On these definitions of law, and not to satisfy Napoleon’s requirement, the President insisted on the abandonment of Fox’s blockade.
The withdrawal of the Orders in Council, on the other hand, was required on the ground that England had pledged her faith to withdraw them whenever France revoked her decrees. France had revoked her decrees, and England could not honorably refuse to withdraw the orders.
“As to the Orders in Council which professed to be a reluctant departure from all ordinary rules, and to be justified only as a system of retaliation for a pre-existing measure of France, their foundation, such as it was, is gone the moment that measure is no longer in operation. But the Berlin Decree is repealed, and even the Milan Decree, the successor of your Orders in Council, is repealed also. Why is it, then, that your orders have outlived those edicts?”
In both instances the American position lost character by connection with Napoleon’s acts. Pinkney repudiated such a connection in the first case, and his argument would have been stronger could he have repudiated it in the second. Unable or unwilling to do this, he had no resource but to lose his temper, which he did with proper self-control. The correctness of his reasoning or of his facts became less important from the moment he showed himself in earnest; for then the controversy entered a new phase.
In making an issue of war, President Madison needed to exercise extreme caution not to shock the sentiment of New England, but he needed to observe no such delicacy in regard to the feelings of the British Tories. In respect to the British government, the nature of the issue mattered little, provided an issue were made; and Pinkney might reasonably think that the more paradoxical his arguments the more impression they would produce. Centuries of study at Oxford and Edinburgh, and generations devoted to the logic or rhetoric of Aristotle, Cicero, and Quintilian, had left the most educated classes of Great Britain still in the stage of culture where reasoning, in order to convince, must cease to be reasonable. As Pinkney became positive and arrogant, Wellesley became conciliatory and almost yielding. The American note of January 14, written in a tone that had not hitherto been taken in London, was coupled with a notice that brought the two governments in presence of the long-threatened rupture. Pinkney informed Lord Wellesley that as the British government, after a lapse of many months, had taken no steps to carry out the assurance of sending a new minister to Washington, the United States government could not retain a minister at London. Therewith Pinkney requested an audience of leave.
Although Wellesley had never avowed a political motive for his systematic delays, no one could doubt that he intentionally postponed not only concession on the Orders in Council, but also a settlement of the “Chesapeake” affair and the appointment of a new minister at Washington, because his colleagues, as he hinted[11] to Pinkney, were persuaded “that the British interest in America would be completely destroyed by sending thither at this time a minister plenipotentiary,” and of course by any other frank advance. The influence of F. J. Jackson with the Government was perhaps strong enough to check action that would have amounted to a censure on his own conduct; and although the American elections showed that Jackson had for the time so much reduced British influence in America as to make some change of policy necessary if it were to be revived, Jackson, in daily intercourse with the Foreign Office and with ministers, was exerting every effort to maintain his credit. Nothing less than Pinkney’s request for an audience of leave was likely to end these ministerial hesitations.
For the moment, as Pinkney knew, his request could not be granted, because the King was insane and could give audience to no one. Since Nov. 1, 1810, Parliament had done no other business than such as related to the regency; yet on Jan. 14, 1811, when Pinkney’s two notes were written, the Regency Bill had not been brought before the Commons. Introduced on the following day, Parliament showed extraordinary energy by making it law in little more than a fortnight; yet the Prince Regent, who took the oaths February 6, still required time to settle his government.
Everything depended on the Prince Regent’s action. Had he followed the expected course,—had he dismissed Spencer Perceval, and put himself in the hands of Wellesley, Grenville, Grey, and Holland,—the danger of an American war might possibly have vanished. The Orders in Council might have been withdrawn, the “Chesapeake” affair might have been settled, a friendly minister would have been sent to Washington, and the war party in the Twelfth Congress would have been thrown into a minority. After much manœuvring, the Prince of Wales at last avowed his decision. February 4 he wrote to Spencer Perceval, announcing the wish, wholly in deference to the King’s feelings, that the late ministers should remain in charge of the government. The Whigs were once more prostrated by this desertion, and the Marquess Wellesley abandoned his last hope of saving the government from Perceval’s control.
The effect of the Prince Regent’s course was instantly felt. His letter to Perceval was written February 4; he assumed the royal office February 6; and February 11 Wellesley was able to answer[12] Pinkney’s note on blockades.
“France requires,” said he, “that Great Britain shall not only repeal the Orders in Council, but renounce those principles of blockade which are alleged in the same letter to be new,—an allegation which must be understood to refer to the introductory part of the Berlin Decree. If Great Britain shall not submit to those terms, it is plainly intimated in the same letter that France requires America to enforce them. To these conditions his Royal Highness, on behalf of his Majesty, cannot accede. No principles of blockade have been promulgated or acted upon by Great Britain previously to the Berlin Decree which are not strictly conformable to the rights of civilized war and to the approved usages and laws of nations.... I am commanded to inform you that his Royal Highness cannot consent to blend the question which has arisen upon the Orders in Council with any discussion of the general principles of blockade.”