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ful purfuits, carried into captivity, and ignominiously confined on board of Britifh fhips of war; fubject to be incarcerated; compelled inglorioufly to fight for principles, inconfiftent with justice, repugnant to the feelings of freemen?

Sir, our demands have been bottomed on juftice-peace has been our object, which has been manifefted by the numberless facrifices we have made; and, fir, it is to be lamented that in the profecution of this laudable defign, the injuftice of our enemies has fufpended our ufual pursuits, and fubjected our commerce to the rapacity of thofe invaders of our rights. But, fir,the cup of forbearance is exhaufted; it is time to found the tocfin of alarm-to gird on our fwords, to prepare for action. Sir, to step one ftep further without fhewing that fpirit of refentment becoming freemen, would be tof e national degradation ftare us in the face; would be to acknowledge ourfelves unworthy of felf-gov. ernment, to prepare for a ftate of vaffalage.

Mr. Speaker, by an examination of the correfpondence between Mr. Fofter and our government, it will be found that an explicit demand has been made of the revocation of the orders in council by our government, and a pofitive refufal on the part of Britain, or what is tantamount. Here, then, fir, we are completely at iffue, and I know of no other way of deciding it than by battle or fubmiffion; which of the two will be reforted to by the national councils, I am yet unable to determine; but with the people, the former would be laid hold of with avidity, and fupported with Spartan bravery.

Sir, we have heard much of the expenfe of a war, and have been told that the people would not fupport you in it. What, fir, a country fo extenfive as America, fo populous, abounding in wealth, and, I truft, people patriotic, poff ffing a full fhare of national pride, and not be willing to be at the expense of supporting their rights? This is, in my mind, a prepofterous idea; it is a kind of calculating policy that does not pervade this land of liberty. The people cannot eftimate, in pounds, fhillings and pence, the value of national honor and rights: they are fond of peace, but honor and intereft bind them to oppofe oppreffion and defend their rights, independent of the confideration of expense; at least, I can vouch for thofe whom I have the honor to reprefent-they are difpofed to cherish economy as a principle of virtue in a republic; but, fir, at a time as perilous as the prefent, when our rights are invaded and our honor affailed, they would be willing that every fhilling fhould be drawn from the public chefts, every cent from private purfes, rather than fuccumb to tyranny. They are determined at the rifk of their lives and fortunes, to tranfmit to pofterity unfullied, thof ineftimable bleffings of liberty and independence which was achieved by the valorous actions of their ancftors.

Sir, the most infatuated partizan of Britain cannot but fee in her conduct an unequivocal proof of the rapacious and vindictive pol

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icy which dictates hermeasures: all men muft fee that the flagrant injuries which we are now fuffering from her, proceed from a general plan of piracy, from a difpofition to ravifh from us whatever may contribute to their convenience, independent of national law.

Mr. Speaker, the temporifing and vibrating policy has had a tendency to unnerve patriotic ardor and to paraly ze the national energies. Sir, the deftruction of our navigation and commerce; the annihilation of mercantile capital; the extinction of revenue, the fe would be minor evils. A few years off curity and exertion might repair them. But the humiliation of the American mind would be a lafting and mortal difeafe. Mental debaf ment is the greatcft misfortune that can be fall a people. The moft pernicious confequence that a government can experience, is a conqueft over, that juft and elevated fenfe of its own rights which inspires a due fenfibility to infult and injury, over that manly pride of character which prefers peril or facrifice to the fubmiflion to oppreffion, and which confiders national ignominy as the greate ft of national calamities. Sir, as a refpectable, numerous and wealthy nation, I am not fure but we have carried our moderation to a degree of criminality. Yet, fir, I acknowledge moderation in all governments a virtue-in weak or young nations, it is often wife to take every chance by patience and addrefs, to divert hoftility, and fometimes to hold parley with infult and injury; but to capitulate with oppreffion, or to furrender to it at difcretion, is in any government that has any power of refiftance, as foolish as it is contemptible. Sir, the honor of a nation is its life. Deliberately to abandon it, is to commit an act of political fuicide. Mr.Speaker, there is treafon in the fentiment, avowed in the language of feme, and betrayed by the conduct of others, that we ought to fubmit to oppreffion or any kind of evils, rather than go to war with Eng. land-becaufe, fay gentlemen, fhe is fighting the battles of the world, and is keeping a more dangerons enemy from us-that if we were to commit an act that would lead to war with G. Britain, we would have in a fhort time the tyrant of France upon us, and would foon be in as wretched a fituation as the peninfula of Spain. This, in my opinion, is not only dangerous, but daftardly doctrine. Sir, the people that can prefer difgrace to danger are prepared for a mafter, and deferve one; but, thank God, the people of America have not caught the panic-they are not fo far loft to a fenfe of honor, or fo deftitute of patriotism, as to prefer fubmiffion, ab. ject acquiefcence, to oppreffion, to war.

Mr. Speaker, all attempts to bring about an amicable adjustment of differences have failed-it would be fully in the extreme to depend on negociating any longer. We muft determine on doing ourselves juftice-there is no alternative left, but to repel aggreffion and defend our rights-the refolution to do this is impofed on the government by a painful but irrefiftible neceffitythen, fir, is it not neceffary to adopt these preparatory measures,

to be in readiness for not only defenfive but offenfive operations? Then I call on the manly spirit of American virtue, on all those who are Americans at heart, to bury animofities, to lay afide prejudices, which are not bottomed on integrity and honor, to ftand forth for the honor and welfare of our common country; to be the defenders of thofe ineftimable rights achieved by the valor of the heroes of '76. This is the time not to have it attributed to fear or bafenefs-the time for men of all parties to rally under the good old Whig standard.

Sir, my view is, if an honorable adjustment of differences between this government and the government of Great Britain does not take place against next spring, by a revocation of the orders in council, a releafement of our impreffed American feamen, togeth er with a relinquifhment of the principle of impreffment, and ample reparation for damages, that we grant letters of marque and reprifal, and by a fyftem of privateering cut up their commerce; and as I hope to fee the day when the Britifh will have no Halifax on this continent, to find captured American vessels to for adju dication and condemnation; that we make a defcent on their N. American poffeffions, by which we fhall check their influence, particularly over the favages, by cutting off all communication with thofe hoftile barbarians on our borders. Sir, I am not fo paffive as to fubfcribe to the doctrine advanced yesterday in a lengthy harange, which in fubftance amounts to a recommendation of patience and refignation as the remedy againft oppreffion. I know that war is to deprecated; that it ought to be made the laft refort, fo as to preferve national honor, which ought to be deemed paramount to every other confideration; but, fir, as much as I deprecate a state of war, I have never been taught to confider it the greatest of evils: our ancestors did not confider it fo; they not only broke to pieces the chains that were forging, but they cut afunder the ties which had bound them, and launched into an ocean of uncertainty; fuccefs crowned their efforts; they difpelled the thick clouds of oppreffion, and fhook off the fetters of defpotifm-and, fir, have their defcendants become fo degenerate as to fuffer them to be rivetted on again, by an abandonment of inherent rights, and truckling at the feet of tyranny? I truft not. I flatter myself that the national councils will awaken from their political flumberings; that they will act worthy of themselves, and up to the expectations of the people.

[Debates to be continued.]

CONGRESSIONAL REPORTER.

No. 12.] TWELFTH CONGRESS.... FIRST SESSION.

[Debates in Congress---Continued.]

[1811-12.

In the House of Representatives. On the second Resolution reported by the Committee on Foreign Relations.

MR. TROUP rose to make an effort to put an end to the debate; a debate in which the great mass of the House were enlisted on one side, against the solitary gentleman from Virginia, (Mr. Randolph) on the other. I trust, sir, the period has arrived, when the House will feel itself bound by the imperious calls of the country to act, and to act promptly. I am ready to go heart and hand with the advocates of the resolution-all I ask is, that they will lead with prudence and discretion; deliberate when deliberation is useful, act when action is necessary. But if the spirit of debate, as in former times has seized -upon us; if idle verbiage and empty vociferation are to take place of manly and energetic conduct, I enter at this early stage of the proceeding my solemn protest. I cannot, I will not share the responsibility of this ruinous course. Indeed, sir, so concious do I feel of the evil, nay of the danger to the country from the course which has been adopted, I shall be constrained to call for the previous question, unless my friends shall interpose the more pleasant corrective; their own good sense to stop it. I know, sir, they have been impelled by the most honorable sentiments, the most generous passions, patriotism, honor, zeal for their country, rage against her oppressors. They are good reasoners, they are eloquent-but of what avail is argument, of what avail is eloquence, to convince, to pur-suade, whom? Ourselves, the people. Sir, if the people are to be reasoned into awar now, it is too soon, much too soon to begin it. If their representatives here are to be led to it by the flowers of rhetoric, it is too soon, much too soon to begin it.

When the honorable chairman of the committee (Mr. Porter) of Foreign Relations reported the resolutions, I had hoped he would have made a motion to go into conclave, or if that had not been deemed advisable, that at least the resolutions taken up with open doors, would have been treated as a system of defensive measures called for by the exigency of the times, and affording no just ground of complaint to any power which might please to consider itself the object of them. Such a course would have been not less consistent with the report of the committee itself, than with the letter and spirit of the President's message. The President himself would have been fortified by it. When the British minister called, as he will undoubtedly upon the President, to demand the causes of these warlike preparations, he might have been answered-Sir, they are no No. 12.

other than what they purport on the face of them, to be a system of defence on the part of the American government, called for by the state of the world; or if he pleased, he might have said, called for by the attitude which his Britannic majesty had assumed, the propriety of which no nation had a right to question. But instead of this,what had been done? Why, at the very outset, we have been told the measures were intended as measures of offensive hostility—that the army as to be raised to attack Canada; nothing short of it; all the advocates of the resolution declared it. Now, sir, could a more public or formal declaration of war have been made-contrary to the practice of all nations we declare first and make preparations afterwards-More magnanimous than wise, we tell the enemy when we will strike, where we will strike,and how we will strike--Do we mean a mere bravado? Impossible-no man who knows the advocates of the resolution would suspect it; but we hope the enemy will rece‹le ; she may; but if she should not,let gentlemen look to the consequences, let them look well to the character of that enemy; is he feeble, spiritless, destitute of resources, without courage, without honor?— No, sir, with two hundred and fifty thousand regulars and all the munitions of war in store, his fleets and transports manned, equipped and provisioned; their sails bent to every wind, they ask but 120 days to reinforce Quebec, to fortify Montreal, to guard the passes into Canada, to march the supernumeraries to Boston; here we sit in idle debate. Sir, I do contend most seriously, the 10,000 regulars can march from Canada to Boston in defiance of the mi itia of Massachusetts, well armed and organized as I know them to be. Well, sir, suppose this should happen and more wonderful things have happened-what will be said? what will my friend from Virginia say to the first victims of the war? Why, he will say, "this is no war of mine; I exerted all my strength to turn these people from their mad and desperate career!" The gentleman from Virginia exonerates himself from all responsibility by the very act of opposition; but what can be said of us, the advocates of the resolution, to whom all responsibility attaches? That "we had not finished our war speeches!" That "we could not begin to raise men until we had finished them!" Sir, believe me, the people of this country want no such speeches-they will go to war, because they believe war is necessary to the preservation of their honor and substantial interest; they want men and arms to defend them-not words: If gentlemen persevere in the debate, I will call the previous question. The safety of the state, after what has been said and done, demands it, and all other considerations must yield to that.

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MR. MACON considered the present, from the turn the debate had taken, the most important question which had come before the national government for many years past, because it was evidently discussed as a war question, though the real question before the House, if adopted, did not declare war : It was not now a question

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