Her people were starving because the vigilance of British cruisers had driven French cruisers from the seas, and no food could be imported.

To permit Americans to purvey food for the French colonies would clearly be to undo the good work of the British navy.
Obviously food was contraband of war.

So all English men-of-war were ordered to seize French goods on whatever ship found; to confiscate cargoes of wheat, corn, or fish bound for French ports as contraband, and particularly to board all American merchantmen and scrutinize the crews for English-born sailors.

The latter injunction was obeyed with peculiar zeal, so that the State Department had evidence that at one time, in 1806, there were as many as 6000 American seamen serving unwillingly in the British navy.
France, meanwhile, sought retaliation upon England at the expense of the Americans.

The United States, said the French government, is a sovereign nation.