Baton Rouge, Dec. 22, 1802.
These are the measures, Mr. President, that have been adopted; these are the orders that have been issued by the Intendant General to every district of the Spanish provinces, prohibiting the subjects of His Catholic Majesty from having any commerce, dealing, intercourse, or communion whatsoever with the citizens of the United States; excluding us from their shores for the distance of two hundred and seventy miles; treating us like a nation of pirates, or a banditti of robbers, who they feared to trust in their country. And this day, sir, if a vessel belonging to a citizen of the United States, engaged in a fair and legal trade, was upon the waters of the Mississippi, within the Spanish lines, and in a state of the most extreme distress, the Spaniard who should yield her aid or comfort would do it at the peril of his life.
If it should be said, sir, that this important question will not long be an affair of controversy between the United States and Spain; that Louisiana, New Orleans, and this usurped claim of the Spanish Government to the exclusive navigation of the Mississippi, will soon be found in other hands; that whenever we may have to negotiate on this subject, either in the cabinet or the field, it will not be with His Catholic Majesty, but with the First Consul; not with a King, but with the King of Kings—I answer that in these insults to our national dignity, we at present know no power but Spain. Whatever agency Buonaparte may have had in this business, he has been concealed from our view. It is Spain that has violated her plighted faith; it is Spain that has trampled upon the dearest interests of the United States, and insulted our Government to our faces without the semblance of a cause, and she alone is responsible to us for these outrages. And, under such circumstances, is it becoming, politic, or honorable in us to treat her as a friend and as a neighbor; to remonstrate with her on her acts of injustice, and wait till she shall add insult to insult, and heap injury upon injury; or what is perhaps even worse, if any thing worse than national degradation can befall an independent people, till this golden opportunity shall have passed away, and the facility of redress be wrested from our hands? No, sir, we should now view her as our open enemy, as having declared war against us, and do justice to ourselves. We can never have permanent peace on our Western waters, till we possess ourselves of New Orleans, and such other positions as may be necessary to give us the complete and absolute command of the navigation of the Mississippi. We have now such an opportunity of accomplishing this important object as may not be presented again in centuries, and every justification that could be wished for availing ourselves of the opportunity. Spain has dared us to the trial, and now bids us defiance; she is yet in possession of that country: it is at this moment within your reach and within your power; it offers a sure and easy conquest; we should have to encounter there now only a weak, inactive, and unenterprising people; but how may a few months vary this scene, and darken our prospects! Though not officially informed we know that the Spanish provinces on the Mississippi have been ceded to the French, and that they will as soon as possible take possession of them. What may we then expect? When in the last extremity we shall be driven to arms in defence of our indisputable rights, where now slumbers on his post with folded arms the sluggish Spaniard, we shall be hailed by the vigilant and alert French grenadier, and in the defenceless garrison that would now surrender at our approach, we shall see unfurled the standards that have waved triumphant in Italy, surrounded by impregnable ramparts, and defended by the disciplined veterans of Egypt.
But, Mr. President, what is more than all to be dreaded, in such hands, it may be made the means of access and corruption to your national councils and a key to your Treasury. Your Western people will see in Buonaparte, at their very doors, a powerful friend or a dangerous enemy; and should he, after obtaining complete control over the navigation of the Mississippi, approach them, not in the menacing attitude of an enemy, but under the specious garb of a protector and a friend; should he, instead of embarrassing their commerce by any fiscal arrangements, invite them to the free navigation of the river, and give them privileges in trade not heretofore enjoyed; should he, instead of attempting to coerce them to his measures, contrary to their wishes, send missionaries into their country to court and intrigue with them, he may seduce their affections, and thus accomplish by address and cunning, what even his force might not be equal to. In this way, having operated upon their passions, having enlisted in his service their hopes and their fears, he may gain an undue ascendency over them. Should these things be effected, which God forbid—but Buonaparte in a few years has done much more—what, let me ask honorable gentlemen, will be the consequences? I fear even to look them in the face. The degraded countries of Europe, that have been enslaved by the divisions and distractions of their councils, produced by similar means, afford us melancholy examples. Foreign influence will gain admittance to your national councils; the First Consul, or his interests, will be represented in the Congress of the United States; this floor may become the theatre of sedition and intrigue. You will have a French faction in the Government, and that faction will increase, with the rapidly increasing population of the Western world. Whenever this period shall arrive, it will be the crisis of American glory, and must result, either in the political subjugation of the Atlantic States, or in their separation from the Western country; and I am sure there is no American who does not view as one of the greatest evils that could befall us, the dismemberment of this Union. Honorable gentlemen may wrap themselves up in their present imaginary security, and say that these things are afar off, or that they can never happen; but let me beseech of them to look well to the measures they are now pursuing, for, on the wisdom, the promptness, and energy of those measures, will depend whether they shall happen or not. And let me tell them, sir, that the want of firmness or judgment in the cabinet, will be no apology for the disgrace and ruin of the nation.
Mr. Breckenridge observed, that he did not mean to wander in the field of declamation, nor, after the example of the honorable gentleman who had preceded him, endeavor to alarm or agitate the public mind; that he should endeavor to strip the subject of all improper coloring, and examine dispassionately the propriety of the measures which the Senate were called upon to sanction. He would be very brief.
What is the true and undisguised state of facts? Early in the session, the House of Representatives were informed, by a communication from the President, of the conduct of the Intendant at New Orleans. This communication stated, that he had taken measures to attempt a restoration of the right which had been violated; and that there were reasons to believe that the conduct of the Intendant was unauthorized by the Court of Spain. Accompanying this message were official papers, in which it appeared that the Governor of New Orleans had strongly opposed the conduct of the Intendant, declared that he was acting without authority in refusing the deposit, and indicated a disposition to oppose openly the proceeding. The Spanish Minister who resides here, also interposed on the occasion, and who stands deservedly high in the confidence of his Government, was clearly of opinion, that the Intendant was acting without authority, and that redress would be given so soon as the competent authority could interpose. From this state of things, and which is the actual state at this moment, what is the course any civilized nation who respects her character or rights, would pursue? There is but one course, which is admitted by writers on the laws of nations, as the proper one; and is thus described by Vattel, in his book, sec. 336, 338:
"A sovereign ought to show, in all his quarrels, a sincere desire of rendering justice and preserving peace. He is obliged before he takes up arms, and after having taken them up also, to offer equitable conditions, and then alone his arms become just against an obstinate enemy, who refuses to listen to justice or to equity. His own advantage, and that of human society, oblige him to attempt, before he takes up arms, all the pacific methods of obtaining either the reparation of the injury, or a just satisfaction. This moderation, this circumspection, is so much the more proper, and commonly even indispensable, as the action we take for an injury does not always proceed from a design to offend us, and is sometimes a mistake rather than an act of malice: frequently it even happens, that the injury is done by inferior persons, without their sovereign having any share in it; and on these occasions, it is not natural to presume that he would refuse us a just satisfaction."
This is the course which the President has taken, and in which the House of Representatives have expressed, by their resolution, their confidence.
What are the reasons urged by the gentlemen to induce a different proceeding, an immediate appeal to arms? You prostrate, say the gentlemen, your national honor by negotiating, where there is a direct violation of a treaty! How happens it that our national honor has, at this particular crisis, become so delicate, and that the feelings of certain gentlemen are now so alive to it? Has it been the practice of this Government heretofore to break lances on the spot with any nation who injured or insulted her? Or has not the invariable course been to seek reparation in the first place by negotiation? I ask for an example to the contrary; even under the Administration of Washington, so much eulogized by the gentleman last up. Were not the Detroit, and several other forts within our territory, held ten or a dozen years by Great Britain, in direct violation of a treaty? Were not wanton spoliations committed on your commerce by Great Britain, by France, and by Spain, to the amount of very many millions; and all adjusted through the medium of negotiations? Were not your merchants plundered, and your citizens doomed to slavery by Algiers, and still those in power, even Washington himself, submitted to negotiation, to ransom, and to tribute? Why then do gentlemen, who on those occasions approved of these measures, now despair of negotiation? America has been uniformly successful, at least in settling her differences by treaty.