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CHAPTER XII.

The President's Message to Congress. The foreign relations of the United States. Correspondence between the American Minister at Paris and the Minister of Foreign Affairs. Mr. Madison's Correspondence with Mr. Pinkney. Proceedings of Congress. The embargo. Inquiry as to the two millions appropriated for the purchase of Florida. Effects of the Embargo. Measures of defence. Embargo taken off. Communication from Mr. J. Q. Adams. State of public affairs. Review of Mr. Jefferson's administration.

1808-1809.

HAVING seen the measures of self-defence adopted by the United States against the worst mischiefs to which the undiscriminating fury of the European belligerents exposed them, let us now see how these rights were asserted by their government, in its diplomatic intercourse with those belligerents.

Mr. Erskine having, on the 12th of March, 1807, sent a formal notice of the Berlin decree, and added, that his government, not exercising that retaliation which was justifiable, had merely issued an order of January, 1807, for preventing commerce between different ports of his enemies, Mr. Madison, in reply, remonstrated against this order, and the right of retaliation asserted in it; and Mr. Erskine having on the 23rd of February, 1808, explained the character of the order in council of November, 1807, Mr. Madison, on the 25th of March, replied to him at length. He denies the fact assumed by the orders, that the United States had acquiesced in the French decrees, and he denies

the principle that one belligerent may retaliate to any extent and under any modifications which may suit its pleasure. So far as the Berlin decree was a local regulation, it furnished to Great Britain no ground of complaint: so far as it was to be executed on the high seas, it could affect only neutrals. That at the time of the orders of November, the French decree was not known to have been executed in any instance the case of the Horizon being the first: That the United States had every reason to believe that the decree was not to be enforced as to them; and as soon as it was, they took measures to defend their rights: That, admitting the right of retaliation in Great Britain, it could not justify her to the extent to which she carried it: That retaliation is an equivalent for injury received, and there was no comparison between that which she experienced and that which she inflicted: That the British order of January, 1807, itself declared that the fleets of France, instead of being able to enforce the blockade of the British isles, were themselves blockaded, and was thus self-condemned as a measure of retaliation.

He says that as the United States do not acquiesce in the invasions of their rights, they ought not to be involved in the controversy on which ever side the invasions began. He however reminds Mr. Erskine that before the French decree there were blockades declared by the British government that were not authorized by the law of nations. He speaks in an indignant tone of the exceptions made in the orders of November, which, under the name of indulgences to neutrals, were in fact badges of humiliation, inconsistent with national independence. The first of these allowed a commercial intercourse with the colonies of an enemy, contrary to the rule of 1756. He denies that this is an established principle of the law of nations; that it is claimed to be such only by Great Britain; never by her before 1756,

and at first then, not because such trade was in itself illegal, but because it furnished presumptive evidence that the property belonged to an enemy; and that the British courts themselves had sometimes conformed to it and sometimes rejected it. The other exceptions allowed to the United States a trade to the whole continent of Europe, on first going to a British port, accepting a British license, and paying a tribute, as if they were reduced to their former colonial dependence; and he asks, if the policy be to subject an enemy to privations, why are channels opened for a British trade which are shut to a neutral trade? and if the real object be to admit a neutral trade, why are neutral vessels required to come to a British port, when it is known that they are then not admitted into the ports of the enemy? He animadverts on the duty on cotton, and on the condemnation of American vessels for having "certificates of origin,” though these are in conformity with domestic regulations generally practised.

On the 29th of March he sent a further remonstrance against the order in council of January, 1807, in which he enforces his former objections to the right of retaliation claimed by Great Britain.

On the 12th of November, 1807, General Armstrong learnt the decision of the council of prizes in France in the case of the Horizon. This American vessel was wrecked on the coast of France, was seized by the officers of the government, and though the value of the vessel was restored, that part of her cargo which consisted of English merchandise was condemned under the Berlin decree. The American minister made a remonstrance to the government, and showed that the decision was inconsistent with the declarations made to him in October preceding. One of the grounds taken by the council of prizes was that the interpretation of the decree that had been first given to General Armstrong was the opinion of an individual, and could not weigh

against the subsequent opinion given in the name of the emperor himself. On the 24th of November, Mons. Champagny the minister of foreign relations at Paris, writes to General Armstrong that the American government could not complain of the measures of the French government while they allow their ships to be visited by English ships and submit to other wrongs. That France had been forced to adopt those measures, and had had recourse to more rigid precautions in consequence of the intimate relations between the United States and England. That the inconvenience is justly to be imputed, not to France but England. She should be combated with her own arms. England disregards the rights of nations, and it is only in forcing her to a peace, that they can be recovered.

On the 2nd of April, 1808, General Armstrong, in pursuance of his instructions, remonstrated against the condemnations of American property, under the Berlin and Milan decrees, which he shows to be clear infractions of the treaty of 1800. He insists that the only pretext of justification, the acquiescence of the United States in the wrongs they sustained from the British government, is not true in fact, and though it were, has no foundation in reason or law. He avers that the United States have not submitted, and would "not submit to the usurpations of Great Britain, nor to those of any other nation.*"

On the 4th of July, General Armstrong answers Mons. Champagny's letter of the 15th of January. He says the United States have the right to elect their own policy with regard to England as they have with regard to France, and without it they cannot be considered independent; that the peremptory tone of Champagny's note was less adapted to the accomplishment of its object than to offend against the respect due to an independent nation; and that the alter

*Wait's State Papers, 56.

native presented to the United States in the last paragraph of an acquiescence in the views of France against Great Britain, and a confiscation of all American property sequestered, is equally derogatory to both governments: To France as it imputes to her propositions founded in wrong to individuals; and to the United States, as it implies a sacrifice of her rights and honour to her pecuniary interests.

To the several remonstrances made by the American minister against the captures and burning of American property, no answer was given by the French government.

In Mr. Madison's letter to Mr. Pinkney, dated February 19th, 1808, he says that among the considerations which advised the embargo, was the probability of such orders as were actually issued by the British government on the 11th of November, 1807-the language of the British gazettes, with other indications having left little doubt that such were meditated. The appearance of these orders in council, he says, had done much towards reconciling all descriptions of persons to the embargo.

In a subsequent letter * to Mr. Pinkney, dated the 14th of April, after stating what reparations for the attack on the Chesapeake would be deemed satisfactory, if the adjustment should be made in England, Mr. Madison urges the same considerations to Great Britain to repeal the illegal orders which had been previously presented to France. He says, "It would be happy for all parties, the belligerents as well as the United States, if truth could, in this case, be made to prevail; and if the retaliatory rivalship of the former against the latter could be converted into an emulation, as politic as it would be magnanimous in both, to take the lead, in a fair,

* It appeared by Mr. Rose's letter to Mr. Madison of March 17, that the British government did not require of the United States more than that they should discharge deserters from their service. This order, therefore, went a step farther.