New England was defenseless against the British. Earlier in the war, Federalist governors refused to pledge their state militias to defense of the nation. [1] After the British captured Castine, a town in Maine, Governor Strong of Massachusetts called up the Massachusetts militia to defend Maine.
He then called the Massachusetts legislature for an emergency session on October 5, 1814. He explained that President Madison refused to repay Massachusetts for the expense of calling the state militia into service. He said:
“The situation of this State is peculiarly dangerous and perplexing. We have been led by the terms of the Constitution to rely on the government of the Union to provide for our defence. We had resigned to that government the revenues of the State with the expectation that this object would not be neglected…Let us then, relying on the support and direction of Providence, united in such measures for our safety as the times demand and the principles of justice and the law of self-preservation will justify.”[2]
On September 10, 1814, the widely read Boston Centinel had proclaimed the federal government was nearly defunct. The newspaper urged New Englanders to provide for their own protection.[3]
Governor Strong’s address appealed to the state to take back the powers it had delegated to the federal government.[4] The Massachusetts legislature formed a committee, led by Harrison Gray Otis, to explore the issue.
Next: What the committee reported
Look for it Monday, August 11
[1] Samuel Eliot Morison and Henry Steele Commager The Growth of the American Republic, V. I (New York: Oxford University Press, 1962) 427.
[2] Henry Adams, History of the United States of America during the Administrations of James Madison, (New York: Literary Classics of the United States, 1986) 1064-5.
[3] Adams, History…Administrations of James Madison, 1065.
[4] Adams, History…Administrations of James Madison, 1065.
