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KF5JRV > TODAY 30.04.19 13:22l 72 Lines 3988 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : 35475_KF5JRV
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Subj: Today in History - Apr 30
Path: IW8PGT<CX2SA<N3HYM<KF5JRV
Sent: 190430/1215Z 35475@KF5JRV.#NWAR.AR.USA.NA BPQ6.0.18
On April 30, 1803, representatives of the United States and Napoleonic
France conclude negotiations for the Louisiana Purchase, a massive land
sale that doubles the size of the young American republic. What was
known as Louisiana Territory comprised most of modern-day United States
between the Mississippi and the Rocky Mountains, with the exceptions of
Texas, parts of New Mexico, and other pockets of land already controlled
by the United States. A formal treaty for the Louisiana Purchase,
antedated to April 30, was signed two days later.
Beginning in the 17th century, France explored the Mississippi River
valley and established scattered settlements in the region. By the
middle of the 18th century, France controlled more of the modern United
States than any other European power: from New Orleans northeast to the
Great Lakes and northwest to modern-day Montana. In 1762, during the
French and Indian War, France ceded its America territory west of the
Mississippi River to Spain and in 1763 transferred nearly all of its
remaining North American holdings to Great Britain. Spain, no longer a
dominant European power, did little to develop Louisiana Territory
during the next three decades. In 1796, Spain allied itself with France,
leading Britain to use its powerful navy to cut off Spain from America.
In 1801, Spain signed a secret treaty with France to return Louisiana
Territory to France. Reports of the retrocession caused considerable
uneasiness in the United States. Since the late 1780s, Americans had
been moving westward into the Ohio and Tennessee River valleys, and
these settlers were highly dependent on free access to the Mississippi
River and the strategic port of New Orleans. U.S. officials feared that
France, resurgent under the leadership of Napoleon Bonaparte, would soon
seek to dominate the Mississippi River and access to the Gulf of Mexico.
In a letter to Robert Livingston, the U.S. minister to France, President
Thomas Jefferson stated, “The day that France takes possession of New
Orleans…we must marry ourselves to the British fleet and nation.ö
Livingston was ordered to negotiate with French minister Charles Maurice
de Talleyrand for the purchase of New Orleans.
France was slow in taking control of Louisiana, but in 1802 Spanish
authorities, apparently acting under French orders, revoked a
U.S.-Spanish treaty that granted Americans the right to store goods in
New Orleans. In response, President Jefferson sent future president
James Monroe to Paris to aid Livingston in the New Orleans purchase
talks. On April 11, 1803, the day before Monroe’s arrival, Talleyrand
asked a surprised Livingston what the United States would give for all
of Louisiana Territory. It is believed that the failure of France to put
down a slave revolution in Haiti, the impending war with Great Britain
and probable Royal Navy blockade of France, and financial difficulties
may all have prompted Napoleon to offer Louisiana for sale to the United
States.
Negotiations moved swiftly, and at the end of April the U.S. envoys
agreed to pay $11,250,000 and assumed claims of its citizens against
France in the amount of $3,750,000. In exchange, the United States
acquired the vast domain of Louisiana Territory, some 828,000 square
miles of land. In October, Congress ratified the purchase, and in
December 1803 France formally transferred authority over the region to
the United States. The acquisition of the Louisiana Territory for the
bargain price of less than three cents an acre was Thomas Jefferson’s
most notable achievement as president. American expansion westward into
the new lands began immediately, and in 1804 a territorial government
was established. On April 30, 1812, exactly nine years after the
Louisiana Purchase agreement was made, the first of 13 states to be
carved from the territory–Louisiana–was admitted into the Union as the
18th U.S. state.
73 de Scott KF5JRV
Pmail: KF5JRV@KF5JRV.#NWAR.AR.USA.NA
email: KF5JRV@GMAIL.COM
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