on merchant vessels at sea gave like security and she asserted a naval
right to search such vessels in time of peace, professing her complete
acquiescence in a like right to the American navy over British merchant
vessels--a concession refused by America, and of no practical value
since no American citizen sought service in the British merchant marine.

This "right of search" controversy involved then, two basic points of
opposition between the two governments. First America contested the
British theory of "once a citizen always a citizen[5]"; second, America
denied any right whatever to a foreign naval vessel in _time of peace_
to stop and search a vessel lawfully flying the American flag. The
_right of search in time of war_, that is, a belligerent right of
search, America never denied, but there was both then and later much
public confusion in both countries as to the question at issue since,
once at war, Great Britain frequently exercised a legal belligerent
right of search and followed it up by the seizure of sailors alleged to
be British subjects. Nor were British naval captains especially careful
to make sure that no American-born sailors were included in their
impressment seizures, and as the accounts spread of victim after victim,
the American irritation steadily increased. True, France was also an
offender, but as the weaker naval power her offence was lost sight of in
view of the, literally, thousands of _bona fide_ Americans seized by
Great Britain. Here, then, was a third cause of irritation connected
with impressment, though not a point of governmental dispute as to
right, for Great Britain professed her earnest desire to restore
promptly any American-born sailors whom her naval officers had seized
through error. In fact many such sailors were soon liberated, but a
large number either continued to serve on British ships or to languish
in British prisons until the end of the Napoleonic Wars[6].