1. JA's commission of 27 Nov. 1777 to replace Silas Deane as one of the three American Commissioners to France, was identical to that given the joint commission as originally constituted in 1776 (vol. 5:333–334; Franklin, Papers, 22:634–635). It directed the Commissioners to negotiate with France, but the February 1778 signing of the Franco-American treaties had obviated it by the time JA arrived at Paris in April 1778. Despite JA's statement here, the power to negotiate treaties with other European nations did not come from the formal commission, but rather from “Additional Instructions” adopted on 16 Oct. 1776 (Franklin, Papers, 22:629–630). The appointment, in Jan. and May 1777 (JCC, 7:8, 318, 334, 343), of separate commissioners to conclude treaties with Spain, Tuscany, Prussia, and Austria forestalled the Commissioners at Paris from acting except, perhaps, with respect to the Netherlands and Russia. Only in the case of the former did they contemplate doing so. For the Commissioners' views on the extent of their power, see vol. 7:64–65, 86–88. JA considered the American Commissioners' powers an issue in 1781 because Congress failed to { 121 } formally terminate the joint commission by recalling JA and Arthur Lee and state explicitly that Franklin's appointment as minister to France superseded his appointment as a Commissioner and the Commission itself. This would have had little practical effect in 1781, because Henry Laurens' appointment as minister to the Netherlands precluded either JA or Franklin from exercising the Commissioners' powers there, and no other nations were interested in a treaty with the U.S. With the end of the war, however, Benjamin Franklin was approached regarding treaties with the U.S., leading JA, as he did periodically, to revisit the whole issue. See, for example, his letters of 15 March and 5 Sept 1783 to William Lee and Elbridge Gerry, respectively (LbC, Adams Papers; MHi: G. F. Hoar Autograph Coll.). Not until 1784, when Congress appointed JA, Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson ministers plenipotentiary to negotiate treaties with the nations of Europe and the Barbary states, was the issue laid to rest (JCC, 26:357–362; 27:372–374).

2. Thus in MS.

3. Vol. 10:407–408.

4. When JA copied this letter from his Letterbook for publication in the Boston Patriot he omitted the final paragraph (JA, Corr. in the Boston Patriot, p. 382–384).

5. JA wrote this sentence at the bottom of the page and marked it for insertion at this point. For his opposition to the Olive Branch Petition of 5 July 1775 and his spectacular dispute with John Dickinson that arose from it, see JA, Diary and Autobiography, 3:314–321; 2:173–175. For his account of the conference with Adm. Lord Richard Howe on 11 Sept. 1776, attended by himself, Benjamin Franklin, and Edward Rutledge, see same, 3:417–431.

1. This is likely the postscript of 6 Feb. to Dumas' letter to Congress of 5 Feb., which he had enclosed in his to JA of 5 Feb., above. It reported on the arrival of a courier from St. Petersburg carrying letters from the Dutch diplomats there regarding their activities in the aftermath of Sir Joseph Yorke's departure and the outbreak of the Anglo-Dutch war. Dumas thought the intelligence doubtful because the diplomatic activity seemed premature (PCC, No. 93, I, f. 502).

2. Charles René Dominique Souchet, Chevalier Destouches, the second in command, immediately replaced Ternay as commander of the French squadron at Newport. Destouches was himself replaced in May, when Jacques Melchior Saint Laurent, Comte de Barras, arrived from France (Lee Kennett, The French Forces in America, 1780–1783, Westport, 1977, p. 81, 104).