist’ arguments lacked cogency…” -- a biased and mistaken judgment by Bellesiles. People might disagree over how much weight should be given to the concerns of the Anti-Federalists against competing factors e.g. providing security from foreign attack-- but the Anti-Federalist concerns were valid. 5) Bellesiles attacks the Second Amendment concept of an universal militia from several more angles - and repeats those attacks several times. One of his arguments is that the militia was not a serious fighting force: a)Page 209: “They [military leaders] knew full well that no reliance could be placed on the militia to provide for the new nation’s security, internal or external.” b)Page 210: “For that crucial period [1783-1789] ..the security of the nation did indeed depend on the militia. It was a close call.” c) Page 218:”Those with experience of the realities of government, war, and gun production knew that such visions [of an universal militia ] were fantasies…The leaders of the new nation followed Washington’s lead in calling for a standing army backed by a smaller, more organized , and better-armed militia.” d) Page 219: “The frontier militia themselves could not fight the Indians with any hope of success” e) Page 220: “For Federalists, the Whiskey Rebellion of 1794 simply drove home the point that little or no reliance was to be placed in the militia” f) Page 229: “Hamilton, Washington, and every member of Congress who had participated in the American Revolution knew that most Americans did not own guns and had no interest in buying them “ g) Page 252: “United States entered the War of 1812 grotesquely unprepared for a sustained conflict” h) Page 254: Quotes historian Lawrence Cress’ s judgement that Republican policy of depending on militia “would render the republic in the years preceding the War of 1812 virtually defenseless” i) Page 254: "for when the British did attack Washington DC in August 1814, the militia crumbled " j) Page 257: "One could go on and on with examples of inept, poorly armed, and horribly disciplined militia almost losing the War of 1812 for the United States." k) Page 259: "In battle after battle the militia had performed terribly, if at all. The only view that most regular troops had of the militia in the midst of battle was of their backs as these "citizen-soldiers" fled in terror." l) Page 261: "Reliance on the myth of an armed and vigorous militia had almost cost the United States the war [of 1812]. As it was, the nation emerged humiliated and chastened. ... the militia itself would suffer an ignoble demise from which it never recovered." m) Page 214: A “counterfactual faith in militia had become a core American belief” 6)I think that Bellesiles presents a false and misleading picture in several respects. First of all, the US was not at risk in the War of 1812 -- many questioned why the war was fought at all. The southern and western states wanted a pretext to take land from the Indians and some politicians had the idea of annexing Canada. Plus American pride was irritated by British seizures of sailors from American ships-- the British claiming that the seizures were deserters from the Royal Navy. Britain, on the other hand, was annoyed by America trading with France while Britain was at war. 7)While American shipping and coastal cities were vulnerable to the Royal Navy, the same factors that had decided the Revolutionary War still prevailed. If British forces marched inland from the coast, they could not depend on foraging from the American countryside. The supply lines back to their ships would be constantly vulnerable to ambush by highly mobile militiamen mounted on horses. By contrast, American forces could be supplied from the interior by river barges floated downstream. Transporting an European Army to North America and supplying it from Europe was very expensive, Britain and France were engaged in war with each other, and both were in debt from past wars. Hence, Britain would have trouble sustaining an army much above 35,000? troops over the long term. By contrast, the America militia numbered 677,681 in 1810 and had roughly 259,000 muskets and rifles(Arming America, page 446. ) If Britain could not hold the colonies in 1780, she was certainly not going to retake a much larger and more powerful nation in 1812. The US Army’s “American Military History” concurs that the US was fairly secure from foreign attack in the 25 years following the 1783 peace treaty. 8)There was one important strategic factor in the War of 1812 that Bellesiles does not discuss America had to have free passage on the Mississippi River in order to transport goods from lands west of the Appalachians to coastal cities on the Atlantic seaboard and to Europe. Foreign control of Louisiana posed the danger that western lands (Kentucky, Tennessee, Ohio.etc) might break from the Union and ally themselves with Spain, France, or whoever controlled New Orleans because otherwise the western lands would have no economic future. On page 268 of “Governmental Secrecy and the Founding Fathers”, Daniel Hoffman notes S.F Bemis’s observation that it was “actually easier for farmers in western Pennsylvania to send their heaviest produce to Philadelphia by way of New Orleans than directly overland”. Similarly, powerful men in New York wanted control of the Great Lakes because the Erie Canel would transport goods between the Midwest and New York City. (Clinton proposed the Canel in 1808.) Plus land speculation seizing huge tracts of new land and selling subdivisions to working class farmers was one of the quickest ways for a politician to get rich. 9) Economic imperialism, not dread of foreign invasion, drove Congress to declare war in 1812 which explains the militia’s reluctance to invade Canada. There was no social safety net in 1812. The common man had no reason to risk his life and starvation of his widow and orphans just to support the grandiose schemes of America’s wealthy. Invasions of Canada were hampered by the fact that the New England states strongly disapproved of the War because it disrupted their trade with Britain those states even considered seceding from the Union. Moreover, there was no precedent for sending the militia into a foreign country. Finally, military operations were hampered by a corrupt supply system which was a very lucrative business for some and which Congress continually failed to reform. ( I wonder why.) As the Army’s American Military History notes: “Both Congress and the War Department overlooked the greatest need for reform as the Army continued to rely on contractors for the collection delivery of rations for the troops. With no centralized direction for subsistence supply, the inefficient, fraud-racked contract system proved to be one of the gravest hindrances to military operations throughout the war.” 10) Bellesiles criticizes the militia performance in the War but the US Army’s “American Military History” has this to say: “The militia performed as well as the Regular Army. The defeats and humiliations of the Regular forces during the first years of the war matched those of the militia, just as in a later period the Kentucky volunteers at the Thames and the Maryland militia before Baltimore proved that the state citizen soldier could perform well. “ --See http://www.army.mil/cmh-pg/books/AMH/AMH-06.htm (bottom paragraph) . This chapter of the American Military History also describes the extensive failures of the Regular Army. What it does NOT mention and what Bellesiles does not mention -- is that James Wilkinson, commander in chief of the federal Army, had been a paid agent of Spain for years something historians discovered a century later while poring through Spanish archives. Years earlier, Wilkinson had been discharged from the Continental Army while handling supplies because of discrepancies in the accounts. He was reinstated in the regular army as a general by Washington at the urging of Alexander Hamilton. 11) Re Para 5-c above, Bellesiles misstates Washington's recommendation re the structure of the US military , in my opinion. The US Army's "American Military History" notes that Washington recommended only a small force of regulars (2630 officers and men total), dependence on the militia for major conflicts, and creation of a strong Navy. See http://www.army.mil/cmh-pg/books/AMH/AMH-05.htm. 12)On pages 254-255, Bellesiles ridicules the militia for failing to defend Washington DC from a British force in 1814, but fails to note that the militia drove back that same British army when it approached Baltimore. The British commander was killed and the invading army retreated to British ships in Chesapeake Bay. Bellesiles also fails to note that Washington DC only numbered 15,471 people in 1810 (US Census). It was reasonable that the militias focused on defending a major city/port instead of a small town filled with bureaucrats and political parasites. If a similar situation ever came up again, one would hope that today’s militia would show a similar nicety of judgment. Bellesiles’ narrow focus on land forces is misplaced in any event. The primary concerns in the War of 1812 were building up the US Navy (on the Great Lakes as well as the Atlantic) and establishing artillery fortifications to protect coastal cities. 13) Bellesiles spends many pages in Chapter Seven arguing that much of the early militia was unarmed the implication being that the NRA’s vision of armed citizens defending the Republic is a myth. Hilariously, Bellesiles own data refutes his argument. In the January William and Mary Quarterly Forum on Arming America, Randolph Roth discussed Bellesiles’ misleading use of statistics regarding percentage of firearms ownership. I would like to expand on Roth’s comments. Bellesiles statements (page 262-263) that the 1803 gun census showed that just 4.9 percent of America’s population was armed is misleading due to high birth rates in early America, most of the population was young children. Most of the remainder were the elderly, female , or slaves. Bellesiles’ argument that recorded firearms only equaled 23.7 percent of adult white males also is misleading in the 1800 census, 251,335 adult white males were over the militia age of 44 years , leaving roughly 708,000 men aged 18 to 44 out of a total population of 5,084,912. Because of exemptions for mariners, postal carriers, local /state officials, federal officials, federal military personnel,etc. the 1803 militia numbered 524,086 men. Bellesiles acknowledges that at least 45 percent of the militia bore arms. What he fails to realize is that probably no more than 45 percent of the militia could be deployed at any one time because the economy would collapse. But so what?? 235,000 armed men should certainly have been able to handle any threat that Europe could afford to deploy to North America on the order of 35,000 troops?. And by 1810, the militia was much larger due to population growth (immigration, high birth rate) and had many more arms: 308,254 arms for 677,681 militia members (Arming America, page 446). Bellesiles unwittingly gives indirect support for this observation when he notes on page 210 that Hamilton thought the country should have arms for 30,000 soldiers. The problem in 1812 was not lack of arms it was one of transporting and concentrating militia at points of British invasions along the coast --and of supplying the militia. (Note: US Census data from http://fisher.lib.virginia.edu/census/ ) Bellesiles’ paradigm is to supply a constant barrage of quotes from individuals re militia need for federal firearms, etc. The problem is that Bellesiles doesn’t show whether these individual anecdotes accurately reflected the overall situation. Low-level officials are always petitioning for federal largesse and predicting disaster if their requests are not met but such hyperbolic petitions rarely reflect reality. Similarly, it’s not surprising that local governments would try to get federal funds for firearms in lieu of buying the guns themselves that doesn’t mean that their petitions were truthful or their need was pressing. For example, Bellesiles asserts on page 219 that the “frontier militia themselves could not fight the Indians with any hope of success”. Yet, Andrew Jackson and the Tennessee militia destroyed the military power of the Creek nation at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend in 1814. 14) Moreover, the militia census did not record all private firearms. Bellesiles argues (p.262) that “these censuses of firearms were conducted by militia officers and constables going house-to-house in their districts …there is no record of any opposition to or even complaint against these gun censuses..”. Actually, Thomas Jefferson noted to Congress in 1804 : “ I lay before Congress the last returns of the Militia of the United States. Their incompleteness is much to be regretted…” . An examination of the 1803 militia returns see http://www.potomac-inc.org/172.gif -- is even more revealing. Private arms tended to be rifles, because of their superior accuracy for hunting and frugal use of lead. State and federal military forces tended to use the faster loading musket. Because Kentucky was newly established in 1803, most of its militia arms were private weapons 11,157 rifles and only 2923 muskets. The older states in New England , by contrast, only reported large supplies of muskets. It is hard to believe that there was not a single privately-owned rifle in New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island, or Connecticut in 1803 -- yet that is what is reported. In view of state population figures, it is hard to believe that Massachusetts could have 44,075 muskets but only 203 rifles. It is also hard to believe that New York only had 642 rifles and New Jersey only had 6. One wonders if the Federalists of New England, having lost power to the hated Thomas Jefferson and Democratic-Republicans, were hiding something. 15) The 1803 militia return also refutes another one of Bellesiles’ exaggerations re militia shortcomings that “slave insurrections pushed the [southern] militia to its limits, demonstrating that not even the fear of slave uprisings sufficed to motivate the majority of whites to own guns and practice their use.” [Page 246] Speaking of Gabriel’s Rebellion (Virginia, 1800), Bellesiles says “Most observers, including John Randolph, felt that only heavy rains and the early discovery of the uprising prevented a successful slave rebellion.”[page 247] Yet , estimated figures for slaves involved in Gabriel’s Rebellion are roughly 1500-2000. Only about 26? slaves were actually tried and less than that executed. Gabriel’s followers were armed largely with homemade swords and pikes. The 1803 militia return cited above shows that Virginia had about 62,000 militiamen armed with about 12,500 rifles and muskets [http://www.potomac-inc.org/milret.html, http://www.potomac-inc.org/171.gif , http://www.potomac-inc.org/172.gif ] . Bellesiles missed the larger lesson of Gabriel’s Rebellion --that a disarmed people have no choice but to accept a miserable slavery unless freed by an outside agency. Bellesiles is probably correct that firearms were in relatively short supply in the Richmond area --but his error is to extrapolate Richmond’s situation to the South as a whole. The 1803 militia return cited above shows that North Carolina had 17,821 rifles and muskets for 40,669 militiamen (44%). As I noted here on H-OIEAHC in February, Jefferson said that Tidewater Virginia had been denuded of firearms during the Revolution in order to supply Virginia’s Continentals. (My guess is that defense of the Tidewater was considered infeasible since several large rivers ran inland from the coast and provided corridors for the British Navy.) Tidewater firearms had probably been lost to the British when Virginia’s Continentals were captured at Charleston or were stored at West Point when the Continental Army was disbanded in 1783. 16) Contrary to Bellesiles, the militia did not die a “slow, embarrassing death.” When the Confederacy attacked Fort Sumter, Lincoln’s response was to call out Bellesiles’ nonexistent militia.
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