Burr conspiracy

The Burr conspiracy of 1805–1807, was a treasonous plot alleged to have been planned by American politician and former military officer Aaron Burr (1756–1836), in the years during and after his single term as the third vice president of the United States (1801–1805), during the presidential administration and first term of the third president Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826, served 1801–1809).

Burr was accused of attempting to use his international connections and support from a cabal of American planters, politicians, and United States Army officers to establish an independent country in the old federal Southwest Territory (1790–1796), south of the Ohio River (future states of Kentucky, Tennessee and the future federal Territories of later Mississippi Territory (1798–1817), and adjacent Alabama Territory), and east of the Mississippi River and north of the southern coast along the Gulf of Mexico; or to invade/conquer the newly acquired Louisiana Purchase of 1803, west of the Mississippi River, later organized as the Louisiana Territory (1804–1812), then divided into future 18th state of Louisiana and upper/northern portion as Missouri Territory (1812–1821); or plotting against the northern parts of the colonial New Spain (later Mexico), still held by Spain; or against and seizing the Florida peninsula of the longtime Royal Spanish colony of Spanish Florida (consisting of West Florida and East Florida), in the Americas/Western Hemisphere, part of the world-wide Spanish Empire since the early 16th century.

Burr's version was that he intended to farm 40,000 acres (160 km²) in the Spanish Texas colonial province of the New Spain Viceroyalty which had been supposedly leased to him by the Spanish Crown.

In February 1807, former Vice President Burr was arrested on President Jefferson's orders and charged/indicted for treason, despite a lack of firm evidence. While Burr was ultimately acquitted of treason in a trial, due to the lack of detailed specificity in the 1787 text of the United States Constitution about any alleged crimes of treason, the fiasco and affair further destroyed his already faltering political career. Effigies of his likeness were hanged and burned throughout the country and the threat of additional charges from individual states forced him into exile overseas in Europe.

Burr's true intentions remain unclear and, as a result, have led to varying theories from historians: some claim that he intended to take parts of Texas and the newly acquired Louisiana Purchase of 1803 for himself, while others believe he intended to try to conquer Mexico to the southwest (then a royal Spanish colonial province of the Kingdom of Spain in the Viceroyalty of New Spain, in the Americas, part of the world-wide Spanish Empire), or even as the gossip extended to wild accusations of conquering even the entirety of the continent of North America.^{[citation needed]} The number of men backing him is also unclear, with wide-ranging different inconclusive accounts ranging from fewer than 40 men to upwards of 7,000.^{[citation needed]}

General James Wilkinson was one of Burr's key partners. The Commanding General of the United States Army at the time, Wilkinson was known for his attempt to separate Kentucky and Tennessee from the union during the 1780s. Burr persuaded President Thomas Jefferson to appoint Wilkinson to the position of Governor of the Louisiana Territory in 1805. Wilkinson would later send a letter to Jefferson that Wilkinson claimed was evidence of Burr's treason.

While Burr was still vice president, in 1804 he met with Anthony Merry, the British Minister to the United States. As Burr told several of his colleagues, he suggested to Merry that the British might regain power in the Southwest if they contributed guns and money to his expedition. Merry wrote, "It is clear Mr. Burr... means to endeavour to be the instrument for effecting such a connection—he has told me that the inhabitants of Louisiana ... prefer having the protection and assistance of Great Britain." "Execution of their design is only delayed by the difficulty of obtaining previously an assurance of protection & assistance from some foreign power."

Thomas Jefferson was re-elected in 1804, but Burr was not nominated by the Democratic-Republicans to be Jefferson's running mate, and his term as vice president ended in March 1805. In November of that year, Burr again met with Merry and asked for two or three ships of the line and money. Merry informed Burr that London had not yet responded to Burr's plans which he had forwarded the previous year. Merry gave him fifteen hundred dollars. Those Merry worked for in London expressed no interest in furthering an American secession. In the spring of 1806, Burr had his final meeting with Merry. In this meeting Merry informed Burr that still no response had been received from London. Burr told Merry, "with or without such support it certainly would be made very shortly." Merry was recalled to Britain on June 1, 1806.