When discussing the
embargo bill as a preliminary war measure in 1812, Clay, made Speaker
during his first session in the House, scorned the appeal of New York
for peace, in her defenceless condition, as her representatives
described her. "I do not wish to hear," said Clay, "of the opinion of
Brockholst Livingston or any other man. I consider this a war measure,
and approve of it because it is a direct precursor of war." Fourteen
Legislatures of the South and West, he said, had put themselves on
record as wishing to avenge the insults of Britain. The Legislature
of his own State had supported Jefferson's embargo four years previously
with such zeal that they almost passed a measure abolishing the English
common law in Kentucky courts.
Perhaps it was an accident that this twelfth Congress was composed
almost one-half of new members; but more likely it was the result of
popular impatience with the compromising foreign attitude of the
National Government. It was an incipient political revolution, without
involving a change of administration, a form of rebuke not infrequent
in the history of the Republic.
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