University Microfilms, Inc.. Ann Arbor, Michigan PEMKSYLVANIA.;

This dissertation has been microfilmed exactly as received , SAPIO, Victor Anthony, 1937- PENNSYLVANIA: PROTAGONIST OF THE WAR OF 1812. The Ohio State University, Ph.D,, 1965 History, modem University Microfilms, Inc.. Ann Arbor, Michigan PEMKSYLVANIA.; PROTAGONIST OF THE WAR OF l8 l2 DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University hy Victor Anthony Sapio, B, A,, M. A. ******* The Ohio State University 1965 Approved hy R dviser Department of History v m February 22, 1937 Bom - Naples, Italy 195 8 .......................... B.Â., College of Wooster, Wooster, Ohio 195 9 .......................... M.Â., University of Illinois, Ifirbana, Illinois 1961-1965 . , . Graduate assistant, assistant instructor, Ohio State ISaivexsiiy, Columbus Ohio FIELDS OP STUDY Major Field: History Colonial Anerica. Professor Eugene H. Rosebocra Early National, Professor Harry L. Coles Latin America. Professor John J • TePaske Middle East. Arofessor Sydney N. Fisher Modem Europe, I 870- 1965. Professor Charles Morley T&BEB OF COHTEHTS Introduction 1 Footnotes 6 I. £:q>anslon: Canada, Florida and Indians as Causes of the war 8 Footnotes 29 II. Economic Depression as a Cause of the War 33 Footnotes 52 = III. The Nation's Honor and the Party’s Welfare 56 Footnotes 93 IV. Pennsylvania and Economic Coercion 100 Footnotes I 5 I V. P a rty S o lid a rity as Motive fo r War 158 Footnotes 200 VI. Pennsylvania at War 206 Footnotes 236 Conclusion 24l Bibliography 246 IHTRODUCTION The causes of the War of l8l2 have produced a historiographi cal controversy far out of proportion to its military inçortance, prohahly because the explanations of contençorary historians proved 1 . inconsistent and unsatisfactory. Those who wrote soon after the war, who had participated in it either in a military capacity or as political leaders of the period, generally agreed that the United States went to war to p ro te c t i t s m aritim e commerce and n e u tra l rig h ts a g a in st th e p re datory policies of Great Britain — policies which not only destroyed U. S. commerce, hut insulted the national honor and threatened the 2 country's international prestige. Late nineteenth-century histor ians, althou^ on occasion intimating that other factors may also have played a role, generally accepted this maritime interpre- 3 ta tio n . Early in the twentieth century, historians looking at the distribution of the congressional vote for war began to have serious doubts about the validity of the maritime interpretation. They were particularly impressed by the strong siq)port in the Mississippi Valley and the opposition of the Northeast. A war supported by the 2 West, the nation's non-commercial area, and fanatically opposed by Hew England, the nation's commercial center, these historians suggested, could not have been fought exclusively for the pro- k te c tio n of commerce and seamen's r ig h ts . Soon a multitude of monographs and books appeared vhich attempted to analyze and assess other factors which might have prompted the nation to go to war. A majority of these tried to ejqplain the West's support for the war. Land hunger, fear of a British-sv:pported Indian uprising, economic depression, and an exuberence of youthful patriotism were advanced as possible 5 cau ses. When it was pointed out that the West, however valid its reasons, and however strong its support for the war, had neither the votes nor the influence to bring about a declaration of war, an effort was made to posit an alliance between West and South based on complementary im perialistic ambitions and common economic depression.^ The inevitable result has been the acceptance of all of the factors mentioned above as having played some role in developing war sentiment, in effect a multi-causal solution,^ which concludes that without the maritime controversy the war would never have occurred. One attempt has been made to assay the relative importance 8 of the various factors, but this hardly achieved its goal. To accept a configuration of forces in a given historical situation 3 is to rule out as futile any effort to decide which of the given forces was the most decisive factor, the most inçortant cause, or the crucial issue. In instances where a variety of elements are at work, the context and interaction of these elements are all-important. Each factor derives its significance ftom the position it occupies in the conç)lex structure of relationships, and the problem for the historian is not to measure the relative weight of various factors, but to discover the pattern of their interaction. While it can legitimately be argued that one element is absolutely necessary to bring the others into play, it is s till inç)ossible to assign measures of relative value to all the factors Q involved. The most recent study of the causes of the War of l8l2, Roger Brown’s The Republic in Peril (New York; 1964) accepts all of the causes which other historians have advanced^^ and asserts that they were Irçortant because their very existence threatened the United States' republican experiment. The seeming inability of the United States to protect its commerce and its seamen against British depredations, to protect its frontiers against Indian uprisings, and to protect its economy against the maritime regu lations of the two European belligerents, he asserts, tended to prove the dire predictions of the post-revolutionary war Cassandras who hadfwarned that republican institutions could not long endure persistent pressure. The United States went to war to protect the reputation of republicanism. h To Brown, the most important characteristic of the vote for war was not its sectional, hut its partisan character. All the Federalists voted against war; a preponderant majority of 11 Republicans voted for it. Brown then argues that the Republicans, determined to show the world that republicanism could succeed, that a republican government could protect the national interest, brought about a declaration of war. To prove his thesis, he examines the attitudes and positions of Republican Congressmen, administration officials, and local Republican leaders. While this study does not confirm Brown's thesis, it provides some evidence to support a minor theme he mentioned. As American policy continued to drift, Pennsylvania Republicans began to fear that the administration's failure to take effective action to protect American rights might lead the people to seek new leader ship. They pressed for a declaration of war in order to insure the Republican party's success in the elections of l8l2. Republicans believed that the Federalist opposition had little faith in republican institutions and that if the republican experiment were to be successful the reins of government must remain in Republican hands. Events in the four years preceding the declaration of war indicated a resurgence of Federalist strength which the Republicans attributed to the Federalist assertions that the nation's ambiguous foreign policy, deteriorating economy, and weak frontiers could only be saved by returning them to power. To prevent further growth of Federalist strength, to 5 retain power in their hands and thereby assure friendly direction of the republican experiment, the Republicans took the nation to war. This study w ill focus on Pennsylvania, "The Keystone of the Democratic Arch," because that state provided the largest vote in favor of war and gave willing and constant support to its prose cution, and because both nationally and domestically it was more steadfastly Republican than any other state in the Union. Rone of the studies of the causes of the war gives more than passing attention to Pennsylvania. Considering its size, influence, and unflagging aupport of Republican candidates and measures, an under standing of the factors which motivated its representatives to vote for war w ill undoubtedly shed some li^ t on Republican attitudes generally. The work w ill begin by testing the validity of the major inter pretations of the causes of the war in Pennsylvania and w ill extend into the war years in an attempt to show that the factors which prompted Pennsylvania Republicans to vote for war also prompted them to give the war effort their fu ll support. FOOTNOTES — imODUCTION 1. Reginald Horsman, "Western War Aims, 1811-I 812." Indiana Magazine of History, Vol. H I (1957)# pp. I-I 8. For an excellent survey of the historiographical controhersy to 1942 see Warren H. Goodman, "The Origins of the War of l8l2: A Surv^ of Changing Interpretations," Mississippi Valley H istorical Review. Vol. XXVII (1941-1942J, pp. 17I- 187. 2. H. M. Brackenridge, History of the late War Between the United States and Great Britain (iPhiladelphia; i854)j C. J. IngersoH, H istorical Sketch of the Second War Between the United States and Great Britain ^Philadelphia : 1845). 3 . Henry Adams, The War o f l8 l2 (e d ite d hy H. A. DeWeerd, Washing to n : 1944 ); John B. IfcMaster, History of the People of the United States. Vol. Ill (New York: 1892}; Richard Hildreth, The History of the United States of America from the Adoption of the Fédéral Constitution to the End of the Sixteenth Congress, Vols. II and III (New York; iSt?); Hermann E. von Holst, The Constitutional and Political History of the United States. Vol. I (Chicago: l58l); James Schouler, History of the United States of America Under the Constitution, Vol. IlT^ew York: 1882). 4. D. R. Anderson, "The Insurgents of I 81I," American Historical Association, Annual Report, Vol. I ( 1911) , p . 167; Howard T» Lewis, "A Re-Analysis of the Causes of the War of l8l2." Americana, Vol.

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