For Honour's Sake Read Online Free PDF Page B

merchantmen. Defending America’s coastline would be a daunting challenge, Gallatin concluded, but not insurmountable if preparations began immediately.
    Gallatin recognized that a purely defensive war could not be fought effectively. The initiative always lay with the enemy to choose where and when to fight. He therefore proposed a multi-pronged invasion, conducted in stages over several months, of British North America and the seizure of New Providence and Bermuda by amphibious assault. Only Newfoundland, too far away and too heavily garrisoned, was to be left alone. Upper Canada, Lower Canada, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, all were to be invaded in turn. Halifax, with its great port, was the most difficult objective to capture but also the most vital. So “long as the Britishhold Halifax they will be able, by the superiority of their naval force, to blockade, during the greater part of the year, all our principal seaports…. If we take it, the difficulty to refit and obtain refreshments will greatly diminish that evil, and enable us to draw some advantage from our small navy on our own coast.” Taking Upper Canada was also critical “in order to cover our northern frontier and to ruin the British fur-trade.”
    Gallatin placed the cost of the proposed operation at about $18 million and requiring deployment of around 30,000 men. The war could be financed by drawing down the present surplus by $8 million, dedicating $2.5 million in taxes and duties, selling $500,000 of federal land, and borrowing $7 million. 14 Gallatin sat and awaited the response of the rest of the executive.
    Madison was aghast and Jefferson in no mood to act so intemperately. No, president and secretary of state argued, diplomacy and economic retribution would be the first response. War was unthinkable before those avenues of winning redress were exhausted. Reluctantly Gallatin acceded to Jefferson and Madison’s arguments. He knew both men well and was first and foremost a loyal servant of the president. But he doubted the efficacy of Jefferson’s proposed course.
    On July 2, Jefferson issued a written proclamation denying the Royal Navy access to American ports. The president hoped this measure would satisfy public calls for action while ensuring there would be no further attacks on British ships and crew by mobs or militia. Good, traditional Republicans, Jefferson and Madison were also anxious that the administration not ignite hostilities between Great Britain and America. Authority to make war lay with Congress, Jefferson argued, and the president and his executive “should do no act committing them to war, when it is very probable that they may prefer a non-intercourse to war.” 15
    Madison sent a dispatch on July 6 to James Monroe, then the U.S. minister in London, demanding that the British government formally disavow the attack on
Chesapeake
and return the four seamen. That the entire incident had been the misguided inspiration of one man was increasingly clear, and there was every reason to believe that the British would agree to this demand, but Jefferson and Madison were not content to limit discussions to the incident that had brought the nation tothe brink of war. Jefferson, Madison later explained, had decided to convert “a particular incident into an occasion for removing another and more extensive source of danger to the harmony of the two countries.” 16 Monroe was to wrest from the British a far greater concession than an admission that America’s national sovereignty had been violated by the attack. “As a security for the future,” Madison wrote, “an entire abolition of impressment from vessels under the flag of the United States … is also to make an indispensable part of the satisfaction.” 17
    Gallatin realized that Monroe was being sent on a fool’s errand. “Great Britain will not, I am confident, give either satisfaction or security,” he