John C. Sullivan - Honey War

Honey War

After Sullivan died in 1830, the Sullivan Line was extended in the west to the Missouri River in 1836 as the U.S. government in the Platte Purchase bought all the land west from the Indian Boundary Line and then permitted Missouri to annex the land. As part of the purchase, Missouri wanted the Sullivan Line resurveyed. Joseph C. Brown who was involved with establishing the Fifth Principal Meridian from which most of land in the Louisiana Territory was mapped was hired by Missouri to resurvey the land. Brown was to say that instead of using the mouth of the Kansas, the northern should have been determined by its relation to the mouth of Ohio River. Brown said the border should be 9.5 miles (15.3 km) north of the Sullivan Line at what is now Lacey-Keosauqua State Park in Keosauqua, Iowa. Brown's Line was not recognized by Iowa. Missouri sent Clark County, Missouri sheriff to collect taxes in the strip and was arrested. According to legend Missouri tax collectors cut down three trees that had honey bee hives to collect honey in lieu of taxes. State militias from both Missouri and Iowa were called out before the governors eventually agreed to let the Supreme Court decide the case which it did in State of Missouri v. State of Iowa, 48 U.S. 660 (1849), upholding the Sullivan Line noting that is how it was written in state's constitution. The line was resurveyed to correct various jogs as disputes were to continue over the line into the 20th century.