Freedom of Trade (1810-11)

The Non-intercourse Act now also had to be dropped. Its place was taken on May 1, 1810, by a third law, which was intended to give the belligerents a period of grace within which they might amend their ways, but at the same time to play out the one who did so against his still obdurate antagonist. It was laid down that, if either of the two countries, Great Britain and France, rescinded her regulations before March 3, 1811, but the other country did not follow the example within three months, the President might by proclamation put into force against the latter country the principal provisions of the Non-intercourse Act. For the moment, therefore, trade was free with all countries and consequently grew apace during the year 1810. However, this did not hold good of the colonial carrying trade, which had largely dropped out of American hands, not only, or perhaps not even principally, because of the Continental decrees and the Orders in Council, but also in consequence of the military events themselves, in that at first the insurrection in Spain in 1808 and afterwards the capture of the French colonies in 1809-10, put the British themselves in a position to take over the trade in almost anything that could be called colonial goods. The trade that did grow apace, therefore, was especially imports and also all trade in the products of the United States, chiefly the sale of raw cotton to Great Britain and of grain to the combatants in the Iberian peninsula; but this is of comparatively little interest from our present point of view.