are appointed Judges. All know the influence of interest on the mind of man, and how unconsciously his judgment is warped by that influence. To this bias add that of the esprit de corps, of their peculiar maxim and creed, that it is the office of a good Judge to enlarge his jurisdiction,' and the absence of responsibility; and how can we expect impartial decision between the General government, of which they are so eminent a part, and an individual State, from which they have nothing to hope or fear. We have seen too, that, contrary to all correct example, they are in the habit of going out of the question before them, to throw an anchor ahead, and grapple further hold for future advances of power. They are then, in fact, the corps of sappers and miners, steadily working to undermine the independent rights of the States, and to consolidate all power in the hands of that government, in which they have so important a freehold estate. But it is not by the consolidation or concentration of powers, but by their distribution, that good government is effected." "I repeat," he adds, "that I do not charge the Judges with willful and ill-intentioned error; but honest error must be arrested, when its toleration leads to public ruin. As, for the safety of society, we commit honest maniacs to Bedlam, so Judges should be withdrawn from the bench, whose erroneous biases are leading us to dissolution. It may, indeed, injure them in fame or in fortune; but it saves the Republic, which is the first and supreme law."

The latter part of Mr. Jefferson's administration was afflicted by a crisis in our foreign relations, which demanded the exercise of all that fortitude and emulous self-denial, which particularly immortalized the introductory stages of the Revolution, and charged the entire responsibility of the war upon Great Britain. Unfortunately, the fierce political passions and animosities engendered by the terrible contests of opinion, which had distracted the nation, and the demoralizing mania of commercial cupidity and avarice engendered by a twenty-four year's interval of peace, greatly interrupted on the present occasion, that spirit of indissoluble cohesion between the States, which, and which alone, carried us triumphantly through the crisis of emancipation, and of revolution from monarchism to republicanism. The generous enthusiasm of the spirit of '76 had, in a considerable measure, evaporated. Every description of embargo, and every degree of commercial deprivation, which was then

too little to satisfy the voluntary rivalry of self-immolation in the cause of country, was now too great to be endured, though clothed with the authority of law, and mercifully ordained for averting the otherwise inevitable and overwhelming calamities of a war, not with England alone, but with nearly the whole continent of Europe.

The memorable embargo of Mr. Jefferson was one of those extraordinary measures, which are occasionally indispensable to counteract extraordinary emergencies. There never was a situation of the world, which rendered the measure more imperative with America, than on the present occasion; nor is it probable there will ever exist a parallel situation. The causes which combined to produce such a phenomenon in our foreign relations, are too substantially understood to require dilatation. From the renewal of hostilities between Great Britain and France, in 1803, down to the period at which the embargo was enacted, the commerce of the United States was subjected to a steady, deliberate and progressive accumulation of rival depredations by the belligerents, until it was effectually annihilated with nearly all the world. In the tremendous struggle for ascendency, which animated these powerful competitors, and convulsed the European world to its centre, the laws of nature, and of nations, were utterly disregarded by both. The maritime interests of the United States constituted the desecrated medium through which the antagonists vied in the attempt to crush and overpower each other, the injuries inflicted on our commerce by the one, being retaliated by the other, not on the aggressor, but on the innocent and peaceable victim to their united ferocity.

Anterior to the above named epoch, however, Great Britain had commenced her system of desolating interpolations upon the established law of nations. She first forbade to neutrals all trade with her enemies in time of war, which they had not in time of peace. This deprived them of their trade from port to port of the same nation. Then she forbade them to trade from the port of one nation to that of any other at war with her, although a right fully exercised in time of peace. And these prohibitions she had the audacity to assert, by declaring places blockaded, before which she had not a single vessel of war, contrary to all reason and the usages of civilized nations; nay, she declared even places blockaded which her united forces would be incompetent to effect, such as entire coasts, and

1

whole empires. Next, instead of taking vessels only entering a blockaded port, she took them over the whole ocean, if destined to that port, although ignorant of the blockade, and with no intention to violate it. Then came the celebrated Berlin decree of the French Emperor, in November, 1806, which declared the British Islands in a state of blockade, and consequently interdicted our navigation to England and her dependencies. Then thundered forth the countervailing orders in council, on the part of Great Britain, which declared all France and her allies in a state of blockade, and consequently interdicted our navigation to France and her dependencies, comprehending nearly the whole continent of Europe. And these decrees and orders were followed by the famous Milan rejoinder of Bonaparte, and the surrejoinders of England, too numerous to mention, and more and more aggressive on the rights of unoffending. neutral America.

Under the joint operation of these antagonist edicts and prociamations, there was not a single port in Europe, or her dependencies, to which American vessels could navigate, without being exposed to capture and condemnation. In this situation what were the United States to do? To have made reprisals on both the belligerents, though rigorously and impartially just, would have been to commit us in a war with both and their respective allies, which would have been certain destruction. To have made reprisals on one and not on the other, under the existing circumstances, would have been a departure from just and impartial neutrality, and involved us, as a party, in the European conflagration. But to submit to the ferocious and unrestrained spoliations of the belligerents, without resistance and reprisal, was impossible; it would have amounted to a surrender, at once, of our independence as a nation, besides soon annihilating our property on the ocean. More than nine hundred American vessels were captured by the British, under their orders in council, at a time of profound peace between the two nations. American property, to the amount of thirty millions of dollars, was placed at the discretion of the Admiralty courts of Great Britain; and a still greater amount was submitted to the French council of prizes or council of State. In such a state of things, the only alternatives were: 1st, War with all Europe. 2d, Submission to univer sal and unrestrained piracy. 3d, Embargo, as a powerfully coercive peace measure, and a preparation for war. The President wisely

preferred the last, as the least of the three evils; and in pursuance of his recommendation, the measure was adopted by Congress, on the 22d day of December, 1807, by overwhelming majorities in both Houses.

In addition to the joint aggressions on our neutral rights, under the sweeping paper blockades of both belligerents, Great Britain was in the distinct habit of daily violations of our sovereignty, in the form of impressments. The injuries perpetually rising from this source alone, constituted an abundant cause of war, and consequently of embargo, as to that nation. At no period since the commencement of the French revolution, had there been the want of a sufficient cause of war with Great Britain, in her vexations and lawless asportations of our seamen; which ought to have silenced forever the ungenerous imputation that the present measure was the dictate of a fraudulent neutrality, favorable to Bonaparte. Denying the right of expatriation, the British ministry authorized the seizure of naturalized Americans wherever they could be found, under color of their having been born within the British dominions. From the abuses of this practice, sufficiently enormous in its rightful exercise, thousands of American citizens, native born, as well as naturalized, were subjected to the petty despotism of naval officers, acting as judges, juries, and executioners, and doomed by them to slavery, and death, or to become the instruments of destruction to their own countrymen.

Minor provocations and injuries were, in June 1807, absorbed in the audacity of an aggression, which is without a parallel in the history of independent nations at peace. By order of the British Admiral, Berkley, the ship Leopard of fifty guns, fired on the United States frigate Chesapeake, of thirty-six guns, within the waters of the United States, in order to compel the delivery of part of her crew, claimed as British subjects. After several broadsides from the Leopard, and four men killed on board the Chesapeake, the latter struck; was boarded by the British; and had four men taken from her, three of them native American citizens, one of whom was hanged as a British deserter. Never since the battle of Lexington had there existed such a state of universal exasperation in the public mind, as was produced by this enormity. Popular assemblies were convened in every considerable place, at which resolutions were passed, expressive of unqualified indignation at the outrage, and

pledging the lives, fortunes, and sacred honors of the people, to procure indemnity for the past, security for the future.'

Now was the time, above all others, when, if Mr. Jefferson was really actuated by undue partiality to France and hostility to England, as was always alleged against him, he might have effectually gratified his political passions, and have been justified by the whole nation. But, instead of convening Congress instantly upon the occurrence, when war would have been declared against England almost unanimously, he prudently deferred that measure until the extraordinary ebullition of the public mind had subsided. Maintaining a wise and discriminating moderation, however, as far removed from pusillanimity as rashness, he forthwith issued an energetic proclamation, interdicting British armed vessels from entering the waters of the United States, and commanding all those therein immediately to depart. In this manner, peace was judiciously prolonged, without any compromise of the national honor, and saving the right to declare war, under better auspices, on failure of an amicable reparation of the injury. By the time Congress assembled, the affair of the Chesapeake was hopefully committed to negotiation, with the additional constraint which it imposed on the British government to settle the whole subject of impressments. And the depredations on our neutral rights by the rival belligerents, under their orders in council and imperial decrees, were put together on an equal footing, and made the occasion of an embargo operating equally and impartially against both.

This was the only act of Mr. Jefferson's administration, which received the avowed approbation of the federalists as a party; and the second one in his whole political life which attained to that rare distinction-his correspondence with Genet being the first. It is obvious that they were actuated by the same principle, on both occasions, in bestowing their commendations-viz. that of subservience to England and inveterate enmity to France, the reverse of which they had always so copiously charged upon the President. Alluding to the transaction some years after, Mr. Jefferson wrote to a friend : "Had I been personally hostile to England, and biased in favor of either the character or views of her great antagonist, the affair of the Chesapeake put war into my hand. I had only to open it, and let havoc loose. But if ever I was gratified with the possession of power, and of the confidence of those who had entrusted me