What Forgiveness is For

Today, on Historia Obscura, there is an excellent new article by Pam Keyes:

http://www.historiaobscura.com/the-letter-that-tried-to-scuttle-the-baratarians-pardon/

It introduces two new characters to the tale of Jean Laffite:  George Poindexter and Fulwar Skipwith. As I am a bit of a name fancier, I am fascinated by the name "Fulwar Skipwith", and I have every expectation of learning more about him in future installments.

But for now, here is what it is good to know about pardons:

• Pardons are not usually issued after someone has done a good turn. In many cases, they have to be issued in advance, so that a person under arrest or in prison can go forth and do good. This was the case for the Baratarian privateers.
• Sometimes a pardon is just a roundabout way of admitting that what you accused or convicted someone of is not true. The Baratarians were smugglers and privateers, not pirates.
• The great value of the pardon to the person issuing it is that he may now resume a regular relationship with the person pardoned.
• We do not pardon people and then banish them. We do not pardon people and then execute them. Pardoning is not in order to calm the anxiety of the person who felt wronged -- it is so that the person pardoned can become part of regular society, and can contribute and serve.

George Poindexter did not appear to understand these elementary facts about how pardons work,  because he tried to get the government to retroactively take back pardons that were already issued. If the Baratarians had not been pardoned, they could not have served in the Battle of New Orleans. It may have been that the anticipated service was necessary to take full advantage of the pardon, but no service could have been rendered had the presidential pardon not already existed.

Today, we hear people say things like: "I do not forgive for the other person's sake. I do it for my own sake, so that I can know inner peace. I forgive, but I do not forget, and I don't ever need to see them again." Forgiveness is a spontaneous emotion, but like all emotions it serves a function: to rehabilitate people, so that we can work with them.  To forgive people, and then to refuse to have anything to do with them again is not forgiveness. 

Patterson and Ross Awarded Laffite-owned Property They Seized

This week on Historia Obscura there is a very significant article by Pam Keyes.

http://www.historiaobscura.com/john-dicks-letter-to-monroe-honoring-the-baratarians/

The article gives the background for a letter written by John Dick, the US District Attorney for Louisiana,  to James Monroe, the Secretary of State, on behalf of the Baratarian privateers. President James Madison had just signed a blanket pardon to the Baratarians for their evasion of the Customs Taxes of the day prior to the Battle of New Orleans. Dick was glad he did not have to prosecute any of the Baratarians, because of their indispensable service to the United States that helped defeat the British.

But despite the presidential pardon, Pam Keyes notes in her article that property belonging to the Baratarians, and the Laffites in particular, which had been seized in the Patterson-Ross raid prior to the Battle of New Orleans, was awarded by Congress to the raiders, Patterson and Ross,  to have and to hold and to spend as they pleased.

A couple of weeks before Dick wrote his letter, and after the Baratarian indictments were dropped, Ross left New Orleans in March 1815 for Washington, D.C. to petition Congress with the help of a Congressional friend for the monies from the Barataria raid. The bill for the relief of Ross and Patterson was read for the first time in Congress on April 1816, a month before the sickly Ross died at a relative’s home in Pennsylvania. Jean Laffite went to Washington, too, but not until December 1815, when he wrote a letter to President Madison on Dec. 27 seeking recovery of the raid monies. Madison’s response is unknown, but at that time, he was not in Washington. On Feb. 22, 1817, President Madison signed into law an amended bill supported by Congress that directed the secretary of the treasury to pay Ross and Patterson $50,000 from the proceeds of the Barataria raid.

 We have to ask ourselves who were the pirates in this transaction, and who was the aggrieved property holder.

How to Take Back a Punishment and Be Vindicated

There are three branches to the United States government. What one takes away, another one can give back. For instance, if the legislative branch makes a mistake and passes an unconstitutional act, the executive can refuse to enforce it and the judicial can nullify it.

If somebody is wrongfully adjudicated guilty of a crime, the executive can pardon the accused, and the legislative can offer restitution in payment for what has been suffered.

But what if someone is in the middle of a lawsuit to reclaim his property, and the legislature just passes a law that the spoils go to one of the parties to the litigation? I don't have direct evidence of this myself, but I have heard that something like that happened to the goods belonging to Jean and Pierre Laffite. Before their lawsuit could come to trial, a law was passed to the effect that the goods belonged to Patterson. Is that constitutional?

It's good to have checks and balances. And yet.... this ability to undo what has already been done can be misused. And sometimes a person does not want  a pardon for a crime he has not committed. He wants vindication, instead.

Notice that when President Madison pardoned all the Baratarians who served in the Battle of New Orleans, Jean Laffite did not claim that pardon, because he believed he was not guilty of a crime.

And when Andrew Jackson was forced to pay $1000.00 as a fine for being in contempt of court, for having Judge Hall incarcerated for granting a writ of habeas corpus during Jackson's imposition of martial law, Jackson never asked for a pardon. Instead, toward the end of his life, he got Congress to pass a law that the fine was to be paid back to him.

Why? Was it because he needed the money? Or was he trying to make a point? According to the book by Matthew Warshauer, Andrew Jackson and the Politics of Martial Law it was because: “He viewed the return of his fine as a larger statement about the legitimacy of violating the constitution and civil liberties in times of national emergency.”

What can we learn from this? If you get in trouble, but you want to be vindicated, don't go for a pardon. Get an act of Congress to refund your money.

Why not Honor Jean Laffite? Because Acknowledging a Debt is Hard

On Historia Obscura, the latest article is about how we should honor Jean Laffite for his contributions to the American victory in the series of engagements known as the Battle of New Orleans. You would think that after nearly two hundred years, that proposition would be relatively uncontroversial. All of Laffite's enemies have since died, his contemporary rivals and detractors are not  here to continue to besmirch his name, and we have access to the facts.

And yet down in New Orleans there is some fellow by the name of Tim Pickles who wants to say that Jean Laffite helped the British and not the Americans. Why? What's in it for him? Maybe he is a historian who hopes to get credit for a revision of history. Maybe repeating the same old story won't win him any points.

But there are others who step up to support him, in a seemingly unmotivated, disinterested way. One comment was that the only real question  is where Jean Laffite was at every point in each battle, turning the issue of Laffite's loyalty into a historical game of  "Where's Waldo?"

Really? Where was Andrew Jackson at every point in each battle? If we find no record of his whereabouts at any particular junction, are we going to assume that he had sold out to the British?

An Artist's Conception of Jean Laffite by Lanie Frick

People seem to doubt the loyalty of Jean Laffite to the United States precisely because the United States government was not kind to him. Where he offered support and undying loyalty, courage in battle and materials supplied with no hope of ever being repaid, they sent ships against him, robbed him of his goods, and after the war eventually chased him away, forcing him to relocate to Galveston and afterwards telling him he must leave there, too. Sometimes when people are being mean to you, they project their own feelings onto you, assuming that you can't possibly like them, because they don't deserve it.

But Jean Laffite did like the United States of America. He loved it very much, so much so that he was willing to give his life, his wealth and his sacred honor in its support. Was he a courageous fighter, a bold tactician and a commander of men? Yes. And he used all that to help with the Battle of New Orleans. He was right there in the thick of things, getting his hands dirty building mud fortifications, making sure everyone had enough flints for their muskets and advising about the lay of the land, which was not known to Andrew Jackson. He went down the line and helped lift the morale of the men. He sent key personnel to important locations to be where they needed to be to meet and defeat the enemy.

But Jean Laffite was also a financier, a businessman and privateer. One of his major contributions to the Battle of New Orleans was supplying gunpowder and flints free of charge at a time when the regular armed forces of the United States did not have any.

The idea that Laffite's contribution should be judged solely on his achievements as a foot soldier -- how many men he shot with a musket or a cannon or killed with his bare hands -- is ludicrous. We don't judge Andrew Jackson that way!

Why would people think this? Perhaps because we have been conditioned to forget that patriotism and support of one's country can take many forms. George Washington was a great American, but so was Haym Solomon. Washington led armies and spent money. Haym Solomon provided an entire fortune to make sure that Washington could do this. There could not have been one without the other. But the contributions of the General are well known. The debt of the nation to the broker/banker is forgotten.

Jean Laffite was a renaissance man. He was like George Washington and Haym Solomon all rolled into one. He was a leader of men, a bold fighter and also the source of the funding for arming his own subordinates as well as Jackson's men. In this way, he is both a hero and a benefactor.

But people are seldom willing to openly acknowledge debts they can never repay.  Sometimes, when they are owed too much, benefactors are reviled by precisely those people who ought to be grateful. While Jackson acknowledged Jean Laffite's material contribution to the Battle of New Orleans, James Madison never did, except by a proclamation offering to pardon all who participated in the battle. Pardon! What was there to pardon? That they didn't pay customs taxes? What about all the money they contributed to the government during the war?

The United States of America was founded on the idea that taxes should not be taken by force, but that people should use their own money and their own muskets and their own gunpowder and flints to form a well regulated militia. That was the distinguishing factor between the British and the Americans. That was why Jean Laffite was on the American side in the first place. It was why  though "proscribed" by his adopted country, he continued to love her and to want her to prosper.

 Madison, in his pardon proclamation,  named no names and offered no commendations, and the ships and goods plundered by the United States Army and Navy in the Patterson-Ross raid were never returned. The gunpowder and flint donated after the raid were never paid for. In the end, the atmosphere in New Orleans became so poisonous toward the Laffites that they decided they had better leave and start life elsewhere.

Why did this happen? Because when people rob you, they will not be content just to take your goods. They will also want to be able to justify what they did by saying you deserved it. This kind of behavior is going on to this very day.

Let's remember the debt we all owe to Jean Laffite. It can never be repaid, but the least we can do is give credit where credit is due. He was a hero, and he was wronged. Let's not forget what he did for the nation, despite the way he was treated!