Essex Decision

Essex Decision, decision rendered by the British High Court of Admiralty in 1804 and confirmed the following year, which contributed to the bad feeling between the United States and Great Britain that eventually led to the War of 1812. Britain and France were at war, and the American merchant vessel Essex had been captured by the British while transporting goods from the French West Indies to France. Because U.S. merchant vessels were forbidden by the British to carry cargo directly between the French colonies and France, American ships evaded this prohibition by interrupting the voyage with a stop at an American port. The court, citing a precedent of 1756, disallowed the legality of this practice and ruled that such a stop did not constitute an interruption of the voyage. The British were thus given broader legal sanction for action against neutral ships trading with France.