The reversal of party position on both sides was due not to choice, but to interchange of situation. The very act of conducting the government on the one hand and of opposing it on the other brought this exchange. Jefferson, the former advocate of peace, from his retirement now urged a vigorous policy which involved retaliation on England, if she burned American cities, by hiring discontented workmen in London to burn British buildings, by conquering Canada, and, after dictating terms of peace with Britain, by making war upon Napoleon. The reversal of party brought consequent exchange of policy. Instead of Federal encroachment on individual rights, the Republicans must now become aggressors, and the Federalists protestants. Instead of the protests coming from Virginia and Kentucky they now emanated from the New England States. Instead of regarding the State Legislatures as the ultimate protectors of the States, the resistants now went beyond that agency and adopted the very expedient so frequently urged by Jefferson, and the one which Madison testified that he had contemplated in 1799—a convention of delegates from the States.
Some parts of the resolutions adopted by this convention of twenty-seven delegates from the five New England States which met at Hartford, Connecticut, in December, 1814, might easily be supposed to have been voiced by Virginia and Kentucky fifteen years before, so completely had parties and sections exchanged.
"It is as much a duty of the state authorities to watch over the rights reserved, as of the United States to exercise the powers which are delegated" was the voice of southern individualism speaking through a New England convention. "In cases of deliberate, dangerous, and palpable infractions of the Constitution, affecting the sovereignty of a state and the liberties of the people, it is not only the right, but the duty of such a state to interpose its authority for their protection."
Thus was the doctrine of "interposition" transferred from South to North, equalising sections, and conducing to the ultimate making of the nation.
But the means to be employed were not the same in each case. Resistance in the Union to unconstitutional acts had been the Republican plan of 1798; withdrawal from a Union, whose government had been grossly and corruptly administered ever since the first twelve years of prosperity and happiness, was the Federalist thought of 1814. "Even at this late hour," said the Hartford Convention report, "let government leave to New England the remnant of her resources and she is ready and able to defend her territory." The peaceful dissolution of the Union and the substitution of "a new form of confederacy among those states which shall intend to maintain a federal relation to each other" was declared to be a possibility. A severance of the Union by one or more States withdrawing against the will of the rest was justified only in case of absolute necessity. The immediate remedy was to perfect "an arrangement which may at once be consistent with the honor and interest of the national government and the security of the states." By the readjustment which they proposed to make between the States and the Union, the latter would practically withdraw from the Eastern States so far as revenue and defence, the two highest attributes of sovereignty, were concerned.
Ultimately the convention hoped for certain amendments to the Constitution, Jefferson's remedy again, "to strengthen and if possible to perpetuate the union of the states," and, incidentally, to curb the national strength of their opponents. To this end, the two-fifths negro representation which the slave States had been given in the Constitution was to be abolished; the extension of Southern power by creating more States from the Louisiana Purchase was to be curbed by requiring a two-thirds vote in each House for the admission of a new State into the Union; Northern commerce was to be protected from future annihilation by limiting embargoes to sixty days; a two-thirds vote of both Houses was to be required to declare war or non-intercourse with a nation; the pro-French element in national politics was to be curbed by forbidding naturalised persons to hold national office; future eight-year Jeffersons and Madisons were to be prevented, and the Virginia presidential trust broken by making a President ineligible for a second term, and by prohibiting two consecutive Presidents to be elected from the same State. A complete transition of the fear of presidential usurpation had been wrought by the burden of war falling more heavily on one section than the other.
[Illustration: DISLOYALTY OF NEW ENGLAND DURING THE WAR OF 1812. This cartoon represents Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island contemplating jumping into the arms of John Bull, while Maine prays below for guidance. The King says "Oh 'tis my Yankee boys, jump in, my fine fellows, plenty molasses and codfish, plenty of goods to smuggle, honours, titles, and nobility into the bargain." Massachusetts, nearest the King, says "What a dangerous leap! but we must jump, Brother Conn." Connecticut, in the middle, says "I cannot, Brother Mass. Let me pray and fast some little longer Little Rhode Island will jump the first." Rhode Island says "Poor little I! What will become of me? This leap is of a frightful size. I sink into despondency.">[
National finances were seriously impaired by the war. The lending section refused to support the Administration. Of the loan authorised in 1814, less than one-half was taken and that at a discount of twenty per cent. During the same year, the Government defaulted on the interest due on the national debt. Moneyed men claimed that business had been so impaired by the embargo and war as to prevent their coming to the relief of the nation. Unfortunately, strict-construction theory had cut off the bank which might otherwise have been a source of supply. A glance at a table of statistics of the commerce and financial standing of the United States during the embargo and war period will show the effects of a maritime war and explain the causes of the complaints of commercial New England. The following sums are in round numbers of millions of dollars.
Exports Imports National Debt 1807……….. 108……….. 138……….. 69 1808……….. 22……….. 56……….. 65 1811……….. 61……….. 53……….. 48 1812……….. 38……….. 77……….. 77 1813……….. 27……….. 22……….. 55 1814……….. 16……….. 12……….. 81 1815……….. 52……….. 113……….. 99 1816……….. 81……….. 147……….. 127
Almost annihilated by the embargo of 1808 and the War of 1812-15, the exports and imports, when relieved from such incumbrances, leaped to figures which caused anger and rebellion when contemplated. The prospect of wiping out the national debt was indefinitely postponed. Increased burdens of national taxation brought as loud a protest from the Federalists in 1814 as came from the Republicans in 1798.