War On Britain In 1812 example essay topic

413 words
What led Americans to declare war on Britain in 1812? For more than five years, tensions had grown between the United States and European nations. After years of failed negotiations, some Americans decided it was time for a war. Americans claimed that their right to trade and use the sea was violated by Great Britain. American ships were being seized, cargoes were stolen, and sailors had been kidnapped.

Great Britain was in clear violation of the rights of America's use of the sea. The only option other than a war would be to completely stop trading with European nations, which would completely cripple our economy. American complaints went unheard for years bringing us close to war. (Documents 1, 2, and 4) Some people were not in favor of war. Certain people believed that the war was not in defense of our rights on the seas, but for greed of land.

A war with Britain could truly be greed for the land north of us, Canada. People were against the war because of this reason. (Document 3) Now Americans were in defense of their own rights. A reason for the war would be too demonstrate to the world that we were united as one group of people. We wanted to show that our government was prepared to assert our rights. This was for the interest of the people, and to eliminate all foreign aggression.

People were anxious to show our power to the British. (Document 7) The nation was divided when it came to going to war. According to the House of representatives vote on June 4, 1812, Most of northern states (NY, NJ, ME, MA, CT, RI, VT, and NH) were opposed to war. While all states south of Pennsylvania were overwhelmingly in favor of war. This was again the case during the presidential election of 1812, when President Madison just narrowly defeated Federalist DeWitt Clinton. It was obvious the Democratic-Republicans were in favor of the war, as the Federalists were unanimously opposed.

(Documents 5, 6, and 8) President Madison declared war in congress on June 1, 1812. It took time for congress to approve the war, but finally they did. After years of violating America's rights to use the seas, Britain was defeated in the war of 1812. America finally was able to use the seas freely.