War Hawks Dbq

Due to tensions with Great Britain, the United States declared war in 1812, giving form to a war that had been building for years. Though the war was between Great Britain and the United States, France also played a part in building up to this war. It started as Britain and France went to war and didn’t want the US to be trading with their enemy. Subsequently, France captured ships headed to Britain and the British captured ships heading towards France, impressing sailors to fight in the war. Congress, persuaded by Jefferson, passed the Embargo act and later the Nonintercourse Act, which blocked off trade from France and Britain. Later, the United States had problems with Indians, who Britain helped, supplying them with weapons and ammo, once again, making the tension rise. Taking a daring chance, the US declared they would stop the shipments and trade with the warring nation, if France or Britain (depending on who stopped first) stopped capturing their ships. Napoleon declared that France would respect the US’

War Hawks were the main demographic in Congress that wanted war for a variation of reasons. They brought up a possibly to expand the United States’ territory as they wanted to take over Florida from Spain and Canada from the British. The War Hawks were into the idea of nationalism as they had a very prideful of their country. As such, they wanted to have retribution for the capture of American ships, seeing it as an insult to America’s rights. Others such as John Randolph of Virginia, were against the War Hawk’s ideology. They thought that the people would disapprove due to repercussions such as taxes. Fear also played a part as they feared that the British would attack the ports they blockaded, possibly damaging trade and ergo, the economy. However, it didn’t matter in the end as President Madison sided with the War Hawks, asking Congress to declare