Jefferson (and almost everyone else) knew that Wilkinson was a crook and he had in a cabinet meeting discussed dismissing him from command a few years before because of his corruption. Wilkinson had been in the pay of the Spanish for years and it was no secret.
Jefferson’s true character was shown by this trial by his acquiescence in Wilkinson’s disregard of and wholesale violation of the law and the fact that it became evident that W. had been a bigger mover in any plot than Burr.
I have no problem with a trial but a BIG problem with total disregard of the law Jefferson condoned as well as his attempt to convict Burr prior to the trial in the press by pronouncements about his certain guilt.
There is ZERO evidence that Burr had any intention of splitting the western states from the Union in this case. All evidence pointed to confirmation of his claim that he was aiming to settle lands in the Bastrop tract (area around present day Monroe, La. and to be prepared for war with Spain wherein he would seize Mexico. At that time war with Spain was widely expected even by Jefferson, the ultra-pacifist.
Rather than foiling any treasonous plot Jefferson’s intent ONLY was to destroy Burr now his greatest enemy after Hamilton’s murder. In his mind only Burr stood between the Virginia dynasty and decades of power. He had to be destroyed by any means fair or foul.
But that is also beside the point. If anything, the Burr trial proved that the system worked. He was acquitted just as he should have been.
I have no problem with a trial but a BIG problem with total disregard of the law Jefferson condoned as well as his attempt to convict Burr prior to the trial in the press by pronouncements about his certain guilt.
Much like the Reynolds scandal, I find it unusual that you consider that even the least bit out of the ordinary. Even today, police routinely issue statements to the press expressing the "guilt" of even the most minor, petty criminals well before their trials, just as opposition political parties are certain to make hay when one of their adversaries gets caught up in an extramarital affair and bribery scandal. Yet when Jefferson does it, you make it as if it were some great and extraordinary offense to common decency? Once again, you betray your own extreme personal prejudices against Jefferson and the extent to which they distort your ability to provide measured historical analysis.