for the present, to confine my observations to the important question of
free bottoms making free goods. It was with the utmost astonishment that
I heard the doctrine advanced on this floor, that such a provision, if
admitted, would prove injurious to America, inasmuch as in case of war
between this country and any other nation, the goods of that nation
might be protected by the English flag. It is not to a state of war that
the benefits of this provision would extend; but it is the only security
which neutral nations can have against the legal plundering on the high
seas, so often committed by belligerent powers. It is not for the sake
of protecting an enemy's property; it is not for the sake of securing an
advantageous carrying trade; but it is in order effectually to secure
ourselves against sea aggressions, that this provision is necessary.
Spoliations may arise from unjust orders, given by the government of a
belligerent nation to their officers and cruisers, and these may be
redressed by application to and negotiation with that order. But no
complaints, no negotiations, no orders of government itself, can give
redress when those spoliations are grounded on a supposition, that the
vessels of the neutral nation have an enemy's property on board, as long
as such property is not protected by the flag of the neutral nation; as
long as it is liable to be captured, it is not sufficient, in order to
avoid detention and capture, to have no such property on board. Every
privateer, under pretence that he suspects an enemy's goods to be part
of a cargo, may search, vex, and capture a vessel; and if in any corner
of the dominions of the belligerent power, a single judge can be found
inclined, if not determined, to condemn, at all events, before his
tribunal, all vessels so captured will be brought there, and the same
pretence which caused the capture will justify a condemnation. The only
nation who persists in the support of this doctrine, as making part of
the law of nations, is the first maritime power of Europe, whom their
interest, as they are the strongest, and as there is hardly a maritime