Part 221

Mr. GOLD said this was a bill involving questions of great importance, as well in principle as in its details. There was one feature especially of the bill which required mature consideration; he alluded to the limited period of service of the proposed additional force. There was no pressing emergency to hurry the bill; and he, therefore, moved to postpone the further consideration of it to Monday, which was negatived.

Death of Mr. Smilie.

So soon as this decision was declared--

Mr. FINDLAY rose.--It is my melancholy duty, said he, to announce to this House that my venerable colleague and old friend and associate, JOHN SMILIE, is no more. He departed this life at two o'clock this afternoon.

A committee was then appointed to superintend the funeral of the deceased, consisting of Messrs. FINDLAY, LYLE, BROWN, ROBERTS, DAVIS, LACOCK, and HYNEMAN.

A resolution was unanimously adopted, requesting each member of the House, in testimony of their respect to the memory of JOHN SMILIE, to wear crape on the left arm for one month.

And, on motion of Mr. FITCH, the House then adjourned.

THURSDAY, December 31.

On motion of Mr. FINDLAY,

Resolved, unanimously, That the members of this House will attend the funeral of the late JOHN SMILIE, this day, at two o'clock.

Resolved, That a message be sent to the Senate to notify them of the death of John Smilie, late a member of this House, and that his funeral will take place at two o'clock, this day.

And then the House adjourned.

SATURDAY, January 2, 1813.

Additional Military Force.

The House resumed the consideration of the report of the Committee of the Whole on the bill in addition to the act for raising an additional military force.

The amendments made by the House having been agreed to, the question was stated, Shall the bill be engrossed, and read a third time?

Mr. MOSELY said that, in stating concisely some of the reasons which would induce him to vote against the present bill, he should not attempt to enter into a consideration of the justice or expediency of the war, nor the policy of continuing it. War is declared, and it appears to be the determination of those who have the control of our public concerns to prosecute it with the utmost vigor; yes, sir, with a vigor that, within twelve months from the enlistment of the twenty thousand men to be raised by this bill, we are told must bring it to a successful termination. Really, Mr. Speaker, when I listened to the confident assurance of the honorable Chairman of the Military Committee, that with these twenty thousand men, in addition to the troops already raised, and voted to be raised, we should in a single campaign be able to conquer Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick, and that the object of all these conquests was to procure an honorable peace, I almost felt myself persuaded as a peace man to join the honorable gentleman in his project of fighting for peace one year, with such a certainty of obtaining it at the expiration of that period; but unfortunately I could not but recollect the fate of similar assurances made on former occasions. When we were about declaring war, I very well remember that we were told with equal confidence by gentlemen anxious to engage in it (and who would listen to no arguments, even for delay, against the measure) that we had only to declare war, and Canada would, in the course of a few months, at most, be ours; that the militia alone, with the aid of a very few regulars, would be competent to the conquest of the whole country, except the fortress of Quebec; and that that must very soon fall of course. An honorable gentleman from Vermont (Mr. FISK) informed us that the people of those Provinces would almost conquer themselves; that they were at least pre-disposed to be conquered--to use his own expression, that they were "panting" to participate in our liberty.

Experience has now proved the fallacy of these predictions. Gentlemen must now be convinced that Canada is not to be conquered quite so easily as they had imagined--that it is not to be subdued with a few thousand militia, regulars, or volunteers, though aided by proclamations. I mention proclamations, because they seem to be considered as an indispensable auxiliary on all great emergencies. What can be done by proclamation, I will readily concede we are competent to do. No nation, I believe, ever arrived at greater perfection in the art of proclamation-making than we have done; and if history is faithful to record them, we shall in this particular at least bear the palm from all the world.

Sir, it can afford pleasure to no man, who feels as he ought for the honor and interest of his country, to dwell unnecessarily upon the disasters and disgrace which have everywhere attended our military operations from the commencement of the war to the present time. I mean upon land; for to our little Navy too much praise cannot be given. Our gallant seamen have not only afforded to their countrymen examples of valor worthy of imitation, but they have also taught us a lesson of wisdom, by which I am happy to find we have manifested a disposition to profit. But, sir, while gentlemen must feel mortified at the miserable termination of all our boasted military exploits thus far, and might wish to draw a veil over the disgraceful scenes which have taken place, it cannot be done; it would be unwise to attempt it. We ought rather to look at the causes which have produced our misfortunes, and pursue a course in future which may not expose us to similar evils.

Mr. GOLD said the annals of this Government, the last six months, commencing with the declaration of war, would be found the most interesting, the most deplorable.

In that period, we have seen a war declared, precipitately and prematurely; for, notwithstanding all the arguments urged on that occasion, with so much zeal and eloquence, time has dissipated all; the illusion has vanished; your army, so confidently expected, did not, under the magic of that declaration, spring into existence; the condition of your enlistments would not, I apprehend, at this hour, justify the declaration of war. We have seen, sir, that war conducted in a manner well to comport with the spirit in which it was declared; disaster upon disaster in rapid succession have followed; the tone and heart of the country broken; universal disgust at the past, and deep concern and anxiety for the future, prevail everywhere.

And what, Mr. Speaker, is now proposed for the future--what is to retrieve our affairs--on what are our hopes to rest? An army of twelve-months' men! A broken reed! An army and term of service, which well nigh lost the country in the Revolutionary war; an army which in every step and stage of that war received the uniform and reiterated censure and condemnation of Washington, and every intelligent officer of that period; an army that stands recorded by every historian of that war with deep reproach and reprobation. Such is the foundation of our future hopes; shutting our eyes upon the lessons of experience, we live but to repeat former errors and renew our sufferings. Shall we never learn, that a soldier is not the creature of an hour; that he must be seasoned to the hardships of war; that to remove your recruit from his fireside, from his plentiful board, and all the comforts with which he is surrounded, to the theatre of service, there to sleep on the ground in tents, with two or three articles of subsistence only, is to give him up a victim to disease, to consign him to the grave? This precise result is presented to the mind by the melancholy review of the last campaign; disease and death have walked abroad in our armies on the frontier; they have been swept to the grave as by the besom of destruction. It has not stopped with your army; the frontier inhabitants, infected by the diseases of the camp, fly from the deadly theatre as from a destroying angel! Shall we never learn the difference between our situation, and that of nations who have a competent military establishment, sufficient at all times for both offensive and defensive operations?

The slender Military Establishment of the United States, whilst it consults economy, and favors the genius of the Government, forbids a hasty resort to war, especially extra-territorial and offensive war; time for preparation, after the measure is resolved on, is indispensable; and a disregard of our situation in this respect cannot fail to induce defeat and disaster--to produce such a campaign as has just now closed.

But, Mr. Speaker, wherefore change the term of enlistment, from five years, or during the war, to one year? The sole avowed object of the war by land was the conquest of the Canadas. Are you at this hour nearer your object than on the day you declared war, or has that object, with a steady and sure pace, constantly receded from you as you have advanced in the war? Is Canada so far conquered that you can now reduce the term of enlistment? It is impossible to shut our eyes on the past; while all is disgust and despondency with our own citizens--sick of the past, and concerned for the future; while every post brings to the Cabinet fearful and alarming changes in the sentiments of the people under this ill-fated war; your enemy, the Canadians, take courage, their wavering sentiments have become resolved, and union in defence of their firesides, the land that gives them bread, is spreading and cementing all in the patriotic vow.

There was a time, sir, when you had friends in the Upper Province; there were many who wished well to your arms, and would have greeted your approach, but that ill-fated policy which precipitated every thing, which in zeal for the end overlooked the means, has blasted all our hopes from that quarter. The Canadian, while he knows your power, distrusts your wisdom and your capacity to conduct the war; he dares not commit himself, his all, to such auspices. Hence, sir, difficulties thicken on every side, and at least three times the force is now necessary to effect the conquest, which would have been required at the commencement of the war. Have we made an impression on the Prince Regent and his Ministry? are they now more disposed to succumb and accept your terms than before the war? How stand the people of the British Empire? Instead of their coercing the Government into our terms, which we fondly anticipated, the late election to Parliament shows them disposed to go hand in hand with the Government in resisting our claims and inflicting on us all the evils of war. "Maritime Rights" are echoed and re-echoed with applause throughout the Empire. Such, sir, are the bitter fruits of your policy, and to what farther point the same hand shall conduct the destinies of the country, remains to be seen.

I seek not to aggravate the misconduct of the war, nor to commend our enemies, but only wish, sir, that we may see things as they are, our actual situation, and thus look danger in the face. Do you persevere in the conquest of Canada? Pass not the barrier with an army of less than forty-five or fifty thousand men: if you do, in my apprehension, the defeats and disasters of the past campaign will be visited upon you; another army will be made to pass under the yoke, and at the end of the year, you will find yourself still further removed from your object. The tug of war is now placed fairly before us, we cannot advance without meeting it. Such, Mr. Speaker, are the grounds on which I object to this twelve-months' army; it is not adapted to the professed object of the war, the conquest of Canada. Is there, sir, any other object in contemplation of the Government; any other land of leeks and onions, which Heaven has given us, or to which our destinies lead? Is the South of easier access than the North, and is the circle of hostility to be extended to that quarter? We profess a pacific policy; moderation and justice are our boast; let us beware how we commit to the hazard this high and enviable character; how we yield, on specious grounds, to the mad and destructive policy which we reprobate in others; a policy which has in all periods overwhelmed nations with calamity, and swelled the tide of human misery.

I fear there are points in our neutral course, in our relative conduct towards Great Britain and France which will not bear examination. You proclaimed the Berlin and Milan decrees revoked, and put upon Great Britain the threatened alternative of non-intercourse. Was the fact so? You took a promise for the fact; you proclaimed the fact, while France herself, the author of the deed and party to be benefited, denies and disowns it as done at the time. Here was a fatal error, a departure from the straight line of justice; and when our error in this was palpable to all the world, we gave no explanation, no excuse, but persevered in a measure which led to war. It is this course, sir, this departure from even-handed neutrality between Great Britain and France, that has lost you the support of your own citizens to a great and alarming extent, and at this moment sustains the British Ministry in the hearts of Englishmen. It is this belief of our Government's leaning to France, that has carried that Ministry so triumphantly through the late elections to Parliament.

If any thing could add to the gloom and sicken the mind under the prospect before us, it is the inauspicious conjunction of events. America and France both making war at the same time on Great Britain; we making the enemy of France our enemy, and this at the ill-fated moment when the all-grasping Emperor of that country is rolling a baleful cloud, charged with destruction, north upon the Russian Empire; upon a power always just to America; upon our truest and best friend in the European theatre. Against such a friend, at such a period, we have beheld the march of the Corsican through rivers of blood; his footsteps are traced over the ashes of the proudest cities, and he sits himself down, at length, at Moscow, like Marius over the ruins of Carthage.