Fall Works
Eaton V. United States
Our Cornerstone
By Stephen L. Wilmeth
If the
Congress do not consent that government shall send a force … to check the
insolence of these scoundrels and to render the United States respectable, I
hope they will resolve at their next session to wrest the quiver of arrows from
the left talon of the Eagle and substitute a fiddle bow or a cigar in lieu.
~ William Eaton
The subject
matter of William Eaton’s quote could be applied to any number of current issues.
Too many leaders place biased priorities over the foundational spirit of our
founding.
If the name
of Eaton was the correct answer on a multiple-choice test, who among us could
come up with the correct question? Actually, his name and his story have much
to do with the idea that the individual and the sovereignty of our nation are
at once singular and united with our American model, but let’s first delay that
thought.
It is
getting to be time to ramp up the celebration of fall works.
Fall
Works
It is work,
but it is also a reminder of heritage in cow country.
In our
world, the days of following the work with the wagon and a hoodlum stacked high
with bedrolls and equipment have been displaced with nights under roof and
gooseneck trailers. Hay has replaced the need to jingle the horses, but oats
still have a place in buckets and feeders (there aren’t nearly as many
stanchions as we knew as kids). The sounds at the corral in early mornings,
though, will largely mimic the times of old as will the preparations for the
day.
Few are
still milking cows to get done before horses are loaded, but you can bet the
cowboys still assess each other’s tack and horses picked for the day. The
mornings are now cold enough that missing a seat inside the pickup cabs and
having to climb into the back will immediately remind everybody why a Levi
jumper is still a most practical outerwear selection.
Our
predecessors taught us that lesson well.
Most of
them packed a can of Prince Albert or a sack of Bull Durham along with their rolling
paper in their left jumper pockets whereas that is only a memory today. In a
wind, those old cowboys could hunker down in those jackets and roll a smoke and
light it with a kitchen match all with one hand. Health has now eliminated
that, but the smell of that smoke in the early morning would sure bring back
memories.
Jumping out
and setting up circles and drives are throwbacks that are eternal.
The absence
of pitching horses should make most everybody happier, but there will always be
somebody in the mix gingerly stepping on and trying to get lined out before
something happens that might result in a wreck.
It might be
an occasional stretch to declare most cattle today are gentler than their
predecessors, but the attempt has long been to seek and insist on stock that is
easier to handle. Wild cattle are not welcome for the most part and we have
worked hard to make it that way.
The general
skill level is probably not on par with our predecessors, or perhaps a better
way to say it is that there are fewer and fewer cowboys to select from than the
industry of decades ago. What few that are truly accomplished, though, are
throwbacks that always bear watching. Two or three in each crew make the
entirety of the work not just more efficient, but elevates an old-time cowboy
expression, copacetic, into an appropriate description.
Nostalgia,
timelessness, and the celebration of many things not the least of which is the
individual are all appropriate descriptions when the last gate is shut, and the
horses are unsaddled at the end of fall works. There is a reminder that
conclusions are important, and … so is the relationship between the steward and
this God given land.
Our
Cornerstone
The plight
of William Eaton is an important American lesson.
Eaton’s
foray into our history took place back in 1805 when the United States finally
decided to stand up to the tyranny and exploitation of the Barbary Coast
pirates of the Mediterranean trade routes. As it turned out, he was an
individual who believed there were some mountains that needed defending even if
that meant death, and, as he demonstrated, the United States Constitution became
the mountain he elected to defend.
Through
twists of intrigue, Eaton was clandestinely assigned the task by Thomas
Jefferson to displace the head tyrant and Bashaw of Tripoli, Yussef Karamanli,
with his more malleable brother, Hamet Karamanli. In that process, Eaton
endured unbelievable hardships and personal debt to protect the United States
from the racketeering assaults on American cargo ships by the Bashaw. In the
end, Jefferson abandoned Eaton and Hamet Karamanli with a treaty replete with
hidden side deals that paid ransom to the Bashaw in exchange for his
conditional allegiance. Of course, Yussef continued his gangster ways extorting
luxurious demands on the U.S., drinking brandy with his concubines, and
bankrupting his kingdom.
Jefferson eventually suffered
politically with what today can be termed biased based, appeasement rule that
saw him squander seven years by economic theory and unconfessed pacifism that
flew in the face of his words in the Declaration of Independence. On the last day of his administration, he
rode home horseback in a snowstorm in what must be considered a degree of
disgrace.
Eaton, never forgiving Jefferson
and the federal government for capitulating to an enemy of his country and his
Constitution, died a broken man. His life remains a largely unknown lesson that
conclusions are important, and … so is the relationship between the citizen and
this God given land.
Stephen
L. Wilmeth is a rancher from southern New Mexico. “Government has become an
elitist, biased based appeasement rule. The citizen and the Constitution are
nothing more than adjuncts to a byline.”
- Looking at a longer time period, 2002 to 2018, 20 states and the federal government forfeited over $63 billion. The remaining states did not provide data for those 17 years.
- Since 2000, states and the federal government forfeited a combined total of at least $68.8 billion. And because not all states provided full data, this figure drastically underestimates forfeiture’s true scope.
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