| PREVIOUS | NEXT | ITEM LIST | NEW SEARCH | BEST MATCH |
A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation: U.S. Congressional Documents and Debates, 1774-1875
l9th of June 1779 (1) The Ultimata being Order of the Day, One or more of the Resolutions recommended by a Committee of the whole set aside by previous question as twenty, or perhaps more, or say few more or less had been on Thursday-then agreed to postpone the consideration of the remainder until a Proposition by Mr. Gerry should be considered.
The Proposition as follows.(2)
That it is essential to the welfare of these United States that the Inhabitants thereof at the expiration of the War should continue to enjoy the free and undisturbed exercise of their common right to fish on the Banks of Newfoundland and other Banks and Seas of North America, preserving inviolate the Treaties between France and the said States.(3)
That an explanatory Article be prepared and sent to our Minister Plenipotentiary at the Court of Versailles to be by him presented to his most Christian Majesty whereby the common right to the said Fishery be more explicitly guaranteed to the Inhabitants of these States than it already is by the Treaties aforesaid.
That the said Minister Plenipotentiary be instructed to obtain in the Treaty of Peace with Great Britain a stipulation on their part not to disturb the Inhabitants of these States in the free exercise of their common right to the said Fishery, and that he be authorized to make a reciprocal engagement on the part of the United States.
That the faith of Congress be pledged to the several States that without their unanimous consent no Treaty of Commerce shall be formed with Great Britain previous to such stipulation.
That the explanatory Article should not be satisfied by His Most Christian Majesty, nor the Stipulation adopted by the Court of Great Britain the said Minister Plenipotentiary be directed to give notice thereof to Congress and not to sign any Treaty of Peace until their pleasure be known.
Page 83
JUNE 19, 1779
Link to date-related documents.
Debate on the first Clause from 1/2 past 11 to 1/2 past 3 oClock- adjourned without determin[ing].
In the course of debate Mr. Gerry who upon a former day had warmly censured the North Carolina Members and others who had unwarily disclosed that they had consulted the Minister of France on the Article for securing the Fisheries avowed that he had now in his turn conferred on the same subject with the Minister.
*Mr. G. Morris said our pretended private business was no secret, it was known and talked of in every one of the States. Mr. McKean confirmed this as to every County Town in Pennsylvania.*
Mr. Laurens rose and said I speak to privilege.
"Mr. President, I find this business has been spoke of without much reserve aboard, one gentleman acknowledges that he has conversed on it with the Minister of France, we know that several others had done so before him-another Gentleman informs us that our pretended private business is known and talked of in every one of the States. I have reason to believe it has been transmitted to South Carolina-but not by me. I have hitherto held myself restricted from speaking or writing on the subject, but I now give notice that henceforward I shall not consider myself under any obligations."
Mr. Drayton-If the intelligence has been transmitted to South Carolina it was not by me, so far I am upon an equal footing with my Colleague.
* 23d June. This information now appears to wear the aspect of an harbinger to Americanus in the Pensylvania Gazette of this day.(4)
Tr (ScHi: Laurens Papers, no. 20). In the hand of James Custer and endorsed by Henry Laurens: "Release from Bond of Secrecy-respecting Fishery &c."
1 Although Custer dated these notes "19th of June 1779," it is clear that they were put into their present form no earlier than June 23, as Laurens' concluding comment concerns an event of that date
2 "The Proposition" appears in the journals as five numbered propositions, which follow nearly verbatim Laurens' next five paragraphs. JCC, 14:749-50. They appear also in Austin, Life of Elbridge Gerry, 1:287-88, where they are followed by a summary of Gerry's remarks on them when they were introduced. Austin's summary suggests that he prepared it from original notes by Gerry then in his possession. It is reprinted here verbatim, ibid., 1:289-92.
"It is not so much fishing, said he, as enterprise, industry and employment. It is not fish merely which gentlemen sneer at, it is gold, the produce of that avocation. It is the employment of those who would otherwise be idle, the food of those who would otherwise be hungry, the wealth of those who would otherwise be poor, that depend on your putting these resolutions into the instructions of your minister.
"He denied that it would protract the war. Whenever Great Britain is ready to acknowledge your independence she will be ready to accede to all your other reasonable and fair demands. It is not to be expected that she will incline to diminish your boundaries either on the land or the ocean. Show her that this is your right, you will obtain it of her justice; or prove to her that it is your determination to maintain it, and you will secure it from her policy.
"As to our right, Mr. Gerry said, the God of nature gave it to us. He made the sea the common property of all mankind in a more strict sense than he had done the
Page 84
JUNE 19, 1779
Link to date-related documents.
land. Land requires exclusive occupation for government, cultivation or property. But the great world of waters admits of no national appropriation. Where the winds can carry us upon the ocean, there we may sail, and where we sail, there we occupy, and what we occupy we may of right use for the purposes for which occupation is valuable; and it might as well be claimed by any nation to restrain us from navigation as fishery. We ask only the right of casting our hooks into the ocean and owning what we may catch; and to say that this is not the right of an independent people, is to say they have purchased a nominal independence, by affixing to themselves a constant mark of vassalage; for unless the right is bargained away by treaty it belongs to us by inheritance .
"If it could be supposed that any obstruction to our rights originated in the policy of our ally, it would diminish the affection with which our great friend is now cherished in the hearts of our people. But before France had given us one encouraging word, the people of New-England had poured out their blood like water in defence of their rights; they had been cheered also by their southern friends, but at first they had stood alone; and by God's blessing they would stand alone again without allies or friends, before they would barter away their rights.
"If such a surrender could take place, the commerce of New-England will on the return of peace seek British channels. It will be the object of Britain to detach us from all commercial connexion with our ally, and she will find her objects greatly assisted by the temper of our people.
"But if we insist on the right, Britain will yield it to us. Her policy will assist us. After a peace she will be desirous of our custom. She will not be likely to crowd the terms of a peace that looks disgraceful to us, and will be felt as oppressive. In making any peace she will have done much for her own humiliation, and she will do a little more for our favour. It will be her policy, when she is no longer our open enemy, to have us believe she is truly our friend; and by the liberality of her conditions, to obliterate our animosity. Our commerce will be of little value to her unless we enjoy the fisheries, and any commerce with her would without them be ruinous to ourselves. By lessening our means of payment we must either stop the importations of her manufacturers, or burthen ourselves with a constantly increasing debt."
For Gerry's role "as the leading champion to make the fisheries a fundamental part of any peace treaty," see George A. Billias, Elbridge Gerry: Founding Father and Republican Statesman (New York: McGraw-Hill Co., 1976), pp. 92-95.
3 There is a second copy of Gerry's "propositions," in Laurens' hand, in another unit of the Laurens Papers, where it is followed by additional notes of debates on them by Laurens dated June 19 and July 17. Those of July 17 follow almost verbatim those on the fourth proposition recorded in the journals under that date JCC, 14: 850), but the following notes of June 19 on a motion by Gouverneur Morris concerning the first proposition are unique.
"The first proposition being read a motion was made by Mr Morris seconded by Mr. D[rayton] to strike out the words 'essential to the welfare of ' & also the word 'that' after United States & the words 'should continue' in order in the room of the former words to insert 'would be very injurious to' in the room of 'that' to insert 'and' & in lieu of the latter words to insert 'not'. Y[ea]s & N[ay]s. The words stand." Laurens Papers, no. 22, ScHi.
4 The congressional debate on the ultimata, long a matter of general interest, had recently become a subject of public discussion in several American newspapers. A particularly telling analysis of Congress' inability to reach agreement on peace terms appeared in the June 23 issue of the Pennsylvania Gazette over the pseudonym "Americanus," a frequent contributor to such public debates. Upon this occasion, "Americanus" had been moved to deny charges, made by Francis Lighfoot Lee in the May 28 issue of the Maryland Gazette, that responsibility for the impasse lay with pro-French delegates ["the execrable faction"], concluding instead that the actual culprit was the demand of New Englanders to make American access to the Newfoundland fisheries a sine qua non of any peace treaty.
As the tenor of the essay suggested intimate knowledge of Congress' proceedings,
Page 85
JUNE 20, 1779
Link to date-related documents.
the identity of "Americanus" stimulated considerable speculation in subsequent issues of the Gazette, but it was not discovered and continues to baffle historians to the present day. When Thomas Paine suggested that the essay was the work of Gouverneur Morris, Morris promptly denied the allegation in an essay signed "Cato" that appeared in the July 9 issue of the Gazette, for which see Gouvernor Morris to Benjamin Towne, July 9? 1779. The best analyses of the subject are those of Edmund Burnett and William Stinchcombe, but since neither knew that Morris was the author of the "Cato" essay, their conclusions are open to objection. See Burnett, Letters, 4:276-79; and William C. Stinchcombe, The American Revolution and the French Alliance (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1969), pp. 68-69. See also James Lovell to Samuel Adams, July 8, 1779, note 2. For discussion of the larger issue of French efforts to influence the American debate on peace terms, see Stinchcombe, op. cit., chapter 5; and Orville T. Murphy, Charles Gravier, Comte de Vergennes; French Diplomacy in the Age of Revolution: 1719-1787 (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1982), chapter 30.
PREVIOUS SECTION .. NEXT SECTION .. NAVIGATOR
| PREVIOUS | NEXT | ITEM LIST | NEW SEARCH | BEST MATCH |