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against Great Britain produced by her depredations on our commerce was greatly increased by her persistent assertion of the right to search American vessels for suspected deserters from her navy, a right continually exercised by her cruisers in the most offensive manner, and in the practice of which multitudes of native-born American seamen were forced into the British navy. The insolence of the British naval officers was at length carried so far that in June, 1807, the frigate Chesapeake was stopped near the entrance to Chesapeake bay by the English man-of-war Leopard, and on the refusal of her commander to submit to a search was fired into, and 21 of her crew were killed or wounded. This outrage, for which immediate reparation was demanded by Jefferson, was not atoned for till four years later, and even then the right of search was still claimed by the British government, and eventually became a cause of war. In February, 1806, an act had been passed prohibiting the importation of certain articles of British production, the first of a series of similar measures designed to bring Great Britain to terms. In December, 1807, congress, on the recommendation of the president, laid an embargo, which prohibited the departure from American ports of vessels bound for foreign countries. This measure was vehemently denounced by the federal party, and for a time it prostrated the shipping and commercial interests of the United States. It was repealed in February, 1809, just before the expiration of the president's second term. In the presidential election of 1808 the republican (or, as it was now often called, the democratic) party supported James Madison for president and George Clinton for vice president. Madison and Clinton were elected, the former receiving 122 votes and the latter 113, while the federal candidates, C. C. Pinckney and Rufus King, received each 47, a few votes being cast for other candidates. The ruinous operation of the embargo law had considerably weakened the democratic party, particularly in the commercial eastern and middle states. Mr. Madison formed his cabinet as follows: Robert Smith, secretary of state; Albert Gallatin, of the treasury; William Eustis, of war; Paul Hamilton, of the navy; and Cæsar A. Rodney, attorney general. Congress met in May, 1809, in extra session, and continued the non-importation system. A long negotiation was carried on with the English government on this subject, the orders in council, and the right of search, which resulted only in augmenting the unfriendly feeling between the two countries. Though the president was exceedingly averse to forcible measures, the pressure of public opinion, and the influence of Clay, Calhoun, Lowndes, and other leaders of the war party, at length induced him to acquiesce reluctantly in a declaration of hostilities. He sent to congress, June 1, 1812, a message on the subject of the aggressions of Great Britain, which was referred to the committee on foreign relations in the house of representatives, who on June 3 reported a manifesto as a basis of the declaration of war, for these reasons: the impressment of American seamen by the commanders of British ships of war; the British doctrine and system of blockade; the orders in council; and, lastly, various depredations committed by British subjects on the commerce of the United States. The house adopted the measure by a vote of 79 to 49, and the senate by a vote of 19 to 13; and on June 18 the president signed the act declaring war. For several months thereafter the British government did little toward counter hostilities. But although the United States had the advantage that the main force of their enemy was occupied by the great European conflict, their own preparation for the contest was in every respect inadequate. The treasury was almost empty, the revenue having been nearly ruined by the non-importation acts and embargoes; the army at first numbered but 10,000 men, half of them raw recruits, and was very deficient in officers of experience; while the navy comprised only eight frigates, two sloops, and five brigs. Long before war was declared British emissaries, as was alleged, had been engaged in exciting the northwestern Indians against the Americans; and in the summer of 1811 hostilities were actually begun by the tribes north of the Ohio under the lead of Tecumseh. William Henry Harrison, governor of Indiana territory, encountered them with a considerable force on the banks of the Tippecanoe river, Nov. 7, 1811, and defeated them. After the declaration of war, Gen. Hull, then governor of Michigan territory, was ordered to invade Canada from Detroit, which he accordingly did at the head of 1,800 men. His force was wholly inadequate to the enterprise, and he was soon compelled to fall back; and his men being reduced by various casualties to 800, on Aug. 16, 1812, he surrendered his army, Detroit, and all Michigan to Gen. Brock. An invasion of Canada on the Niagara frontier was almost equally unsuccessful, and the campaign of 1812 closed with little or no credit to the American arms on land. But the navy, small as it was, had achieved a series of brilliant victories. The frigate Constitution, Capt. Isaac Hull, captured the British frigate Guerriere, Aug. 19; the sloop of war Wasp, Capt. Jones, captured the brig Frolic, Oct. 18; the frigate United States, Capt. Decatur, captured the frigate Macedonian, Oct. 25; and the Constitution, of which Capt. Bainbridge had now taken command, captured the frigate Java, Dec. 29. In these contests the British loss in killed and wounded was vastly in excess of that of the Americans, and the result highly elated the public, with whom the navy hitherto had been in no special favor. A swarm of privateers scoured the ocean, preying upon British commerce to such an extent that their captures in this year alone amounted to more