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Historical Background

The War of 1812: Military Stalemate and National Awakening

The recurring problem of neutrality on the seas, a new generation's wish to prove its independence of Great Britain, the expansionists' desire to acquire Canada—these and other factors meshed in 1812 to produce the declaration of war. The Nation was unprepared for war, and more than 20 years of conflict produced little better than a stalemate. The United States failed to achieve its military objectives. Canada and the United States failed to achieve its military objectives. Canada and the Floridas eluded capture, and at the end of the war the U.S. Navy was helplessly blockaded in its own ports. The British fared no better. Their attempts to invade the United States failed, and the Royal Navy was unable to drive the hundreds of U.S. commerce-raiding privateers from the sea. On the domestic front the war aggravated a discontent, particularly in New England, that approached disunion at the Hartford Convention. The peace treaty, the Treaty of Ghent, was inconclusive. Mentioning none of the causes of the war, it merely restored prewar conditions. Yet the war was important to the United States both as a preface to 19th-century nationalism and as a final chapter in the struggle for independence from Great Britain.

Captain Perry transferring his flag from the Lawrence to the Niagara during the Battle of Lake Erie (1813). This U.S. victory paved the way for William Henry Harrison's march into Canada. From an engraving of a painting by Thomas Birch, Library of Congress.

NEUTRALITY ON THE SEAS AND THE "WAR HAWKS"

In his request to Congress for a declaration of war, President Madison listed as justification the violation of the flag on the high seas, the impressment of U.S. seamen, trade restrictions against U.S. commerce, and the frontiersmen's charge of British sponsorship of Indian attacks along the frontier. There were other factors. After 1811 a group of freshmen Congressmen from the South and West, all Democratic-Republicans, clamored for war against Britain. These "War Hawks" included Henry Clay and Richard M. Johnson of Kentucky; William Lowndes, John C. Calhoun, David R. Williams, and Langdon Cheeves of South Carolina; and Felix Grundy of Tennessee. They argued for an aggressive policy of territorial expansion and defense of the national honor. Expressing the sentiments of their supporters, they aimed to end Indian harassment of Western settlements, to conquer Canada and the Floridas, and to make the United States a fully independent power in North America. They chafed because the Embargo and the Non-Intercourse Acts had failed to force admission of Southern and Western goods to the European markets. To the "War Hawks," these had been acts of submission that had led to national humiliation and economic suffering in the West. Unlike most Federalists, they sought less diplomacy and more action.