“A Rouge’s Paradise”: Crime and Punishment in Antebellum Florida, 1821-1861. By James M. Denham. Tuscaloosa and London: University of Alabama Press, 1997.

            In A Rouge’s Paradise author James M. Denham uses an examination of crime in antebellum Florida as a vessel to examine the larger issue of the Southern frontier.  Through copious court records and assorted legal documents, Denham brings his readers into the rough and tumble backcountry of the Old South and the violent nature of that world.  His work examines both the tumultuous lives of poor Florida “crackers”, and looks at how duels and affairs of honor also brought some of Florida’s most prominent citizens into conflict with the Sunshine State’s judicial system.

            Denham’s primary argument is that the economy of Florida was crippled by its place on the frontier of the United States.  The geographic determinism limited the ability to impose law and order on a society pervaded by alcoholism, Celtic poor, and a rich elite myopically concerned with affairs of honor.  The result was a society that, like the rest of the Southern U.S. (according to Denham), could not escape its own cultural heritage and gain a path to modern industrialization.  The book is filled with colorful anecdotes that attempt to further Denham’s thesis.  They recount what are surely some of the most interesting criminal enterprises and incidents in Florida’s early U.S. history, but the do little to actual resolve Denham’s arguments.

            Florida was much more ethnically diverse than Denham alludes to which weakens his thesis concerning the Celtic origins of crime in the state.  The Celtic portion of the thesis also perpetuates stereotypes towards people of Celtic origin.  Denham apparently assumes that alcoholism in Florida was a result of this Celtic culture, but does little to examine Florida’s consumption of spirits to the U.S. as a whole and indeed if he had he may have been surprised.  If alcoholism (which is not the same thing as heavy consumption of alcohol) was more prevalent on the frontier, why was that?  Rather than ask biting questions that analyze his evidence, he focuses on ethnic stereotypes and anecdotal stories. 

            Another area that is lacking in Denham’s book is his examination of Florida’s free people of color.  Fully half of Florida’s population was of African American or Native American origin, a considerably portion of which were free.  If they did not have run-ins with the law, that is important to note, but as a reader one is left wondering about the criminal history (or lack thereof) of a sizable portion of the population.

            A Rouge’s Paradise as a generally well researched book, but the analysis could be greatly improved in fully investigate the information that Denham has uncovered.  And while it is important to acknowledge Florida as part of the South as a whole, it is not necessary to shoehorn it into the “stereotypical” South, which modern research is showing never really existed in the first place.  The book would be of use in an upper division undergraduate course focused on crime or Florida history as well as graduate level courses.  Because of its detailed nature though, A Rouge’s Paradise would probably be of little use in more lower division undergraduate courses. 

Joe Stoltz

A Rogue’s Paradise:  Crime and Punishment in Antebellum Florida, 1821-1861.  By James M. Denham. (Tuscaloosa:  The University of Alabama Press, 1997).

In this book, Dr. Denham provides an excellent narrative historical account of crime and punishment in the antebellum era of Florida.  The author touts a well-known theory that frontier sections of civilizations tended tended to have a higher level of criminal activity due to the lower population and the lack of law enforcement personnel.

The author divides his work into 14 separate chapters that dealt with separate issues.  In the first chapter he deals with matters such as criminal law, its effects on Florida society, another chapter profiling the establishment of courts, judgeships, law officers.  Denham then details the different types of crime and their punishment.  In Chapter 10 he gives an analysis of the Florida lawmen who worked long hours for little pay at a dangerous job that gave no appreciation and garnered little respect.  The last four chapters show the difficulty in the capture and incarceration criminal elements, dealing with organized criminal activity and vigilante gangs. 

Dr. Denham has written an easily understandable and readable account on the development and establishment of the Judicial Process in Florida and how it became a haven for those seeking either a fresh start or refuge form law enforcement.  In his account, Denham puts forth the idea that the violence of the area could be attributed to the extensive use of alcohol and an exaggerated sense of personal honor.  This belief follows the theory put forth by Dr. Grady McWhiney about the influences of Celtic heritage in Southern society.  He relates how crimes against persons did not garner as much punishment as crimes involving property and against the public order/morality. 

The majority of the various minor crimes and misdemeanors involve the use of fines and the “lash” while repeated offenders suffered either the process of branding or became pillared.  Capital punishment was generally reserved for the most grievous of offenses. 

An interesting point made by the author deals with the legal system and its employment in crimes involving blacks.  The author details how Masters of slaves usually handled the punishment for minor offenses, but when the crimes involved major offenses, the Florida legal system gave blacks extensive legal protections, an unusual occurrence in the Deep South.  The Florida legal code recognized slaves as part of the human race.

Dr. Denham has researched this subject extensively in Florida Newspapers and court records as well as among personal manuscripts in national and state Archives.  This rich resource provides the scholarly researcher with a vast amount of untapped, primary resources for them to use.  The broadness of his subject, however, tends to dilute the work he is striving to accomplish.  The expansive distances between the population centers for court judges forced them become circuit riders and Denham’s examination of the difficulty in obtaining adequate funding for both the Court system and the various law enforcement offices, while interesting in a general format, would be better suited in a work detailing the difficulties faced by the judges themselves.

Despite this minor drawback, Dr. Denham gives an excellent view into the difficulties faced by the population of Florida in dealing with criminal elements. The interesting use of court records provides a fresh view into antebellum Florida society and an enjoyable work.

 Texas Christian University                                                                      Thomas Walker

A Rogue's Paradise: Crime and Punishment in Antebellum Florida, 1821-1861. By James M. Denham. (Tuscaloosa: The University of Alabama Press, 1997 ISBN 08173-0847-4. Pp. 381).

Frontier areas tend to be more lawless. The lack of established law enforcement, low population density, and a lack of settled areas where courts can hold session lead persons who have had trouble with the rules of a more sedentary and civilized society to seek the amnesty of a new start in a frontier area. Antebellum Florida met the criteria of a frontier society longer than most states. The disruption of the prolonged Seminole War, the presence of large areas of impenetrable swamp separating sparsely populated and more settled areas, the presence of heat, humidity, and disease, and the unsettled status of the law in a territory transferred from nation to nation, all contributed to the prolonged presence of Florida as a frontier area. Even after achieving statehood in 1846, Florida continued to suffer from most of the problems of frontier states. The problem became so endemic that the state acquired the title of a 'Rogue's Paradise.'

 James Denham has explored the effect of crime and punishment on the growth and development of the Florida frontier. Using court records, government documents, and newspapers, the author narrates the maturation of the legal system as Florida struggled with the forces of war, climate, geography, and lawlessness. The core thesis in his work is the role of 'honor' in the Southern legal system. Denham is presently Associate Professor of History at Florida Southern University after training at Florida State University. His primary research interests continues to be the historical aspects of crime and criminality.
 
 Law enforcement in the South was compounded by the rural agricultural population, which over-valued 'honor' and juries which were notoriously reluctant to convict their neighbors. Fines were the usual mode of punishment with hanging reserved for only the most heinous crimes. A favorite punishment for repeat offenders was lashing or pillaring in the town square. Branding was reserved for serious career criminals and banishment from the county or state, either voluntary or forced, often followed corporal punishment. Personal attacks against those who violated the South's cherished code of honor, usually verbally abusing the defendant, usually resulted in acquittal, even when the victim was murdered. Convicted defendants usually obtained pardons or commutations of their sentences from the governor on the recommendation of family and friends.

 The author structures his investigations by examining the sources of crime in the local frontier society, what types of crimes the population committed, how they punished criminals, how the judges and law enforcement officers felt about the system, and how the populace felt about crimes. Not surprisingly, the 'decent' folks did not like crime or criminals. He then investigates the courts, judges, and law enforcement officers of the territory and early state. During the territorial days most officials received Presidential appointments and originated from neighboring states. Some were from the North, but most of these did not fare well in the Southern legal system, despairing of the tendency of local juries to find their neighbors innocent. The author then turns his attention to the type of crimes--those against persons, women, property, and public order, examining each in turn.  Crimes against persons and women--murder, assault, abuse, and rape--usually involved a combination of Southern honor and drunkenness. Juries acquitted most murder as self-defense or as good riddance. The legal system often expunged crimes against property--usually theft--if the culprit left the state. Crimes against the public involved drunkenness more than any other disorder. As settlements grew and matured, the urban population demanded careful scrutiny of saloons and public drunkenness.

The author narrates the unique place of blacks in the criminal codes. While deferring to owners for punishment for minor crimes such as theft, the Florida legal system afforded the non-person of blacks extraordinary legal safeguards in capital trials--in essence recognizing their humanity and vulnerability before the law. Finally, he looks at jails, gangs, executions, court circuit, and individual judicial and law officials.

 One difficulty with the methodology used by Denham is the countless series of small anecdotes he relates in an endless dribble of facts and personalities that obscure his overall theme. John Stevenson killed so and so whenever, was tried wherever by whomever, and punished however. Marie somebody killed her husband wherever and received a trial etc., etc., etc. The author seems to relate the details of every one of the six thousand plus criminal proceedings he unearthed. The book would have flowed much smoother with fewer renditions of specific cases.

The book contains voluminous endnotes and seventy-five pages of appendices, documenting crimes and prosecution county by county. The crime records are broken down into those against person, property, moral order, and those involving slaves. The aggregate guilt or innocence for each type of crime is listed. In addition, the author enumerates every judge and law enforcement officer serving during the antebellum era, both in the territory and state. This book seems to have exhausted the subject of criminality in Antebellum Florida. It also exhausted the reviewer.

Watson Arnold