Some very important questions con nected with the law of blockade were brought into discussion in the course of the last war by the Berlin decree of Bonaparte and the orders of the king of Great Britain in council.
The Berlin decree, which was issued on the 21st of November, 1806, declared the whole of the British islands in a state of blockade, and all vessels, of whatever country, trading to them, liable to be cap tured by the ships of France. It also shut out all British vessels and produce both from France and from all the other countries then subject to the authority of the French emperor. By a subsequent decree, issued soon after in aid of this, all neutral vessels were required to carry what were called letters or certificates of origin, that is, attestations from the French consuls of the ports from which they had set out, that no part of their cargo was British. This was the revival of an expedient which had been first re sorted to by the Directory in 1796. There can be no question as to the invalidity of this blockade, according to the recognised principles of the law of nations : the essential circumstance of a good blockade, namely, the presence of a force sufficient to maintain it, was here entirely wanting. And it is proper also to state that a certain representation of the nature of the decree, much insisted upon by some of the writers and pamph leteers in the course of the subsequent discussions, with the view of mitigating its absurdity and violence, that is to say, that it was never attempted to be en forced, is now well known not to have been strictly correct. Many vessels of neutrals were actually captured and con demned by the French courts, in con formity with it, during the first few months which followed its promulgation.
The first step in resistance to the Ber lin decree was taken by Great Britain on the 7th of January, 1807, while the Whig ministry of which Mr. Fox had been the head was still in office, by an order in council subjecting to seizure all neutral vessels trading from one hostile port in Europe to another with property belong ing to an enemy. This order, however, is said to have been extensively evaded ; while, at the same time, new efforts began to be made by the French emperor to enforce the Berlin decree. It is admitted that in the course of the months of Sep tember and October, 1807, several neutral vessels were captured for violation of that decree ; that a considerable alarm was excited among the mercantile classes in this country by these acts of violence ; that the premium of insurance rose ; and that some suspension of trade took place.
(See Edin. Rev.' vol. xiv. p. 442, &c.) It is contended by the supporters of the British orders in council, that the effect of the Berlin decree upon the commerce of this country during the months of August, September, and October in par ticular, was most severely felt. (See Mr. Stephen's 'Speech.') In these circumstances the British go vernment, at the head of which Mr. Perceval now was, issued further orders in council, dated the 1 1 th and 21st of November, 1807. These new orders declared France and all its tributary states to be in a state of blockade, and all vessels subject to seizure which were either found to have certificates of origin on board, or which should attempt to trade with any of the parts of the world thus blockaded. All neutral vessels, in tended for France or any other hostile country, were ordered in all cases to touch first at some British port, and to pay custom-dues there, after which they were, in certain cases, to be allowed to depart to their destination. In all cases, in like manner, vessels clearing out from a hos tile port were, before proceeding farther on their voyage, to touch at a British port.
The predicament in which neutral countries were placed by this war of edicts was sufficiently embarrassing. The effect of the recent British orders in coun cil is thus distinctly stated by a writer in the Edinburgh Review,' vol. xii. p. 229 :—" Taken in combination with the Berlin decree, they interdict the whole foreign trade of all neutral nations ; they prohibit everything which that decree had allowed ; and they enjoin those very things which are there made a ground of confiscation." By a subsequent decree, issued by Bo naparte from Milan on the 27th of De cember, 1807, the British dominions in all quarters of the world were declared to be in a state of blockade, and all countries were prohibited from trading with each other in any articles produced or manufactured in the parts of the earth :hus put under a ban. Various additional orders in council were also promulgated from time to time, in explanation or slight modification of those last men tioned.