When the Revolutionary War had ended came the long twenty-three years' war in which Great Britain, for the most part, single-handed, fought for the freedom of Europe against the most colossal tyranny ever devised by a victorious general. No nation in the history of the world carried on a war so stubborn, so desperate, so costly, so vital. Had Great Britain failed, what would now be the position of the world? At the very time when Britain's need was the sorest, when every ship, every soldier and sailor that she could find was needed to break down the power of the man who had subjugated all Europe except Russia and Great Britain, the United States, the land of boasted liberty, did her best to cripple the liberating armies by proclaiming war against Britain in the hour of her sorest need.
Napoleon was at the height of his power, with an army collected at Boulogne for the invasion of England. England was growing exhausted by the contest. Her great Prime Minister, Pitt, had died broken hearted. Every indication was favorable to the conquest of Canada by the United States and therewith the extinction of all British interests on the western continent.
In the motherland it seemed, to the popular imagination, that on the other side of the Atlantic lived an implacable enemy, whose rancor was greater than their boasted love of liberty. Fisher Ames, who was regarded by his party as its wisest counsellor and chief ornament, expresses this general feeling on their part in a letter to Mr. Quincy, dated Dedham, Dec. 6, 1807, in which he says: "Our cabinet takes council of the mob, and it is now a question whether hatred of Great Britain and the reproach fixed even upon violent men, if they will not proceed in their violence, will not overcome the fears of the maritime states, and of the planters in Congress. The usual levity of a democracy has not appeared in regard to Great Britain. We have been steady in our hatred of her, and when popular passions are not worn out by time, but argument, they must, I should think, explode in war."[89]
The action of the United States in declaring war against Great Britain when she was most sorely pressed in righting for the liberty of mankind is best set forth in the famous speech of Josiah Quincy, delivered before Congress on the 5th of January, 1813. It was, as he himself says of it, "most direct, pointed and searching as to the motive and conduct of our rulers. It exposed openly and without reserve or fear the iniquity of the proposed invasion of Canada. I was sparing of neither language nor illustration." Its author, on reading it over in his old age, might well say that "he shrunk not from the judgment of after times." Its invective is keen, its sarcasm bitter, its denunciations heavy and severe, but the facts from which they derive their sting or their weight are clearly stated and sustained.
As a means of carrying on the war, he denounces the invasion of Canada as "cruel, wanton, senseless, and wicked—an attempt to compel the mother country to our terms by laying waste an innocent province which had never injured us, but had long been connected with us by habits of good neighborhood and mutual good offices." He said "that the embarrassment of our relations with Great Britain and the keeping alive between this country and that of a root of bitterness has been, is, and will continue to be, a main principle of the policy of this American Cabinet."
The Democratic Party having attained power by fostering the old grudge against England, and having maintained itself in power by force of that antipathy, a consent to the declaration of war had been extorted from the reluctant Madison as the condition precedent of his nomination for a second term of office.
When war against Great Britain was proposed at the last session, there were thousands in these United States, and I confess to you I was myself among the number, who believed not one word of the matter, I put my trust in the old-fashioned notions of common sense and common prudence. That a people which had been more than twenty years at peace should enter upon hostilities against a people which had been twenty years at war, the idea seemed so absurd that I never once entertained it as possible. It is easy enough to make an excuse for any purpose. When a victim is destined to be immolated, every hedge presents sticks for the sacrifice. The lamb that stands at the mouth of the stream will always trouble the water if you take the account of the wolf who stands at the source of it. We have heard great lamentation about the disgrace of our arms on the frontier. Why, sir, the disgrace of our arms on the frontier is terrestrial glory in comparison with the disgrace of the attempt. Mr. Speaker, when I contemplate the character and consequences of this invasion of Canada, when I reflect on its criminality and its danger to the peace and liberty of this once happy country, I thank the great Author and Source of all virtue that, through His grace, that section of country in which I have the happiness to reside, is in so great a degree free from the iniquity of this transgression. I speak it with pride. The people of that section have done what they could to vindicate themselves and their children from the burden of their sin.
Surely if any nation had a claim for liberal treatment from another, it was the British nation from the American. After the discovery of the error of the American government in relation to the repeal of the Berlin and Milan Decrees in November, 1810, they had declared war against her on the supposition that she had refused to repeal her orders in council after the French Decrees were in fact revoked, whereas it now appears that they were in fact not revoked. Surely the knowledge of this error was followed by an instant and anxious desire to redress the resulting injury. No, sir, nothing occurred. On the contrary the question of impressment is made the basis of continuing the war. They renewed hostilities. They rushed upon Canada. Nothing would satisfy them but blood.
I know, Mr. Speaker, that while I utter these things, a thousand tongues and a thousand pens are preparing without doors to overwhelm me, if possible, by their pestiferous gall. Already I hear in the air the sound of "Traitor," "British Agent," "British Gold!" and all those changes of calumny by which the imagination of the mass of men are affected and by which they are prevented from listening to what is true and receiving what is reasonable.[90]
As will be noticed in the foregoing extract from Josiah Quincy's celebrated speech, New England refused to take any part in the war. In fact, it must be said in their favor that they refused absolutely to send any troops to aid in the invasion of Canada. They regarded the pretexts on which the war had been declared with contemptuous incredulity, believing them to be but thin disguises of its real object. That object they believed to be the gratification of the malignant hatred the slave-holding states bore toward communities of free and intelligent labor, by the destruction of their wealth and prosperity.