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Jefferson's lifelong prejudice against Great Britain[26] would permit him to see in all this nothing but a sordid and brutal imperialism. Not for a moment did he understand or consider the British point of view. England's "intentions have been to claim the ocean as her conquest, & prohibit any vessel from navigating it but on ... tribute," he wrote.[27] Nevertheless, he met Great Britain's orders and instructions with hesitant recommendations that the country be put in a state of defense; only feeble preliminary steps were taken to that end.

The President's principal reliance was on the device of taking from Great Britain her American markets. So came the Non-Importation Act of April, 1806, prohibiting the admission of those products that constituted the bulk of Great Britain's immensely profitable trade with the United States.[28] This economic measure was of no avail—it amounted to little more than an encouragement of successful smuggling.

When the Leopard attacked the Chesapeake,[29] Jefferson issued his proclamation reciting the "enormity" as he called it, and ordering all British armed vessels from American waters.[30] The spirit of America was at last aroused.[31] Demands for war rang throughout the land.[32] But they did not come from the lips of Federalists, who, with a few exceptions, protested loudly against any kind of retaliation.

John Lowell, unequaled in talent and learning among the brilliant group of Federalists in Boston, wrote a pamphlet in defense of British conduct.[33] It was an uncommonly able performance, bright, informed, witty, well reasoned. "Despising the threats of prosecution for treason," he would, said Lowell, use his right of free speech to save the country from an unjustifiable war. What did the Chesapeake incident, what did impressment of Americans, what did anything and everything amount to, compared to the one tremendous fact of Great Britain's struggle with France? All thoughtful men knew that Great Britain alone stood between us and that slavery which would be our portion if France should prevail.[34]

Lowell's sparkling essay well set forth the intense conviction of nearly all leading Federalists. Giles was not without justification when he branded them as "the mere Anglican party."[35] The London press had approved the attack on the Chesapeake, applauded Admiral Berkeley, and even insisted upon war against the United States.[36] American Federalists were not far behind the Times and the Morning Post.

Jefferson, on the contrary, vividly stated the thought of the ordinary American: "The English being equally tyrannical at sea as he [Bonaparte] is on land, & that tyranny bearing on us in every point of either honor or interest, I say, 'down with England' and as for what Buonaparte is then to do to us, let us trust to the chapter of accidents, I cannot, with the Anglomen, prefer a certain present evil to a future hypothetical one."[37]

But the President did not propose to execute his policy of "down with England" by any such horrid method as bloodshed. He would stop Americans from trading with the world—that would prevent the capture of our ships and the impressment of our seamen.[38] Thus it was that the Embargo Act of December, 1807, and the supplementary acts of January, March, and April, 1808, were passed.[39] All exportation by sea or land was rigidly forbidden under heavy penalties. Even coasting vessels were not allowed to continue purely American trade unless heavy bond was given that landing would be made exclusively at American ports. Flour could be shipped by sea only in case the President thought it necessary to keep from hunger the population of any given port.[40]

Here was an exercise of National power such as John Marshall had never dreamed of. The effect was disastrous. American ocean-carrying trade was ruined; British ships were given the monopoly of the seas.[41] And England was not "downed," as Jefferson expected. In fact neither France nor Great Britain relaxed its practices in the least.[42]

The commercial interests demanded the repeal of the Embargo laws,[43] so ruinous to American shipping, so destructive to American trade, so futile in redressing the wrongs we had suffered. Massachusetts was enraged. A great proportion of the tonnage of the whole