1814.

security and defence which may be consistent with the preservation of their resources from total ruin, and adapted to their local situation, mutual relations and habits, and not repugnant to other obligations as members of the Union." When these proceedings reached Connecticut, the General Assembly was in session; on the second Thursday in October, a joint committee of the two houses submitted a report reviewing the evils to which the State had been subjected, approving the Convention, but disclaiming all disloyalty or infidelity to the Union. Upon the reception of this report, the General Assembly of Connecticut appointed seven delegates to meet the delegates of Massachusetts and any other of the New England States at Hartford, on the 15th day of December, "and confer with them on the subjects proposed by a resolution of said Commonwealth communicated to this legislature, and upon any other subjects which may come before them, for the purpose of devising and recommending such measures for the safety and welfare of these States as may consist with our obligations as members of the national Union."

The General Assembly of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations received a copy of the same proceedings which had been sent to Connecticut and the other States; this body took immediate action thereon, and appointed four delegates to meet at Hartford, "and confer with such delegates as are or shall be appointed by other States, upon the common dangers to which these States are exposed, upon the best means of co-operating for our mutual defence against the enemy, and upon the measures which may be in the power of said States, consistently with their obligations, to adopt, to restore and secure to the people thereof their rights and privileges under the Constitution of the United States."

The only other States that took any action in reference to these proceedings were New Hampshire, which sent two delegates, and Vermont, which sent one, from primary assemblies of the people.*

This was the authority and instructions of the twenty-six virtuous and enlightened patriots who formed the Hartford Convention which assembled on the 16th day of December, 1814. George Cabot, a native and citizen of Massachusetts,

History of the Hartford Convention, by T. Dwight, Secretary of the Convention, pp. 342, 351.

was elected president. He was a descendant of one of the discoverers of a portion of this continent, and was possessed of strong powers of mind and extensive acquirements, united with the strictest integrity and the purest morals; he was a distinguished patriot in the Revolution, and afterwards a Senator in Congress from his native State. In truth may it be said, this was a body of honorable men, consisting for the most part of statesmen, eminent judges and lawyers, remarkable for their position, their attainments, and their virtue.

The action of this Convention will further prove, beyond all doubt and cavil, that its proceedings were all constitutional, loyal, and right. After being in session three weeks, a report was unanimously adopted by that body, which presented a review of the war and the condition of the New England States; but not one word about disloyalty to the Union. Accompanying the report were a series of resolutions declaring, in the first place, that it be recommended to the several States represented in the Convention to authorize an application to be made to the Government of the United States, requesting their consent to some arrangement whereby the States may separately or in concert be empowered to assume upon themselves the defence of their own territory against the enemy; and that a reasonable portion of the taxes collected within said States may be paid into the respective treasuries thereof and appropriated to the payment of the balance due said States and to the future defence thereof.*

There were other resolutions, but they bore either directly upon the request of the States to defend themselves by their own militia, or recommended some amendment to the Constitution. Thus, the Hartford Convention appears legitimate in its origin, in no respect violating the Federal compact, either in letter or spirit. The commissions under which the members assembled were scrupulously guarded against any violation of the Constitution; whilst the account of their proceedings shows that they punctiliously observed the injunctions contained in their instructions. Without one act or expression that was unconstitutional, this harmless body of intelligent gentlemen adjourned sine die, January 5th, 1815, and returned home to meet the execration of their countrymen, and die disliked by a large number of the American people, without cause and guiltless of any offence.

* Journal of the Hartford Convention.

It is worthy of historical notice, that the President and Secretary of War, fired with sudden fear at the assembling of this mighty body of warlike disturbers of the tranquillity of the Union, dispatched Lieutenant-Colonel Jessup to Hartford, to counteract its proceedings, if necessary, by force; the result of which was that Jessup, after a daily correspondence with the Secretary of War, conveying no information of the slightest importance, accepted an invitation, in conjunction with all of his officers, to a public ball; and left the capital of Connecticut no doubt in a very pleasant humor, and with no complaints against the Convention or the people of Hartford, whose generous hospitality he had so freely received.

The true and just doctrine of State rights has been sufficiently discussed in another portion of this work; yet nothing can be more striking in the history of parties in this country than the position occupied on this occasion by the distinguished hero of State rights, the author of the report of the Virginia Legislature, in 1799, in reference to the "palpable and alarming infractions of the Constitution in the two late cases of the Alien and Sedition Acts.'" When the Federalists of New England occupied the same position it was treason, and the father of the States-right school in Virginia, stood ready to put them down by the Federal sword.

If the Hartford Convention is condemned, how will the States-right party reconcile the position it assumed in 1832, in South Carolina, in reference to the tariff? For it is not to be forgotten that the legislature called a convention which passed an ordinance determining not to obey the laws of Congress in reference to the collection of duties at the ports of that State, and to resist if their collection should be attempted to be enforced by the General Government. If Otis, Cabot, Done, and Sherman in 1814, were guilty of opposition to the laws of their country, how will the memory of Hayne, Hamilton, McDuffie, and Calhoun escape the fierce denunciation of the Democratic party in reference to the position they and their State occupied in 1832?

Whilst the nation was becoming more and more united, and Congress was engaged with a stronger feeling of determination in passing acts for the more vigorous prosecution of the war, the Executive was not unmindful of the opportunities that offered in obtaining an honorable peace.

The letter of Castlereagh declining the mediation of Russia, nevertheless expressed a desire for the restoration of

amicable relations, and a willingness on the part of Great Britain to enter into direct negotiations. In consideration of the Russian mediation, Madison had appointed Adams, then American Minister at the Russian Court, Albert Gallatin, and James A. Bayard, Commissioners to negotiate a peace. In January, 1814, when it was believed that there was no prospect of peace, and Gallatin and Bayard supposed to be on their way home, Henry Clay and Jonathan Russell were added to the existing commission and sailed immediately for Europe. The Commissioners were arranged by the President and Senate in the following order:-Adams, Bayard, Clay, Russell, and Gallatin. The American Commissioners, were directed to proceed to Gottenburg, the place first designated, from whence the negotiation was afterwards transferred to Ghent, where they met the British Commissioners Lord Gambier, Henry Goulburn, and William Adams. The American Commissioners, with their Secretary of Legation, Christopher Hughes, and four junior assistants, established themselves in considerable style and kept house together with uncommon dignity, with the joint outfit and salary of one hundred thousand dollars per annum. Ghent, a Belgian city of seventy or eighty thousand inhabitants, between the Scheldt and Lys, and not far distant from the sea, was then occupied by British troops under the command of Sir Edward Lyons, whose only personal knowledge of America, it is said, was that his father had been killed in the battle of Bunker Hill. The Commissioners were hospitably entertained by the authorities of Ghent, with dinners and balls, the only dancing member of which was the venerable John Quincy Adams.

Gambier, the head of the British Commission, then a retired naval officer, possessed no marked character, and was of ordinary ability; William Adams was an Admiralty officer of strong prejudices and little learning; Goulburn was a young man of hereditary distinction, trained for a statesman and acquainted with the laws and rights of nations, rather as a student than a diplomatist.

On the other hand, America presented at the Congress of Ghent, a brilliant and bold array of talent. John Quincy Adams was a man of vast learning, an educated and practical diplomatist; Bayard, a distinguished debater and experienced member of Congress; Clay, eminently suited for the occasion by his indomitable firmness, great familiarity with

the history of the war, the exceeding readiness and soundness of his thoughts, which he imparted with unconquerable array of argument, brilliant force, and fluency; Russell had been Chargé d'Affaires, first at Paris and afterwards at London, when war was declared, where he won universal admiration by the skill and firmness with which he discharged his delicate trust; Gallatin had been for many years a favorite cabinet officer, and was a man of strong and capacious mind, eminently versed in the domestic and diplomatic history of his country, and especially familiar with all the commercial and maritime questions to be discussed. In the instructions first given to our Commissioners, the impressment of American seamen and illegal blockades were alleged as the principal causes of war; this was also stated in the report of the Committee of Foreign Relations of the House of Representatives. By an act of Congress, passed in pursuance of that report, it will be seen that the United States were disposed to exclude all British seamen from American service; but the instructions required that England should be bound by the same restrictions in reference to our seamen being forced into British service.

At a subsequent period, the Secretary of State instructed our Commissioners, if found indispensably necessary, to omit the subject of impressment; the altered condition of European affairs, in consequence of the downfall of Napoleon, was stated as the reason, and consequently it was omitted in the treaty. If it appears strange or inconsistent, the justification can only be found in the entire cessation of any cause of complaint on this score, from the date of the treaty to the present time.

The English Commissioners were exceedingly rigorous and exacting in their first communication, requiring a settlement of the existing difficulties with the Indian tribes and the guaranty of a tract of country for them, which was emphatically refused on the part of the United States; and the British Commissioners were compelled to be satisfied with a mutual stipulation for peace with the Indians.*

Upon the final disposition of this question, arose others of more magnitude and importance in reference to the navigation of the Mississippi River. By the treaty of 1783, it had been stipulated that Great Britain in common with the citi

* American State Papers, vol. ix.