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French Decrees.

This House, then, sir, had made a special call upon the Executive as to the time and manner of the promulgation of this decree; they made a general call as to all correspondences and other information touching the relations between this Government and that of France, with the usual exception of such matters as the public interest forbade him to communicate. This resolution having been answered by the President, enclosing the documents desired, what, I ask, sir, was the fair and reasonable presumption? Certainly that the President had done his duty; that he had communicated all the information in the Department of State not within the express reservation or exception contained in the resolution itself; and this belief, no doubt, upon the receipt of the President's answer, existed in every mind, until the assertion of the Duke of Bassano, not repeated in his note to Mr. Barlow, destroyed in some minds this fair presumption. This presumption, which in the discussion of a contested election, the day before yesterday, was urged with so much pertinacity and success by the gentlemen on the other side of the House, the advocates of these resolutions seem now to have abandoned or forgotten. A sheriff in that instance had been required by the law to administer an oath to the clerks of election, but no certificate of such oath appearing on the returns, the petitioning member avers that it was not administered; but, sir, such regard had the gentleman for the reputation of this officer, that this presumption was sufficient to repel the assertion of a respectable individual, formerly a member of this House, and at that time petitioning to be admitted in lieu of the sitting member. This presumption in favor of the officer, I believed with them to be founded in sound principle, and its influence was visible on the vote of this House a principle whose influence cherishes, not only the character of the honest officer of the Government, but pervades every class of the community-for every man is presumed innocent until proven to be guilty. But, forsooth, this principle in every other situation so sacred, when applied to the Chief Magistrate of the United States, is rejected to him it furnishes no protection. A being whose character has been portrayed with a pencil dipped in acrimony; a being whom the opposition have de scribed as the mere creature of Bonaparte, the prime agent of the destroyer of Europe, is to absolve, by a mere ipse dixit, this fair and most reasonable presumption. Upon the declaration of such an individual in the conversation with our Minister, that the decree had been communicated to the predecessor of Mr. Barlow, the presumption that the President had done his duty, had communicated every thing relative to its promulgation which the interest of the country did not forbid, suddenly vanishes an effect which the assertion of the most respectable freeman of his country would not produce under like circumstances, if uttered against the most insignificant officer of the Govern

[JUNE, 1813. ment. This enchantment, indeed, looks like French influence; and, sir, we have strong reason to apprehend that the morality of this new standard of veracity-this same Duke of Bassano-will supersede the doctrines of that good pious soul the Prince Regent, the bulwark of our religion.

Mr. PEARSON addressed the Chair as follows: Mr. Speaker: I rise to address you under circumstances not the most favorable to myself; nor can I indulge the expectation of obtaining the patient attention of the House at this late hour of the day, and after a discussion, on the part of some gentlemen at least, so able and so interesting. But, sir, impelled by a sense of positive duty to myself, and to those good men who have placed me here as their representative, I cannot for a moment hesitate to forego all considerations of personal convenience, to do that which every gentleman of the minority, in the habit of speaking, ought to do, protest against the abominable, the slavish doctrine advanced, and repel the charges and insinuations made by the member from Tennessee, (Mr. GRUNDY.) It is not, however, my purpose solely to notice the remarks of the member from Tennessee; nor shall I pursue other gentlemen through all their windings and turnings, in the wild, wide range they have taken in this debate. The proposition before us, demands some attention. It is plain, simple, and distinct; it is an inquiry for "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth," in relation to a subject deemed vitally interesting to us as a people-involving the reputation of our Administration and its agents, or that being and his agents, who tells us he loves us, and we are doomed to call our ally. To gentlemen situated as the honorable member from Kentucky, (Mr. MCKEE,) who was ignorant of the call made on the Executive last session on this subject, and the result of that call-to some gentlemen who have just taken their seats in the House for the first time, the resolutions under consideration may appear unnecessarily definite and inquisitorial. They might well imagine, that a general resolution, in ordinary form, would bring forth all the information now desired. The reasonableness of this opinion proves, incontestably, the propriety and necessity of the course now proposed. A general call, such as that proposed by the gentleman from Kentucky, was made near the close of the last session of Congress. The terms of that resolution were sufficiently broad and comprehensive to authorize the expectation, that the information sought for would be obtained. What was the fact? In the night, and at the last hour of the session, a confidential Message was received from the President containing those garbled extracts which have excited so much suspicion and indignation, which evidently left a tale behind, which it is our purpose and our duty to unfold. It is a fact also, not unworthy of remembrance, that in reply to a call of the Senate on this same subject, the dike extracts were

given under the injunction of secrecy. Is it not a theme for curious speculation, to know what high and weighty considerations of State rendered necessary a pledge of secrecy on the part of both branches of the Legislature, as the condition on which those precious extracts should be made known to them; and what sudden change of policy should have absolved the members of this House from the pledge of secrecy, which for several weeks had been imposed on the Senate? What was the real motive for keeping those papers from the public eye is to me unknown; and I trust, other considerations, than the mere convenience of the galleries, authorized their public disclosure.

[H. OF R.

our land; that the Executive of these United States did, after the arrival of the French Minister Serrurier, in the month of February, 1811, refuse to permit necessary and proper inquiries to be made of him, in relation to the pretended repeal of the decrees of Berlin and Milan, and did permit the unfortunate law of 2d March, 1811, to be passed, (confirming the erroneous and fatal proclamation of the 2d November, 1810,) under the false supposition that the French decrees had been repealed, when almost every man doubted, and many of the most intelligent denied the fact, without allowing those inquiries to be made, which would have elicited the truth, dispelled our doubts, and saved the nation from the gulf into which it has fallen. With these and many other facts and circumstances (some of which perhaps I may have occasion to notice in the course of my remarks) fresh in the recollection of a free, a jealous, and enlightened people, is it, ought it to be a matter of surprise even with the most confident believers in Executive purity and infallibility, that such suspicions, such impressions as I have stated, do exist? No, sir, the wonder is they are not universal. I hesitate not to say, I never have considered the communications from the present and late Executive, on the subject of French affairs, sufficiently full, free, and entire

Mr. Speaker: In a Government like this, where not only freedom, but publicity of debate is guarantied by the charter of our rights; where the people have the right to know, not only what is done, but how and by whom, all transactions enveloped in mystery, or clothed with secrecy, naturally excite suspicion, and not unfrequently alarm. This will continue inseparable from our nature, whilst a vestige of liberty remains. It is that characteristic of freemen which distinguishes them from the slaves and sycophants of power. Here let me tell gentlemen, whatever may be their opinions, however honest and unbounded may be their confidence, there does exist no slight impres--they have in general been characterized by a sion among many of our best and wisest men, that all is not right in the relations of this country with the Government of France-that "something is rotten in the state of Denmark." Whether this impression be well or illy founded, is not for me to say; but when we reflect, that amid this massy pile of documents, with which your tables are breaking and your shelves are groaning, so few pages are to be found in relation to our complicated concerns with France, scarcely one entire letter to be seen, and no where to be heard a bold, dignified and spirited tone of remonstrance against the monstrous wrongs and galling insults of the tyrant who rules that devoted nation: when it is recollected, also, that there is a private chest, a box of arcana in the vaults of this House, whose contents, though almost moulding with age, have not yet seen the light; and of whose importance many gentlemen of this House can bear testimony, particularly the honorable gentleman from Massachusetts, (Mr. PICKERING,) who but lately, whilst a member of the Senate, underwent a sort of ordeal for having impiously, or inadvertently, brought to the light one of those hidden offsprings of French intrigue, still too tender for exposure. When all these things crowd upon our recollection, and when it is evident, as has been shown by my honorable friend from Maryland, (Mr. HANSON,) from the written testimony of your late Secretary of State, (a man then high in your confidence,) and for a supposed insinuation against his veracity, the nation was nearly set into a flame, and the offender, a man in the character of a messenger of peace, banished like a culprit from

tameness of expression, easily mistaken for the language of apology. Indeed, our late Minister in France, (Barlow,) from his own showing, disdained not to become the apologist of France for acts of the most flagrant and wanton injustice, which the agents of that nation did not deign to palliate or excuse. Witness what he said in justification of our trading under French license. Witness his excuse for the seizure and judgment of confiscation of the brig Belisarius and cargo, by the Council of Prizes, in January or February, 1812, because this vessel and cargo were liable to the decree of Milan, of the 17th December, 1807. Witness the reasons he urges for the promulgation of the paper in question, purporting to be a repeal of the decrees of Berlin and Milan, bearing date 28th April, 1811. He shrewdly conceived, after the appearance of the declaration of the Prince Regent of the 21st April, 1812, that a document might be exhibited, so carved and cut and ante-dated, as to satisfy the incredulous of his country, and still steer clear of producing a repeal of the Orders in Council. He did not ask it for his own satisfaction, or that of his Government. No, he was perfectly satisfied that the Berlin and Milan decrees had ceased to be applied to American vessels. And why?-because America did not permit her flag to be denationalized. In other words, because America had conformed to the principles of those decrees-she submitted to them, and claimed the benefit of exception, expressed in the decrees themselves. Yes, sir, here is the only true reason why our vessels are or have at any time been exempted from the full effect and operation of those de

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[JUNE, 1813. March, and whilst it was under consideration in the House of Representatives, the French Government did, formally and officially, through their Minister, Mr. Serrurier, make known their determination not to restore the property which had been seized and condemned in the ports of France.

to the American Minister in France, of 5th June and July, 1810, that the restoration, or satisfactory assurances of indemnity for the immense amount of American property unjustly seized and condemned in France, was made an indispensable pre-requisite the sine qua non, to the enforcement of the non-importation against England, and the contrary as to France. With this declaration before us, and before the world, was it just, was it fair, was it consistent, to withhold from the Legislature of this nation, the knowledge of the fact that the property of our citizens would not be restored-that this indispensable pre-requisite would not be complied with? Could we with a knowledge of this fact have passed the law of March, 1811? Would we have done a deed so pregnant with mischief, and which has brought forth the calamities we now endure?

Mr. Speaker, will it be said that the evidence of your late Secretary of State, has lost its conclusive authority with many of his former admirers? be it so; the facts, however, here stated, never have been denied, they are susceptible of proof, and you are pointed to the witness.

crees. It is an admission supported, to my understanding, by the most incontestable facts, that those decrees are not, and never have for a moment been repealed; that no exemption from their rigid operation, in our favor, was ever admitted till after the proclamation of the President was received in France. Even that proclamation did not arrest the progress of It will be recollected, by the construction seizures and captures; it had the effect only of which the President himself gave to his own continuing our property in a state of seques-powers under the law of May, 1810, as expresstration, mortgaged as security for further resist-ed by the letters from the Department of State ance to Great Britain, which was accomplished by the law of March, 1811; and not until the knowledge of that law in France, was there a single case of an American vessel captured since the 1st of November, 1810, that had been released, or even had a trial. Strange, then, that gentlemen will still contend, as some have this day, that those decrees ceased to violate our neutral commerce on the 1st of November, 1810, and that there have been no cases of seizure, capture, and condemnation, under them, from that time to this. They might as well have said, there had been no burnings either. The truth is, there have been seizures, captures, and condemnations, almost uniformly during the whole period. I defy any gentleman to produce a single case where a decision has been made by the Council of Prizes, the regular tribunal for pronouncing the law, exempting American vessels from the operation of those decrees. On the contrary, there are cases of their express application-condemnations have been made of American vessels within the period alluded to, by the Council of Prizes among other reasons for having violated those very decrees. I can here instance the ship Julian, The statement receives additional confirmaand Hercules, and others, which have been tion to my mind, from having been told by a furnished from the Department of State. The gentleman of unquestionable veracity, about the fact is this, sir: since we have taken up the time of the present French Minister's arrival in business of resistance in conformity to the dic- this city, that the late Secretary of State intates of the Berlin and Milan decrees, the Em-formed him, that he intended to relieve Conperor in his good pleasure, has, by his own gress and the nation from the suspense and special interposition, released many of our ves- doubt which existed in relation to the repeal sels which would have otherwise been conof the French decrees, by being very explicit demned, and thus our submission to, has been and decisive with the new French Minister, transformed into a repeal of his decrees. But, on the subject-or words to this effect. Sir, the sir, why labor this subject, already worn thread-note he prepared was explicit and decisive; but bare? The Emperor himself has proven that the famous letter of 5th August, 1810, did not warrant the assertion that his decrees were repealed, and thus does he give the lie to the proclamation of your President. Mr. Speaker, in addition to the important disclosure already stated on the authority of your late Secretary of State, permit me to refer to the same authority, for evidence of a most important fact of concealment, or withholding information, in relation to the views and intentions of the French Government; which, had it been disclosed, would or ought to have been all essential to the deliberations of this House, and ought of itself to have prevented the enactment of that unwarrantable and fatal law of March 2, 1811. The fact is this: That on the 22d of February, 1811, previous to the passage of the law of

it was explicitly and decisively refused to be sent by the higher authority. Well do I remember the history of those times, and although I never for a moment believed in the fair and bona fide repeal of the French decrees, I participated in the general satisfaction expressed on hearing of the arrival of the French Minister at Norfolk-believing the period was then at hand, when all doubt, all embarrassment on the question of the pretended repeal would be removed, and the real state of our relations with France made bare to the nation. The dubious, unfixed, and tardy course of the Committee of Foreign Relations at that period cannot be forgotteneven their labors were suspended for the event. Sir, the Minister arrived, but our fond expectations were blasted, not a word, not a whisper of intelligence reached this House; we were

JUNE, 1813.]

French Decrees.

[H. OF R.

left still to grapple in the dark; the Committee | Speaker, I will not follow the example of of Foreign Relations hurried through the law the gentleman from South Carolina, by hazardof March 1811, the effects of which are now ing a positive assertion on a question susceptible Scourging this land. What our disappointment of doubt, and depending on motives in other was on this occasion, can well be imagined; breasts, impossible for us to ascertain; but I but what our indignation ought to have been, dare to say, the gentleman has fallen far short when made acquainted with the cause of this of convincing me of the correctness of his disappointment, cannot be expressed. position, or of putting the question at rest. So far, then, as depends on the evidence of opinion, founded on a knowledge of facts before us, 1 must dissent from the opinion so confidently expressed by the gentleman from South Carolina, (Mr. CALHOUN.)

It is true, the declaration of the Prince Regent of the 21st April, 1812, and some of the letters of Mr. Foster, near the close of his correspondence with the Secretary of State, required the repeal on the part of France to be absolute and unconditional. It is equally true, that the last letter from Mr. Foster on this subject, (and that, too, after he had received the declaration of the Prince Regent,) declares the repeal of the French decrees as preliminary to a repeal of the Orders in Council, to be such as we had a right to require in our character of a neutral nation. It will also be recollected, that the question between this Government and Great Britain was, whether the decrees of France had been repealed at all, and not as to the extent of that repeal. The British Government denied the letter of the Duc de Cadore, of August 5th, to amount to a repeal, and required some authentic document of the fact. We contended that the letter of the 5th August, to

One word more, sir, on this hated subject of French decrees. I have stated, at the time of issuing the President's proclamation, and passing the law of March, 1811, I did not believe in their repeal; and here I will take occasion to remark, that, independent of other evidence, the testimony of Mr. Jonathan Russell, then our agent in France, in his letters to the Department of State, during the winter of 1810'11, tended strongly to confirm this opinion; the facts he relates in relation to the seizure of the New Orleans Packet, the schooner Friendship, and others, and his reasoning on those facts, are not only conclusive as to the continued operation of those decrees, but that he knew they were not repealed. This gentleman, however, seems subsequently to have changed his opinions, and yielding perhaps to an impetus not to be resisted, labors to prove that we were not shuffled into the lead, where national honor and the law required us to follow. As this gentleman is one of the persons implicated in the subject of the present inquiry, let me say, whilst I remember it, that so far from having the terms of those resolutions narrowed, or the inquiry more limited, I would suggest to the honorable mover the propriety of adding an in-gether with the late practices of France, in terrogatory to this effect-whether Mr. Russell has, by any public official communication, denied or admitted the charge made by the Duke of Bassano, that the decree of the 28th April, 1811, was communicated to him at or about the time of its date. No private or verbal declarations on the subject ought to satisfy us.

Mr. Speaker, whether the promulgation of the French repealing decree of April, 1811, at the time it bears date would have produced a repeal of the Orders in Council, is perhaps, at this time, a question not very essential to decide. It has, however, received much importance from this discussion. In reply to a remark from the honorable mover of the resolutions under consideration, and an opinion advanced by the gentleman from Virginia, (Mr. SHEFFEY,) the gentleman from South Carolina, (Mr. CALHOUN,) not content to permit the effect of the promulgation of the French repealing decree, at the time it bears date, to remain a matter of opinion and speculation, not content with merely controverting, by argument, the opinions which had been advanced, he, in a tempest of zeal, and in language peculiar, undertakes to prove, beyond the possibility of a doubt, to put the question forever at rest, and fix falsehood on him who "dares hereafter to say, if the French decree of repeal had been known, the British Orders would have been repealed, and the war thus prevented." Mr.

relation to us, were satisfactory evidence to entitle us to an abrogation of the British orders. Thus, all discussion, as to the partial suspension of the French decrees, or our conditional and partial exemption from them, entitling us to the like exemption from the British orders, was perfectly superfluous-an argument from premises totally denied, and stated by Mr. Foster, in the correspondence relied on by gentlemen on the other side of the House, to be altogether unnecessary and irrelevant. The declaration of the Prince Regent, so far from assuming higher ground than had been before occupied, always appeared to me to have been intended to furnish an opening for the promulgation of any French repealing decree that might exist, and if none did exist, that we might, more consistently with our former admissions, require one to be issued. This is inferred by the declaration, insisting only on the promulgation of a repealing document, regardless of its construction, or the practice under it, as preliminary to the repeal of the Orders in Council. It is fair to argue from what has, to what would have happened. The Orders in Council were repealed as soon after the appearance of the French repealing decree, as the unsettled state of the British Cabinet would admit; and the reason given for this change of policy was the promulgation of that decree-the difficulty gentlemen find in tracing up any other cause,

French Decrees.