“Is embargo independence?  Deceive not yourselves! it is palpable submission!  France and Great Britain require you to relinquish a part of your commerce, and you relinquish it entirely!  At every corner of this great city we meet some gentlemen of the majority wringing their hands and exclaiming, ’What shall we do? nothing but an embargo will save us; remove it, and what shall we do?’ Sir, it is not for me, an humble and uninfluential individual, at an awful distance from the predominant influences, to suggest plans for Government.  But, to my eye, the path of duty is as distinct as the Milky Way,—­all studded with living sapphires, glowing with light.  It is the path of active preparation, of dignified energy.  It is the path of 1776.  It consists not in abandoning our rights, but in supporting them as they exist and where they exist,—­on the ocean as well as on the land.”

Troup of Georgia, one of the champions of the Democratic party, replied to the Opposition,—­“Shall we sacrifice the honor and independence of the nation for a little trade in codfish and potash?  Permission to arm is equivalent to a declaration of war; make the embargo effective, and it will show what all the great commercial politicians have said is true,—­it will vitally affect the manufacturing and commercial interests of England.”

As one coercive measure after another was proposed, John Randolph of Roanoke, who had at first favored an embargo, came out against the measure, and “warned the Administration that they were fast following in the fatal footsteps of Lord North.”

But one of the most effective speeches against the Democratic policy was made in February, 1809, by Gardinier, who represented New York, a city the creation of commerce.

“The avowed object of this policy,” he said, “was to save our vessels and property from capture; the real one seemed to be to establish a total non-intercourse with the whole world.  We are engaged perpetually in making additions and supplements to the embargo.  Wherever we can spy a hole, although it be no bigger than a wheat-straw, at which industry and enterprise can find vent, all our powers are called in requisition to stop it.  The people of the country shall sell nothing but what they can sell to each other.  All our surplus produce shall rot on our hands.  God knows what all this means; I cannot understand it.  I see effects, but I can trace them to no cause.  I fear there is an unknown hand guiding us to the most dreadful destinies, unseen, because it cannot endure the light.  Darkness and mystery overshadow the House and the whole nation.  We know nothing, we are permitted to know nothing.  We sit here as mere automata.”

This speech nearly cost Gardinier his life, for he was in consequence of it challenged and dangerously wounded; but the embargo was permitted to continue.

The produce of the country fell sixty to seventy per cent. in value, and much of it passed at low prices into the hands of British agents.  Armed ships from England appeared on the coast of Georgia and loaded with cotton from lighters in defiance of Government, and Northern ships in the outports occasionally eluded the vigilance of collectors or escaped by their collusion; but the measure pressed with a crushing weight upon the honest merchants and ship-owners.