The Middle Period, 1817-1858. John William Burgess
Treaty of Paris of 1763—The Boundary between Louisiana and Florida—Occupation of Florida by the United States Forces during the War of 1812—The Hold of the Spaniards on Florida Weakened by the War of 1812—The British Troops in Florida during and after the War of 1812—Nicholls and his Buccaneer State in Florida—The British Government's Repulse of Nicholls' Advances—Destruction of the Nicholls Fort by the United States Forces—The Seminole War—The Fight at Fowltown—The Seminole War Defensive—McGregor on Amelia Island—General Gaines sent to Amelia Island—General Jackson placed in Command in Florida—His Orders—Jackson's Letter to President Monroe—Jackson's Operations in Florida—The First Treaty for the Cession of Florida to the United States—Jackson's Popularity in consequence of the Seminole War—The Attempt in Congress to Censure Jackson—The same Attempt in the Cabinet—The Failure of the Attempt to Censure Jackson in Congress—Assumption of the Responsibility for Jackson's Acts by the Administration—Jackson Triumphant—The Treaty of Cession Attacked in Congress, but Ratified by the Senate—Rejection of the Treaty by the Spanish Government—Resumption of Negotiations—The New Treaty Ratified by the Senate and by the Spanish Government—Political Results of the Seminole War.
It was entirely natural that the quickening of the national spirit and the growth of the national consciousness throughout the United States, in the decade between 1810 and 1820, had, for one of their results, the extension of the territory of the United States, at some point or other, to its natural limits.
| The influence of physical geography upon political development. |
The element of physical geography always plays a large part in national political development. The natural territorial basis of a national state is a geographical unity. That is, it is a territory separated by broad bodies of water, or high mountain ranges, or broad belts of uninhabitable country, or climatic extremes, from other territory, and possessing a fair degree of coherence within. If a national state develops itself on any part of such a territory, it will inevitably tend to spread to the natural limits of the same. It will not become a completely national state until it shall have attained such boundaries, for a completely national state is the sovereign organization of a people having an ethnic unity upon a territory which is a geographic unity.
| Defect in the southern boundary of the United States before 1819. |
In the second decade of this century, and down to the latter part of it, the United States had not acquired the territory of the country as far as to the natural southern boundary east of Louisiana. This boundary was, of course, the Gulf of Mexico; but Spain held in quasi possession a broad strip, and then a long peninsula, of land along and within this boundary. In other words, the territory called Florida, or the Floridas, was, politically, a colony of Spain, but geographically a part of the United States. It was inhabited chiefly by Indian tribes. Spanish rule in this territory was, therefore, foreign rule, both from the geographical point of view and the ethnical. Indian rule was not to be thought of in the nineteenth century. There was but one natural solution of the question. It was that the United States should annex this territory and extend the jurisdiction of the general Government over it.
| The Treaty of Paris of 1763. |
The Treaty of Paris of 1763 was the first great international agreement which gave a fair degree of definiteness to the claims of England, France, and Spain, upon the North American continent. In this Treaty, France surrendered Canada, Cape Breton, and all claims to territory east of the Mississippi River, from the source of the river to the point of confluence of the Iberville with it, to Great Britain. From this latter point, the boundary between the two powers was declared to be the middle line of the Iberville, and of the Lakes Maurepas and Pontchartrain, to the Gulf of Mexico. It is also expressly stated in this Treaty that France cedes the river and port of Mobile to Great Britain.
In this same instrument, Spain surrendered to Great Britain Florida and every claim to territory east and southeast of the Mississippi.
| The boundary between Louisiana and Florida. |
The boundary between Louisiana and Florida had, to that time, been the River Perdido. After the cessions above mentioned to Great Britain, the British Government united the part of Louisiana received from France with Florida, and then divided Florida into two districts by the line of the River Appalachicola. That part lying to the west of this river was named West Florida, and the part east of it was called East Florida.
By a secret Treaty of the year 1762, which became known to the world some eighteen months later, but whose terms were not executed until 1769, France ceded Louisiana to Spain. After this, therefore, the North American continent was divided between Great Britain and Spain, and the line of division was, so far as it was fixed, the Mississippi River to the confluence of the Iberville with it, then the Iberville and the middle line of the Lakes Maurepas and Pontchartrain to the Gulf of Mexico.
The Treaty of 1762 between France and Spain, having been concluded before the Treaty of 1763 between France and Great Britain, gave Spain a certain show of title to the territory between the Mississippi and the Perdido; but the Treaty of 1763, in which France ceded this same territory to Great Britain, was, as we have just seen, known first, and was the Treaty which France executed in respect to this territory. The conflict of claims between Great Britain and Spain, which was thus engendered, continued to be waged for twenty years, and was settled in the year 1783, in so far as these two powers were concerned, by the recession of Florida to Spain.
In this same year, Great Britain recognized the independence of the United States, with a southern boundary extending from the point where the Mississippi River is intersected by the thirty-first parallel of latitude, along this parallel to the River Appalachicola, thence down the Appalachicola to its confluence with Flint River, thence on the line of shortest distance