Econlib

The Library

Other Sites

 Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow TO SECRETARY LIVINGSTON. - The Works of John Adams, vol. 8 (Letters and State Papers 1782-1799)

Return to Title Page for The Works of John Adams, vol. 8 (Letters and State Papers 1782-1799)

Search this Title:

Also in the Library:

Subject Area: Political Theory
Topic: The American Revolution and Constitution

TO SECRETARY LIVINGSTON. - John Adams, The Works of John Adams, vol. 8 (Letters and State Papers 1782-1799) [1853]

Edition used:

The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: with a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations, by his Grandson Charles Francis Adams (Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1856). 10 volumes. Vol. 8.

Part of: The Works of John Adams, 10 vols.

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


TO SECRETARY LIVINGSTON.

Paris, 11 November, 1782.

Sir,—

On my first arrival at Paris, I found my colleagues engaged in conferences with Mr. Oswald. They had been before chiefly conducted by Mr. Jay, Dr. Franklin having been mostly confined for three months by a long and painful illness. At this time, however, he was so much better, although still weak and lame, as to join us in most of the subsequent conferences, and we were so constantly engaged, forenoon, afternoon, and evening, that I had not been out to Versailles nor anywhere else.

On Saturday last, the Marquis de Lafayette called upon me, and told me he had been to Versailles, and the Count de Vergennes had said to him, that he had been informed by the returns of the police that I was in Paris, but not officially, and he should take it well if I would come to see him. I went out to dine with Dr. Franklin the same day, who had just returned from delivering his memorial, and repeated to me the same message. I said to both, I would go the next morning; and accordingly on Sunday, the 9th, I went to make my court to his Excellency.

He received me politely, and asked me questions about our progress. I answered him, that the English minister appeared to me to divide with us upon ostensible points; that I still doubted his intentions to make a universal peace; that the cry of the nation was for something to be done or said with the American ministers, and to satisfy this, the King of Great Britain had been advised to be the third power in Europe to acknowledge our independence. As this was a royal act under the great seal of his kingdom, it could never be denied or revoked; but still it did not render the nation unanimous, and to avoid finally disgusting any great party, the minister would still pursue his usual studied obscurity of policy. Points must be conceded to the Americans, before a complete agreement could be made with them, even on terms to be inserted in the universal peace, which would open the full cry of a powerful party upon him, among which were the refugees. It could not be supposed, that the refugees and Penobscot were such points with the nation or minister, that they would continue the war for them only, if they were ready to strike with France, Spain, and Holland.

The Count then asked me some questions respecting Sagadahoc, which I answered by showing him the records which I had in my pocket, particularly that of Governor Pownall’s solemn act of possession in 1759, the grants and settlements of Mount Desert, Machias, and all the other townships east of Penobscot River, the original grant of James I. to Sir William Alexander of Nova Scotia, in which it is bounded on St. Croix River (this grant I had in Latin, French, and English), the dissertations of Governor Shirley and Governor Hutchinson, and the authority of Governor Bernard, all showing the right of Massachusetts to this tract to be incontestable. I added, that I did not think any British minister would ever put his hand to a written claim of that tract of land, their own national acts were so numerous and so clear against them. The Count said, Mr. Fitzherbert had told him that it was for the masts that a point was made of that tract; but the Count said, Canada was an immense resource for masts. I said, there were so few masts there that this could not be the motive; that the refugees were still at the bottom of this; several of them had pretensions to lands in Sagadahoc, and the rest hoped for grants there.

The Count said, it was not at all surprising that the British ministry should insist upon compensation to the tories, for that all the precedents were in their favor; in the case of the United Provinces with Spain, all were restored to their possessions; and that there never had been an example of such an affair terminated by treaty, but all were restored. He said it was a point well settled by precedents. I begged his Excellency’s pardon for this, and thought there was no precedent in point. A restitution of an estate not alienated, although confiscated to a crown or state, could not be a precedent in point, because, in our case, these estates had not only been confiscated, but alienated by the state, so that it was no longer in the power of the state to restore them. And when you come to the question of compensation, there is every argument of national honor, dignity of the state, public and private justice and humanity, for us to insist upon a compensation for all the plate, negroes, rice, and tobacco stolen, and houses and substance consumed, as there is for them to demand compensation to the tories; and this was so much the stronger in our favor, as our sufferers were innocent people, and theirs guilty ones.

M. Rayneval, who was present, said something about the King and nation being bound to support their adherents. I answered, that I could not comprehend this doctrine. Here was a set of people whose bad faith and misrepresentations had deceived the King and deluded the nation to follow their all-devouring ambition, until they had totally failed of their object, had brought an indelible reproach on the British name, and almost irretrievable ruin on the nation, and yet that nation is bound to support their deceivers and ruiners! If the national honor was bound at all, it was bound still to follow their ambition, to conquer America, and plant the refugees there in pomp and power, and in such case, we all know whose estates would be confiscated, and what compensation would be obtained. All this M. Rayneval said was very true.

The Count asked me to dine, which I accepted, and was treated with more attention and complaisance than ever, both by him and the Countess.

As it is our duty to penetrate, if we can, the motives and views of our allies, as well as our enemies, it is worth while for congress to consider what may be the true motives of these intimations in favor of the tories. History shows that nations have generally had as much difficulty to arrange their affairs with their allies as with their enemies. France has had as much, this war, with Spain as with England. Holland and England, whenever they have been allies, have always found many difficulties, and from the nature of things it must ever be an intricate task to reconcile the notions, prejudices, principles, &c., of two nations in one concert of counsels and operations.

We may well think, that the French would be very glad to have the Americans join with them in a future war. Suppose, for example, they should think the tories men of monarchical principles, or men of more ambition than principle, or men corrupted and of no principle, and should, therefore, think them more easily seduced to their purposes than virtuous republicans, is it not easy to see the policy of a French minister in wishing them amnesty and compensation? Suppose that a French minister foresees that the presence of the tories in America will keep up perpetually two parties, a French and an English party, and that this will compel the patriotic and independent men to join the French side, is it not natural for him to wish them restored? Is it not easy too to see that a French minister cannot wish to have the English and Americans perfectly agreed upon all points, before they themselves, the Spanish, and the Dutch, are agreed too? Can they be sorry then to see us split upon such a point as the tories? What can be their motives to become the advocates of the tories? It seems the French minister at Philadelphia has made some representations to congress in favor of a compensation to the royalists, and that the Count de Vergennes’s conversation with me was much in favor of it. The Count probably knows, that we are instructed against it, and that congress are instructed against it, or rather have not a constitutional authority to make it; that we can only write about it to congress, and they to the States, who may, and probably will, deliberate upon it a year or eighteen months before they all decide, and then every one of them will determine against it. In this way there is an insuperable obstacle to any agreement between the English and Americans, even upon terms to be inserted in the general peace, before all are ready, and indeed after. It has been upon former occasions the constant practice of the French to have some of their subjects in London, and the English some of theirs in Paris, during conferences for peace, in order to propagate such sentiments as they wished to prevail. I doubt not such are there now. M. Rayneval has certainly been there. It is reported, I know not how truly, that M. Gerard has been there, and probably others are there, who can easily prompt the tories to clamor, and to cry that the King’s dignity and the nation’s honor are compromised to support their demands.

America has been long enough involved in the wars of Europe. She has been a football between contending nations from the beginning, and it is easy to foresee, that France and England both will endeavor to involve us in their future wars. It is our interest and duty to avoid them as much as possible, and to be completely independent, and to have nothing to do with either of them, but in commerce. My poor thoughts and feeble efforts have been from the beginning constantly employed to arrange all our European connections to this end, and will continue to be so employed, whether they succeed or not. My hopes of success are stronger now than they ever have been, because I find Mr. Jay precisely in the same sentiments, after all the observations and reflections he has made in Europe, and Dr. Franklin, at last, at least appears to coincide with us. We are all three perfectly united in the affair of the tories and of Sagadahoc, the only points in which the British minister pretends to differ from us.

The inclosed papers will show congress the substance of the negotiation. The treaty, as first projected between Mr. Oswald on one side, and Dr. Franklin and Mr. Jay on the other, before my arrival; the treaty as projected after my arrival, between Mr. Oswald and the three American ministers, my Lord Shelburne having disagreed to the first; Mr. Oswald’s letter and our answer; Mr. Strachey’s letter and our answer. Mr. Strachey has gone to London with the whole, and we are waiting his return, or the arrival of some other, with further instructions.

If congress should wish to know my conjecture, it is, that the ministry will still insist upon compensation to the tories, and thus involve the nation every month of the war in an expense sufficient to make a full compensation to all the tories in question. They would not do this, however, if they were ready with France and Spain.1

I have the honor to be, &c.

John Adams.

[1 ]Compare with this, the Diary, vol. iii. pp. 300-306.