The most comprehensive and controversial economic sanction ever adopted by the United States was the Embargo. Also known as the Long Embargo, this measure was in force from December 22, 1807, to March 1, 1809. Essentially a non-exportation law, the Embargo prohibited American ships and goods from leaving port. It was designed to force Great Britain and France to show greater respect for American rights during the Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815) by depriving them of American trade. Its purpose was also to protect American ships and seamen by keeping them in port. The Embargo failed as a coercive measure, and whatever protection American ships and seamen derived from their forced inactivity was more than offset by the adverse impact that the measure had on American trade and prosperity.

The Embargo was the most ambitious of a series of economic sanctions, collectively known as the restrictive system, adopted prior to the War of 1812. The American...