8951. WAR OF 1812, Declaration of.—
War was declared on June 18th, thirty years
after the signature of our peace in 1782.
* * * It is not ten years since Great Britain
began a series of insults and injuries which
would have been met with war in the threshold
by any European power. This course has been
unremittingly followed up by increased wrongs,
with glimmerings, indeed, of peaceable redress,
just sufficient to keep us in quiet, till she has
had the impudence at length to extinguish even
these glimmerings by open avowal. This would
not have been borne so long, but that France
has kept pace with England in iniquity of principle,
although not in the power of inflicting
wrongs on us. The difficulty of selecting a foe
between them has spared us many years of war,
and enabled us to enter into it with less debt,
more strength and preparation.—
To General Kosciusko. Washington ed. vi, 67.
Ford ed., ix, 361.
(M.
June. 1812)
