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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.

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TO SECRETARY LIVINGSTON.

Paris, 15 August, 1783.

Sir,—

France, England, Spain, and America are all agreed; but Mr. Hartley is sanguine that the treaty will not be signed, because, he says, the Count de Vergennes does not mean to sign it. His reasons for this opinion I know not, and I think he is mistaken. It is very certain, however, that the French minister is embarrassed, and would not, perhaps, be sorry to find good reasons for postponing the signature for some time.

Congress may judge in some degree of the situation of things, by the following conversation which I had this morning with M. Brantzen, the ambassador extraordinary from the States-General, to whom I returned the visit he made me yesterday, when I was abroad.

He told me, “that he was as far, and indeed farther than ever, from an agreement with the Duke of Manchester. He had given up, he said, all pretensions to a compensation for the unjust damages of the war, and he had in a manner waved his claim of the restitution of Negapatnam. But the Duke of Manchester now insisted peremptorily upon, not only all the ancient salutations from the Dutch flag to the English, but an unlimited liberty of navigation in all the seas of the East Indies. He had despatched an express to the Hague the day before yesterday, who would arrive to-day; but the grand pensionary was sick, and the states of Holland not sitting; so that there must be some time before he could have an answer. Concerning the salutes to the flag, there would be different opinions, but they would be all of a mind against the liberty of navigation in the Indies. He could not, therefore, expect from their High Mightinesses permission to sign, and the Count de Vergennes would be embarrassed. All the other powers were ready, and to make them wait would raise a cry.

“To sign without Holland would raise a terrible storm in Holland against the Count, and no small one in France. And even if the States should authorize him to sign a shameful peace, this would raise no less clamor in Holland and France against the Count. He will, therefore, not know what to do, and will seek to postpone; for the parties of the Marquis de Castries and of M. de Breteuil will take advantage of every clamor against the Count, as these parties wish M. de Breteuil in his place. I am persuaded, therefore, that the Count himself looks upon his own situation as very hazardous. It has been so a long time. It was his instability in his place that made him sign the preliminaries, for money to carry on the war could not be obtained without M. Necker, and M. Necker would not come in with the Count, as they were and are sworn enemies to each other. He was, therefore, reduced to the dilemma to make peace or go out. I have good reasons to believe that the Maréchal de Castries disapproves of the Count’s conduct towards our Republic. He certainly deceived me. The states-general did very wrong to bind me to leave so much to the French minister; but I thought him an honest man, and that I could trust him; so I left things to him, according to my instructions, depending on his word, and at last I found myself the dupe. No, not a dupe, for I am always upon my guard not to be a dupe. But he deceived me; and when one whom I have reason to believe an honest man deceives me, I cannot call myself a dupe, for I can do no other than believe an honest man, when he gives me his word.”

In several of your letters, sir, you have insisted on my reciting to you my conversations with foreign ministers. You must not esteem them infallible oracles. They are often mistaken in their facts, and sometimes wrong in their reasonings. But these sentiments of M. Brantzen are of so much importance, that I thought proper to recite them. It will, indeed, be necessary for your foreign ministers to be more inquisitive than we have been, and to transmit to congress more information concerning the intrigues of courts than we have done. If the Maréchal de Castries and M. de Breteuil, who is now in the council, and M. Necker, are not friends to the Count de Vergennes, and all the world here agree they are not, congress ought to know it. Although I would have so much respect to the Queen, as not to name her Majesty upon unnecessary occasions, yet, upon this, when she is sister to the Emperor, and the question at Court is, whether there shall be a war with her brother, it is obviously a matter of so much importance, as to make it a duty to communicate to congress her sentiments, which all men here agree are favorable to de Castries and Breteuil, but not partial to the present minister of foreign affairs. I said, in a former letter, if this minister continues, there will be war; but I am told by some, if there is war, he cannot continue; for neither he nor his friends can raise the money. M. de Rayneval, however, affirmed positively to Mr. Hartley, that nothing but death could remove the Count.1

All these things show the critical and uncertain constitution of this Court, and the uncertainty when the definitive treaty will be signed, notwithstanding that four powers are agreed, and, therefore, I can give congress no clear information upon that head. This is a great chagrin to me, both on account of the public and myself, because I am as uncertain about my own destiny as that of the public.

With great respect, I have the honor to be, &c.

John Adams.

[1 ]This prediction proved to be correct. But much light is shed upon the facts stated in this letter, and the action of the Maréchal de Castries, by the fifth volume of the Mémoires Historiques et Politiques du Règne de Louis XVI., by J. L. Soulavie. The memoir, reviewing the policy of Count de Vergennes, read in the cabinet by De Castries, is there given in full, vol. v. pp. 9-96.