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Browsing: Papers of John Adams, Volume 12
Docno: ADMS-06-12-02-0209
Recipient: Adams, John
Date: 1782-03-19
From Jean Luzac
[dateline] Leyden 19th. March 1782
[salute] Honorable Sir
The Committee of the corporate Body of Merchants, Manufacturers and Traders of this
City have charged me, as their Counsel, to present Your Excellency with two printed
Copies of the Petition, they have put up Monday last to the Great-Council of Leyden,
in order to pray for the conclusion of commercial connexions with the United-States
of America.1 They hope, Your Excellency will accept those Copies as a testimony of their regard
for You, Sir, as the Representative of a State, which they desire to call soon, with
full and avowed right, their Sister-Republic. My love for my Country, my inclination
for yours, my respect for your character, public and private, these are all motives,
Sir, which make this commission one of the most agreeable I could ever perform in
my life.2
[salute] I am with the sincerest and most perfect regard, Sir, Your Excellency’s Most obedient and very humble Servant
[signed] J. Luzac
RC and enclosure (Adams Papers).
1. Only one copy of the petition of 18 March signed by 64 merchants, manufacturers, and
traders, is in the Adams Papers. JA included an English translation in his letter of 19 March to Robert R. Livingston, calendared above, and reprinted the translation in A Collection of State-Papers, 1782, p. 26–34.
Luzac, whom JA credited as the author (to Edmund Jenings, 3 April, below), gave a more detailed account of the petition’s origins in a letter to John
Thaxter of [19 March] (copy, Adams Papers). Luzac remarked upon the unanimity of the merchants in their desire for a commercial
treaty with the United States and had “l’honneur de dire à Mr. Adams, que le Corps
de la Nation desiroit { 339 } vivement la reconnoissance de l’Independance Americaine” (the honor to inform Mr.
Adams that the body of the nation eagerly wished for the recognition of American independence).
He indicated that the burgomasters had graciously received the petition and that the
council agreed unanimously to direct their deputies in the States of Holland to insist
vigorously that the wishes of the people be fulfilled.
Cite web page as: Founding Families: Digital Editions of the Papers of the Winthrops and the Adamses, ed.C. James Taylor. Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society, 2018.
http://www.masshist.org/apde2/
http://www.masshist.org/apde2/