The Devil’s Apprentice, analysis- The crime against Kansas.

When The Devil’s Apprentice gets too good and you need to share… This was peak “Type B fun.” He put me through the ringer, but I look back with fondness. One of the many perils of single life, I have no one to share this exciting knowledge with. Except you…

An extract from The Devil’s apprentice.

First of all, wow, my boy Charles Sumner went to SCHOOL. Second of all… Damn if I was pro slavery I’d have beaten your ass too. You are damn lucky they didn’t kill you sir, slave masters have no chill. Or soul. But bravo, and brava. What a stirring speech, he went to Norse Mythology, Ancient Rome, on several occasions, the French revolution, King George III got a mention so did Aeneid and American Eloquence. We travelled. It was amazing.

But what did he actually talk about…

From what I can gather the crime against Kansas is not how he’d describe it, I’d describe it as follows.

Following the Missouri Compromise (a massive great line drawn in the sand almost literally which stated which states were free and which weren’t (south of the line slavery is legal, north of it it, it isn’t.” Kansas is north of it. So it should be a free state, right? Wrong. Charles is speaking whilst Kansas is still a territory i.e. it has no representation in the house of Representatives… but they’re close, they are a territory of 50,000-60,000 souls.  They sent Missourians, thousands of them to “participate” (read “rig”) their elections. Why? Because Missourians are slave states. These newcomers came ARMED, bro why did you need to have 2 wagons full of guns AND 7 canon against your fellow citizens if you weren’t trying to start a civil war??? They’d come, pay a dollar, vote and then leave. Why? Because they weren’t any Missourians, they were pro-slavery Missourians.

 This got us a small “war” (literally 2 people died.) of Wacherusa. Where it should be noted, Native Americans or “Red people” (because pick-me ism never pays and even abolitionists aren’t above racial slurs) fought on the side of the slave masters, forgetting that they too were currently being enslaved.

Now this was fascinating, because it ended with them going to the governor and declaring it was all a misunderstanding (it was not, they’d just got bored of it.) there was no reasonable reason to start the war, nor was the ending satisfactory, it was a mastery in diplomacy, “lets all go home and bury the hatchet.” Essentially. Tensions still remained, and nothing was resolved. It was all due to incompetent government.

Then we have the story of the fact that a runaway slave met the full force of the Army and Navy of the US government in Boston because God forbid they get North successfully (Harriet Tubman had been running circles around your asses for years but lets not get into that, and that the president of the united states got involved over ONE slave. )

He calls the current president out for the fact that people were allowed to invade his land and vote in elections where they weren’t resident and yet the vote be upheld as legal because the president is a puppet to the slave masters.

He puts everyone on blast. South Carolina senator? Blast. Illinois? Blast. The guy who wrote the fugitive slave bill? Blast. He’s got smoke for everyone. (that’s why he gets his ass beaten. The brother of the South Carolina senator was in the house of Representatives, and rather than call him out for a duel as an equal he decided to use a whip for dogs to crack the Sumner’s skull open.) (yet magically doesn’t get charged for assault) so this is the only beating ever in Congress, this is why the speech is famous… damn. He made sure he earned that beating. Never, have I ever seen a man sweat so hard in order to earn his beating. He deserved it. Calling slavery an “ugly mistress” of the South Carolina senator was only one of the milder things he had to say.

He blasts everyone who said Kansas doesn’t have a large enough population to become a state, (definitely BS, some people became a state with 20,000 people there. Kansas had 50,000-60,000 and Congress could still admit you even if you had a slightly lower population…) Also, bringing Michigan into statehood was MESSY.

He glazes over the barbarism of slavery, more focus is on the principle that humans shouldn’t own humans. And that it blackens the soul. But I will excuse him for that, he’s big on tyranny.  My favourite quote (other than the ugly mistress thing) was.

“Nothing can come out of nothing; and there is absolutely nothing in the constitution out of which Slavery can be derived, while there are provisions, which, when properly interpreted, make its existence anywhere within the exclusive national jurisdiction impossible”

 and how the American revolution didn’t need to happen if the British were kinder about it (I actually believe that and can’t wait to read about it.) Like a broken marriage where one person is trying to fix it and the other ignoring them until divorce papers land on their door. He likens the President to the British. Meanwhile I read the speech King George gave. From the Library of Congress. Why don’t British sources have the speech? Also why are there lines missing in the Congress one? Because there were some lines he was quoting I didn’t read in the congress speech. Anyway, the British basically were treating the Americans like naughty children, increasing the size of the navy, and army “landed militia” and bringing troops from Gibraltar etc… then saying. “If you go back to obedience…we’ll let you.” (this reminds me of my family, “if you want to treat us like family, even when we haven’t treated you like family… we’ll let you.”)We can’t have the colony rise up, we’ve put too much money into it. Forgetting that after 150+ years these people had developed their own identity and they didn’t want to be obedient. Who wants to be obedient when they live amongst hostile native American tribes and even more hostile conditions? Self government was always going to happen, but we could have had a more “Canadian/Australian/New Zealand” relationship where the King was still head of state but it was an independent country with self governance. But yes, the British were the bad guys and this was evident.

Charles Sumner gave me such a rich world I feel a little bereft of his presence, even 1 week on.

I miss him, and his prose. He’s a fellow traveller on this road of enlightenment.

His esoteric language at times lost me and I needed to do a lot of independent study in order to understand the context, but his stories were evocative and relevant and homed in the point and his sentiments were righteous. So I’ll give him a 9/10.

Also, if I haven’t said it before, you were right sir, a crime was being committed against Kansas and I thank you for pointing it out so thoroughly to me.

But sir, my loquacious brother in Christ…please drop the name of your tutor or at the very least your reading list so your fellow brethren in Christ can catch up with your eloquence.

With love, from the descendant of freed slaves

An example of…

Grace and Courage.

Annetta Mother Smith.