Hartford Convention - Negative Reception

Negative Reception

The Democratic-Republican Congress would never have recommended any of New England's proposals for ratification. Hartford delegates intended for them to embarrass the President and the Republicans in Congress—and also to serve as a basis for negotiations between New England and the rest of the country.

Some delegates may have been in favor of New England's secession from the United States, and forming an independent republic, though no such resolution was adopted at the convention. Historian Samuel Eliot Morison rejected the notion that Hartford was an attempt to take New England out of the Union and give treasonous aid and comfort to Britain. Morison wrote, "Democratic politicians, seeking a foil to their own mismanagement of the war and to discredit the still formidable Federalist party, caressed and fed this infant myth until it became so tough and lusty as to defy both solemn denials and documentary proof."

After the convention Massachusetts sent three commissioners to Washington, D.C. to negotiate for the terms that had been agreed. By the time they arrived in February 1815, news of Andrew Jackson's overwhelming victory at the Battle of New Orleans, and the signing of the Treaty of Ghent, preceded them and, consequently, their presence in the capital seemed both ludicrous and subversive. They quickly returned. Thereafter, both Hartford Convention and Federalist Party became synonymous with disunion, secession, and treason, especially in the South. The party was ruined, and ceased to be a significant force in national politics, although in a few places (notably Massachusetts, where Federalists were elected governor annually until 1823) it retained some power.