Napoleon Emperor

THE First Consul of France had procured his election to a seat on an imperial throne, in the spring of 1804; and on the 2nd of December following, he appeared before the altar of the Church of Notre Dame, in Paris, where he was consecrated " The High and Mighty Napoleon the First, Emperor of the French. " In 1806 he was monarch of Italy, and his three brothers were made ruling sovereigns. Then he was upon the full tide of successful domination, and a large part of continental Europe was prostrate at his feet. England had joined the continental powers against him in 1803, in order to crush out the Democratic revolution which had occurred in France, and threatened the peace of the United Kingdom; and the British navy had almost destroyed the French power on the sea. At the same time American shipping enjoyed the privilege of free intercourse between the ports of England and France, and pursued a very profitable carrying trade which unforeseen circumstances soon destroyed.

The envious shipping-merchants of Great Britain, and her navy officers and privateersmen who could then obtain very few prizes lawfully, represented to their government that the Americans, under the guise of neutrality, were secretly aiding the French. This hint caused that government to revive in full force the "rule of 1756" concerning neutrals; and orders were secretly issued authorizing British cruisers to seize and British admiralty courts to condemn as prizes American vessels and their cargoes that might be captured by British cruisers.

The depredations by these cruisers upon American commerce were commenced under the most frivolous and absurd pretexts, and the most intense indignation was aroused throughout the United States. Memorials from merchants in all the seaboard towns and cities were presented to Congress, in which the Democrats, with Mr. Jefferson (just re-elected) at their head, had an overwhelming majority. This and other grievances inflicted by the British government were discussed. Among them the alleged right of search which the British put forth, was paramount; and on the recommendation of the President, Congress, in the spring of 1806, passed an act prohibiting the importation into the United States of many of the more important manufactures of Great Britain, after the first of November following. In May William Pinckney was sent to London to join Mr. Monroe, the American minister there, in negotiating a treaty with the British government concerning the rights of neutrals, the impressment of seamen, and the right of search. A treaty was finally signed, but as it did not offer security to American vessels against the aggressions of British cruisers in searching for and carrying off seamen, the President would not lay it before the Senate.

A new difficulty now arose. In their anxiety to injure each other, the British and French government ceased to respect the rights of other nations, and dealt heavy blows at the life of the commerce of the word. In this business Great Britain took the lead. On the 16th of May (1806) that government, by an order in council, declared the whole coast of Europe from the Elbe to Brest to be in a state of blockade. Napoleon retaliated by issuing a decree from Berlin on the 21st of November, in which he declared all the British islands to be in a state of blockade. This was intended as a blow against Britain's martime supremacy, and was the beginning of the Emperor's " Continental System," designed to ruin Great Britain. The latter, by another order in council issued January, 1807, prohibited all coast trade with France. So these desperate powers played with the world's commerce in their mad efforts to injure each other. American vessels were seized by both English and French cruisers, and American commerce dwindled to a merely coast trade. Our republic lacked a competent navy to protect our commerce on the high seas; and the swarm of gun-boats (small sailing-vessels having each a cannon in the bow and stern), which Congress had authorized from time to time, were insufficient for a coast-guard.

Early in 1807, American commerce was almost swept from the sea by the operations of the "orders" and "decrees." The French had withheld the operation of the decrees for full a year, but the British cruisers had been let loose at once. This produced bitter feelings toward the government of Great Britain on the part of the Americans, and this was intensified by the haughty assertion and offensive practice of the British doctrine of the right of search for suspected deserters from the royal navy, and to carry away the suspected without hindrance. This right was claimed on the ground that a British-born subject could never expatriate himself, and that his government might take him, wherever found, and place him in the army or navy, although, by legal process, he may have been made a citizen of another nation. This right of search and seizure had been strenuously denied and its policy strongly condemned, because American seamen might be thus forced into the British service under the false pretext that they were deserters. This had already happened. It had been proven, after thorough investigation, that since the promulgation of the British rule of 1756, a dozen years before, nearly three hundred seamen, a greter portion of them Americans, had been taken from vessels and pressed into the British service.