James Madison War Message to Congress June 1, 1812

I communicate to Congress certain documents being a continuation of those heretofore laid before them on the subject of our affairs with Great Britain without going back beyond the renewal in 1803 of the war in which Great Britain is engaged in omitting unrepaired wrongs of inferior magnitude the conduct of her government presents a series of acts hostile to the United States and as an independent and neutral nation British cruisers have been in the continued practice of violating the American flag on the great highway of nations and of seizing and carrying off persons sailing under it not in the exercise of a belligerent right founded on the law of nations against an enemy but of a municipal prerogative over British subjects British jurisdiction is thus extended to neutral vessels in a situation where no laws can operate but the law of nations and the laws of the country to which the vessels belong and a self redress is assumed which if British subjects were wrongfully detained and alone concerned is that substitution of force for a resort to the responsible sovereign which falls within the definition of war the practice hints is so far from affecting British subjects alone that under the pretext of searching for these thousands of American citizens under the safeguard of public law and of their national flag have been torn from their country and from everything dear to them have been dragged on board ships of war of a foreign nation and exposed under the severity zuv their discipline to be exiled to the most distant and deadly climes to risk their lives in the battles of their oppressors and to be the melancholy instruments of taking away those of their own brethren against this crying in Normandy which Great Britain would be so prompt to avenge if committed against herself the United States have in vain exhausted remonstrances and expostulations and that no proof might be wanting of their conciliatory dispositions and no pretext left for a continuance of the practice the British government was formally assured of the readiness of the United States to enter into arrangements such as could not be rejected if the recovery of British subjects were the real and the sole object the communication passed without effect British cruisers have been in the practice also of violating the rights and the peace of our coasts they hover over and harass our entering in departing commerce to the most insulting pretensions they have added the most lawless proceedings in our very harbors and have wantonly spilt American blood within the sanctuary of our territorial jurisdiction under pretended blockades without the presence of an adequate force and sometimes without the practicability of applying one our Commerce has been plundered in every sea the great staples of our country have been cut off from their legitimate markets and a destructive blow aimed at our agricultural and maritime interests not content with these occasional expedience for laying waste our neutral trade the Cabinet of Britain resorted at length to the sweeping system of blockades under the name of orders and Council which has been molded and managed as my best suit its political views its commercial jealousies or the avidity of British cruisers it has become indeed sufficiently certain that the commerce of the United States is to be sacrificed not as interfering with the belligerent rights of Great Britain not as supplying the wants of her enemies which she herself supplies but as interfering with the monopolies which she covets for her own Commerce and navigation she carries on a war against the lawful Commerce of a friend that she may the better carry on a commerce with an enemy a commerce polluted by the forgeries and perjuries which are for the most part the only passports by which it can't succeed in reviewing the conduct of Great Britain toward the United States our attention is necessarily drawn to the warfare just renewed by the savages on one of our extensive frontiers a warfare which is known to spare neither age nor sex and to be distinguished by features peculiarly shocking to humanity it is difficult to account for the activity in combinations which have for some time been developing themselves among tribes and constant intercourse with British traders and Garrison's without connecting their hostility with that influence and without recollecting the authenticated examples of such inter positions heretofore furnished by the officers and agents of that government such is the spectacle of injuries and indignities which have been heaped on our country and such the crisis which its unexampled forbearance and conciliatory efforts have not been able to avert our moderation and conciliation have had no other effect than to encourage perseverance and to enlarge pretensions we behold our seafaring citizens still the daily victims of lawless violence committed on the great common and highway of nations even within sight of the country which owes them protection we behold our vessels freita dwith the products of our soil and industry or returning with the honest proceeds of them rested from their lawful destinations confiscated by prize courts no longer the organs of public law but the instruments of arbitrary edicts and their unfortunate crews dispersed and lost or forced or inveigled in British ports into British fleets we behold in find on the sign of Great Britain a state of war against the United States and on the side of the United States a state of peace toward Great Britain whether the United States shall continue passive under these progressive usurpations and these accumulating wrongs or opposing force to force in defense of their national rights shall commit a just cause into the hands of the Almighty disposer of events avoiding all connections which might entangle it in the contest of views of other powers and preserving a constant readiness to concur in an honor re-establishment of peace and friendship is a solemn question which the Constitution wisely confides to the legislative department of the government in recommending it to their early deliberations I am happy in the assurance that the decision will be worthy the enlightened and patriotic counsels of a virtuous a free and a powerful nation you