Essential Facts
Background
- Britain and France were at war with each other during the Napoleonic Wars.
- They were using blockades and trade embargoes to disrupt each other’s trade with foreign nations, such as the United States.
- Britain used Orders in Council, while Napoleon Bonaparte, the French Emperor, used the Continental System.
- The U.S. used economic sanctions to try to protect its trading rights.
Napoleon’s Unofficial Offer to the United States
- The Cadore Letter was issued on August 5, 1810, by Jean-Baptiste Nompère de Champagny, the Duke of Cadore, by order of Napoleon.
- Napoleon hoped to convince the U.S. to distract Britain from its war with France.
- It was received by John Armstrong Jr., the United States Minister to France.
- Napoleon offered to repeal the Berlin Decree and the Milan Decree if Britain dropped the Orders in Council that restricted trade with France.
- The letter was unofficial, so there was no guarantee the offer included in the letter would be upheld.
President Madison’s Response
- President James Madison responded to the Cadore Letter on November 2, 1810.
- He announced France was ending its Decrees, and Britain had three months to drop the Orders in Council. If Britain, the U.S. would reopen trade with France and reinstate the trade embargo against Britain.
- Madison did this without proof that Napoleon had stopped enforcing restrictions on American ships.
- Madison hoped to regain influence within the Democratic-Republican Party because it favored relations with France over Britain.
French Harassment Continues
- The Cadore Letter failed to change French policy toward American ships.
- Napoleon did not drop the Decrees.
- By December 1810, French ships were still harassing American ships.
- Napoleon likely used the letter to create economic pressure on Great Britain.
- The same day Madison announced his response to the Cadore Letter, France sold some of the American ships it had seized.
Additional Details
- Britain refused to rescind the Orders in Council.
- On November 2, 1801, Madison announced the U.S. would reinstate a trade embargo against Britain in 90 days.
- Federalists used the situation to increase criticism of President Madison, and Democratic-Republicans increased their call for war.
- Madison pointed to the letter as an example of European corruption, feeling Napoleon had intentionally misled him.
Significance
The Cadore Letter is important to American History because it contributed to the tensions between the United States and Great Britain that led to the War of 1812. Some historians believe Napoleon used the letter to trick President James Madison into supporting the Continental System and France’s economic sanctions against Britain.
Cadore Letter Text (Primary Document)
The Duke of Cadore to General Armstrong. Paris, August 5, 1810.
Sir:
I have laid before His Majesty, the Emperor and King, the act of Congress of the 1st of May, taken from the Gazette of the United States, which you have sent to me.
His Majesty could have wished that this act, and all the other acts of the Government of the United States, which interest France, had always been officially made known to him. In general, he has only had a knowledge of them indirectly, and after a long interval of time. There have resulted from this delay serious inconveniences, which would not have existed if these acts had been promptly and officially communicated.
The Emperor had applauded the general embargo laid by the United States on all their vessels, because that measure, if it has been prejudicial to France, had in it at least nothing offensive to her honor. It has cause her to lose her colonies of Martinique, Guadaloupe, and Cayenne; the Emperor has not complained of it. He has made this sacrifice to the principle which had determined the Americans to lay the embargo, inspiring them with the noble resolution of interdicting to themselves the ocean, rather than to submit to the laws of those who wished to make themselves the tyrants of it.
The act of the 1st March has raised the embargo, and substituted for it a measure the most injurious of France.
This act, of which the Emperor knew nothing until very lately, interdicted to American vessels the commerce of France, at the time it authorized that to Spain, Naples, and Holland, that is to say, the countries under French influence, and denounced confiscation against all French vessels which should enter the ports of America. Reprisal was a right, and commanded by the dignity of France, a circumstance on which it was impossible to make a compromise. The sequestration of all American vessels in France has been the necessary consequence of the measure taken by Congress.
Now Congress retrace their steps, they revoke the act of the 1st of March; the ports of America are open to French commerce, and France is no longer interdicted to the Americans; in short, Congress engages to oppose itself to that of one of the Belligerent Powers which should refuse to acknowledge the rights of neutrals.
In this new state of things, I am authorized to declare to you, sir, that the decrees of Berlin and Milan are revoked, and that after the 1st of November they shall cease to have effect; it being understood that, in consequence of this declaration, the English shall revoke their orders in council, and renounce the new principles of blockade, which they have wished to establish; or that the United States, conformably to the act you have just communicated, shall cause their rights to be respected by the English.
It is with the most particular satisfaction, sir, that I make known to you this determination of the Emperor. His Majesty loves the Americans. Their prosperity and their commerce are within the scope of his policy.
The independence of America is one of the principal titles of glory to France. Since that epoch, the Emperor is pleased in aggrandizing the United States, and under all circumstances, that which can contribute to the independence, to the prosperity, and the liberty of the Americans, the Emperor will consider as conformable with the interests of his empire.
Accept, sir, the assurances of my high consideration,
CHAMPAGNY, DUKE DE CADORE.
His Excellency General Armstrong, &c.
Cadore Letter APUSH
The Cadore Letter is part of the following units, topics, and chapters in the AP US History curriculum:
Unit 4: 1800–1848
- Topic 4.4 — America on the World Stage
American Pageant Notes
- Chapter 11 — Triumphs and Travails of the Jeffersonian Republic (1800–1812)
- Chapter 12 — The Second War for Independence and the Upsurge of Nationalism (1812–1824)
American History Central
- Foreign Affairs in the New Nation
- War of 1812 — Causes of the War, Maritime Disputes
