Brisbane soon became the center of a brilliant group which believed and taught Fourierism. Some of the others were: John Allen, the Channings, George W. Curtis, Charles A. Dana, John S. Dwight, Parke Goodwin, George C. Foster, Henry James, Horace Greeley, James Russell Lowell, C. Neidhardt, Francis G. Shaw, John G. Whittier, George Ripley and many others.[22]
Hundreds became interested and phalanges were established in many sections of the United States. In fact, the propaganda was so successful that an avalanche of applications fell upon Brisbane before he had worked out any plan of promotion or forms. He warned those who contemplated forming the “associations” not to be hasty and not to make any attempt to put the principles into operation until they had sufficient capital to guarantee some sort of success. However, very little attention was given to his advice and many phalanges were established, but few were successful.[23]
It was from the results of the teachings of these three men, Fourier, Considerant, and Brisbane, and from the direct effort of the last two that La Réunion was established in Texas, on the banks of the Trinity river.
“The best elements of the old world ask only to leave it; let America afford to them a little aid; nothing more is required, for them at once to join forces with her. Europe is now driving from her bosom whatever is good; let America give it a home with herself.”
Victor Considerant, European Colonization in Texas, p. 29.
CHAPTER II
AU TEXAS
Considerant, as a leader of the Fourieristic socialists, had always refused to combine the teaching or propagandizing of the movement with any attempt to put the phalansterian organization of society into operation. He thought that the proper promotion of either problem would require too large an outlay of energy and money ever to combine the two into one undertaking, and consequently the teaching of Fourierism and the colonization which would naturally grow out of it should be separate undertakings. However, Considerant’s ideas changed after his first visit to the United States in 1852; that is, he was willing to merge the two in a very limited manner.[1]
Considerant’s departure to the United States on his first visit seemed to have been hurriedly made, for he said that he left so quickly that he did not have time to write to any one concerning his proposed trip. At first, the trip was planned as only a four months’ tour of the United States, but it later developed into a search for a location suitable for the establishment of a colony.[2] On November 28, 1852, he left France and sailed to Liverpool, from whence he sailed for New York on December 1, and reached that port about two weeks later. No one met him at the port and, as Brisbane was in Detroit, he spent the time visiting some phalanges near New York. Among these were Lowell’s and Lawrence’s colonies near Boston, and the North American Phalanx in New Jersey. The latter was the most successful and enduring of all the phalanges established in North America. Considerant, after a six weeks’ visit, pronounced the colony a failure in one sense of the word: the co-operative efforts in economic and social life were carried out very successfully, but serial development of other phalanges had been totally abandoned by the colony. This he regretted very much.[3]
When Brisbane returned to New York from Detroit, he immediately got in touch with Considerant, and they began to discuss what was best to advance Fourierism in the United States. Brisbane apparently proposed the founding of a big paper that would literally cover the United States with propaganda. Considerant, however, urged that the day of education had passed and proposed immediate founding of a colony that would show what actually could be done with Fourierism at work. The idea of disseminating propaganda should be secondary to the project itself. Agreed on this part of the program, the two men began to seek a location for the proposed colony. Brisbane proposed that lands in Ohio or Illinois be chosen, but the project was subsequently rejected both by him and by Considerant along with many other places. Finally, the following was urged: first, that the northern, eastern, and western states should be excluded because of the length and severity of the winters, the short seasons and the excessive heat in summer, and by the high price of land in the Ohio Valley; second, the citizens of the proposed colony should be of both American and European stock, out of which Considerant expected the development of a super-race; and third, the colony must be located in the United States and east of the Rocky Mountains. They thought of going to Santa Fe, but on the advice of Captain Macy abandoned this plan because it was too far from the Gulf of Mexico through which the colonists would have to ship their goods and produce. Thus, the only possible solution was to locate the colony somewhere in the South or in Texas. The latter place was finally agreed upon, and a trip was immediately planned for investigation of the territory and the location of the colony.[4]
Considerant and Brisbane left Lake Erie April 30, 1853, where ice was still floating in the lake and the trees had not yet budded, for Texas. The first day they went to Cleveland, from there to Wellsville, to Canton, and then to Cincinnati. Here their arrival was announced in the papers in the following way:
Albert Brisbane and Victor Considerant, two of the most eminent living Socialists, of the Fourier school, were in Cincinnati on the 5 inst. Both of these Gentlemen are able, popular advocates of the Phalansterian system of the great French associationists above named. They are on their way to Northern Texas and the Red River country, for the purpose of selecting from twelve to fifteen thousand acres of good land, with a view to the importation of a colony of French and American Socialists.[5]