CHAPTER XIX.

PEACE WITH GREAT BRITAIN.-GENERAL JACKSON AND MARTIAL LAW AT

NEWS ORLEANS.—PROTECTIVE TARIFF.-BANK. -COMPENSATION, NAVI: GATION, NEUTRALITY, AND OTHER ACTS.

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The first account of the progress of negotiations at Ghent, was unfavorable. The British commissioners, lord Gambier, Henry Goulburn, and William Adams, did not arrive until the 6th of August. Dispatches dated the 12th, were communicated to congress the 10th of October. As an indispensable condition of a treaty of peace, the British commissioners were instructed to require, that their Indian allies should be included in the pacification, and that a definite boundary between them and the United States should be settled ; with the intention, on their part, that the Indian territories should be a barrier between the United States and Canada : and the United States were to be prohibited from purchasing those territories. Extravagant as this demand was, it was not less so than another, designed to strengthen this barrier-our relinquishment of the right to maintain military posts on the lakes, or to keep armed vessels on them.

Other subjects were mentioned which they thought proper to discuss; none of which, however, were to be made a sine qua non of a treaty. One was the forcible seizure of mariners from on board merchant ships on the high seas, and, in connection with it, the right of the king of Great Britain to the allegiance of all his native subjects. Another was the revision of the boundary line between the United States and the British territories. And another was the fisheries. It was intended to refuse the privilege formerly granted by treaty, of fishing within the territorial jurisdiction of Great Britain, without an equivalent.

The American commissioners stated that, upon the subjects of impressment and boundary they were authorized to treat; but as the Indian and fishery questions had not been in dispute between the two governments, they had not been anticipated by our government, and, consequently, in relation to them they had no instructions. Our commissioncrs mentioned as additional subjects suitable for discussion: 1. A definition of blockade, and of other neutral and belligerent rights. 2. Certain claims of indemnity to individuals for captures and seizures, preceding and subsequent to the war; besides several others, to be considered in case of a propitious termination of the present conferences.

The extravagant and even humiliating terms which were exacted by

the British government, and to which no one could believe our goveriiment would ever accede, nearly extinguished all hope of peace, and served to stimulate congress to a more effective preparation for the prosecution of the war. After a suspense of several months, on the 11th of February, 1815, a vessel arrived at New York bringing the news of PEACE, and bearing the treaty itself, ratified by the British gov

The intelligence spread rapidly throughout the country, and was everywhere received with exclamations of joy. It was ratified at Washington the 17th of February, and proclaimed the next day by the president.

The correspondence between the American and British commissioners, has been justly regarded as highly creditable to the former, being characterized by firmness, moderation and ability. As to the comparative talent of the antagonist diplomatists, the results of the negotiation do not furnish infallible evidence. All things considered, however, there was no just ground of complaint, in respect to the management of the American side of the controversy. It is indeed a singular fact, that not one of the declared objects of the war, formed an essential topic of discussion in this negotiation of peace: the progress and result of which, as drawn from the correspondence, is thus summarily stated by Hildreth :

“ The weakness of the British possessions in North America; the necessity of some barrier against that ambitious spirit of annexation exhibited in the acquisition of Louisiana, the threatened conquest of Canada, and the constant curtailment of the Indian territory: these had been stated by the British commissioners, at the opening of the negotiations, as grounds of their claim for an assignment to the British Indian allies of a permanent neutral territory, with a prohibition to the United States to establish fortresses or keep ships on the great lakes. The American commissioners had protested, in reply, against this attempted interference with the Indians, as a thing which the policy of Great Britain had never permitted in her own case, and as contrary to the assurances originally given of a disposition to treat on terms of perfect reciprocity. They denied, with emphasis, that the conquest of Canada had ever been a declared object of the war; and they dwelt on the humane disposition of their government toward the Indians, protesting, also, against the British employment of Indian auxiliaries. Finally, after some pretty sharp controversy, the British commissioners had agreed to be content with a neutral stipulation for peace with the Indians, the tribes still actively engaged in hostilities at the close of the war to be restored to the same position in which they had stood at its commencement. This question disposed of by the prorisional assent of the American commissioners, the next related to boundaries. The false idea that the Mississippi had its source north of the 49th degree of latitude, had rendered nugatory the provision of the treaty of 1783 as to the northern boundary of the United States west of the Lake of the Woods. That boundary, indeed, since the acquisition of Louisiana, remained to be extended far to the west, the United States claiming, under that cession, even to the Pacific Ocean. The provision for a boundary on the northeast, so far as related to the territory between the head of the St. Croix and the head of the Connecticut, had likewise failed, so the British commissioners contended, from similar geographical ignorance; and, as the basis of a new arrangement, they had suggested that each party should retain what he held at the signing of the treaty. To this the American commissioners had refused to agree. So the negotiation had stood by the latest accounts previous to the arrival of the treaty of peace.

“The treaty, as signed, provided for the mutual restoration of all conquered territory, and for the appointment of three commissions; one to settle the title to the islands in Passamaquaddy Bay, another to make out the north-eastern boundary as far as the St. Lawrence, and a third to run the line through the St. Lawrence and the lakes to the Lake of the Woods. In case of disagreement in either commission, the point in dispute was to be referred to some friendly power. No provision was made as to the boundary west of the Lake of the Woods, nor as to the fishing on the shores of British America. The British commissioners refused to accept, in return for this right of fishing, a modified renewal of the article for the navigation of the Mississippi, which, in their view, was also terminated by the war.

The result,

therefore, was, that, instead of leaving the parties where they began, the war took away from Great Britain a nominal right, never used, of navigating the Mississippi, and from the New England fishermen a valuable right, hitherto used from the earliest times, of catching and curing fish on the shores of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, the loss of which still continues to be felt. By some adroit management, the English commissioners were induced to admit into the treaty a clause copied from that of 1783, with the history of which probably they were not familiar, against carrying away “any negroes or other property." The only remaining article related to the slave trade, for the suppression of which, as irreconcilable with the principles of humanity and justice, both parties promised to use their best endeavors."

An inquiry here naturally suggests itself. As, after the revocation of the British orders in council, impressment was the only grievance to be redressed by war; and as that question was subsequently waived by our government in the negotiation ; what was gained by the war?

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It has been considered as no small point gained, that ample evidence has been given to Great Britain of our capacity successfully to resist her power, especially upon ocean, where she had long claimed a vast superiority; and that a guaranty had thus been furnished against future aggression. It is questionable, however, if the result could have been known, or if the unbiased counsels of our older statesmen had prevailed, whether war would have been declared. Jefferson, Madison, Gallatin, Macon, and others, were of a pacific disposition. The leading men of the administration were known to have given a reluctant sanction to the war project; but they found themselves under a kind of necessity to yield to the impulsive young politicians, Calhoun, Clay, and a number of others, who, it was suspected, were striving to turn the popular prejudice against Great Britain, to their own political advantage. Whether the nation has ever obtained an equivalent for the 30,000 lives and the hundred millions of money expended; for the loss of property and several years of prosperous commerce; for the depravation of the public morals, and the train of other evils inseparable from a state of war; is a question which at least admits of a reasonable doubt.

On the 20th of December, Gen. Jackson proclaimed martial law at New Orleans. On the 5th of March, an order was issued, stating, that attempts had been made, under specious pretexts, to diminish our force by seducing French inhabitants from their duty; and that he had, on the 28th ultimo, ordered all French subjects having certificates of the French consul, to repair to the interior, not short of Baton Rouge, until the enemy had left our waters, or until the restoration of peace. And he now enjoined all officers and soldiers to give the earliest intelligence of all mutiny or sedition, and to arrest all concerned therein, and to confine them for trial agreeably to the rules and articles of war. On the 7th he inclosed in a letter to “ Mr. Le Clerc, printer," a circular from the postmaster general, which, he said, he believed to be genuine, and which placed the pleasing intelligence of peace almost beyond a doubt. Martial law, however, was still continued, for the alleged reason that he had not received official advice of the ratification of the treaty of peace. No farther danger from the enemy being generally apprehended, the continuance of martial law, which began to be complained of, was made the subject of animadversion by a writer in one of the newspapers, whose name the publisher was compelled to disclose, and who proved to be a member of the legislature, named Louallier, who was, by order of Gen. Jackson, committed to prison to be tried by a military court for his life, on a charge of mutiny.

On application to judge Hall, of the United States district court, a writ of habeas corpus was obtained in behalf of the prisoner ; whereupon

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the judge was himself arrested and sent out of the city. The district attorney having applied to a state judge for a writ of habeas corpus to release judge Hall, he also was imprisoned.

In his answer to a complimentary address of the city battalion of uniform companies, the general took oceasion to vindicate his resistance to the civil authority. He said : “In declaring martial law, his object, and his only object, was to embody the whole resources of the country for its defense. That law, while it existed, necessarily suspended all rights and privileges inconsistent with its provisions.” He maintained the necessity of continuing martial law, in order to prevent his ranks from being “ thinned by desertion, and his whole army broken to pieces by mutiny, while yet a powerful force of the enemy remained on the coast, and within a few hours sail of the city.” It was not until he discovered that the civil power stood no longer in need of the military for its support, that he restored to it its usual functions; and the restoration was not delayed a moment after that period had arrived.

After the militia had been dismissed, and the judge had returned to the city, he ordered the general to appear before him to show cause why an attachment should not be issued against him for contempt in refusing obedience to the writ of habeas corpus, and for imprisoning the judge. The general appeared, accordingly, and tendered to the court, in his defense, a paper protesting against the proceedings of the court as “illegal, unconstitutional, and informal,” and reserving to himself the benefit of his exceptions to them. This list of exceptions was followed by a statement of the reasons for instituting and keeping up martial law; among which were letters from the governor of Louisiana, and information derived from other sources, after his arrival at that place, putting him on his guard against a portion of the inhabitants, the legislature, and foreign emissaries; many of the people being disaffected foreigners, and unworthy of confidence. The militia had been represented as insubordinate, encouraged in their disobedience by the legislature, which was characterized as politically rotten, and the whole state dependent mainly on the regular troops and the militia from other states. These facts justified, in his view, the institution of martial law.

In regard to its continuance after the first information of peace, he said, the numbers of the enemy still quadrupled all the regular forces which he could command; and they might renew their attacks. If he had revoked his proclamation, or ceased to act under it, the fatal security into which they had been lulled would have destroyed all discipline, dissolved all his forces, and left him without any means of defense against an enemy instructed by traitors within our own bosom of the time and place at which an attack might be safely made. He thought the peace