GM plant Fremont Ca.
The Calforia
Posted on July 5, 2025 by Royal Rosamond Press
Drive an all eclectic Calforia with the charging nipple on the front. Don’t you love the split window – and real steel chrome bumpers – that the billionaires stole from the American People with the help of the Whacky Graham Crusaders?
Elon Musk founded a new political party, called the..
AMERICA PARTY
He should hire me to create his BRAND, do a logo, and author Real History to go with his party. My relative, John Fremont, founded Radical Democratic Party in order to force Lincoln’s hand in emancipating America’s slave. Fremont co-founded the Republican Party and was its first candidate for President. There is a similarity between Musk and Fremont. If Musk can convince Trump to allow California to secede from the the Union, then WE can work together to make a perfect State, that is..
FREE OF DEBT!
We can re-build the…
Calforia Automobile plant in Fremont named after John Fremont. Never fight We The People for THEIR VISION of the future
The California Barrel Company is directly across the Bay! Let’s make a deal!
John Presco
President: California Barrel Company Co.
Frémont and Cochrane dropped out of the race on September 21, 1864. In a letter to The New York Times, Frémont wrote that it had become increasingly clear that the Democrats could not be trusted on the issues of union or abolition. As such, he did not want to act as a spoiler against Lincoln.[22] At the same time, Frémont remained critical of Lincoln, writing that “his Administration has been politically, militarily and financially, a failure, and that its necessary continuance is a cause of regret for the country”.[23] In another letter to the same paper written one week previously, but published in the same edition, he wrote that the ideas of the Radical Democratic Party would nevertheless be pursued.[24] It has been speculated that Frémont’s withdrawal may have been part of a deal with Lincoln whereby the more conservative Postmaster General Montgomery Blair was removed from his post.[25]
Most Radical Democratic Party supporters went on to support Lincoln in the general election,[26] though there were some exceptions to this, notably Wendell Philips.[27] The party itself was finished, having only formed to run a candidate in the 1864 election.
Fremont Assembly was a General Motors automobile factory in Fremont, California, in the San Francisco area, replacing the older Oakland Assembly. Groundbreaking for the plant occurred in September 1961, and the plant produced its first vehicle on May 1, 1963. Production continued through March 1, 1982, when the plant was closed after production problems. After closure, the plant was refurbished and reopened as the more successful NUMMI (New United Motor Manufacturing, Inc.) joint-venture between GM and Toyota between 1984 and 2010, and later became the Tesla Factory in 2010.
Elon Musk says he has formed a new political party amid his ongoing feud with President Donald Trump.
Musk asked his 221.7 million X followers to vote in a poll deciding whether he should form the new “America Party” on Friday. The tech mogul first threatened to form a party earlier this week if Congress passed Trump’s sweeping tax and spending legislation, which he calls the “Big, Beautiful Bill.”
The billionaire has argued that the legislation, which the president signed into law on Friday, will increase the deficit by trillions.
After 65 percent of respondents voted “yes” on his poll, Musk says he’s following through.
“By a factor of 2 to 1, you want a new political party and you shall have it,” Musk wrote Saturday afternoon. “When it comes to bankrupting our country with waste & graft, we live in a one-party system, not a democracy.”
The British Embassy has trolled the U.S. on Independence Day by posting a meme on social media implying it hoped for bad weather in the U.S.
Posting on X, the British Embassy’s in Washington mocked the U.S., as people around the country celebrate the federal holiday.
Why It Matters
The Fourth of July, or Independence Day, is a U.S. federal holiday commemorating the adoption of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, when 13 American colonies declared their independence from Great Britain.
It is typically celebrated with large gatherings and fireworks display, though this year several cities have canceled or postponed events, citing concerns about immigration enforcement and overcrowding.
Fireworks light up the St. Louis skyline and the Gateway Arch on Thursday, July 3, 2025, in St. Louis. David Carson/St. Louis Post-Dispatch via AP
By poking fun at the U.S., the British Embassy is reflecting the historical context of long-ago poor relations between the two countries. Since then though, the two countries enjoy a strong alliance, which was dubbed a “special relationship” by U.K. Prime Minister Winston Churchill in the 40s—a term that remains today
What To Know
The embassy account used a popular meme format, a series of stills taken from a conversation between English soccer player, David Beckham, and his musician wife, Victoria Beckham, from their 2023 documentary series, Beckham.
It imagined a conversation between the pair which started with Victoria Beckham wishing the U.S. well and ended with her saying: “I hope it pours down and the BBQs go out.”
Lawsuit Against Republican Party
Posted on August 2, 2023 by Royal Rosamond Press
I am related to John Fremont. I will be posting on how the Republican party does not resemble Fremont’s party – in the slightest – in consideration of a lawsuit.
John Presco
Above is John Presco with his grandson, Tyler Hunt up in Portland.
At their first presidential nominating convention in 1856, the Republicans nominated John C. Frémont on a platform that called on Congress to abolish slavery in the territories, reflecting a widely held view in the North. Although ultimately unsuccessful in his presidential bid, Frémont carried 11 Northern states and received nearly two-fifths of the electoral vote. During the first four years of its existence, the party rapidly displaced the Whigs as the main opposition to the dominant Democratic Party. In 1860 the Democrats split over the slavery issue, as the Northern and Southern wings of the party nominated different candidates (Stephen A. Douglas and John C. Breckinridge, respectively); the election that year also included John Bell, the nominee of the Constitutional Union Party. Thus, the Republican candidate, Abraham Lincoln, was able to capture the presidency, winning 18 Northern states and receiving 60 percent of the electoral vote but only 40 percent of the popular vote. By the time of Lincoln’s inauguration as president, however, seven Southern states had seceded from the Union, and the country soon descended into the American Civil War (1861–65).
The Radical Democracy Party was an abolitionist and anti-Confederate political party in the United States. The party was formed to contest the 1864 presidential election and it was made up largely of disaffected Radical Republicans who felt that President Abraham Lincoln was too moderate on the issues of slavery and racial equality. John C. Frémont was nominated as the party’s presidential candidate, with John Cochrane as his running mate. However, their campaign failed to gain momentum and not wanting to act as a spoiler against Lincoln, they withdrew from the race in September.
Frémont and Cochrane dropped out of the race on September 21, 1864. In a letter to The New York Times, Frémont wrote that it had become increasingly clear that the Democrats could not be trusted on the issues of union or abolition. As such, he did not want to act as a spoiler against Lincoln.[19] At the same time, Frémont remained critical of Lincoln, writing that “his Administration has been politically, militarily and financially, a failure, and that its necessary continuance is a cause of regret for the country”.[20] In another letter to the same paper written one week previously, but published in the same edition, he wrote that the ideas of the Radical Democracy Party would nevertheless be pursued.[21] It has been speculated that Frémont’s withdrawal may have been part of a deal with Lincoln whereby the more conservative Postmaster General Montgomery Blair was removed from his post.[22]
Most Radical Democracy Party supporters went on to support Lincoln in the general election,[23] though there were some exceptions to this, notably Wendell Philips.[24] The party itself was finished, having only formed to run a candidate in the 1864 election.
John Fremont Against Traitors
Posted on February 20, 2022 by Royal Rosamond Press
Vice President Harris and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy met Saturday at the Munich Security Conference in Germany Saturday morning to discuss aggression from Russia and how the U.S. and its allies would respond.
New Jessie Scouts Unmask Spies
Posted on April 16, 2021 by Royal Rosamond Press
- I have been trying to form The New Jessie Scouts to do battle with the enemy within.
Seer Jon
The House committee investigating the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol believes former Energy Secretary Rick Perry is the author of a text message to former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows that was turned over to the committee that called for encouraging Republican-led states to cast their Electoral College votes for Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election regardless of the outcome of the popular vote, according to CNN.
Jessie Scouts and BLM | Rosamond Press
Flying Fremont’s Flag
Posted on June 2, 2024 by Royal Rosamond Press
Donald Trump did not say he would be the President of – ALL AMERICANS – when he put his hand on the Bible at his ONLY Inauguration. After being found guilty of felonies, he still claims the election was rigged – as well as the court that convicted him! Did Trump reach out to Native Americans? I am an eighth Cherokee, according to my mother, Rosemary. However, I believe Mary Heil was half-Cherokee, so, I am one sixteenth, Native. My people were here when John Wilson landed with the Winthrop Fleet.
The Speaker of the House has led the Defense of Trump from the Republican Party founded by my kindred, and has Seceded Fremont’s Party FROM THE UNION! The Old Confederacy has risen from the dead – and attacked the integrity of a New York Court of Law that John Astor helped build. His attorney, Thomas Hart Benton, was instrumental in securing the Oregon Territory that Fremont explored. His journals were written by his wife, Jessie Benton, who designed the flag above! Because I OWN THIS HISTORY, I am seeking a stellar attorney to sue Michael Johnson and is treacherous cronies…..I WANT THEM OUT OF FREMONT’S PARTY – NOW!
GET OUT!
On this day, June 2, 2024, I John Presco, found The Liberty Caps, who will re-capture all the State Flags the Insurrectionists put in their Crusader Christian War Room. America has long worshipped….
The Goddess of Liberty!
Images of The Freedom Goddess adorned the walls and ceilings of our Capitol – before women had the right to vote! The Christian Trumpire Goon Squad invaded the sacred Halls of the Freedom Goddess, and shit on The Floors of Freedom. Their flag should be a muddy puke green, with steaming-mad brown turd of their lying boss man!
Be free with the Goddess of Liberty!
John Presco Lover of the Liberty Cap!
The Fremont Flag, designed and made by Jessie Benton Fremont, 1841. General John Charles Fremont, also referred to as the “Pathfinder”, first unfurled the Fremont flag on the crest of the Rocky Mountains on his First Expedition westward into United States territory on August 15, 1842. Knowing he would enter territories beyond national boundaries, Fremont realized he could not carry the Stars and Stripes. His bride, Jessie Benton Fremont, solved the problem by designing and making a flag that incorporated elements of the national flag, with a distinctive motif (the eagle’s talon holds a peace pipe or “calumet” instead of the traditional olive branch) intended as a message of peace to the Native people. In his memories, Fremont wrote he flew the flag on “Snow Peak”, now known as Fremont Peak in present day Wyoming, and “unfurled the national flag to wave in the breeze where never a flag had waved before.” On returning from his expedition, Fremont gave the flag to his wife, who backed it with a piece of her lilac silk wedding dress and embroidered upon it, in gold, the words “Rocky Mountains, 1841”–the year the expedition set forth. The flag was later said to be carried and used on Fremont’s Third Expedition in 1845-1846, an expedition that historians remark as a turning point in California history. The flag was donated to the Southwest Museum by Fremont’s daughter, Elizabeth, on May 3, 1905 and which she later rose on the day of the Museum’s groundbreaking in 1912. It is unknown if this is the flag Fremont flew in California.
Cunning Christians Get Out!
Posted on December 27, 2021 by Royal Rosamond Press
All Christians who still back the treacherous Trump are not welcome in the Republican Party! GET OUT! Form your own party!
The liberty cap was the symbol of freedom and liberty commonly used in the 19th century and is seen in many places in the United States Capitol.
The arms feature a sun symbol, two supporters, and the motto “Excelsior” (“Ever upward”) on a ribbon. The scene depicted under the sun in the coat of arms is a view of the Hudson River. The supporters of the shield are Liberty (with her liberty cap on a staff) and Justice. An American eagle surmounts the globe at the top.
Donald Trump, far left, watches as jury foreperson #1 delivers guilty verdicts with judge Juan Merchan listening on the bench in Manhattan Criminal Court, Thursday, May 30, 2024, in New York. (Elizabeth Williams via AP)
BY CHRISTINE FERNANDOUpdated 5:16 PM PDT, May 31, 2024Share
CHICAGO (AP) — After Donald Trump’s historic guilty verdict, a steady flow of images showing upside-down American flags has appeared on social media as his supporters and right-wing commentators protest his felony conviction.
At least one such flag was spotted Friday outside Trump Tower in New York City as the Republican former president spoke about the trial. Republican National Committee co-chair Lara Trump, the former president’s daughter-in-law, and Donald Trump Jr., his eldest son, have been sharing images of inverted flags online, as did Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a longtime ally.
Donald Trump did not say he would be the President of – ALL AMERICANS – when he put his hand on the Bible at his ONLY Inauguration. After being found guilty of felonies, he still claims the election was rigged – as well as the court that convicted him! Did Trump reach out to the Native Americans? I am an eighth Cherokee, according to my mother, Rosemary. However, I believe Mary Heil was half-Cherokee, so, I am one sixteenth, Native. My people were here when John Wilson landed with the Winthrop Fleet.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican lawmakers reacted with immediate fury on Thursday as a New York jury convicted former President Donald Trump on 34 counts of falsifying business records to influence the 2016 election, speaking out with near unanimity in questioning the legitimacy of the trial and how it was conducted.
House Speaker Mike Johnson said it was a “shameful day in American history” and the charges were “purely political.” Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance said the verdict was a “disgrace to the judicial system.” And Louisiana Rep. Steve Scalise, the No. 2 House Republican, said that the decision was “a defeat for Americans who believe in the critical legal tenet that justice is blind.”
The Fremonts First to Emancipate Slaves
Posted on May 2, 2017 by Royal Rosamond Press
John Fremont, and his wife, Jessie Benton-Fremont, were the first to emancipate black slaves in America. If Andrew Jackson was alive when the Fremonts and the Forty-Eighters were calling for the Freedom of all Peoples, then, he would have to deal with Senator Thomas Benton’s daughter – then her husband! Freedom is a family affair. These brave souls became my kindred, when Christine Rosamond Presco, married Garth Benton, two well known artists. Jessie and her sister held famous Salons.
Jon Presco
I Claim The Republican Party!
Posted on October 5, 2023 by Royal Rosamond Press
Russian Orthodox demonstartors protest against an unapproved LGBT groups’ rally in front of the Moscow City Hall, 27 May 2006.GETTY IMAGES
Cunning Christians Get Out!
Posted on December 27, 2021 by Royal Rosamond Press
All Christians who still back the treacherous Trump are not welcome in the Republican Party! GET OUT! Form your own party!
Congressman Jim Jordon has threatened to NOT TO HONOR our NATO agreement that was approved by Republican Lawmakers when it was SIGNED! The U.S. has spent a trillion dollars reinforcing this agreement. Americans who vote both parties paid for the defense of Europe with their tax money. We have an investment in the future of The Free World. The Free World is being undermined by the MASSIVE FRAUD the ex-president inflicted on our Honest Business World, and is the No.1 Republicans candidate. Trump instructs Jim Jordon in a covert manner. This constitute Conspiracy to Defraud.. This goes against the bylaws of the Republican’ Party Co-founded by my kin, John Fremont – who blesses my lawsuit I will bring against those who NOW claim John’s Party, when so many experts are saying – IT IS DEAD! Do not fund this defunct party! Instead, send your hard-earned monies to Zelinzkyy and the Ukrainians!
John Presco ‘Legal Owner of The Republican Party’
The United States and 11 other nations establish the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), a mutual defense pact aimed at containing possible Soviet aggression against Western Europe. NATO stood as the main U.S.-led military alliance against the Soviet Union throughout the duration of the Cold War.
Relations between the United States and the Soviet Union began to deteriorate rapidly in 1948. There were heated disagreements over the postwar status of Germany, with the Americans insisting on German recovery and eventual rearmament and the Soviets steadfastly opposing such actions. In June 1948, the Soviets blocked all ground travel to the American occupation zone in West Berlin, and only a massive U.S. airlift of food and other necessities sustained the population of the zone until the Soviets relented and lifted the blockade in May 1949.
In January 1949, President Harry S. Truman warned in his State of the Union Address that the forces of democracy and communism were locked in a dangerous struggle, and he called for a defensive alliance of nations in the North Atlantic—U.S military in Korea.NATO was the result. In April 1949, representatives from Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Great Britain, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, and Portugal joined the United States in signing the NATO agreement. The signatories agreed, “An armed attack against one or more of them… shall be considered an attack against them all.” President Truman welcomed the organization as “a shield against aggression.”
Two days before Russia invaded Ukraine with an assault that intelligence officials had warned was coming, conservative commentator Candace Owens insisted that the U.S. was “at fault.”
“NATO (under direction from the United States) is violating previous agreements and expanding eastward,” Owens said in the Feb. 22 tweet, which directed her more than 3 million followers to remarks from Russian President Vladimir Putin that she said showed “what’s actually going on.”
I hereby Copyright the name ‘REPUBLICAN’
Posted on February 17, 2017 by Royal Rosamond Press
I hereby Copyright the name ‘REPUBLICAN’.
Jon Presco
Copyright 2017
President: Royal Rosamond Press
John Astor Corresponds With Thomas Jefferson
Posted on January 31, 2020 by Royal Rosamond Press
It is 2:15 A.M. January 31, 2020…..a day that will go down in infamy! Officially, Great Britain left the European Union, and, officially the Republican Party, is dead, and so is the Democracy that Thomas Jefferson helped found. The President of Oregon State, and his crack team of historians, blamed my kindred, Senator Thomas Hard Benton for Manifest Destiny, and thus, the liquidation of Native Americans, that MAYBE should not have happened, but, it did! What would be the alternative – outcome? This question can be applied to Britex, and, the wanton need to destroy the Democratic Party – and the Bohemian Way of Life – that was once titled “The fastest growing religion in America.” This is to say the Evangelical Tea Party Ministers had no choice but to accuse President Obama of things he did not do, and, doing all he could to destroy Jesus and the Republican Party co-founded by my kindred, John Fremont, the first Presidential candidate for the Republican Party, and friend of the Astor family. John’s father-in-law was John Astor’s attorney. To top all this off, Washington Irving wrote a book about Astor that was reviewed by Edgar Alan Poe. Add this my Puritan kin, then….here it is…..Oregon’s History in a nutshell, along with California and Washington State. Am I thinking about SECESSION on the this most darkest of nights….where every other person hate the other – with a passion! And it will get worse – much worse!
WE HAVE NO HISTORY……OR RULE OF LAW! Our Constitution is burning in hell! No doubt Jessie Benton’s book of her husband’s explorations was inspired by Irving’s famous book, thus, Ed Ray and his historians – copped out! They dare not go after a famous woman, and one of the most famous writers in history! Because, then – you have no college or university – and right to teach anyone! What woke me was the realization that my struggle to be a mature human being, has been dashed upon the rocks by a collective of morons! How about…Murderous, Un-cultured, Savages using a skinned Jesus as a disguise? Astor is playing a game with the Russians. He and Jefferson, need pawns.
I believe I just composed a FARREL BLOCK!
John Presco
President: Royal Rosamond Press
“Although Washington Irving (1783-1859) never traveled to Oregon Country, he wrote one of the most widely read and influential narratives of the region. His two-volume Astoria, or Anecdotes of an Enterprise beyond the Rocky Mountains, published in 1836, introduced more readers to the Pacific Northwest than any single book up to that time.
The Seditious Hypocrisy of The Republican Party
Posted on December 17, 2022 by Royal Rosamond Press
Matthew 23:27
“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness.
“Abraham Lincoln was a big supporter of the “colonization” of former slaves. During the Lincoln-Douglas debates in 1858 he said, “If all earthly power were given me, I should not know what to do as to the existing institution. My first impulse would be to free all the slaves and send them to Liberia — to their own native land. But a moment’s reflection would convince me that, whatever of high hope there may be in this, in the long run, its sudden execution is impossible.”
Frémont Emancipation
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Major General John C. Frémont
The Frémont Emancipation was part of a military proclamation issued by Major General John C. Frémont (1813–1890) on August 30, 1861 in St. Louis, Missouri during the early months of the American Civil War. The proclamation placed the state of Missouri under martial law and decreed that all property of those bearing arms in rebellion would be confiscated, including slaves, and that confiscated slaves would subsequently be declared free. It also imposed capital punishment for those in rebellion against the federal government.
Frémont, a career army officer, frontiersman and politician, was in command of the military Department of the West from July 1861 to October 1861. Although Frémont claimed his proclamation was intended only as a means of deterring secessionists in Missouri, his policy had national repercussions, potentially setting a highly controversial precedent that the Civil War would be a war of liberation.[1]
For President Abraham Lincoln the proclamation created a difficult situation, as he tried to balance the agendas of Radical Republicans who favored abolition and slave-holding Unionists in the American border states whose support was essential in keeping the states of Missouri, Kentucky and Maryland in the Union.[2]
Nationwide reaction to the proclamation was mixed. Abolitionists enthusiastically supported the measure while conservatives demanded Frémont’s removal.[3] Seeking to reverse Frémont’s actions and maintain political balance, Lincoln eventually ordered Frémont to rescind the edict on September 11, 1861.[4] Lincoln then sent various government officials to Missouri to build a case for Frémont’s removal founded on Frémont’s alleged incompetence rather than his abolitionist views.[5] On these grounds, Lincoln sent an order on October 22, 1861, removing Frémont from command of the Department of the West.[6] Although Lincoln opposed Frémont’s method of emancipation, the episode had a significant impact on Lincoln, shaping his opinions on the appropriate steps towards emancipation and eventually leading, sixteen months later, to Lincoln’s own Emancipation Proclamation.[7]
Born in Savannah, Georgia in 1813, John Charles Frémont would become one of the nation’s leading antislavery politicians in the 1850s.[3] Frémont was granted a second lieutenant’s commission in the U.S. army’s Bureau of Topographical Engineers in 1838, primarily through the support of Secretary of War Joel Poinsett. As a young army officer, Frémont took part in several exploratory expeditions of the American West in the 1840s.[3] For his success in mapping a route across the Rocky Mountains to then Mexican California via the Oregon Trail, Frémont earned the nickname, “the Pathfinder” and attained the status of a national hero.[3] During the Mexican-American War (1846 – 1848), Major Frémont took command of the Californian revolt of American settlers against Mexico and was appointed military governor of California in 1847. Frémont’s independent actions ran at cross-purposes with the senior U.S. army officer in California during the Mexican War—Stephen Watts Kearny. Frémont was arrested, brought to Washington, D.C. for a court-martial and resigned from the army in 1848. Returning to the Pacific coast, Frémont became one of the first senators from California when it was granted statehood in 1850. In 1856, Frémont became the first Presidential candidate of the new Republican Party which established a platform advocating the limitation of slavery to those states in which it already existed.[3] Frémont won 33 percent of the popular vote, but lost to Democratic Party candidate James Buchanan.[8]
At the onset of the Civil War in April 1861, Frémont sought to resume his service in the Regular Army and was commissioned major general, becoming the third highest ranking general in the U.S. army (according to date of appointment), just behind Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan.[9] Frémont was placed in command of the Department of the West which included all states and territories between the Mississippi River and the Rockies as well as the state of Illinois and the western part of Kentucky. The department was headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri. Frémont arrived there and assumed command on July 25, 1861.[10] His chief task was to establish control within the state of Missouri.[11]
Missouri[edit]
Main article: Missouri in the American Civil War
At the commencement of the Civil War, Missouri was a deeply divided state. Missouri had chosen to remain in the Union, and initially maintained a policy of neutrality towards both the Union and the Confederacy. However, Missouri was also a state in which slavery was still legal, a factor which generated sympathy for the Confederacy and secession. The governor of Missouri at the start of the war, Claiborne Jackson, was in favor of secession and attempted to use the Missouri State Militia to resist the build-up of Union forces in his state.[12]
Death of Brig. Gen. Lyon during the Battle of Wilson’s Creek
Before Frémont, two generals had previously served as head of the Department of the West during the first four months of the war. Brigadier General William S. Harney had taken a diplomatic approach in Missouri, attempting to respect Missouri’s neutrality through the Price-Harney Truce, negotiated with Sterling Price, commander of the Missouri State Militia.[13] The truce was unacceptable to many Unionists and particularly to President Lincoln, as continued neutrality in Missouri would result in the state’s refusal to supply men for the Union army. Harney was removed on May 30 and replaced with the hard-line Radical Republican Brig. Gen. Nathaniel Lyon.[14] Earlier, while still a subordinate of Harney’s, Lyon had raised tensions in Missouri to a fever-pitch by acting independently and capturing a portion of the Missouri State Militia during the Camp Jackson Affair on May 10, 1861. Although the maneuver eliminated a threat to the St. Louis Arsenal, it also caused a riot in St. Louis.[15] As commander of the Department of the West, Lyon met with Gov. Jackson and informed him that, “rather than concede to the State of Missouri for one single instant the right to dictate to my government in any matter…I would see you…and every man and woman and child in the State dead and buried.”[16] After this, open warfare commenced between pro-Confederate militia and Union forces in Missouri. Gov. Jackson fled St. Louis, and the Missouri State Militia was re-organized to become the Missouri State Guard—a pro-secession force under the command of Sterling Price and Governor-in-Exile Jackson.
By the time Frémont took command in St. Louis on July 25, 1861, Union forces under Lyon had fought in several engagements against the Missouri State Guard. On August 10, a combined force of Missouri State Guard, Confederate States Army, and Arkansas Militia, consisting of about 11,000 troops, closed in on Lyon’s Union force numbering approximately 5,000 near Springfield, Missouri.[17] During the ensuing Battle of Wilson’s Creek, Lyon was killed and the federal force routed. Pro-secession sentiment surged throughout Missouri following the Battle of Wilson’s Creek. Estimates by Union army officials placed the number of armed secessionists in Missouri at roughly 60,000.[18] Alarmed by the increasing turbulence, Frémont declared martial law in the state of Missouri on August 30, 1861.[19]
Proclamation and reaction[edit]
Just before dawn on August 30, Frémont finished penning his proclamation of martial law and read it to his wife and a trusted advisor, Edward Davis of Philadelphia. Davis warned that officials in Washington would never stand for such a sweeping edict. Frémont responded that he had been given full power to put down secession in Missouri and that, as a war measure, the proclamation was entirely warranted.[20]
The most controversial passage of the proclamation, and the one with the greatest political consequences, was the following:[3]
All persons who shall be taken with arms in their hands within these lines shall be tried by court-martial, and, if found guilty, will be shot. The property, real and personal, of all persons in the State of Missouri who shall take up arms against the United States, and who shall be directly proven to have taken active part with their enemies in the field, is declared to be confiscated to the public use; and their slaves, if any they have, are hereby declared free.[21]
The two extreme measures described within this passage threatened to alienate Unionists in each of the border states. Drawing a line from Cape Girardeau, Missouri to Leavenworth, Kansas, Frémont declared capital punishment would be administered to any secessionists bearing arms north of that line.[19] Further, the proclamation freed the slaves of any secessionists who took up arms against the government. Frémont issued his proclamation without consulting any authority in Missouri or Washington.[3]
The proclamation freed very few slaves. First, and most prominently, two slaves belonging to an aide of the former Gov. Jackson, Frank Lewis and Hiram Reed, were given their manumission papers. This act received significant coverage by the St. Louis press.[19] Frémont then issued papers to 21 other slaves.[22] However, the greatest significance of the proclamation came in the form of political ramifications. The proclamation set a political precedent, over which there was tremendous disagreement, that the Civil War was a war against slavery.[23] This threatened to tip the delicate political balance in border states. Missouri, Kentucky, and Maryland all might have been pushed towards secession if such a precedent had been backed by the federal government at the beginning of the war.[24]
Unionists in Missouri were divided in their reaction. Radical Republicans, who favored abolition, were overjoyed. This included much of the St. Louis press.[3] Frémont surrounded himself with men of this faction, and several Radical Republican politicians had come to St. Louis with him as aides and advisors. These included Illinois Congressman Owen Lovejoy (brother of the antislavery journalist Elijah Lovejoy who had been murdered in 1837 by an anti-abolitionist mob), Ohio Congressman John A. Gurley and Indiana Congressman John P.C. Shanks. All ardent abolitionists, these men encouraged and influenced Frémont’s proclamation.[25] More moderate Unionists were troubled by Frémont’s proclamation and pro-slavery conservatives were outraged.[19] Most important, among the moderates in Missouri alienated by Frémont’s proclamation was the new governor of Missouri, Hamilton Rowan Gamble, whose authority Frémont had now superseded by declaring martial law. Feeling that Frémont had greatly overstepped his authority, Gamble began to work for Frémont’s removal.[3] In neighboring Kentucky, there was widespread outrage. Although the proclamation pertained only to the state of Missouri, Kentuckians feared that a similar edict might be applied by Frémont to their state. Most slaves in Kentucky belonged to Unionists and threatening to free them could have pushed the state into the Confederacy.[2]
Lincoln’s reaction and Frémont’s removal[edit]
President Abraham Lincoln
President Lincoln learned of Frémont’s proclamation by reading it in the newspaper.[23] Disturbed by Frémont’s actions, Lincoln felt that emancipation was “not within the range of military law or necessity” and that such powers rested only with the elected federal government.[26] Lincoln also recognized the monumental political problem that such an edict posed to his efforts to keep the border states in the Union. He was particularly worried about reports he heard of the furor in Kentucky over the edict, writing, “I think to lose Kentucky is nearly the same as to lose the whole game.”[27] According to Lincoln in a letter to a supporter of Frémont, a unit of Kentucky militia fighting for the Union, upon hearing of Frémont’s proclamation, threw down their weapons and disbanded.[27] Lincoln determined the proclamation could not be allowed to remain in force. However, to override the edict or to directly order Frémont to strike out or modify the paragraph had its own political dangers—such an act would outrage abolitionists throughout the North. Sensitive to the political pitfalls on all sides, Lincoln wrote to Frémont, “Allow me to therefore ask, that you will, as of your own motion, modify that paragraph…”[24]
Frémont wrote a reply to Lincoln’s request on September 8, 1861 and sent it to Washington in the hands of his wife, Jessie Benton Frémont, who met with the President in the White House on September 10. In the letter, Frémont stated that he knew the situation in Missouri better than the President and that he would not rescind the proclamation unless directly ordered. Angered, Lincoln wrote Frémont the next day, directly ordering him to modify the emancipation clause to conform with existing federal law—that only slaves themselves acting in armed rebellion could be confiscated and freed.[4]
Lincoln could not allow Frémont’s insubordination to go unpunished. However, his dilemma again lay in politics. Removal of Frémont over the emancipation issue would infuriate radicals in Congress. Lincoln determined that if Frémont were to be removed, it would have to be for matters unrelated to the proclamation. He therefore sent Postmaster General Montgomery Blair and Quartermaster General Montgomery Meigs to Missouri to evaluate Frémont’s management of his department.[5] On his return, Blair reported that a tremendous state of disorganization existed in Missouri and Frémont “seemed stupified…and is doing absolutely nothing.”[6] When Adjutant General Lorenzo Thomas made his own inspection and reported to Lincoln that Frémont was, “wholly incompetent,” Lincoln decided to leak Thomas’s report to the press.[28] Amidst the resulting public outrage against Frémont, Lincoln sent an order on October 22, 1861, removing him from command of the Department of the West.[6]
Aftermath[edit]
For Frémont, the personal repercussions of his proclamation were disastrous. His removal from command of the Western Department did irreparable damage to his reputation.[3] Giving Frémont a second chance, Lincoln approved his appointment to command the strategically important Mountain Department, overseeing the mountainous region surrounding the Virginia and Kentucky border. Frémont’s forces were badly defeated, however, in the Battle of Cross Keys in Virginia on June 8, 1862.[3] He eventually resigned from frustration at being passed over when Lincoln appointed Maj. Gen. John Pope to command of the Army of Virginia, and spent the rest of the war awaiting a new appointment which never came.[3]
For Lincoln, the immediate effects of Frémont’s removal resulted in the furor the president had anticipated from northern abolitionists. Massachusetts Governor John Albion Andrew, a Radical Republican and abolitionist, wrote that Lincoln’s actions had a “chilling influence” on the antislavery movement.[29] The outrage was only a short-term effect, however, and soon subsided.[29]
The most significant long-term consequence of the Frémont Emancipation was the effect it had on Lincoln’s perceptions of emancipation and, specifically, how it should be accomplished. As historian Allen Guelzo describes, Lincoln became determined, after Frémont’s failed proclamation, that emancipation could not be a matter of martial law or some other temporary measure that would later be challenged in courts. To ensure its permanence, Lincoln felt, emancipation would have to be put into effect by the federal government in a manner that was incontrovertibly constitutional.[30] Equally important, the timing of emancipation would need to be orchestrated carefully, so as not to interfere with the war effort. Although in 1861, Lincoln had not yet espoused the idea of immediate emancipation and still hoped to work with state governments to accomplish gradual and perhaps even a compensated emancipation, the Frémont incident solidified Lincoln’s belief that emancipation was the President’s responsibility and could not be accomplished by scattered decrees from Union generals. This realization was one of several factors that led to Lincoln’s own Emancipation Proclamation in September 1862.[7]
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