One can claim that from their standpoint Canada won. But more important than any outcome with Canada was that other European countries had to accept that the USA was a real nation, would remain so, and had to be dealt with as such, not as a runaway British child. You refer to the British prewar attitude that their sailors could not stop being British simply by signing a paper in New York or Boston. No nation at that time thought one could do so. In fact the whole idea of an entirely new nation would have been weird to any European. they identified race with nationality just as Greece did at least until the last few decades. A Greek who took US citizenship (in my youth at least) dared not return to Greece until he was past the age when he could be drafted. After all, how can someone whose ethnicity is Greek from time immemorial stop being Greek by signing a paper. That was a really novel American idea that the War of 1812 confirmed. On the world stage it was the most important result.
What column is this based on?
Looks like http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/3203/did-canada-win-the-war-of-1812. “Did Canada win the War of 1812?”
In response to the thread title, yeah, pretty much. Canada was recognized as its own self, which led to it becoming a proper dominion later. And we stopped invading it, pretty much.
Posting this. My daughter LOVES it and during that unit in Social Studies I heard it several times a day
GGGGGreat Grandad commanded US Navy forces at the Battle of Lake Champlain, so I’ve always been in favor (favour?) of annexing Canada. Or Canada annexing me. Either is cool.
Previous threads that may be of interest:
Nothing to add, but I had taken my family to Toronto last week, and visited Fort York.
It was odd to hear of the US as the “Bad Guys”. Fang, showing all the accumulated wisdom of a newly-minted thirteen year old, had to be reminded that we were guests in their country, and that chanting U-S-A was a Bad Idea[sup]TM[/sup].
My favorite War of 1812 legend:
The Yanks invading York found what they thought was a “scalp” taken from an American by natives allied with the British, located in a prominent place inside the parliament buildings; this fueled their rage at the British supporting ‘atrocities’, so they burned Parliament to the ground, and fire-raised around the city (this later inspired the Brits to, famously, burn the White House in revenge).
In reality it was: the Speaker’s wig! 
The story may be a legend, but it is repeated in many sources:
Though it may have been a judge’s wig, and not the speaker’s:
http://www.revparl.ca/english/issue.asp?param=212&art=1489
If the legend is true, that is surely the most bizarre misunderstanding of all time.
Canada was the first foreign country the US invaded, in 1775, with a goal of conquest. Then again in 1812, burning down one of the colonial capitals as an act of war.
Je me souviens.
I’m not saying it was undeserved, just every battlefield I’d ever visited had been in the US.
One thing that did strike me about Fort York was how incredibly respectful the exhibits were to members of both armies.
Basically - I’d like to send more time in Toronto, if only to spend more time in the ROM.
While visiting the Ontario legislature this weekend, we saw the parliamentary mace which was taken by American troops during their raid. It was returned by FDR in 1934 as a friendly gesture.
Did they ever give back the “scalp”?
Everybody won the war if 1812.
America burnt down York, now Toronto. (Winning!)
Later t’he Canadians/First Nations repelled the Americans, holding our border (winning!)
Having dealt with Napolean, the British had troops to spare to join in and retaliate on Washington, burning down the White House. (Winning!)
The Americans managed to hold New Orleans, in later important battles. (Winning!)
America was still a very young country with no standing army or war funding. The local militias often fled when they realized the Indians were fighting along side the Canadians. They’d been subjected to a campaign to fear and shoot natives on sight, by the US government wishing the west to be opened.
Funding was provided by the wealthy St Lawence valley farmers, with the proviso they not wage the war in their valley, thwarting several natural geographic spots where they might have cut off supply lines and turned fates.
The people who lost the war of 1812 were the First Nations people’s of Canada, they were promised things by the Canadians/British solders on the ground that the crown felt no need whatsoever to honour. To do so might make them equals, peers, partners.
Their betrayal of the natives, like the burning of York, helped galvanize this country together, upon a mutual distrust of the crown, and a precarious Union of settlers, soldiers, natives, French, English and former Americans too!
A couple of other American scores were:[ul]
[li]proving that, ton for ton, US ships were actually better,[/li][li]holding off the RN at Baltimore, and[/li][li]getting most of what we wanted, anyway, as a result of Waterloo.[/li][/ul]
By the way, don’t forget that the Americans also burned Niagara-on-the-Lake. Niagara-on-the-Lake hasn’t forgotten. (On the other hand, some years back I saw an open-air performance of The Devil’s Disciple at Fort George, so I guess all is forgiven—except on the historic signs, plaques, etc.)
Hadn’t heard about the “scalp” before now, and it wasn’t mentioned on our tour.
I assume it is a sort of urban legend, though it gets repeated so frequently it is probably a very early one.
But I think it is very funny. 
If it is true, at least arguably the “scalp” set in train the events that led to the White House being burned …
Way I see it the Brits and the Yanks proved to each other’s satisfaction that neither could beat the other decisively, at least with the sort of efforts they were willing to make. However, the Brits didn’t start it and didn’t really want to beat the Yanks, so that realization was a Brit victory. The alleged causes of the war were a mixed bag - naval impressment, gaining Canada, removing impediments to the Yanks crushing the natives, etc. - some of which would have happened anyway without war (naval impressment), and some of which (notably, gaining Canada) never happened - so in terms of war aims, the Yanks got the worse of the bargain.
The real outcomes of the war had nothing to do with who won or lost it. Rather, they were at least the following:
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Creation of Canadian nationalism, which prior to that hadn’t really existed: there was Quebec nationalism to be sure, but English Canadians variously viewed themselves more as Brits or Yanks (many in Ontario were from the US).
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Convinced the Brits, Canucks and Yanks never to have a redo. The whole ‘reciprocal burning of cities’ thing was a horrific ordeal that no-one wanted to repeat; the fact neither side could win easily (the Yanks had expected support from the Canadian population which they didn’t get - particularly after burning a couple of Canadian cities) convinced everyone it was a bad idea. Other than the Fenian nonsense, it hasn’t been repeated. This was important later during the Civil War - the Brits may otherwise have been tempted to interfere (the South sure hoped they would).
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The big losers were the native population. Convincing the Brits that war was a fundamentally bad idea under any circumstances undermined any support for their plight that was likely to come from the Brits. The Yanks gleefully dispossessed them while the Brits tactfully looked the other way.
The simplest answer is it was a draw, with both the New World states coming away with things that were a lot more important to them long term than to Britain. The post-war result and the peace treaty were basically returns to Status Quo Ante.
What I call the “myth” of Canada winning is largely based on the story that the War of 1812 was about American trying to invade and conquer Canada. The failed invasion during the American Revolution, under Benedict Arnold, was an actual attempt to “liberate” Canada and bring it into the Patriot fold. At very best the U.S. under Madison (and there are documented records of this) was the belief that America could seize Canada and use it as a bargaining chip to get British agreements on shipping, border forts and etc. There was essentially no ability for America to integrate an entity like Canada by force into the United States, there just wasn’t a real mechanism for it or even capability for it given the supremely tiny Federal government of 1812. Most State militias (which were the bulk of America’s fighting force) were not willing to leave their state to defend against British armies in 1812, so it’s unimaginable they’d be willing to deploy to Canada for a permanent occupation.
America’s attempted seizure of Canada as a tactical war aim failed, but that wasn’t why the war happened.
The “myth” on the American side, very strong for many years (even right after the war) was that this was a “second war of independence” and that Britain was seeking to reconquer the colonies. While a few hardliners in Britain may have felt that way, the Brits were in a similar situation to us vis-a-vis Canada, they had already tried to hold us against our will and it was extremely costly and caused severe economic problems back home–and ended up being deeply unpopular. There are actually parallels (in 18th century form) with the British home front during the Revolution and the American home front during the Vietnam war.
Britain disliked American neutrality in this era because it tacitly benefited France/Napoleon to have access to American trade. That was the main reason for the antagonism of the Americans up to 1812. Once we declared war, Britain mostly just wanted to slap us down and shut us up without distracting them from the much larger European war.
The Revolution was a significant issue in Britain and caused the fall of several prime ministers and a series of domestic crises; the war of 1812 was essentially nothing, even as it was being fought, from the British perspective (due to the ongoing war with Napoleon.)
The not unreasonable notion in America was that Canada wasn’t going to need “occupation”, because many English Canadians were, in fact, from America already and likely to join voluntarily; and French Canada was of course a British conquest, and so would be glad to join the US.
The notion wasn’t that the US was aiming to subdue and occupy an enemy population, but rather, that the US was going to drive off the English Redcoats & fleet who were artificially holding Canadians - French and English - from “naturally” joining the US.
Hence Thomas Jefferson wrote:
http://www.napoleon-series.org/military/Warof1812/2010/Issue13/c_Jefferson.html
Given these assumptions, there was no need for a “permanent occupation” and so lack of ability to accomplish that feat wasn’t an important consideration. The English were to be driven out of their weakly held positions (a “mere matter of marching”) and then “finally” expelled from North America.
Naturally, these war aims proved impossible during the course of the war - mostly because the war itself caused exactly the type of hostility between the populations that this war aim overlooked: as it turned out, burning and looting were not compatible with popular support.
In short, before the war there was (arguably) an “America” and a “British-occupied part of the American Continent”. After the War, and largely as a result of the War, there was an “America” and a “Canada”. While it was clearly impossible for “America” to have occupied a “Canada” given the military resources of 1812, it was not impossible for “America” to expand into the “British-occupied part of the American Continent”, merely by turfing out the British Army: and that was what was originally planned.