Hartford Convention

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The Hartford Convention was a gathering of Federalist Party delegates from five New England states that met in Hartford, Connecticut, between December 15, 1814, and January 5, 1815. Its members convened to discuss their long-held grievances against the policies of the successive Democratic-Republican administrations of Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. But its immediate cause was Madison's conduct of the War of 1812 with Great Britain. Delegates also met to propose changes in government policies and structures that would deal with their concerns.

By the summer of 1814, the prosecution of the war with Britain, which had never gone well to begin with, reached its low point. In August as British troops burned the city of Washington, President Madison was forced to flee. Then, having defeated Napoleon in Europe, Britain began to move troops to North America for a major offensive and blockaded the east coast of the United States. In September, the British invaded New York State from the north and occupied much of Maine.

To make matters worse, the federal government was on the edge of bankruptcy. Seeking to prevent smuggling, Congress had enacted a coastal trade embargo, which not only depressed the economy but reduced federal revenues. The administration was also considering nationalizing the state militias, including those of the New England states. New England Federalists believed they had ample grounds to protest policies that put their region's security and interests at stake.

As usual, Massachusetts Federalists took the lead in seeking a political solution to their region's distress. Massachusetts governor Caleb Strong called the General Court (the state's legislature) into special session in early September to consider measures that "the present dangerous state of public affairs may render expedient." Party moderates turned back proposals for extreme actions, such as prohibiting the collection in Massachusetts of federal customs duties. This illegal act would have qualified as nullification—a refusal to implement federal law. Instead, the legislature adopted a call for a meeting of delegates from New England to prepare the region's defense, promote a "radical reform" in the federal Constitution, and take other measures "not repugnant to their obligations as members of the union."

The Hartford Convention, like the earlier Continental Congress, was an extralegal (that is, not regulated by law), not illegal, gathering. It opened with twenty-six delegates, only three of whom, elected by Federalist meetings in Vermont and New Hampshire counties, were popularly elected. The rest were experienced political figures appointed by their state legislatures and disinclined to take radical measures.

Like the meetings of the Constitutional Convention of 1787, the Hartford Convention's meetings were held in secret, a circumstance that has since kept alive speculation that its members contemplated breaking away from the union. But all evidence points to measured proceedings under the leadership of Massachusetts elder statesman George Cabot. No expressions of disloyalty or treasonous intent mar the convention's official record. The convention's final report, written by Harrison Gray Otis, also of Massachusetts, was moderate. The report assailed conditions that had reduced New England's national influence and rendered the region without security. To substantiate its charges, the report cited the following grievances: the admission of new states in the trans-Appalachian West; the Constitution's three-fifths clause, which gave the South extra representation in Congress; the easy naturalization of immigrants; the administration's patronage policies favoring the South and West; and the conscription of state militias for prosecution of a failing war. The report went on to urge Congress to authorize each state to defend itself and to rebate federal tax revenues to the states for that purpose. Significantly, it did not endorse the nullification of federal laws. Instead, the report argued that such an extreme measure was justifiable, "especially in time of war," only by "absolute necessity." But it is worth noting that the idea was thus not entirely dismissed.

To give teeth to its views, the Convention proposed seven constitutional amendments to address New England's situation. The first, to reduce the South's advantage in Congress, would have counted only the free white population but none of the slaves in apportioning congressional representation and federal direct taxes. Others would have required a two-thirds vote in Congress for the admission of new states, the passage of embargoes, and declarations of war. One would have limited embargoes to sixty days. Another would have barred from Congress and other national offices all nonnative-born citizens (who were thought to favor the opposition party overwhelmingly). And a seventh, aimed at the presidency's "Virginia Dynasty," would have prohibited successive elections of presidents from the same state. Well received by Federalists throughout the nation, the report was officially adopted by the governments of Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island and conveyed to Washington, D.C.

Yet even as the Convention met, American diplomats were concluding peace with Great Britain at Ghent, Belgium. Then in early January 1815, shortly after the Convention had adjourned, Andrew Jackson's forces decisively defeated British regulars at New Orleans. When Americans learned in mid-February of both events, they ridiculed the Convention's actions. The Federalist Party never recovered.

The Hartford Convention, an institutionalized partisan expression of people's grievances, had, and retains, wide significance. As the first concerted expression of opposition to war under the Constitution (and during the first full-scale war fought under that Constitution), it originated and gave legitimacy to a long American tradition of antiwar sentiment and pressure. It revealed how responsible leaders, during war as well as peace, can steer rebellious inclinations into constitutional channels. It raised serious questions about the responsibility of government to all people, regions, and interests, especially with regard to their military security. Its proposal to end the counting of three-fifths of the South's slaves in apportioning the House of Representatives bore fruit finally with Union victory in the Civil War. On the other hand, and most ominously, the Hartford Convention, even while shying away from any talk or threat of disunion, gave added force to notions of interposition (putting the sovereignty of states ahead of that of the federal government) and nullification. These ideas gained enough currency in the South by 1861 to help justify secession.

Embargo; Federalist Party; Fourth of July; War of 1812.

Banner, James M., Jr. To the Hartford Convention: The Federalists and the Origins of Party Politics in Massachusetts, 1789–1815. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1970.

Stagg, J. C. A. Madison's War: Politics, Diplomacy, and Warfare in the Early American Republic, 1783–1830. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1983.

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