ual, I certainly did not think well of these measures. It
appeared to me that the embargo annoyed ourselves as much as our
enemies, while it destroyed the business and cramped the spirits of the
people. In this opinion I may have been right or wrong, but the
gentleman was himself of the same opinion. He told us the other day, as
a proof of his independence of party on great questions, that he
differed with his friends on the subject of the embargo. He was
decidedly and unalterably opposed to it. It furnishes in his judgment,
therefore, no imputation either on my patriotism, or on the soundness of
my political opinions, that I was opposed to it also. I mean opposed in
opinion; for I was not in Congress, and had nothing to do with the act
creating the embargo. And as to opposition to measures for carrying on
the war, after I came into Congress, I again say, let the gentleman
specify; let him lay his finger on any thing calling for an answer, and
he shall have an answer.

Mr. President, you were yourself in the House during a considerable part
of this time. The honorable gentleman may make a witness of you. He may
make a witness of anybody else. He may be his own witness. Give us but
some fact, some charge, something capable in itself either of being
proved or disproved. Prove any thing, state any thing, not consistent
with honorable and patriotic conduct, and I am ready to answer it. Sir,
I am glad this subject has been alluded to in a manner which justifies
me in taking public notice of it; because I am well aware that, for ten
years past, infinite pains has been taken to find something, in the
range of these topics, which might create prejudice against me in the
country. The journals have all been pored over, and the reports
ransacked, and scraps of paragraphs and half-sentences have been
collected, fraudulently put together, and then made to flare out as if
there had been some discovery. But all this failed. The next resort was
to supposed correspondence. My letters were sought for, to learn if, in
the confidence of private friendship, I had ever said any thing which an
enemy could make use of. With this view, the vicinity of my former
residence has been searched, as with a lighted candle. New Hampshire has
been explored, from the mouth of the Merrimack to the White Hills. In
one instance a gentleman had left the State, gone five hundred miles
off, and died. His papers were examined; a letter was found, and I have
unde