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The speech was reported by newspapers throughout the nation. It led to Rush’s becoming an unofficial spokesman for the administration on behalf of the War of 1812, the causes of which were understood by the American public then about as well as they are today. Using the pen name of John Dickinson, Rush published an extensive series of articles justifying the war.3

On the same July 4 that Rush spoke before Congress and the president, an item appeared in the Charleston City Gazette speculating that America’s opening thrust in the War of 1812 would be an invasion of Upper Canada. The report explained that Upper Canada was bounded “by Hudson’s Bay [Company] in the 49th parallel of north latitude, extending due west indefinitely.” As early as 1812, then, the 49th parallel had surfaced as the Canadian-American border. In the American press, that is; not in the act of Parliament that had defined Canada. The 1774 Quebec Act had stipulated the southern border of Canada’s western region as being “the southern boundary of the territory granted to the Merchants Adventurers of England, trading to Hudson’s Bay.” The boundaries of the Hudson’s Bay Company had previously been stipulated in 1670 as being all the land within the drainage basin of Hudson Bay. That drainage basin, however, dips below the 49th parallel, while further west it ends north of the parallel. Just as important, mapmakers in 1774 did not know how far these tributaries extended. When the news article about Upper Canada appeared in 1812, more was known, but much remained uncertain.

Richard Rush (1780-1859) (photo credit 15.1)

Southern boundary (western end) of Hudson Bay watershed

These uncertainties intersected with Rush’s career when, after the War of 1812, President Monroe appointed him to be the ambassador to England, replacing John Quincy Adams, who was returning to become secretary of state. While awaiting the return of Adams from London, Rush served as acting secretary of state and negotiated the 1817 Rush-Bagot Convention, demilitarizing a key frontier between the United States and British North America (present-day Canada) by limiting the number of warships England and the United States could have on the Great Lakes.

The Rush-Bagot Convention boded well for Rush’s upcoming boundary negotiations. But upon Rush’s arrival in London, his endeavor to resolve differences with England did not get off to an easy start. Charles Bagot, the British ambassador to the United States with whom he had just negotiated, wrote disparagingly of one bridge-building effort by Rush:

It is not true that the New England states preserve the manners of old England at the time of their settlement to the degree that Rush thinks.… The real truth is there is very little similarity between the two people, and that little is becoming daily less.… All the young generation, nearly without exception, are of the Democratic Party, the creed of which being hatred of England, leads them to reject as much as they can what they conceive to be an England usage. And, let Rush say what he pleases … in the Southern States … the climate itself would soon induce a great change in English manners, customs, and feelings.4

Rush let such comments pass and focused on his goals, listing them in a paper he gave the British side. His list of eleven items provides insight into what is now the long straight line across most of the top of the United States. Item three was the “Northwestern boundary line,” and item four was the “Columbia River question.”5 Imperceptible on the map today, the long boundary along the 49th parallel resulted from two separate issues.

In undertaking his new responsibilities, Rush sought advice from a key Founding Father, former president John Adams. Adams had been a member of the delegation that negotiated and signed the Treaty of Paris ending the American Revolution in 1783. That treaty stipulated boundaries, fishing rights, and commerce—all of which were now back on the table for two reasons. Some of the issues came