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276Claims and Evidence in SourcesIn the quarter-century following the ratification of the U.S. Constitution, American leaders had to deal with the wars of the French Revolution and Napoleon. These European conflicts posed two dangers to the United States. First, the naval blockades imposed by the British and the French hurt American commerce and prompted calls for a military response. Second, European struggles intensified party conflicts in the United States. On three occasions, the American republic faced danger from the combination of an external military threat and internal political turmoil. In 1798, the Federalist administration of John Adams almost went to war with France to help American merchants and to undermine the Republican Party. In 1807, Thomas Jefferson%u2019s embargo on American commerce shocked Federalists and sharply increased political tensions. And, as the following selections show, the political divisions during the War of 1812 threatened the very existence of the American republic.Factional Politics and the War of 1812GEORGE WASHINGTONFarewell Address, 1796Washington%u2019s support for Alexander Hamilton%u2019s economic policies promoted political factionalism. Ignoring his own role in creating that political divide, Washington condemned factionalism and, as his presidency proceeded, tried to stand above party conflicts. In his farewell address, Washington warns Americans to stand united and avoid the %u201cSpirit of Party.%u201dSource: James D. Richardson, ed., A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, 1789%u20131896 (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1896), 1:%u00a0213%u2013215.A solicitude for your welfare [prompts me] . . . to offer . . . the disinterested warnings of a parting friend, who can possibly have no personal motive to bias his counsels. . . .The Unity of Government which constitutes you one people . . . is a main Pillar in the Edifice of your real independence . . . your tranquility at home; your peace abroad. . . . But it is easy to foresee, that, from different causes, and from different quarters, much pains will be taken, many artifices employed, to weaken in your minds the conviction of this truth. . . .I have already intimated to you the danger of parties in the State, with particular reference to founding them on geographical discriminations. Let me now take a more comprehensive view, and warn you, in the most solemn manner, against the baneful effects of the Spirit of Party, generally.This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human mind. It exists under different shapes, in all governments, more or less stifled, controlled or repressed; but in those of the popular form, it is seen in its greatest rankness, and is truly their worst enemy.The alternate dominion of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge . . . , is itself a frightful despotism; but this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism.JOSIAH QUINCY ET AL.Federalists Protest %u201cMr. Madison%u2019s War%u201dThe United States%u2014and its two political parties%u2014divided sharply over the War of 1812. As Congress debates the issue of going to war against Great Britain, Josiah Quincy and other antiwar Federalist congressmen publish a manifesto that questioned the justifications for the war offered by President Madison and the military strategy proposed by Republican war hawks.Source: Annals of Congress, 12th Cong., 1st sess., vol. 2, cols. 2219%u20132221.How will war upon the land [an invasion of British Canada] protect commerce upon the ocean? What balm has Canada for wounded honor? How are our mariners benefited by a war which exposes those who are free, without promising release to those who are impressed?But it is said that war is demanded by honor. Is national honor a principle which thirsts after vengeance, and is appeased only by blood? . . . If honor demands a war with England, what opiate lulls that honor to sleep over the wrongs done us by France? On land, robberies, seizures, imprisonments, by French authority; at sea, pillage, sinkings, burnings, under French orders. These are notorious. Are they unfelt because they are French? . . .In the East, political divisions prevented a wider war. New England Federalists opposed the war and prohibited their states%u2019 militias from attacking Canada. Boston merchants and banks refused to lend money to the federal government, making the war difficult to finance. In Congress, Daniel Webster, a dynamic young politician from New Hampshire, led Federalists opposed to higher tariffs and national conscription of state militiamen.Gradually, the tide of battle turned in Britain%u2019s favor. When the war began, American privateers had captured scores of British merchant vessels, but by 1813 British warships were disrupting American commerce and threatening seaports along the Atlantic coast. %u00a9 Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers. For review purposes only. Do not distribute.