Medical Matters: Patient John Randolph of Roanoke

Given my background in the natural sciences, I’m often interested whenever I run across a historical figure with intriguing medical conditions.  So this round of  Medical Matters will be devoted to the medical profile of a certain Mr. John Randolph of Roanoke – previously mentioned in Agrarian Doubts: States Rights and the Old South, where I tried to convey some of his eccentric qualities along with his passionate defense of the Southern agricultural way of life.

But what struck many of his colleagues in Congress was…..his looks.   To quote a description of him at the time:

His head is small and until you approach him near enough too serve the premature and unhealthy wrinkles that have furrowed his face, you would say that it was boyish, but as your eye turns toward his extremities everything seems to be unnaturally stretched and protracted.  To his short and meager body are attached long legs which, instead of diminishing, grow larger as they approach the floor until they end in a pair of feet broad and large, giving his whole person the appearance of a sort of pyramid…  His voice is shrill and effeminate and occasionally broken low tones like those heard from dwarves and deformed people.

It is believed by some historians and modern day medical professional, that John Randolph may have had Klinefelter Syndrome.

Klinfelter Syndrome is caused by a meitotic nondisjunction event during cell division and the formation of gametes (egg and sperm cells).   In the specific case of Klinefelters, an extra sex chromosome is present.   Normal human beings have 46 Chromosomes – Men being XY and Women being XX.   Klinefelters results in a person having 47 chromosomes – XXY.

The extra X chromosome can result in a variety of clinical manifestations as listed in the graphic above.   It should be noted however that a person who has Klinefelter syndrome does not necessarily manifest -all- of the symptoms listed.    But one common symptom that raises the suspicion for Klinefelter syndrome aside from body presentation is impotence brought on by a decreased production of testosterone due to testicular atrophy.

We know that John Randolph was in fact impotent.   He was also beardless and had a pre-pubescent voice throughout his life.

However we also know John Randolph was afflicted by tuberculosis at an early age.   Tuberculosis is a mycobacterium which favors the lungs as a site of infection.  However, TB can also infect the genital tract – which would result in damage and a halt to puberty.  So it is also quite possible that Randolph actually never went through the biological stage of puberty – which would help in explaining his impotence.

Tuberculosis would also prove to be the cause of Mr. John Randolph’s death at the age 6o.

Agrarian Doubts: States Rights and the Old South

In my last post, I had mentioned the career of the chief systematizer of Jeffersonian Democracy, John Taylor of Caroline.   I had briefly summarized his commitment to the idea of the United States as an agrarian farmer’s republic and how this blended well with his positive stance on states rights.

Southern support of States Rights and a strict interpretation of the Constitution is rooted in a conviction that to protect the Southern way of life, limitations must be placed on the Federal government.   In their eyes an “artificial capitalist sect,” following Alexander Hamilton’s financial modernization plan, had set their sights on disturbing the delicate balance between state and federal governments in order to favor their own economic interests.

Joining John Taylor in his struggle was the celebrated Virginian congressman and orator, John Randolph of Roanoke.

To call John Randolph eccentric would be a massive understatement.   John strongly identified himself as an “old school” Southern plantation aristocrat.  He often rode around the Virginian countryside in a venerable English stagecoach drawn by six horses.   And like every Southern gentleman, John Randolph was quick to defend his honor in duels when he felt his dignity had been violated.  He actually undertook a duel against the venerable Kentucky statesman Henry Clay – thankfully both survived the ordeal.   John also assaulted another congressman, Willis Alston, in what is described by historians as a pitched battle of thrown tableware and bloody canes.

John Randolph’s aristocratic behavior also extended into his politics which can be summarized as – “I am an Aristocrat.   I love Liberty.  I hate Equality.”  By the word Equality, Randolph is showing a disdain for democracy.   One of his speeches further elaborated as to the reason why:

That all men are born free and equal, I can never assent to, for the best of all reasons, for it is not true.   If there is an animal on earth to which equality does not apply-that is not born free-it is man; he is born in a state of the most abject want and a state of perfect helplessness and ignorance.

Or to put it plainly – the conditions of each man is unequal and government should be left in the hands of better men.   In his view, the traditional patriarchal society of Virginia led by its elites was conducive to holding society together and creating stability.  The major threat to this stability was, in his view, the Federal Government and those who sought to expand its powers.

It is for this reason that John Randolph became a supporter of another long standing American opinion invoked by figures such as Calvin Coolidge – the Government that does nothing is the best kind of government that can exist.  However, like John Taylor, he acknowledged that there were forces that promoted an activist government for both financial and ideological gain.

This led John Randolph to form a faction within Jefferson’s Democratic-Republican Party, known as the Old Republicans, who sought to stick to the “Principles of ’98.”   These principles refer to the Kentucky and Virginian Resolutions of 1798, written by James Madison and Thomas Jefferson in protests against the Alien and Sedition Acts.

Without going into too much detail about the specifics of the situation, this “stand-off” articulated two viewpoints:

1. Alexander Hamilton/The Federalists = Judicial Review by the Supreme Court determines whether the actions of Congress can be deemed Unconstitutional.
2. Jefferson + Madison/The Democratic-Republicans = Individual States can determines the constitutionality of the actions of the central government and can refuse to enforce laws (ie: nullification).

When asked to summarize the principles of Old Republicans faction, Randolph had this to say:

“love of peace, hatred of offensive war, jealousy of the state governments toward the general government; a dread of standing armies; a loathing of public debts, taxes, and excises; tenderness for the liberty of the citizen; jealousy, Argus-eyed jealousy of the patronage of the President.”

Randolph’s support of aristocratic culture and old-style republicanism led him into rather interesting political decisions:

1.  Although against Slavery, Randolph deemed it a necessity for the survival of Virginia.    The ironic thing about this, was that John Randolph was a founder of the American Colonization Society, which transported freed slaves back to Africa to form the nation we now know as Liberia.   He even freed his own slaves at the time of his death.
2. Although incredibly popular with the common voter due to his oratorical skills, he opposed the abolition of primogeniture and entail in support of the Virginian aristocracy.    Or to put it in his own words: “The old families of Virginia will form connections with low people, and sink into the mass of overseers’ sons and daughters”
3. Finally, even though he was an ardent supporter of President Jefferson’s deal to buy the Louisiana Territories from the French, he came to the conclusion that he had violated his own principles.   It was unclear if President Jefferson had the power under the Constitution to make that purchase.     Randolph also feared that an expanding nation would be unable to sustain a common loyalty and interest.

 

 

 

 

Edmund Burke: Anti-Imperialist Founder of Modern Conservatism

studio of Sir Joshua Reynolds, oil on canvas, (1767-1769)

Who was Edmund Burke?

An Irishman who as a member of Parliament argued eloquently in favor of the grievances of the American Colonies against the British Crown.   He made his case based on the fact that the Americans were fighting for their rights as Englishmen against the Crown which had violated custom and tradition for the sake of taxation.  Burke was also part of the effort to reconcile Great Britain with the United States after the War of Independence had ended.

A skilled Orator who impeached the Governor-General of Bengal, Warren Hastings, for unscrupulous, arbitrary, and tyrannical conduct against the Indian people.   While Burke acknowledged the necessities of commerce by the East Indian Company, he pointed out that Hastings and others had essentially extorted or plundered their way to vast wealth – conduct that put them beyond the pale of what was deemed moral.

A lawyer who favored a policy of tolerance to Roman Catholics in English political life.   He sought to enfranchise the Irish people, allowing Catholics to stand for election in Parliament.

And finally an excellent political essayist, who foresaw the bloodshed that would be caused by the French Revolution.   At first he was accused of being an alarmist, as those sympathetic to the wave of revolution in America and France thought this would lead to a new era of reason and rational government.     However, with the death of the Bourbon monarch Louis XVI and the beginning of the Terror, Burke’s views would come to be vindicated.

As a proponent of moderate political reform and champion of the underdog, most today may find it confusing that Edmund Burke also has the distinction of being the Originator of Modern Conservatism.

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At first glance, it is a difficult thing for a reader to evaluate the political thought of Edmund Burke.  He was no academic, but rather a man in the midst of the action – writing speeches, pamphlets, and essays as an active member of the political class.     He wasn’t theorist, he was a do-er.

Burke also had a powerful allergy against philosophical abstraction.   This forms the basis of his critique around the ideas that motivated the French Revolution.  His key work remains the Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790), here he takes aim against a certain conception of natural rights.

For Burke, an appeal to natural rights would lead to “the commonwealth itself in a few generations, crumble away…into the dust and powder of individuality.”   This may sound incredibly strange to modern ears, but it depends on how a person understands “natural rights.”

1. John Locke:  Natural Rights derive from the State of Nature.  They are preserved by and form the basis of the powers of the government.  In fact, government can be called to account for infringement upon these rights.
2. Thomas Hobbes:  Natural Rights  are whatever promotes survival.  They must be surrendered to the State which rescues people from a life that is “nasty, brutish, and short.” Therefore, appealing to natural rights is destructive of State power and returns us back to that Dog-Eat-Dog existence.

 

Burke is reacting to the Hobbesian definition.   In his view, the viability of government rests on customs, conventions and traditions which form the habits and expectations of the populace.   These “prejudices” (or rather pre-judgments) form the real basis for the rights of man and are particular to the countries of origin.

Often these conventions are not capable of rational demonstration.   They may even rest on historical fictions.  But that doesn’t really matter to Burke, because as long as they are believed they work to hold society together.  

Here we see that pragmatic sense of the art of politics, rather than an abstract understanding of how the state should operate.   It is for this reason that Burke has a sincere attachment to the British Constitution and other bodies of traditional law in other countries.

Ultimately, all law is a kind of historical achievement whose authority depends on their age rather than on abstract rights.  This is the reason why when new unpopular laws are passed, they are often difficult to enforce even if they can be articulated in terms of natural rights.   People only begin to respect laws that have been in effect for a very long time as they become “the norm.”  And in some cases the law isn’t respected at all if it clashes too much with the character of the population.

Prudential management and practical statesmanship must triumph over abstract plans, or else the result will end not in the rule of reason, but the rule of brute force.   The outcomes of the French Revolution validated this viewpoint as factions with different interests justified actions based on their understanding “natural rights” and the extant of government power should be.   And when an impasse was reached – one group was purged at the expense of another.

 

 

The Glorious Revolution and the Seeds of Two Ideologies

Picture this – James II, a Catholic monarch of a thoroughly Protestant England is forced to flee his kingdom for France, much in the manner his father Charles II had to at the outbreak of the English Civil War have a century earlier.

This is for all intents and purposes, a power struggle between a monarch subscribing to the idea of the Divine Right of Kings versus a Parliament seeking to expand its own power.

The Issue at Hand:  Religion.

Since the time of Henry VIII, Catholicism had been always held in suspicion by the power holders within the British Isles.  “Popery”was often associated with England’s most hated rivals – France and Spain.    Furthermore, since the Bourbon monarch Louis XIV ruled France in an Absolutist manner, where power was directly centered upon the king, many within England considered Catholicism to be associated with arbitrary rule.

Although not quite political parties in the modern sense, the Tories and Whigs who comprised parliament had two specific fears:

1. The Whigs believed that Catholic Absolutism would endanger Protestant Religion, Liberty, and Property.
2. The Tories had similar fears, but these were complicated by a respect for the traditional authority of the Crown.   However, they did seek a Unity of Church and State for the sake of Stability – which would ideally make the Monarch of England a member of the Church of England.

Look closely enough and one can see the seeds of Anglo-American Conservatism and Liberalism starting to form.

For his own part, James II did little to endear himself to either group.    James attempts to secure Catholic emancipation alienated his original supporters in the Tory party, which feared that his actions would lead to the disestablishment of the Anglican Church.

In a bid to create his own power base, James II held a policy of religious toleration, hoping to forge his own party out of the Catholics and Nonconformists (ie: Protestants who didn’t “conform” to the Church of England).  His Declaration of Indulgence, which would enshrine religious toleration across his kingdom, was seen as a direct stab at the heart of Anglican power.

What followed was perhaps some of the most heavy handed tactics for a peacetime monarch during his era.   It seemed that James II was single-handedly attempting to turn back the clock,  using his power as monarch to purge his opposition (usually Anglican Protestants) from within the government and military.   They were of course replaced with people he could trust (usually Catholics).

This was the proverbial last straw.  Tyranny and Arbitrary Rule seemed like a reality.

In November of 1688, William of Orange stadtholder of the Netherlands and husband to Mary Stuart (James’ daughter) crossed the North Sea with an army to England in an attempt to overthrow his father-in-law.   William was a Protestant hero who valiantly fought alongside other Protestant monarchs against Louis XIV during the War of the Grand Alliance.  As such, he was deemed a more preferable monarch to many factions within the British elite.   And so a conspiracy was formed in order to finance William’s “invasion.”

The rest as they say is history – James II fled to France where to this day his descendants hold a claim to the throne of Great Britain.  This event was commemorated as the Glorious Revolution, specifically because the amount of bloodshed during this transition of power was well below average.

Although William was obviously pleased by the outcome of events, he found that there was some…..interesting legislation waiting for his approval upon ascending the throne.

One such piece of legislation seemed obvious – the Act of Settlement of 1701 required the King of England to be a Protestant and could not marry a Catholic.   This particular law was only recently amended by the Succession to the Crown Act of 2013.

Another law was rather self serving, as the Triennial Act of 1694 required that Parliament would meet every year and have elections every 3 years.   Up until this time, only the King could have called Parliament to convene.

But of particular importance to history at large would be the Bill of Rights of 1689.   The Bill of Rights essentially limited the power of the king, but demanding things such as no taxation by royal prerogative, freedom of speech in Parliament, habeas corpus, and the denial of cruel and unusual punishment for crimes.

To our American readers, this may all seem rather familiar as the American Bill of Rights of 1789 was modeled on the English one.

But what these chain of events concluded was that power was ultimately held by Parliament in the British Isles.   And for the time being, the freedoms and stability held in common by both proto-Liberals and proto-Conservatives were safe.