What Did Jeffersonian Republicans Thought about the War of 1812 - Term Paper Example

Should the War of 1812 be Renamed as Republican War? Thesis Statement Although the war of 1812 is rightly called as a stalemate, there are serious opposing views among historians about its significance and consequences. The Federalist Party with its base in New England bitterly opposed the war while the Republicans strongly advocated for it. Even in the Republican Party, Madison did not favor the war, however, he was forced by the "War Hawks". The results of this war also had serious impacts on the image of the parties and, as national and patriotism was one of the most significant consequences of this war, the Federalist Party was viewed as unpatriotic and disloyal and dissolved very soon. Thus, the war of 1812 can rightly be renamed the Republican’s War as the Republicans successfully waged the war even though the Federalists opposed it. In the preceding pages, I would investigate and analyze the course of the war of 1812 and prove this hypothesis. Background Americans’ confidence in the viability of their republican form of government had begun to erode in the early nineteenth century under the pressure of foreign affairs. Great Britain and France, bled white from butchering one another in the Napoleonic Wars and each desperate for advantage, were assaulting the merchant vessels of the Unite States. The English first started to impress sailors from American ships in 1803. Then in a series of Orders in Council over the next few years they blockaded the European continent, denied to American merchants the wartime carrying trade, and began to seize American ships with their commercial loads. Napoleon responded with the Berlin and Milan Decrees, edicts which blockaded the British Isles and prohibited all neutral trade with them. The French by 1806 also began to confiscate trade vessels of the United States. From 1803 to 1807 the Republican administration of Thomas Jefferson relied upon protest and negotiation in attempting to moderate the maritime policies of the European belligerents. This strategy failed. In December of 1807 the Republicans took a new tack. Determined to find an effective American policy somewhere between war and submission, Jefferson and his Congressional followers enacted the famous embargo. This measure prohibited American ships from travelling to foreign ports, and foreign ships from gathering any cargo in the United States. Designed to bring Great Britain and France to reason by economic pressure, the measure instead prompted economic hardship, political discontent among mercantile interests, and a widespread smuggling trade within the United States. The embargo’s unpopularity brought its repeal in fourteen months, and the subsequent enactment of weaker forms of commercial restrictions.1 All of these policies were ineffective. But they did succeed in creating, especially among Republicans, a profound crisis of confidence over the vigor of American republican government. If the foreign affairs conundrum had helped raise tensions in American political economy by turning it inward toward production an the home market, it also raised larger and even more unsettling questions: could the United States wage a war and survive? And if it could not, did its republican structure deserve to survive? In this high state of uncertainty over the vitality, and hence future, of republicanism, many Americans confronted the traditional republican strategy for international survive. A policy of neutrality and peace – and the avoidance of war at almost any cost – always had been central to the republican experiment. According to precepts rooted in the republicanism of English “Country” ideology, war served as a primary instrument for the “Court” faction in its attempts to consolidate power. By raising taxes, running up the national debt, and enlarging the standing army in wartime, the central government would increase its power of patronage, impoverish the citizenry, and engage in liberticide.2 By 1810, however, this traditional republican strategy had fallen under a shadow. The failure of the embargo’s “peaceful coercion,” and the continued violations of American commerce, raised worried questions about neutrality and the ideological avoidance of war. Many members of the Jeffersonian majority began to evince extreme ambivalence over the “pacific genius” of republicanism. “If this doctrine be true, that a Republican Government cannot stand the shock of war, in vindication of its inalienable and moral rights, it is bad, indeed worse than bad – not worth contending for – a Government not able to defend itself against all aggressions ought to be change,” declared Congressman John Rhea of Tennessee, before continuing; “but the Government of the United States is not a Government of this description …… this nation is as strong, if not stronger, than any Government in the world.” By this ambiguous and sensitive examination of America’s “peaceful spirit” was giving way before a more exacting, vigorous version of republican ideology. Many Jeffersonian Republicans – especially younger ones – ceased worrying whether war would corrupt the republic. Rather they were convinced that is must absorb the shock of violent conflict to prove its worth. They further insisted that the republic held untapped sources of strength that adequately prepared its to meet this challenge. This “energized” republicanism of young Jeffersonian drew nourishment from the values of enterprise, ambition, productive growth, and self-made success endemic to liberalizing change in the early 19th century republic. As Virginia Congressman John Clopton told his constituents in 1812, it was vitality of the young republic – not its delicate, pacific tendencies – that had excited British commercial attacks. “The prospect of these immense [American] resources rapidly multiplying, and under the auspices of a vigorous, active spirit of enterprise pushed into operation,” he wrote, “alarmed the pride and jealousy of that [British] government.”3 The colliding republican strategies for the survival of the young nation – the older “enlightened” design and the newer “energized” one – can be seen in the early 19th century struggles of a quartet of Republicans. The two older statesmen of the set strove to utilize the “pacific genius” of the American republic to avoid a deadly war with the European powers. In contrast, the two younger politicians agitated for recognition and mobilization of America’s republican strength. They envisioned war as a bracing exercise for a growing and vibrant republican society, as a realization of its political potential. Thomas Jefferson and James Madison Thomas Jefferson and James Madison had led the Republican “revolution of 1800,” a crusade which they perceived as a restoration of republican principles to American government after the Federalist interregnum. Along with Albert Gallatin – the third member of the Republican leadership triumvirate – the new President and his Secretary of State sought to establish policies that would realize their vision of the virtuous republic. Especially, after 1803, when European attacks on American neutral commerce began to accelerate, Jefferson and Madison found themselves obliged to shape an Atlantic strategy that would take the young republic – with its virtuous character intact – through the gauntlet of foreign depredations. As intellectual heirs of 18th century traditions, these men drew upon republican fears and Enlightenment hopes to construct a foreign policy based on a commercial leverage and avoidance of war. Such hopes, however, were not realized for these older Jeffersonians. The embargo seemed to have little effect on the economies of France and England, while it caused considerable havoc and privation among American commercial groups. After little more than a year of operation, the measure was repealed by Congress in March of 1809. But perhaps ever more importantly, the failure of the embargo marked the beginning of a precipitous decline of the traditional “enlightened” strategy for the survival of the republic. Madison and Jefferson shared in the feelings of disillusionment and bitterness. While they harbored suspicions, these veterans Republicans also began to drift away from commercial decimation and peaceful coercion as preferred tools of international conduct. In his “Second Annual Message” as President in 1810, he discussed the need for American “seminaries” where the “art of war” could be learned without suffering actual conflict or enduring large standing armies. Little more than a year, Madison admitted that “peaceable coercion” had failed because Britain had determined to “recolonize our commerce by subjecting it to a foreign Authority.” He concluded that American acquiescence would be a “dereliction of our National rights …. not less ruinous than dishonorable.”4 If older figures like Jefferson and Madison begrudgingly abandoned a republican strategy of reason and economic coercion by 1810, a substantial number of Republicans did so enthusiastically. Although nurtured on republican principles, many younger Jeffersonians also drew ideological nourishment from the liberalizing changes transforming the United States since the Revolution. They began to demand a strategy of “energy” rather than “enlightenment” to guarantee the republic’s survival. For many young Republicans, it seemed imperative that the United States present an energetic foreign policy to prove itself. Like Felix Grundy and Hezekiah Niles, they believed that facing up to an international clash of wills – and doing so with a willingness to go to war – was the only way to demonstrate the viability of the republican form of government. Moreover, in advocating an “energized rather than an “enlightened” strategy, these men utilized the powerful thrust toward domestic production and a home market in American political economy. Thus, by 1812 a broad new ideological sensibility was gaining influence in Republican circles. In this atmosphere of ideological ferment and war-crisis, articulate proponents of a revamped republic began to emerge from the shadow and step onto political center stage. The Liberal Impulse to War In 1810, Henry Clay became the youngest Speaker of the House of Representative. Clay was an energetic liberal Republican and determined to rewrite the Republican agenda in accordance with imperatives of liberalizing change in the post-Revolutionary republic. In January 1812, as Speaker of the house and the leader of “War Hawk” Henry Clay, discussed his ideas with timid Congressmen afraid of better British maritime, and insisted that “This country only required resolution and a proper exertion of its immense resources to command respect, and to vindicate every essential right.” In a practical sense, Clay’s selection made an immediate impact and a committee of assertive and Liberal Republicans was formed. The most important of those committees was that dealing with foreign affairs. The Foreign Relations Committee became the center around which the deliberations of the Twelfth Congress revolved. From the late fall of 1811 to the early summer of 1812 the reports and recommendations emanating from this small assemblage dominated the flow of Congressional discourse. The Committee acted as the lever by which the Jeffersonian Republican machinery was inched slowly toward confrontation with Great Britain5. On April 1, 1812, decisive action began. One that day President Madison asked Congress for a sixty-day embargo on American shipping – the measure was understood as clearing the commercial decks for war – and it was passed and signed on April 6. Finally, on June 1, Madison sent a war message to Congress. The Congressional Liberal Republicans displayed none of Madison’s hesitance. On June 3, acting Chairman John C. Calhoun presented to the House a bill to declare war on Great Britain. Federalists Position The federalists stood traumatized after the declaration of war in 1812. On the eve of war with Britain they had been hemmed politically into New England and isolated pockets in the middle and southern states. Economically, their bright portrait of a growing commercial republic was cracking from the harmful rays of European trade restrictions and yellowing under the bright sunlight of domestic manufacturers and entrepreneurial home market. Socially and culturally, the spirit of profit and enterprise they respected had gone out of hand. Whereas Republicans also worried about the effects of avarice and ambition, they maintained faith in the progressive direction of liberalizing change. So, in their social and political criticism the Federalists, like wounded animals, lashed out in pain and paranoia at their offending countrymen. Having failed to lead the republic, the Federalists finally believed they had failed themselves. They were bitter and frustrated group by 1812. Federalists believed themselves to be “genuine republicans,” but in adapting to an era of party maneuver they admitted “to be mere bunglers at the business.” As one observer astutely judged of the Federalist dilemma with liberalizing change in the early republic, “it is easy to raise the devil but difficult to bury him.”6 Outcome of the War Once begun, the war of 1812 defied the expectations of both adherents and opponents. It fulfilled neither Jeffersonian hopes of ecstatic regeneration, nor Federalist fears of cataclysm. Instead, the two and half years of war took shapes as an exercise in frustration, ineptness, and survival. Strategic victories and crushing defeats alike evaded American arms, and the 1815 Treaty of Ghent brought little recompense beyond peace. Indeed, the United States gained virtually nothing concrete from the conflict save a new national hero, Andrew Jackson – in front of whose barricaded soldiers at New Orleans the British graciously marched several thousand troops in parade formation to be moved down – and an unsingable national anthem.7 Yet despite such infelicities, the second war with Great Britain had a profound impact on American life. As scholars have noticed since the nineteenth century, the end of the clash seemed to inaugurate a new phase in the United States’ brief history. Historians of Jeffersonian America traditionally have associated the “successful” English conflict with a post-1815 acceleration of economic development, government centralization, and nationalist favor. As Henry Adams remarked over ninety years ago, for instance, the peace announcement turned attention from issues that had dominated the public agenda for a generation. “A people which had in 1787 been indifferent or hostile to roads, banks, funded debt, and nationality had become in 1815 habituated to ideas and machinery of that sort on a great scale” he wrote. “Monarchy or aristocracy no longer entered into the public mind as factors in future development.”8 The United States’ “second war for independence” may have assured the permanence of republicanism, but that very process of assurance also seemed to transform familiar meanings. As Lance Banning has observed typically, the agreement for peace established for Americans that their experiment in republican government was going to endure.” But 1815 also marked the “point at which to write an end to the debate that traced back to the 18th century argument between the English Country and Court.” For Banning and others, the war’s end brought a new ideological concern with “the needs of the future” and “the most appropriate means of national development.” 9 Conclusion From the above mentioned facts, it becomes clear that the Young Republicans dominated the war policy of the war of 1812 while the Federalists opposed it unsuccessfully. Although it is true that the war was stalemate, the significant outcome of this war was the patriotism aroused in Americans and because of opposing the war, the Federalists earned distrust and hatred. Thus, the war of 1812 can be renamed the Republican’s war. Bibliography Adams, Henry, ed. Documents Relating to New-England Federalism, 1800-1815. New York, 1877. Reprinted ed. New York, 1965. Address to Middlesex County. 8; “From the New York Evening Post,” Charleston Courier, Oct. 18, 1811; Bigelow, “Letters,” Proceedings, Vol. 40. 40, 333, 334; Taggart, “Letters,” Proceedings, Vol. 33, 126-127, 133, 377, 135, 307-308. Annals of Congress, Vol. 23, 330-343 Banning, Lance. The Jeffersonian Persuasions: Evolution of a Party Ideology. Ithaca, N.Y., 1978. Banning, Lance, The Jeffersonian Persuasion: Evolution of a Party Ideology. Ithaca, N.Y., 1978 Brown, Roger H. The Republic in Peril: 1812. New York, 1964, 1971. McCoy, Drew R. The Elusive Republic: Political Economy in Jeffersonian America. Chapel Hill, 1980. To Judge Cooper” from Jefferson, February 18, 1806, Thomas Jefferson Papers, Library of Congress (microfilm); Jefferson to Charles Pinckney, February 2, 1812, cited in Bradford Perkins, Prologue to War: England and the United States, 1805-1812U (Berkeley, 1961), 42; Hunt, ed., Writings, Vol. 8, 129, 174. Stagg, J. C. A. “James Madison and the ‘Malcontents:’ Political Origins of the War of 1812.” Williams and Mary Quarterly, 3rd Ser., (1976), 447-585. Read More