Alexandria daily gazette, commercial & political. [volume] (Alexandria [Va.]) 1808-1812, 1812-06-24

said that she had disregarded our men.
our threatened hostility, it would have accns1
ed more fully with my ideas OF or rcIq;.s
to, and of our attempted ncgotiariors wiz
that power. I have yet to he Informed e -.
time when these friendly advances were rs5.
unaccompanied with something like Dire,
a weapon Of partial hostility, small scoor,a
which was to compel her to accede 10 or.
terms of accommodation. do not end H..
Great Britain has uniformly declined all tsrg,.
ofadiustmcnt. The British treaty, whicl b,i
it MT been for the solitary year Of The psc.E
or rather truce Of AtnieDs, would have bee,
still in force, was suffered to expire and i
have ever understood that there was an ufY.
on the part Of the British government 10 Con
tnue it during the present war, which vi
declined on the part ofthc United States, Der
haps for sufficient reasons. This however,
no part of the present discussion. Whrs
shall we find any attempt at negotiation snce
that PERIOD in which the executive has M
been armed with weapon Of partial boStil,g
1t is true we have proposed to be at peac.E
and on terms Of friendship with her Oh certain
conditions. But our profered friendship hasl
almost always been accompanied with rod
held up in terroreno, TO show her what sheE
had to loose by sighting our friendship anls
TO impress her with belief that it was in our
power to enforce our own terms upon her,,
Surprising man should come TO me with
proposals, which he should use many argp.
ments to prove how greatly my acceding to,
them would rebound to ny advantage, but /
should at the same time brandish cane over
nv head to let me know what | had to dread
from his resentment if did not accept Of his
offers this would be a fair offset to his pro.
fered friendship.
To illustrate this as it respects attempted &c.
gociations with Great Britain, let US advert
little to facts. Was our partial non-impors.
ton law prefer of friendship? No, sir. That;
hostile weapon was considerable abatement
of the friendliness Of the offer made at that
time. However feeble and inefficient the mea.
sure, it was, without doubt, meant as rod
Was the contemptuous manner in which the
treaty Of 1906, which had been negotiated and
signed by Mcssrs. Monroe and pinkney was
sent back, without so much as even submitting
it to the Senate, an evidence either OF the en-
tire Discrimination Of the British government
to be on friendly footing with us, or of curl
extreme readiness and inyariabie Disposition
to make friendly advances? No one will say
Il. If there was any disposition evinced toll
reject friendly advances in this instance, ii
was on the part of the United States. It ii
true that exceptions we're taken at the rotd
by which the treaty was accompanied, aliudin5
+.D+ ~ hat !
decree, conceived 20 be contrary to the estaj
blished laws and usages of nations, was car
ried into rigid execution, and the .. Stated
acouicsccd in it, an event which was BY nh
means anticipated, the British governmenH
would not consider itself as withheld BY thf
Of the, treaty from rctalatpG th4l
injuries of the enemy. This notc was eont
sidered SO offensive, as TO be a suhclen1j
ground for rejecting the treaty, even althoueE
there had been nothing in the instrument 1t 4
self which was improper. pretend not 70
discuss the question whether this was or waSF
not a sufficient reason for refusing the tTeat"f
but it was promptly and instantaneously rel
jected, and, as nearly as l can recollect, aboo1
twelve months after the enacting of the Ber!iTI
decree but soon after its universal and lndls
crimjnate execution, it was followed by theE
orders in council. IF recollect right thc[
date Of the Berlin decree was November l8o0F
and that of the orders in council November
1907. But whether the note annexed to tosL
rejected treaty Of 1906, did or did not contaaF
any thing so highly improper, it certainly con'3
,ained nothing different from what was aheF'8
wards voluntarily offered to both belligeFentS's
as separate inducemert to each to receo'
from their system, in our attempts to ncgo's
tate by the help of our embargo, and was eH'
pressly stipulated afterwards; beth in the nom
intercourse law of 1909, and afterwards IN INC
law of May lst, 1910. Was the embargo e
self meant as friendly advance IN nego"Y
ton, unaccompanied with any thin hHe
hostile weapon to enforce claim Ih's wa
certainly not the explanation Of II at the 'i'oe'
Il is true there was proposal to remove ~
on the condition that our demands were o.