CH. VII.]

they should not be hastily precipitated into situations calculated to put to trial the strength of the moral bond by which they are united. Of all states, that of war is most likely to call into activity the passions which are hostile and dangerous to such a form of government. Time is yet important to our country, to settle and mature its recent institutions. Above all, it appeared to the undersigned, from signs not to be mistaken, that if we entered upon this war, we did it as a divided people; not only from a sense of the inadequacy of our means to success, but from moral and political objections of great weight and general influence.

It appears to the undersigned, that the wrongs of which the United States have to complain, although in some aspects very grievous to our interests, and in many humiliating to our pride, were yet of a nature which, in the present state of the world, either would not justify war, or which war would not remedy. Thus, for instance, the hovering of British vessels on our coasts, and the occasional insults to our ports, imperiously demanded such a systematic application of harbor and seacoast defence, as would repel such aggressions, but in no light can they be considered as making a resort to war, at the present time, on the part of the United States, either necessary or expedient. So also, with respect to the Indian war, of the origin of which but very imperfect information has as yet been given to the public. Without any express act of Congress, an expedition was, last year, set on foot, and prosecuted into the Indian territory, which had been relinquished by treaty, on the part of the United States. And now we are told about the agency of British traders, as to Indian aostilities. It deserves consideration, whether there has been such provident attention, as would have been proper to remove any cause of complaint, either real or imaginary, which the Indians. might allege, and to secure their friendship. With all the sympathy and anxiety excited by the state of that frontier, important as it may be to apply adequate means of protection against the Indians, how is it safely insured by a declaration of war which adds the British to the number of enemies?

As "a decent respect for the opinions of mankind" has not induced the two Houses of Congress

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After a lengthened consideration of these topics, from the federalist point of view, the Address of the Minority concludes in the following terms:

A nation, like the United States, happy in its great local relations; removed from the bloody theatre of Europe; with a maritime border opening vast fields for enterprise; with territorial possessions exceeding every real want; its firesides safe; its altars undefiled; from invasion nothing to fear; from acquisition nothing to hope; how shall such a nation look to heaven for its smiles, while throwing away, as though they were worthless, all the blessings and joys which peace and such a distinguished lot include? With what prayers can it address the Most High, when it prepares to pour forth its youthful rage upon a neighboring people, from whose strength it has nothing to dread, from whose devastation it has nothing to gain?

If our ills were of a nature that war would remedy, if war would compensate any of our losses, or remove any of our complaints, there might be some alleviation of the suffering in the charm of the prospect. But how will war upon the land protect commerce upon the ocean? What balm has Canada for wounded honor? How are our mariners benefited by a war which exposes those who are free, without promising release to those who are impressed?

But it is said that war is demanded by honor. Is national honor a principle which thirsts after vengeance, and is appeased only by blood, which, trampling on the hopes of man, and spurning the law of God, untaught by what is past, and careless of what is to come, precipitates itself into any folly or madness to gratify a selfish vanity, or to satiate some unhallowed rage' If honor demands a war with England, what opiate lulla

that honor to sleep over the wrongs done us by France? On land, robberies, seizures, imprisonments, by French authority; at sea, pillage, sinkings, burnings, under French orders. These are notorious. Are they unfelt because they are French? Is any alleviation to be found in the correspondence and humiliations of the present minister-plenipotentiary of the United States, at the French court? In his communications to our government, as before the public, where is the cause for now selecting France as the friend of our country, and England as the enemy?

If no illusions of personal feeling, and no solicitude for elevation of place, should be permitted to misguide the public councils; if it is, indeed, honorable for the true statesman to consult the public welfare, to provide, in truth, for the public defence, and impose no yoke of bondage; ought the government of this country, with full knowledge of the wrongs inflicted by the French, to aid the French cause by engaging in war against the enemy of France? To supply the waste of such a war, and to meet the appropriations of millions extraordinary for the war expenditures, must our fellow-citizens, throughout the Union, be doomed to sustain the burden of war-taxes in various forms of direct and indirect imposition? For official information respecting the millions deemed requisite for charges of the war, for like information respecting the nature and amount of taxes deemed requisite for drawing those millions from the community, it is here sufficient to refer to estimates and reports made by the secretary of the treasury, and the committee of ways and means, and to the body of resolutions passed in March last, in the House of Representatives.

It would be some relief to our anxiety, if amends were likely to be made for the weakness and wildness of the project, by the prudence of the preparation. But in no aspect of this anomalous affair can we trace the great and distinctive properties of wisdom. There is seen a headlong rushing into difficulties, with little calculation about the means, and little concern about the consequences. With a navy comparatively nominal, we are about to enter into the lists against the greatest marine on the globe. With a commerce, unprotected and spread over every ocean, we propose to make profit by privateering, and for this endanger the wealth of which we are honest

proprietors. An invasion is threatened of the colonies of a power, which, without putting a new ship into commission, or taking another soldier into pay, can spread alarm or desolation along the extensive range of our seaboard. The resources of our country, in their natural state, great beyond our wants or our hopes, are impaired by the effect of artificial restraints. Before adequate fortifications are prepared for domestic defence, before men or money are provided for a war of attack, why hasten into the midst of that awful contest, which is laying waste Europe? It cannot be concealed, that to engage in the present war against England, is to place ourselves on the side of France; and exposes us to the vassalage of states, serving under the ban. ners of the French emperor.

The undersigned cannot refrain from asking, what are the United States to gain by this war? Will the gratification of some privateersmen compensate the nation for that sweep of our legitimate commerce, by the extended marine of our enemy, which this desperate act invites? Will Canada compensate the middle states for New-York; or the western states for New-Orleans? Let us not be deceived. A war of inva sion may invite a retort of invasion. When we visit the peaceable and, as to us, innocent colo. nies of Great Britian with the horrors of war, can we be assured that our own coast will not be visited with like horrors?

At a crisis of the world such as the present, and under impressions such as these, the undersigned could not consider the war in which the United States have, in secret, been precipitated, as necessary, or required by any moral duty. or any political expediency.

contest with so powerful an enemy as England. Neither in men, nor in officers; neither in the executive, nor his cabinet; neither in the financial provisions, nor in regard to the nature and character of the war, was there the proper foresight, the just conception, the needful training, the fitting ability for the vigorous and successful prosecution of hostilities against the neighboring colonies of England by land, or her vast and terrible array of ships of war on the sea. The haughty mistress of the ocean had her thousand floating castles, which proudly bore aloft the royal flag; and innumerable cruisers and privateers were ready in every sea to pounce upon the defenceless American commerce; while the entire naval force of the United States, in ordinary or in building, was only eight frigates and twelve sloops!*

But even this disparity of force, this confessedly insufficient preparation for war in nearly every respect, was not

* In 1812, says Mr. Cooper, the navy of Great Britain nominally contained a thousand and sixty sail, of which between seven and eight hundred were efficient cruising vessels, and the state of things was such in Europe, that she was able to send as many ships as she thought necessary against the Americans. The navy—if we may use the term-of the United States, according to the same authority, consisted of but seventeen cruising vessels on the ocean, of which nine

who had brought about the declaration of war and were determined to carry it on at all hazards. Boston, so illustrious in the Revolutionary struggle, now scouted and denounced the second war against England, and the flags of her shipping were hoisted at half-mast when the news came to her, in token of mourning and humiliation. All New England resounded with the bitterest denunciations of the executive and the war party. The state legislatures, the merchants, the lawyers, the wealth and the talent of this portion of our country fiercely arrayed themselves against the administration and its measures; and many of the New England ministers, who thought themselves called upon to be guides in politics as well as religion, indulged in a style and violence of invective which has no parallel elsewhere in history. A specimen or two of their diatribes may not improperly be here quoted.

"It is a war," exclaimed one ardent beater of the "drum ecclesiastic," "unexampled in history; proclaimed on the most frivolous and groundless pretences; let no consideration whatever deter my brethren, at all times and in all places, from execrating the present war. Mr. Madison has declared it, let Mr. Madison carry it on. If you do not wish to become the slaves of those who are slaves, and are themselves the slaves of French slaves, you must cut the connection, or so far alter the Constitution as to secure yourselves a share

in the government. in the government. The Union has been long since virtually dissolved, and

val History," vol. ii., p. 40.

"Should the English now be at liberty to send all their armies and all their ships to America," cried another, "and in one day burn every city from Maine to Georgia, your condescending rulers would play on their harps, while they gazed on the tremendous conflagration." And again, even more furiously shouted a third, "What sooty slave in all the Ancient Dominion more obsequiously watched the eye of his master, and flew to the indulgence of his desires more servilely, than those same masters have waited, and watched, and obeyed, the orders of the great Napoleon ?" "How will the supporters of this anti-Christian warfare endure their sentence-endure their own reflections-endure the fire that forever burns-the worm which never dies-the hosannas of heaven, while the smoke of their torments ascends forever and ever?"* No wonder if, under such harangues as these must have been, New England arrayed herself against the war, and did every thing in her power to oppose and harass the administration.†

* See Ingersoll's "History of the Second War," vol. i., pp. 52–56.

+ Mr. Dwight gives the correspondence between the authorities at Washington and the governor of Connecticut, in which are considered the grounds of the latter's refusal to allow the militia to leave the state. Mr. Dwight further says: "In July, 1812, the governor of Massachusetts issued a general order to the militia

of that state, in which, after some preliminary remarks on the state of the country, and directing that the detachment of ten thousand men should be completed without delay,-it is added,-that as that body of men, being to be raised throughout the state, could not be assembled to repel a sudden invasion, and it would be extremely burdensome to keep them constantly in service, and if they were assembled they would not be adequate to the defence of the exposed points of a coast of several hundred miles in extent,--it was ordered,

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In the middle and southern states, there was greater diversity of sentiment on this subject. Some, if not many, disapproved of the war; but the ma jority undoubtedly were in favor of prosecuting it with vigor and energy. The strong feeling of those who supported the views of the war party was manifested, in one case, in a very violent and scandalous manner. It appears that at Baltimore, there was a newspaper, called "The Federal Gazette," the editor of which, not only ardently advocated the views of his party, but also indulged in very free strictures upon the administration and its course in regard to the war. This was on the 20th of June: the same evening, his office was mobbed, and his whole establishment destroyed. Some weeks afterwards, Hanson, the editor, endeavored to re-establish his paper, hoping that the law would protect him and his property; but fearing renewed assaults, he fortified his house, and aided by Generals Henry Lee and Lingan, Revolutionary officers, he determined to resist aggression by force. On the 27th of July, the mob again attacked Hanson's establishment; blood was shed; and the occupants of the house were persuaded by the mayor, as the only means of saving their lives, to surrender and go to jail, to answer charges against them. The next night the jail was broken open, and the pris oners shamefully abused and maltreated.

1812.

that the officers of the whole militia of the state hold themselves, and the militia under their command, in constant readiness to assemble and march to any part or parts of the state."-"History of the Hartford Convention," p. 269.