ones' cries." Will you, for the chance of conquering East Florida-of annexing the Island of Amelia to your territory-of satisfying the cupidity of land-speculators, or even of gratifying a mistaken sense of interest in a respectable State, encounter the terrible contingencies, the almost certain horrors of negro insurrection, of Indian hostility, of midnight conflagration, of widespread ruin and indiscriminate massacre?

an allegation. Have we not denied the acts of Matthews-refused to ratify them? I will not say, that by this the government did not violate its faith with Matthews-so far as it relates to this, instead of imputing exclusive blame to this unfortunate, and, as I understand, confessedly meritorious officer, I cannot but believe that he thought he acted with perfect good faith to the government; strictly in virtue of his private, Sir, it appears to me, that the prominent if not public instructions-and that he counted argument, that is urged for the adoption of this not only on the support but the applause of measure, viz., the war with England, is the government. Cruelly disappointed in the result, strongest argument against it. What is the he conceived that he had just cause of complaint great object of your policy, your solitary hope he considered himself the victim of a temporof success, in your war against England? It is avowed to be, the conquest of Canada. How is this to be effected? by frittering your force into various divisions; an army of the south, an army of the north, and an army of the west? No, sir, if like our ally France, we are impelled by this lust of conquest, and aspire to like success, we must adopt her mode of ensuring it. Select one great point for attainment, and keeping that steadily in view, press upon it with all the energy of your means. Why scatter your forces, in numerous, frivolous, and unavailing plans? Why not make one grand, undivided effort, and conquer Canada? Why divert into such various channels that force, which ought to be accumulated and contracted into one irresistible torrent?

By pursuing both, we shall be disappointed in both objects. Your war with Spain will ruin your war with England. Your war with England will ruin your war with Spain. Is it true that a war with England and at the same time with Spain, has always been intended? Last year the propositions to seize East Florida, and to conquer Canada, were associated. The inducements then held out were an enlargement and arrondissement of territory at the two extremities—a fair division of the spoil. We consent that you may conquer Canada; permit us to conquer Florida. The declaration that Canada should be conquered and retained was the exacted pledge of the northern men who voted for the war. You have got their votes. You have not, you cannot redeem your pledge. How is it that the proposition for seizing Florida is revived and so strenuously enforced, and so little is said, or done, or wished as to the conquest and incorporation of Canada? Where is the promised benefit to the North?

But, sir, it seems a point of honor demands that we should continue our efforts to reduce the fortress of St. Augustine, because the Spaniards refuse an amnesty to those worthy individuals who were willing to betray their country into our hands. Not only our sympathies are addressed, and even our deliberate approbation challenged for traitors and conspirators, dignified with the name of patriots, but we are invoked for their sakes solely, to plunge into a new war. And to this we are invoked in the hallowed name of the national faith. It is almost degradation to be obliged to examine such

ising, vacillating, insidious policy-and I ask the honorable gentleman from Georgia, did not Matthews die with such sentiments trembling to the very last on his lips? The averment of his own honor and innocence of the tergiversation and pusillanimity of his employers. Was he not hurrying on to Washington, literally for his vindication; when, fortunately for those he had it in his power to expose, death arrested his course? But, sir, what is the ground of the government? They distinctly assert that Matthews has transcended his powers; that he has acted without the scope of his authority. He cannot, say the government, produce our letter of permission to sanction what he has done. Then, clearly, the consequence is, our faith was not compromitted, for our name and authority were not legally or fairly used. Our sympathies cannot justly be awakened for those conspirators. We are not interested in this amnesty. Let the Spanish Government deal with these men, as we should have done with Arnold, had he fallen into our power. Let them meet the punishment of traitors; or let them, rousing themselves to a new, and by us unprompted effort, deserve to be successful. Let them take the chance of being rebels or patriots; of swallowing the hemlock, or being crowned with myrtle.

That indeed is a suspicious patriotism, which bargains beforehand for foreign aid that is hardly a valorous patriotism, that submits nothing to hazard-that conditions for amnesty before guilt, and secures the spoil, without fighting the battle. I will not say I have no sympathy for these people. I would save them if I could; but I will not, on their account, endanger my country's peace or fame. But another claim upon our honor is, our troops were attacked at Moosa-Moosa, where is it? within two miles of the fortress of St. Augustine. And if you had the camp of an enemy at Georgetown, threatening the capitol, the existence of your government-a foreign force, combined with domestic traitors, to overwhelm you, to throw you neck and heels into the Potomac, as one of your choice spirits once proposed—would you not attack? This is, of all others, the most miserable subterfuge. Good God! where are we? In what age do we live? In what country, when it is made a crime to extirpate the invaders of our native soil? In what age,

would say he was bound to meet. The gentle- binding the whole world under one politic and man expressed his surprise that any American moral dominion." could charge his country with an intention to I implore you, sir, that we still adhere to this perform an act so nefarious as that of the sei-system-that wise and philanthropic system, zure of the Danish fleet by the English. Sir, I am not obliged to contend, though with the utmost fairness and propriety I might, that our contemplated act transcends that in enormity, in its outrage on the law of nations, in its prostration of the principles of right and justice.

that is founded on justice, that favors the inno cent, that protects the weak, that suspects and opposes the strong and the unprincipled; that disdains conspiracy in usurpation and fellowship in guilt, though the spoil of defenceless and afflicted neighbors be the bribe, and the splendid example of exalted potentates, the justification. By abandoning this system, what has Europe become? A scene of ruins. And still, amid these very ruins, we meet at every turn, the flames of war bursting out anew into wider conflagration. Let us adhere to the ancient

One point of difference we surely cannot forget, viz., that the Danish fleet was first demanded, and demanded from those who had a right to cede it. In this case you have made no demand, and even if you had, it is of those who have no right to convey. The mere local authorities of Florida have no right to dismember the Span-system of the law of nations. Let us snatch ish empire. Another point of difference is, that this sacred palladium from its burning temple, the French were at hand. They occupied a and re-consecrate it in this our new and virtupart of Denmark, the Duchy of Holstein. Their ous empire. ulterior success, which was not only probable, but inevitable, would have given them possession of the Danish fleet. In addition to this, the English ministry urged, (with what propriety of course I cannot tell,) the secret articles of the treaty of Tilsit, in justification of this

measure.

I perceive, sir, that time will not permit me to examine this question, in the various other relations which have suggested themselves to my mind. I have so strong an opinion that this, as a military enterprise, will, having regard to our present and probable means, after all, prove abortive and unfortunate, that I had

But after all, it was an indefensible act, de-almost felt myself emboldened to submit my serving all the epithets of reprobation which the honorable gentleman has bestowed upon it. It was as fatal in its effects, as censurable in its principle. It gave the hearts of the Danish nation to France, it made an ally of the continental system; it startled Sweden, it irritated Russia, it turned the tide of public opinion against ministers in England, it alarmed and alienated America; and for all this, Britain gained sixteen hulks, some tons of hemp, and naval stores-and the distrust of the world.

Ogle

reasons for that opinion. St. Augustine, without a naval superiority, cannot be subdued; let General Pinckney, brave and intelligent as I know him to be, do his best. My reasons would be drawn from a detailed consideration of General Oglethorpe's operations, in 1739. I have consulted various accounts of that siege. I have a plan of his attack, taken by an engineer employed in the service, now before me. thorpe's best chance of success depended on his naval superiority. But he was defeated. Can Of all the ill-consequences resulting to Great we then hope for success, when the sea is open Britain from this act, the most deeply fatal to to Spanish and British squadrons; and when, her was the opinion, justly entertained in Eng- so far as relates to our naval preparations, we land and in America, the only remaining coun- have committed the same mistake here as in tries where public opinion retains through the our Canadian campaign-a mistake, or rather press and the freedom of institutions, any opera-negligence, that has been the principal, if not tion; that she, who pretended to execrate the the sole cause of our repeated disasters? But outrages of Bonaparte, who professed a rever- this subject, in all its military bearings, has ence for the law of nations, and declared her- been, and can be so much better illustrated by self the advocate of the principles of justice, the honorable gentleman from Maryland, that I virtue and religion, should, overcome by the forbear to enlarge upon it. I leave also to that lure of gain, or intimidated by an unreal neces- gentleman and others, the important topic of sity, have fallen from her high pretensions, the disastrous consequences of this measure, to have forfeited her moral character, have stained the miserable remains of our foreign commerce. her hitherto comparatively spotless reputation. The conjectures and predictions that Spain will In miserable contradiction to herself, she not, because she cannot, from the depression of overthrew, at one blow, that system of univer- her fortunes, the inadequacy of her means, and sal public law, whose maxims and precedents the imbecility of her national character, resent have been long acknowledged-and by no na- this lawless aggression, I believe rather illustration more than herself to be of the same force tive of the meanness of our motives, than of and obligation, as the municipal constitutions the true nature of her disposition and resources. of particular States: "A system," as it is ob- The merchants, those who have the best means served by Lord Erskine, in his celebrated protest of knowing, distinctly understand that your upon this subject, "which has gradually ripened hostile occupation of East Florida will be the with the advancement of learning and the ex-signal of the immediate confiscation of Amertension of commerce, and which ought to be held ican property. In relation to the interests of sacred and inviolable by all governments, as my own State, the consequences of this measure

an undue partiality for France. I am not taking upon myself to say that this would be a fair deduction; but the adoption of this measure would give an apparent sanction to this accusation, which we ought to avoid when we can so easily avoid it, not only without detriment, but with safety and advantage. Let us not only be chaste but unsuspected. What will be the inevitable consequence of a war with Spain? a non-intercourse with the Peninsula. The great object of France will be effected. This in addition to our concurrence in the continental system, and our war with England, is all that the ruler of France in the insolence of his power, the extravagance of his desires, the arrogance of his contempt, or the deadliness of his hatred, sanguine, haughty, insatiable, exorbitant, and inexorable as he is, ever demanded from us, and more than he could ever expect to obtain even from our trembling acquiescence.

will be indeed deplorable. The little remnant | you please,) that our councils are influenced by of trade we have left is that to the Havana, which will be inevitably cut off. And it is a singular fact, well known to my honorable colleague, that real property, plantations of a very considerable value, in the Island of Cuba, belong to native citizens of the State of Rhode Island. They are owned principally by the fast friends of the present administration, by gentlemen who have already loaned to the government more than some whole patriotic States, and whose private armed ships have captured from the enemy more than half a million sterling. These, to be sure, are not considerations of great moment. Since gentlemen choose to sacrifice their friends, it is officious in me to interfere, perhaps; but they are my constituents, and I deem it my duty to suggest their danger and their interests. But there are resulting from this measure, political consequences connected with your foreign relations, with your present war with England-with the present peculiar circum- It will seem to England that this coincidence stances of the world, which are worthy of the in conduct must arise from coincidence in views. gravest consideration. Do you wish to make She would deem us a party in the great design the present contest with England popular be- of her vindictive foe, and our impolitic and unyond any instance in their history-to unite fortunate war would be by her associated in against you the undivided opinions-the en- principle and duration with that war, which she thusiastic feelings-the animated efforts of the now wages for her own security, and the liberaEnglish people-to make this a war indefinite tion of mankind. Sir, I must conclude. The in continuance, vindictive in its mode of opera- subject is not exhausted, but I am. I will not tion, and victorious to England in the end? attempt to recapitulate, or arrange in a more Do you mean to render suspected, and of course correct and compact form, the desultory remarks unavailing, all your pacificatory propositions? I have thrown out. But I must demand it of Then do this dastardly act against a helpless every individual member of the Senate, again people wage your war with Spain. If ever and again to ask himself what right have we to there was a subject which united the opinions the territory of East Florida? Is it any other of the British nation, it was the late Spanish than the right created by desire the right sugrevolution. If there ever was an object in gested by ambition-the right of taking advanwhich the hopes, interests, and efforts of the tage of the troubles of our neighbors, of plunEnglish nation concentred, it is Spanish eman-dering weakness, of imposing on misfortune, of cipation. This act of yours will entirely alienate from us our friends in the British Parliament. We shall be so notoriously in the wrong, that no one in that assembly will dare defend us. But a few months ago, we could refer to the majority that effected the repeal of the Orders in Council, as equally the advocates of their own best national interests, and of our most important national rights. We unwisely continue our war with England after the acquisition of the great avowed object of that war. The peo-session-he ought to do it by the obligation of ple of England now understand that we fight on the single ground of maritime rights. And they are taught to believe that this cruel contest is intended, not so much for our own protection, as for their destruction. On this ground of maritime rights are placed the pride, the hopes, the fears of this sometimes misgoverned, but always magnanimous nation.

oppressing the oppressed? What right would Spain have to occupy St. Mary's or Cumberland Island? the same we have to occupy Augustine and Amelia.

I have directed my attention solely to East Florida. The other member of the question in regard to the Mobile is easily disposed of. If the territory be ours under the treaties and laws of the United States, there is no need of this law to authorize the President to take pos

general duty-he wants no particular law to enable him to assert the claims of the United States. He must take care that the laws and treaties are executed. He encounters no hazardous responsibility; he is empowered so to do, not by a constructive, but by a plain, direct, and absolute authority.

Sir, let us presume for a moment that we shall Add then a Spanish war to your English war, be completely successful as to the attainment of and you will not have a friend left in England. these countries; that they cost us no money, no Do gentlemen affect to deem this of no conse- blood, no actual privation, no present suffering. quence? Then they have forgotten history, or Will not this policy of indefinitely increasing read it but to little advantage. Sir, this Span- our territory be productive of the most baneful ish war will corroborate into certainty the sus-future consequences? Is it not accelerating that picion, (the unjust, the unworthy suspicion if fatal event which the genuine friends of freedom