This week, in case you hadn’t noticed the look-alikes abounding, the Revolutionary War hero the Marquis de Lafayette is visiting Connecticut and many of the other former colonies — as part of a tour that has been two centuries in the making.
He’s reprising an 1824 tour, 200 years ago, when he spent 13 months in our fair land —including visiting 28 towns in Connecticut alone — to mark America’s 50th anniversary and to receive the gratitude and adulation of the country he was indispensable in helping to establish.
Why couldn’t the marquis, age 74 at the time, wait until 1826 to mark the true jubilee of American independence? His age was no factor.
Professor Robert Pierce Forbes believes the answer is that Lafayette’s friend President James Monroe in 1824 simply couldn’t wait. The country was fracturing in factionalism, the galvanizing and unifying memory of the Revolution was fading as its last veterans were dying off, and everybody was questioning the other’s patriotism. Sound familiar?
Forbes believes Monroe needed Lafayette, and right away, in 1824, as an election with four bitter contenders was looming, including John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson, and with none receiving a majority of electoral votes, it was ultimately one of the rare elections thrown into the House. Monroe needed help to calm a country where some of the contenders, like Jackson, or his surrogates, were threatening to march on the capitol if their “claims” weren’t honored.
Sound familiar again? Lafayette’s visit, said Forbes, smoothed and defused the factionalism. Is there a Lafayette figure today? Suggestions welcome.
Forbes, along with Lafayette re-enactor Michael Halbert, will be on hand to elaborate in a lecture at the New Haven Museum Wednesday at 6:00 p.m.
The Independent caught up with the recently retired Southern Connecticut State University history professor at his Westville home, where Forbes said he believes Lafayette is a crucial and under-appreciated figure in securing democracy in America. He also offered some history-based tips to keep our fragile system puttering along.
Here are some highlights from the interview:
Independent: What are some key take-aways of your Lafayette research for your listeners to focus on?
Forbes: We look back at history and it “flattens” out. But it was just as complicated and contingent [that is, things could go either way] as what we are facing today. American democracy is not something “bequeathed” from the founding and just keeps running. We have to relearn and fight for it in every generation.
What role did the memory of the Revolution play in bringing factions together?
The dirty little secret of the Revolution is that it was the soldiers who bore the brunt of it. The vast majority of civilians barely lifted a finger. They sold goods to the British who paid cash! Monroe and Lafayette, both age 19, were both wounded in battle and spent that horrible winter at Washington’s quarters in Valley Forge. Even when it meant putting his soldiers through horrifying deprivation, Washington never defied civilian authority. Those soldiers went on to be the core group of public servants of future decades. You couldn’t stray too far from the ideals of the Revolution [which Lafayette’s visit helped to rekindle].
Lafayette arrived in August, 1824, the election occurred in November, and votes were counted ultimately in Congress in February. What was Lafayette’s specific effect on the situation?
His arrival paralyzed the electoral ardor. People dropped division and hatred and immediately came together under the banner of Lafayette. People who hadn’t talked in a generation competed for the honor to host Lafayette under their roof.
What would Lafayette make of the main contenders today?
I think he would have been very pleased with Harris. Her love of America would have appealed to him, not what Trump is doing. The “American carnage” would have turned him off deeply.
What details do we know of his visit specifically to New Haven? Like what did he think of the pizza [joke]?
New Haven was the first stop after arrival in New York City. Monroe thought it would be a mistake to come to Washington. [Because Lafayette’s unflappable republicanism was hated by most European rulers at the time, including the French King Louis 18th], that would alienate the European powers [whose representatives were there]. He spent the first night on Staten Island. Then Monroe sent him to Boston via New Haven. They visited Yale College, did the rounds of banquets and balls. All the founding fathers generation [from the New Haven area] were dead. But some of the Revolutionary war soldiers, who had been too feeble to travel to NYC and lived in the area, flocked to meet him. He spent only the day in New Haven, and the night in Old Saybrook
Apart from helping Monroe, did he have personal reasons to come to America?
By 1823 he was suspected, and legitimately, of organizing against the Bourbon [French] monarch. He never for an instant wavered in his commitment to republicanism and that’s why all the rulers in France including Napoleon hated him. I think he was suspect of being a revolutionary, so his coming at Monroe’s invitation was self-protective. He was bankrupt at this point, having lost all his money and estates in the [French] revolution. Congress awarded him a present of $100,000 and a township, basically a large plot of land, anywhere he wanted. He chose Florida, a township in Tallahassee, which he sold shortly afterwards.
What was Lafayette’s role on the day after Adams won, receiving two more votes from the states than Jackson?
Monroe throws a dinner party at the White House with Lafayette, of course, as the guest of honor. And everyone wants to see how the President-elect [Adams] interacts with his competitors. [According to the sources, which Forbes reads from] “The moment they [Adams and Jackson] perceived each other, they hastened to meet, taking each other cordially by the hand, with Jackson congratulating, and General Jackson appeared sincere, and it was accepted by the others.” This [narrative] is then ‘sold’ to the rest of the world as how democracy works, and you’d never imagine there had been any contention at all!
Lafayette visited no fewer than 28 towns in Connecticut on the 1824 – 25 tour. Click here for details on the Connecticut Lafayette Trail.
If you miss the marquis on Wednesday, his next stop nearby will be in Old Lyme on August 22 at the Old Lyme Historical Society.