Abridgement of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856 (4 of 16 vol.). United States. Congress
abroad, and is he afraid or unwilling to make a proposition to the Government where he is resident? Surely, sir, that state of things furnishes as definite an answer as any that could be given. We have no hopes that either will remove its edicts. Sir, I consider the embargo as a premium to the commerce of Great Britain. Gentlemen say that she is a great power, a jealous power, and possessed of a monopolizing spirit. If these views be correct, by annihilating our commerce, do we not yield the seas to her, and hold out an inducement to her forever to continue her orders in force? What prospect is there that the embargo will be removed? It cannot now be got rid of by a vote of this House. We are saddled with it. If we cast our eyes to proceedings elsewhere constitutionally held on the same subject, we shall find that it is to remain still farther to oppress and burden the people of this country with increased rigor.
As a measure of finance it has laid the axe to the root. The tree is down that bore the golden fruit, and will not again grow till we ease ourselves of this measure. In a fiscal point of view I cannot then for my life think it a wise or provident measure. But as a preparation for war, it is still worse; because it produces a deficiency of that out of which war alone cannot be sustained. Instead of having money for your surplus produce, it rots upon your hands; instead of receiving a regular revenue, we have arrested its course, and dried up the very source of the fountain. As to preparation at home, which is the only preparation contemplated to make, what or whom is it against? Against France? She cannot come here. Or against England, who, with the monopoly of commerce which you leave her to enjoy, has no object further to annoy you? I believe, as a preparation for war, the best expedient would be to get as much money as we could, to send out our surplus produce and bring back the supplies necessary for an army if to be raised at all – to arm and discipline the militia. A raising of the embargo would be a preparation for war – it would bring us articles of the first necessity for our surplus. But on a continuation of the embargo, things must progress from bad to worse.
Another thing, sir; I do not now mean to take a constitutional view of the subject – but will not gentlemen pause and reflect on the continuance of the embargo? It is well known that the General Government grew out of a spirit of compromise. The great authors of that instrument were well acquainted with the term embargo. A temporary embargo for the purpose of sending out a squadron or concealing an equipment, was well understood. But I ask every one who hears me, if a question had been agitated in convention to give Congress a power to lay an embargo for one or two years, if the Eastern or commercial States would have agreed to it? Does any man believe it? No man who knows the country can believe it. With what sedulous anxiety did they say, in a negative provision of the constitution, that Congress should not lay an export duty! You are prohibited the minor power of taxing exports, and yet you stop exports altogether for an indefinite term. It is utterly inconceivable, that the States interested in commerce should have given their assent to any such powers so self-destructive. If they had given them, they ought to be most clear; not by implication, but most manifest. The exercise of powers counteracting principles most dear to every part of the community, ought to be assumed with the utmost caution. Under that view, except the measure be most wise in itself and its effects most clear, the Government ought not to continue the embargo. But why is it to be continued? We have taken some view of its effects at home. Let us see what effects may be expected to be produced by it abroad. An honorable gentleman told us an hundred millions were saved by having the embargo, a sum nearly equal to the whole exports of the United States for one year, excluding the capital employed. The first two or three seizures of vessels, sir, would have sent an alarm abroad, and the danger been so imminent, they would have voluntarily retired from destruction. There are no reasonable data from which to infer that one hundred millions of our property could at any one time have fallen a prey. Some few vessels might have been taken, but the rest would have escaped the grasp of the power which harassed them.
I will now examine the character of this measure; for upon my word, sir, it seems a political nondescript, though we feel its effects so severely. The President tells you it is a measure of precaution only; and yet we are told by the gentlemen that it is a species of war, which America can best use to coerce the two greatest powers on the earth, commanding land and sea, to truckle at our feet. I know not how gentlemen can place our connection with foreign nations in such a predicament; whilst the President officially holds out to the world that the embargo was a peaceful measure, gentlemen now say that it is a coercive one, a sort of quasi war. I recollect a gentleman at the last session making an estimate of the West Indies being worth an hundred millions to Britain, and predicting that before the measure was ninety days known in the West Indies, it would bring that nation to our feet, that it would act as a great political lever, resting its fulcrum on Jamaica, and move all Europe to our wishes. Double the number of days have elapsed, and they hold out insulting language. How then can we trust to the future predictions of gentlemen? Their error arises from a want of knowledge of the country; a little experience is worth all the theory in the world. In the years 1774-'5, an honorable feeling adopted a non-exportation and non-importation agreement, more faithfully executed by patriotism than any law since made or enacted; for every family refused to use an article which was not raised within the bosom of its own country. Did it produce starvation in the West Indies? No, sir; the politicians of that day did not so calculate. They knew the resources of those islands, and told them that if they would convert a part of their sugar plantations into corn-fields, they would not suffer. We are now in the habit of overvaluing ourselves and undervaluing our enemies. Come the day when it will, we shall have no ignoble foes to meet.
In the Revolutionary war how did England stand – how her islands? For several years she was at war with America, with Holland, with Spain, with France, whose fleets in the East and West Indies were often equal, sometimes superior to her own, and an armed neutrality in the North – during this period a French fleet blockaded the Chesapeake, and aided the capture of Cornwallis, and threatened the British islands – but how was this conflict with the world sustained? Were the islands starved during these years? did they fall? No, sir; the British nation braved the storm, and was only conquered by her sons – America was victorious and independent; but Europe retired discomfited. Sir, America can again prove victorious, but it must be by other measures than embargoes – destructive only at home and without effect abroad.
It is said that one reason why the embargo has not pressed so hard on Great Britain as it might, is, that it has not been so tightly drawn as it may be; that our citizens have evaded it. And, sir, if I have not any geographical knowledge of the country, tighten the cords as you may by revenue cutters and gunboats on the seaboard, and collectors and military on land, they will escape both. Interest, ever alert, will avail itself of our extensive coast and elude the law.
But gentlemen say they are not accountable for the failure in England, from another cause – the language of the public papers and pamphlets of the anti-embargoists. The enemy, we are told, has been induced to hold out under the idea that America will yield. Sir, would Great Britain rely for her oracles on the newspapers or pamphlets of this country? Have those causes wrought on her a perseverance in her measures? I wonder, sir, that, in the anxiety to find causes, gentlemen never cast their eyes to official documents – to a very important State paper issued on this side the Atlantic – saying that the marshals and civil force were not adequate to enforce the embargo. When the President's proclamation arrived in England, no doubt could have remained of the effect of the embargo. Another public record accompanied it – an act of one of the States arresting executions for debt during the continuance of the embargo, and for six months afterwards. With these public documents before them, the British nation would be more apt to judge, and more correctly judge, of the internal situation of the country, than from all the periodical publications of the day put together. Pamphlets also have been written in this country, of which it is said the British Ministry have availed themselves, to induce their people to believe that the United States are not capable of suffering. I believe we are. The people of America are as patriotic as any on earth, and will respect the laws, and must be made to respect them. They will obey them from principle; they must be made to obey them if they do not; for, while a law is in existence, it must be enforced. But I am somewhat surprised that gentlemen who talk of opposition publications in this country, as influencing England, should derive all their political data from British newspaper publications or opposition pamphlets. British opposition papers and pamphlets are with them the best things in the world; but nothing said here must be regarded there