The enquirer. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1804-1815, 1813-03-26
ron Pie ENQUIRER.
70 General James Breckenridge.

Citizens OF your District. 1 beg leave, in
this shape, to express my doubts of the &C
curacy ct the opinions you have advanced.
In stating facts, have you not selected those
only which favored your own opinions p
Have you not omitted those, which are in
tispensablc to the correct understanding of
the subject of your letter; facts, which
would have directly contradicted the opini-
ons which you endeavor TO iuculcate by
garblsd explanations aud mutilated docu-
ments, You have selected and you have
oniffed-In the words of holy writ. "you
dne those things which you ought not to
have done, and you have left uudone those
things which you ought to have done"
In the Sd, 4th, and 5th paragraphs Of
your Letter, you take upon yourself to
charge not emily the Executive Department,
but the Republican Members of Congress
with want of Candour; with making use
Of false and uncandid statements with re-
sorting TO contemplate articles to deceive
the good People Of the United States on a
subject OF the deepest importance to their
interests. Ii, Sir, this assuming assertion
be correct, these men have violated the
solemn obligation Of their Oaths--they have
betrayed the honorable and important
trusts conhaed To them by the voice Of their
constituents, But how de you prove it -
There can be no official Document which
bears upon the subject of your letter, ex-
oept such as have been communicated b"
the ministers of foreign Courts residing i'm
this country, OF by unr own ministers a.
broad; some of whom have been of the Fee
deral party, and some of the Republican /,
To the former at least you will render full
credit. But, sir, if any Of these documents
had been suppressed; if any proposals for
an accommodation made by Great Britain
had been withheld, mutilated or misrepre-
sented, the minister resident here. would
have exposed the deception. On Que occa-
sion, at least, he pretended to have been
misunderstood when he demanded of the
y. States an admission OF English manufac-
lures into the ports of France as the condi-
ton on which alone TIE Orders in Council
would be repealed-and on that occasion,
he certainly did address an explanatory and
very quibbling letter to our government
There is another part of your letter
which renders it Unnecessary for me to refer
e. the Dispatches or our own ministers a.
broad aud of the British ministers i'm this
country. These sets of documents sup
port each other. while they contradict in
the most pointed terms your own asserti-
ems. If you have any other documents,
which will satisfy the Citizens of the cor
rectness of your charges, trust you will
feel the necessity of exhibiting them on the
q
majority of the first characters of the U.
States with Improper proceedings; and, If
You have any proofs at ell, you are bound to
produce them.
1 admit, at the start, that one of the OBJ
9ects in declaring the War was to obtaln a
Repeal of the Orders in Council-which
you say were put on in retaliation merely
of the French Edicts. Now, Sir, wholly
deny this right OF retaliation, which affects
a neutral and unoffending nation, under the
circumstances and on the pretexts which
then existed, In the first place, the first
measure which affected the rights of the
u. States as a neutral nation, came from
England herself. This was the Order of
May, 1906, for blockading the whole coast
OF the German Ocean, in the possession &
nnder the jurisdiction of France. France
7staliated for this and other ou;rages by the
Berlin Decree of November 1906. In the
second place. if Great Britain had been
dissatisfied with this Decree, why did she
aot wait to see what steps the y. States
would take to resist this measure other e.
Demy! No bei!igcrent has a right to reta-
late through neutral. until it has seen
whether that neutral would not take the
necessary steps to defend its own rights
But what did Great Britain do? Without
giving the u. States an opportunity to act
tor themselves; without ever waiting to
hear in what light the French Decree
would be received in this country, c.. Bril-
tain took the sword into her own hands,
and retaliated upon US by her Order in
Council OF January 1907. In the third
place, the French Decree was a dead let
ter, us to the u. States. in the only sense
in which it might violate their rights, until
the famous case Of the Horizon in Septem
Ter 1907. 1t was net put i'll force against us ;
the French minister of marine declared that
it was not TO be put IN force; this declara.
ton was sent to the French minister in the
u. States, MIR. Turreau, to be forward.
ed by him TO the w. Indies as an instruc-
lion to their cruigsrs On that station And
he fact is, that no American vessel was
condemned on the ground of her going to
or from an English port, until the case OF
the Horizon occurred.
In the joarth place, when this case die
oecur, and ic seemed to be the wish oi
France to enforce her decree against us,
any ,retaliatcry measure on the part OF
England, was the more inexcusable, be-
cause she received little or no injury from
che French edictKj as France had little or
no navy TO enforce them. This fact is ex
pressly stated in the Preamble to the Or
dcrs themselves, as well as iii some Of the
notes OF the British minister HIMSELF.
Asto any other ground for vindicating the
Orders in CounCiluistinct from this pretend
sd ground Of retaliation, il would not only be
violation OF the Laws Of Nations, but an in.
suit upon common sense. The whole Bri.
tish Navy would not have been more than
snthcient 20 the biDckading of such an ex.