Simon what kind of nation

More than one hundred fifty years later, their clashes still reverberate in constitutional debates and political battles. In this dramatic and fully accessible account of these titans of the early republic and their fiercely held ideas, James F. Simon brings to life the early history of the nation and sheds new light on the highly charged battle to balance the powers of the federal government and the rights of the states. A fascinating look at two of the nation's greatest statesmen and shrewdest politicians, What Kind of Nation presents a cogent, unbiased assessment of their lasting impact on American government.

James F. He is the author of seven previous books on American history, law, and politics. He lives with his wife in West Nyack, New York. Joseph J. A major contribution A model of narrative history written by someone who knows the law.

Langguth author of Patriots: The Men Who Started the American Revolution and Our Vietnam James Simon has written a legal suspense story, with John Marshall trying to wrench the Supreme Court from a cramped room in the Capitol building to its rightful place under the Constitution while a suspicious President Jefferson fights him bitterly from behind the scenes.

What Kind of Nation helps us to understand the court battles that go on today, no less partisan, no less urgent. The Washington Post James Simon adds a patina of freshness and telling detail to this familiar story. According to Lynch , p. Blanchard , p. In , with Spain losing ground in Venezuela, creole slaveholders regained strength and representation at the Congress of Angostura, which was elected to debate the creation of a joint Venezuelan and New Granadan "Republic of Colombia" referred to here as Gran Colombia.

Although most of his long speech to the congress aimed at convincing the delegates of the necessity of a British-inspired parliamentary system with a hereditary Senate see below , it was also a desperate appeal in favor of the confirmation of his decrees emancipating the slaves, which, he claimed, had transformed them into enthusiastic supporters of the new republic.

Brandishing the scarecrow of the Helotes, Spartacus, and Haiti, he stated: "[ In other words, the survivors of those 3 slaves would indeed become freedmen after the end of the war. There were military reasons to order the recruitment of slaves: these were strong men used to hard work and ready to die for the cause of freedom.

There were crude demographic reasons as well: should only free men fight and die for the freedom of the fatherland, he asked? And once a revolution advocated freedom, nothing could stop its movement, the best one could do was to channel it in the right direction.

Cauca's slaveowners should understand this political rule rather than blindly follow their short-term economic interests, he explained idem , p. Not surprisingly, slavery was not contemplated by the constitution but by the Law of Manumission of 21 July , which only foresaw abolition in the long term while attempting to reconcile the contradictory constitutional rights to freedom and property.

This law declared that from now on all children born to slave mothers would be free but would have to work for their mother's masters without pay until they reached the age of eighteen, theoretically in compensation for their upbringing. Freedom at the age of eighteen was conditional to the masters issuing a certificate of good conduct.

Slaves denied such certificates would be destined by the government to useful work, thus becoming a kind of public slaves. The law also ordered the formation of manumission juntas that would buy the freedom of the most "honest and industrious" adult slaves from their owners, through funds financed by a portion of the value of bequests.

Moreover, after , slaves lost the option of joining the army as a means of getting out of bondage. No promise of freedom was attached to enlistment. No post-independence legislation aimed at easing the condition of the existing slave population.

Moreover, as slaves continued to run away to gain freedom, new departmental ordinances focused on the repression of flight and assistance to fugitive slaves. In addition, as he said, he opposed slavery as fundamentally incompatible with a republic based on the freedom and equality of its citizens.

Yet, his conviction emanated largely from the fear that if slaves were not freed, the Haitian Revolution and its extermination of whites could repeat themselves in Venezuela and New Granada. Haiti was for him the symbol of what Venezuela could have become, had the brutal Spanish reconquest launched in not turned its population of African descent against Ferdinand VII. In reality, although his two letters from Jamaica did not mention the free Afro-descended majority in Venezuela in order to secure British support to independence, he never stopped worrying about Venezuela's demography and the racial dimension of the civil war that had devastated the country until Spanish reconquest.

Led by the creole aristocracy of Caracas, it adopted a constitution that declared the equality of the free regardless of race, but barred most nonwhite citizens from suffrage through property and other requirements. Moreover, the creole patriots adopted laws that promoted the expansion of private ownership in the vast cattle ranching plains of the Orinoco Basin at the expenses of the free llaneros mostly pardo and mestizo cowboys.

Thus the royalists, helped by the arrival of Spanish reinforcements from Puerto Rico, were able to capitalize on the socioracial resentment of pardos and llaneros to enlist some of them in their armies; they also forced or encouraged slaves belonging to patriot landowners to join royalist ranks LYNCH, , p. The Second Republic of Venezuela did not rally the support of the pardo majority either. Nor did he seek to understand the motivations of those who followed the Spaniards. Instead, he offered them an ultimatum, also letting his troops sack and commit massacres in the countryside and the towns they occupied.

By , violence and atrocities were at their peak, with both sides loosing literally thousands of men, but the royalist troops controlled most of Venezuela and submitted its population to repeated abuse. Although he avoided any direct mention of "los colores," he blamed all the current calamities and horrors not on the Spaniards, but on "vuestros hermanos [ He and his army fought for the freedom of America, but they confronted popular masses degraded by the yoke of servitude, turned into idiots by religious fanaticism, and seduced by the prospect of voracious anarchy and undeserved honor and fortune.

Yet, as he pursued the struggle against Spain in New Granada and later went into exile in the Caribbean, events in Venezuela turned in his favor. Pablo Morillo and a 10 men army to reconquer Venezuela and the Caribbean coast of New Granada in Morillo reorganized the llanero royalist units under his command, restoring racial discriminations and reducing slaves to non-combatant tasks. At the same time he brutally repressed alleged or convicted "traitors," confiscated most creole haciendas, and submitted the population, already hurt by four years of war and a deadly earthquake in , to high contributions and forced labor or enlistment.

By late , his 1 patriot troops were the best trained and organized of all. At that time, increasing numbers of llaneros also began to switch sides. Piar was sentenced to death for allegedly planning a conspiracy against the principles of equality, liberty and independence at the basis of the patriot movement DUCOUDRAY, , p.

Legal restrictions on free persons of African origin in the Spanish colonies lasted until Moreover, Piar owed his republican equality to the white, wealthy and noble creoles who initiated the Venezuelan revolution and voluntarily gave up all their privileges to promote "los sagrados derechos del hombre" and the freedom of their own enslaved property. Although the scale of the land's value ranged from 25 pesos for a general in chief to 6 pesos for a captain and only pesos for a soldier, the decree showed his concern for the economic future of the mostly nonwhite rank and file 5 5 After the end of the war, several generals and many officers benefited from land and hacienda redistribution and became caudillos.

More profoundly, he continued to believe that pardo men identified more with their race than their fatherland. This confronted him with a dilemma: his beliefs in the necessity of legal equality to consolidate the republic led him to promote a few men of color, such as Padilla, to higher military positions, yet as soon as these men acquired power and popularity, he suspected them of racial conspiracy. He lamented that the Spanish yoke had not prepared the "pueblo americano" for self-government.

Nacidos todos del seno de una misma Madre, nuestros Padres diferentes en origen y en sangre, son extranjeros, y todos difieren visiblemente en la epidermis; esta desemejanza trae un reato de la mayor trascendencia" ibidem. This obligation of atonement for the sinful origin of Spanish America "reato" required a system of government that would prevent the rapid dislocation of this "heterogeneous society. Therefore he corrected the British-inspired form of government presented in his letters from Jamaica: now the bicameral legislative power would comprise a House of Representatives elected by enfranchised adult men, and the hereditary Senate would be a sort of House of Lords, not made up of nobles but, for the first generation, of the most talented and virtuous patriots elected by the Representatives, and later on by their descendents who would be trained in a special college.

They would act as arbitrators between the easily influenced popular masses and the Executive Power; they would be the warrants of the perpetuity of the republic. As for the Executive, it should rest entirely on a president elected by the active citizens of the Congress - not for life, as he had envisioned in - and on his ministers with broad centralized powers in order to maintain social order and to forge a united nation. This seemed to him all the more vital now that, with victory in sight, the number and percentage of whites would shrink after the departure of peninsulares and creole royalists.

An indication of his preference for whites in political positions was his disparaging remark about Bernardo Rivadavia, the only patriot leader from Buenos Aires with some African ancestry: "La nota de Rivadavia [ He struggled to find a way to restore the pre socioracial hierarchy despite the fact that independence had been won principally by men of color. During the war, he reflected, creole patriots had needed men to fight the Spaniards and they had recruited "blacks, zambos , mulattos , and whites" as long as they were brave.

The only means to reward the most heroic ones had been military promotion, even though their only merit was often "brutal strength. He warned Santander, no doubt including him among the "gentlemen" he criticized: "Esos caballeros [ The Caribbean context contributed to the Libertador's anxiety.

The writer takes an inherently complex topic and makes it understandable for the rest of us. As a law student, it is a great start to your 0L summer reading. Heck it would even be worthwhile if you just really liked Hamilton and wanted to know more of what was going on during that time period.

Taking the AP exam? Give this a read and tie in some context to your studies. History provides perspective! Add to Cart failed.

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