Scheming is the term I picked. Certainly if you read Peckham's 1866 version, and he is solidly Unionist in his view point, and follow that with Galusaha Anderson's 1908 book on St. Louis and the war, they both report, I think accurately, that Blair and Lyon and a number of lesser players were calling in every favor they could and bending a number of rules to their favor between Jan 1861 and June of 1861. Blair had an inside family connection to the Lincoln administration and Sec of War Simon Cameron and he used it for political favor. Remember this in the context of a very politicized military at the time. We first get a glimpse when a squabble of sorts evolves over Major Hagner and Capt Lyon and where the line of authority lay between them in the operation of the arsenal. It took the intercession of then President Buchanan and Chief of the Army Winfield Scott to settle it. With that said, such was not an unusual occurrence.

Both armies, USA and CSA, would be plagued by the political intrigues of the time and many a general on both sides gained their stars not because of their leadership ability or battlefield prowess but because of who they knew in the halls of civillian power in Washington and Richmond.

Blair used his influence to disrupt Harney's operations in the West perhaps for the better good of the Union but IMHO it came at the expense of immediate and local civil unrest in St. Louis. I admit I'm a centrist in this view and as I've said before, one can't help but wonder if the war in Missouri would have been different if the extremes of both sides like Lyon and Jeff Thompson had been mitigated more effectively by the likes of Price and Harney. The rub for many folks is that I consider Harney, one of only 4 full generals at the time, not only competent but perhaps the most well informed about the military competencies of both sides in the western theater in early 1861. IMHO his knowledge base and the respect held by many of him in the West was squandered by leadership in Washington and St. Louis.

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~harney2/General/military.htm

http://www.civilwarstlouis.com/peckham/index.htm

http://www.civilwarstlouis.com/History/Blair%20&%20Lyon.htm

http://books.google.com/books?id=3HRNX4YYbyMC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Galusha+Anderson&hl=en&ei=ZquBTJuHPMGclgfp7pDGDg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCwQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false

http://www.usgennet.org/usa/mo/county/stlouis/acw.htm#"Securing Missouri For the Union"

I'll be quiet now.

John R