The American Navy was but a puny adversary for the British Navy, which had captured or shut up in port all the other navies of Europe. But the small number of American vessels, with the superabundance of trained officers, gave them one great advan tage: the training and discipline of the men, and the equipment of the vessels, had been brought to the very highest point. "The art of handling and fighting the old broadside sailing frigate" had been carried in the little American Navy to an excellence which unvarying success and a tendency to fleet-combats had now made far less common among British captains. Altogether the Amer ican vessels gave a remarkably good account of themselves.
The home dislike to the war had increased steadily with the evidence of incompetent management by the administration. The Federalists, who had always desired a navy, pointed to the naval successes as the best proof of folly with which the war had been undertaken. New England Feder alists complained that the Federal Government utterly neglected the defence of their coast, and that southern influence was far too strong in national affairs. They showed at every opportunity a disposition to adopt the furthest stretch of State sovereignty, as stated in the Kentucky resolutions; and every such development urged the national democracy unconsciously further on the road to nationality. When the New England States sent delegates to meet at Hartford (Conn.), and consider their grievances and the best remedies, treason was suspected, and a readiness to suppress it by force was plainly shown. The recommendations of the con vention came to nothing; but the attitude of the dominant party towards it is one of the symptoms of the manner in which the trials of actual war were steadily reconciling democracy and nationality. The object which Hamilton had sought by high tariffs and the development of national classes had been attained by more natural and healthy means.
In April, 1814, the first abdication of Napoleon took place, and Great Britain was able to give more attention to her American antagonist. The main attack was to be made on Louisi ana, the weakest and most distant portion of the Union. A fleet and army were sent thither, but the British assault was com pletely repulsed (Jan. 8, 1815) by the Americans under Andrew Jackson. Peace had been made at Ghent 15 days before the battle was fought, but the news of the battle and the peace reached Washington almost together.
The United States secured a fairly good treaty. It is true that it said not a word about the questions of impressment, search and neutral rights, the grounds of the war ; Great Britain did not abandon her position on any of them. But everybody knew that circumstances had changed. The new naval power whose frigates alone in the past 20 years had shown their ability to fight English frigates on equal terms was not likely to be troubled in future with the question of impressment ; and in fact, while not renouncing the right, the British Government no longer at tempted to enforce it.
The remainder of this period is one of the barrenest in American history. The opposition of the Federalist Party to the war completed the measure of its un popularity, and it had only a perfunctory existence for a few years longer. Scandal, intrigue and personal criticism became the most marked characteristics of American politics until the dominant party broke at the end of the period, and real party conflict was renewed. But the seeds of the final disruption are visible from the peace of 1814. The old-fashioned Republicans looked with intense suspicion on the new form of Republicanism generated by the war, a type which instinctively bent its energies toward the further development of national power. Clay was the natural leader of the new Democracy; but John Quincy Adams and others of Federalist antecedents or leanings took to the new doctrines kindly; and even Calhoun, Crawford and others of the southern interest were at first strongly inclined to support them. One of the first effects was the revival of protection and of a national bank.
The charter of the national bank had expired in 1811, and the dominant party had refused to recharter it. The attempt to carry on the war by loans resulted in almost a bankruptcy and in a complete inability to act efficiently. As soon as peace gave time for consideration, a second bank was chartered (April io, 1816) for 20 years with a capital of $35,000,000, one fifth of which was to be subscribed for by the national Govern ment. It was to have the custody of the Government revenues, but the secretary of the Treasury could divert the revenues to other custodians, giving his reasons for such action to Congress.