Treaty of Paris
Treaty of Paris
The treaty of paris of 1783 ended the war of independence and granted the thirteen colonies political freedom. A preliminary treaty between Great Britain and the United States had been signed in 1782, but the final agreement was not signed until September 3, 1783.
Peace negotiations began in Paris, France, in April 1782. The U.S. delegation included benjamin franklin, john adams, john jay, and Henry Laurens, while the British were represented by Richard Oswald and Henry Strachey. The negotiators concluded the preliminary treaty on November 30, 1782, but the agreement was not effective until Great Britain concluded treaties with France and Spain concerning foreign colonies.
In the final agreement, the British recognized the independence of the United States. The treaty established generous boundaries for the United States; U.S. territory now extended from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River in the west, and from the Great Lakes and Canada in the north to the 31st parallel in the south. The U.S. fishing fleet was guaranteed access to the fisheries off the coast of Newfoundland with their plentiful supply of cod.
Navigation of the Mississippi River was to be open to both the United States and Great Britain. Creditors of both countries were not to be impeded from collecting their debts, and Congress was to recommend to the states that loyalists to the British cause during the war should be treated fairly and their rights and confiscated property restored.
Treaty of Paris
In the name of the most holy and undivided Trinity.
Source: United States. Department of State, Treaties and Other International Agreements of the United States of America, 1776–1949 (compiled under the direction of Charles I. Bevans), vol. 12 (1974), pp. 8–12.
It having pleased the Divine Providence to dispose the hearts of the most serene and most potent Prince George the Third, by the grace of God, king of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, defender of the faith, duke of Brunswick and Lunebourg, arch-treasurer and prince elector of the Holy Roman Empire etc., and of the United States of America, to forget all past misunderstandings and differences that have unhappily interrupted the good correspondence and friendship which they mutually wish to restore, and to establish such a beneficial and satisfactory intercourse, between the two countries upon the ground of reciprocal advantages and mutual convenience as may promote and secure to both perpetual peace and harmony; and having for this desirable end already laid the foundation of peace and reconciliation by the Provisional Articles signed at Paris on the 30th of November 1782, by the commissioners empowered on each part, which articles were agreed to be inserted in and to constitute the Treaty of Peace proposed to be concluded between the Crown of Great Britain and the said United States, but which treaty was not to be concluded until terms of peace should be agreed upon between Great Britain and France and his Britannic Majesty should be ready to conclude such treaty accordingly; and the treaty between Great Britain and France having since been concluded, his Britannic Majesty and the United States of America, in order to carry into full effect the Provisional Articles above mentioned, according to the tenor thereof, have constituted and appointed, that is to say his Britannic Majesty on his part, David Hartley, Esqr., member of the Parliament of Great Britain, and the said United States on their part, John Adams, Esqr., late a commissioner of the United States of America at the court of Versailles, late delegate in Congress from the state of Massachusetts, and chief justice of the said state, and minister plenipotentiary of the said United States to their high mightinesses the States General of the United Netherlands; Benjamin Franklin, Esqr., late delegate in Congress from the state of Pennsylvania, president of the convention of the said state, and minister plenipotentiary from the United States of America at the court of Versailles; John Jay, Esqr., late president of Congress and chief justice of the state of New York, and minister plenipotentiary from the said United States at the court of Madrid; to be the plenipotentiaries for the concluding and signing the present definitive treaty; who after having reciprocally communicated their respective full powers have agreed upon and confirmed the following articles.
ARTICLE 1
His Britannic Majesty acknowledges the said United States, viz., New Hampshire, Massachusetts Bay, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, to be free sovereign and independent states, that he treats with them as such, and for himself, his heirs, and successors, relinquishes all claims to the government, propriety, and territorial rights of the same and every part thereof.
ARTICLE 2
And that all disputes which might arise in future on the subject of the boundaries of the said United States may be prevented, it is hereby agreed and declared, that the following are and shall be their boundaries, viz.: from the northwest angle of Nova Scotia, viz., that angle which is formed by a line drawn due north from the source of St. Croix River to the highlands; along the said highlands which divide those rivers that empty themselves into the river St. Lawrence, from those which fall into the Atlantic Ocean, to the northwesternmost head of Connecticut River; thence down along the middle of that river to the forty-fifth degree of north latitude; from thence by a line due west on said latitude until it strikes the river Iroquois or Cataraquy; thence along the middle of said river into Lake Ontario; through the middle of said lake until it strikes the communication by water between that lake and Lake Erie; thence along the middle of said communication into Lake Erie, through the middle of said lake until it arrives at the water communication between that lake and Lake Huron; thence along the middle of said water communication into the Lake Huron, thence through the middle of said lake to the water communication between that lake and Lake Superior; thence through Lake Superior northward of the Isles Royal and Phelipeaux to the Long Lake; thence through the middle of said Long Lake and the water communication between it and the Lake of the Woods, to the said Lake of the Woods; thence through the said lake to the most northwestern point thereof, and from thence on a due west course to the river Mississippi; thence by a line to be drawn along the middle of the said river Mississippi until it shall intersect the northernmost part of the thirty-first degree of north latitude. South, by a line to be drawn due east from the determination of the line last mentioned in the latitude of thirty-one degrees north of the equator, to the middle of the river Apalachicola or Catahouche; thence along the middle thereof to its junction with the Flint River, thence straight to the head of Saint Mary's River; and thence down along the middle of Saint Mary's River to the Atlantic Ocean; east, by a line to be drawn along the middle of the river Saint Croix, from its mouth in the Bay of Fundy to its source, and from its source directly north to the aforesaid highlands which divide the rivers that fall into the Atlantic Ocean from those which fall into the river Saint Lawrence; comprehending all islands within twenty leagues of any part of the shores of the United States, and lying between lines to be drawn due east from the points where the aforesaid boundaries between Nova Scotia on the one part and East Florida on the other shall, respectively, touch the Bay of Fundy and the Atlantic Ocean, excepting such islands as now are or heretofore have been within the limits of the said province of Nova Scotia.
ARTICLE 3
It is agreed that the people of the United States shall continue to enjoy unmolested the right to take fish of every kind on the Grand Bank and on all the other banks of Newfoundland, also in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and at all other places in the sea, where the inhabitants of both countries used at any time heretofore to fish. And also that the inhabitants of the United States shall have liberty to take fish of every kind on such part of the coast of Newfoundland as British fishermen shall use, (but not to dry or cure the same on that island) and also on the coasts, bays, and creeks of all other of his Britannic Majesty's dominions in America; and that the American fishermen shall have liberty to dry and cure fish in any of the unsettled bays, harbors, and creeks of Nova Scotia, Magdalen Islands, and Labrador, so long as the same shall remain unsettled, but so soon as the same or either of them shall be settled, it shall not be lawful for the said fishermen to dry or cure fish at such settlement without a previous agreement for that purpose with the inhabitants, proprietors, or possessors of the ground.
ARTICLE 4
It is agreed that creditors on either side shall meet with no lawful impediment to the recovery of the full value in sterling money of all bona fide debts heretofore contracted.
ARTICLE 5
It is agreed that Congress shall earnestly recommend it to the legislatures of the respective states to provide for the restitution of all estates, rights, and properties, which have been confiscated belonging to real British subjects; and also of the estates, rights, and properties of persons resident in districts in the possession of his Majesty's arms and who have not borne arms against the said United States. And that persons of any other description shall have free liberty to go to any part or parts of any of the thirteen United States and therein to remain twelve months unmolested in their endeavors to obtain the restitution of such of their estates, rights, and properties as may have been confiscated; and that Congress shall also earnestly recommend to the several states a reconsideration and revision of all acts or laws regarding the premises, so as to render the said laws or acts perfectly consistent not only with justice and equity but with that spirit of conciliation which on the return of the blessings of peace should universally prevail. And that Congress shall also earnestly recommend to the several states that the estates, rights, and properties, of such last mentioned persons shall be restored to them, they refunding to any persons who may be now in possession the bona fide price (where any has been given) which such persons may have paid on purchasing any of the said lands, rights, or properties since the confiscation.
And it is agreed that all persons who have any interest in confiscated lands, either by debts, marriage settlements, or otherwise, shall meet with no lawful impediment in the prosecution of their just rights.
ARTICLE 6
That there shall be no future confiscations made nor any prosecutions commenced against any person or persons for, or by reason of, the part which he or they may have taken in the present war, and that no person shall on that account suffer any future loss or damage, either in his person, liberty, or property; and that those who may be in confinement on such charges at the time of the ratification of the treaty in America shall be immediately set at liberty, and the prosecutions so commenced be discontinued.
ARTICLE 7
There shall be a firm and perpetual peace between his Britannic Majesty and the said states, and between the subjects of the one and the citizens of the other, wherefore all hostilities both by sea and land shall from henceforth cease. All prisoners on both sides shall be set at liberty, and his Britannic Majesty shall with all convenient speed, and without causing any destruction, or carrying away any Negroes or other property of the American inhabitants, withdraw all his armies, garrisons, and fleets from the said United States, and from every post, place, and harbor within the same; leaving in all fortifications, the American artillery that may be therein; and shall also order and cause all archives, records, deeds, and papers belonging to any of the said states, or their citizens, which in the course of the war may have fallen into the hands of his officers, to be forthwith restored and delivered to the proper states and persons to whom they belong.
ARTICLE 8
The navigation of the river Mississippi, from its source to the ocean, shall forever remain free and open to the subjects of Great Britain and the citizens of the United States.
ARTICLE 9
In case it should so happen that any place or territory belonging to Great Britain or to the United States should have been conquered by the arms of either from the other before the arrival of the said Provisional Articles in America, it is agreed that the same shall be restored without difficulty and without requiring any compensation.
ARTICLE 10
The solemn ratifications of the present treaty expedited in good and due form shall be exchanged between the contracting parties in the space of six months or sooner, if possible, to be computed from the day of the signature of the present treaty. In witness whereof we the undersigned, their ministers plenipotentiary, have in their name and in virtue of our full powers, signed with our hands the present definitive treaty and caused the seals of our arms to be affixed thereto.
Done at Paris, this third day of September in the year of our Lord, one thousand seven hundred and eighty-three.
D. Hartley [Seal]
John Adams [Seal]
B. Franklin [Seal]
John Jay [Seal]
Paris, Treaty of (1783)
PARIS, TREATY OF (1783)
PARIS, TREATY OF (1783). This treaty between Great Britain and the United States, signed in Paris on 3 September 1783, marked the consummation of American independence. At the same time, Great Britain also signed peace treaties with France, an ally of the United States, and Spain, an ally of France; it had signed a treaty with the Netherlands the previous day. More important, the treaty is rightly considered the greatest triumph in the history of American diplomacy.
To secure its independence, the new United States had entered into an alliance with France (after the tremendous victory over Burgoyne at Saratoga in October 1777), and France, in turn, had agreed to an alliance with Spain. While America had achieved its goal—since Britain had, in principle, accepted the idea of American independence—Spain had not gained its objective, the re-capture of Gibraltar. And, given these entangling alliances, the conflict dragged on, though the fighting had largely ended in North America.
There were other issues as well. Spain, for example, also wanted to limit the size of the new United States well east of the Mississippi River, to protect Spanish holdings along the Gulf Coast in the area that became Florida and Texas. Britain also wanted to limit the size of the United States, to protect its position in Canada and with the Native American tribes. France wanted to weaken its traditional opponent, Britain, as much as possible, which required a stronger United States to compete with Britain in North America.
America's diplomats John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, John Jay, and Henry Laurens engaged in a shrewd negotiation. Beginning in March 1782 (Cornwallis had surrendered at Yorktown on 19 October 1781), they opened negotiations first with the government of Prime Minister Charles Rockingham and later with the government of the earl of Shelburne, Sir William Petty. They achieved success with a preliminary, conditional treaty, signed on 30 November 1782, which would not take effect until Britain reached a settlement with France, and France delayed until Britain and Spain achieved a settlement. Again, Spain wanted Gibraltar, which the British were not willing to return.
The conditional British-American treaty fixed the boundaries of the United States to the northeast and northwest, established the Mississippi River as the western
boundary (a great and grand achievement) and secured navigation along the Mississippi for British and American citizens (although the entrance to the Gulf of Mexico flowed through Spanish-controlled New Orleans); the treaty also granted Americans fishing rights off Newfoundland's Grand Banks and the right to cure fish in uninhabited parts of nearby landfall, but not in Newfoundland itself. The treaty also committed the U.S. government to guarantee repayment of debts to British creditors and to improve the treatment of American Loyalists, including the restitution of property seized during the revolutionary fighting.
While these negotiations were taking place, the British stiffened their position after learning that Spain's long siege of Gibraltar had failed. John Jay, in particular, had great fear that France and its minister Charles Gravier, Comte de Vergennes, might seek a separate peace with Britain, at America's expense, to satisfy France's ally Spain. There were the typical machinations associated with such important diplomatic maneuverings. But Benjamin Franklin, though sick with gout, managed to imply to Vergennes that further French opposition to the treaty he had helped negotiate with Britain could drive America back into British arms; he also wrote to Vergennes that the Americans and French would not want the British to see them divided, and thus France should support what the United States had achieved in its separate negotiation. For Vergennes, this helped him out of a difficult situation, since he could not tie France's foreign policy to Spain's longtime quest to regain Gibraltar. Vergennes was able to use America's initiative to convince the Spanish to sign its treaty.
And, thus, on 3 September 1783, this intricate conflict came to a close and the United States achieved its independence and, by gaining land between the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi River, laid the ground for what would become a vast country.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Bemis, Samuel Flagg. The Diplomacy of the American Revolution. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1983.
Dull, Jonathan R. A Diplomatic History of the American Revolution. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1985.
Hutson, James H. John Adams and the Diplomacy of the American Revolution. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1980.
Kaplan, Lawrence S. Colonies into Nation: American Diplomacy, 1763–1801. New York: Macmillan, 1972.
Charles M.Dobbs
See alsoRevolution, Diplomacy of the .
Paris, Treaty of
The U.S. Senate ratified the treaty in February 1899 by one vote more than the necessary two‐thirds. By that time, some Filipino nationalists, angry at U.S. intentions, had launched attacks that opened the Philippine War, which lasted several years, became a bitter guerrilla struggle, and ended in defeat for the native fighters. The Treaty of Paris marked the high tide of late nineteenth‐century colonialism in the United States. The euphoria of victory over Spain turned into significant popular unhappiness and doubt about a protracted war against the Filipinos.
[See also Caribbean and Latin America, U.S. Military Involvement in; Cuba, U.S. Military Involvement in; Spanish‐American War.]
Bibliography
Lewis L. Gould , The Presidency of William McKinley, 1980.
Lewis L. Gould
Paris, Treaty of (1763)
PARIS, TREATY OF (1763)
PARIS, TREATY OF (1763). The Paris Treaty of 1763, forged among Great Britain, France, and Spain, brought to an end the French and Indian War. At the war's close Britain had achieved military supremacy over the French in North America. The terms of the treaty reflected Britain's dominant position: France ceded all of Canada to Great Britain, the British advanced the boundary of their continental colonies westward to the Mississippi River, and the British received full navigation rights to the river. Cuba, conquered by the British, was returned to Spain, which in return ceded East Florida and West Florida to Britain. As compensation for its losses, Spain received from France by the Treaty of Fontainebleau (1762) all the territory west of the Mississippi River and the island and city of New Orleans. France retained only the islands of Saint Pierre and Miquelon off the south coast of Newfoundland, together with the privilege of fishing and drying fish along the northern and western coasts of Newfoundland, as provided in the Treaty of Utrecht (1713). In the West Indies, Great Britain retained the islands of Saint Vincent, Tobago, and Dominica; Saint Lucia, Martinique, and Guadeloupe were returned to France. The Treaty of Paris left only two great colonial empires in the Western Hemisphere, the British and the Spanish.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Anderson, Fred. Crucible of War: The Seven Years' War and the Fate of Empire in British North America, 1754–1766. New York: Vintage Books, 2001.
Gipson, Lawrence H. The British Empire before the American Revolution. New York, 1936.
MaxSavelle/t. g.
See alsoCanada, Relations with ; Canadian-American Waterways ; France, Relations with ; French and Indian War .
Treaty of Paris
TREATY OF PARIS
The Treaty of Paris of 1783 ended the U.S. Revolutionary War and granted the thirteen colonies political independence. A preliminary treaty between Great Britain and the United States was signed in 1782, but the final agreement was not signed until September 3, 1783.
The surrender of the British army at Yorktown, Virginia, on October 19, 1781, ended the major military hostilities of the Revolutionary War, but sporadic fighting, mostly in the south and west, continued for more than a year. The defeat led to the resignation of the British prime minister, Lord North. The coalition cabinet formed after North's resignation decided to begin peace negotiations with the colonial revolutionaries.
The negotiations began in Paris, France, in April 1782. The U.S. delegation included benjamin franklin, john adams, john jay, and Henry Laurens, while the British were represented by Richard Oswald and Henry Strachey. The negotiators concluded the preliminary treaty on November 30, 1782, but the agreement did not take effect until Great Britain concluded treaties with France and Spain concerning other British colonies.
The United States ratified the preliminary treaty on April 15, 1783. In the final agreement that was signed in September 1783, the British recognized the independence of the United States. The treaty established generous boundaries for the United States: U.S. territory would extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River in the west, and from the Great Lakes and Canada in the north to the thirty-first parallel in the south. The U.S. fishing fleet was guaranteed access to the fisheries off the coast of Newfoundland.
Under the treaty navigation of the Mississippi River was to be open to both the United States and Great Britain. Creditors of both countries were not to be impeded from collecting their debts, and Congress was to recommend to the states that loyalists to the British cause during the war be treated fairly and have their rights and confiscated property restored.
further readings
Brecher, Frank W. 2003. Securing American Independence: John Jay and the French Alliance. Westport, Conn.: Praeger.
cross-references
"Treaty of Paris" (Appendix, Primary Document); War of Independence.
Paris, Treaty of
Paris, Treaty of
PARIS, TREATY OF. 10 February 1763. The Treaty of Paris ended the French and Indian War in North America and the Seven Years' War in Europe. France ceded to Britain all claims to Canada, Acadia, Cape Breton Island, and the islands in the St. Lawrence, in effect all her territories east of the Mississippi River, retaining only the islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and fishing rights off Newfoundland. To compensate Spain for her losses as France's ally, France had previously ceded to Spain by the secret Treaty of San Ildefonso on 3 November 1762 the Isle of Orleans (New Orleans) and all her territory west of the Mississippi. The Treaty of Paris thus completed the removal of French power from North America and left only Britain and Spain as imperial powers on the continent. Of the West Indies islands captured during the war, Martinique and Guadeloupe were restored to France; St. Vincent, Dominica, and Tobago were restored to Britain. Britain restored Cuba to Spain in return for the Floridas. Spain acknowledged Britain's rights to maintain log-cutting settlements in Central America. France agreed to evacuate her position in Hanover and to restore Minorca to the British. The status quo in India was restored.
The Treaty of Paris ratified Britain's preeminent position in Europe and North America, but while Britons rejoiced in the success of their armies and navies, those very victories, by so thoroughly upsetting the balance of power, left their leaders to deal with a world in which her foes would be eager for revenge. France was temporarily shattered, exhausted, and humiliated, but she had not been, nor could have been, permanently crippled. Britain now had also to deal with other complications, especially regarding how to govern the newly enlarged empire. Some Englishmen recognized the emerging problem of imperial governance and even argued that, instead of Canada, Britain should have retained the sugar-rich island of Guadeloupe.
revised by Harold E. Selesky
Paris, Treaty of (1898)
PARIS, TREATY OF (1898)
PARIS, TREATY OF (1898). The Paris Treaty of 1898 terminated the Spanish-American War. Under its terms Spain relinquished all authority over Cuba and ceded to the United States Puerto Rico, the Philippine Islands, and Guam in exchange for $20 million as the estimated value of public works and nonmilitary improvements in the Philippines. Hostilities had been suspended 12 August, and on 1 October the five U.S. commissioners, headed by former Secretary of State William R. Day, opened negotiations with the Spanish commissioners in Paris. The most difficult questions encountered were the disposition of the Philippines, which Spain was reluctant to relinquish, and of the $400 million Spanish debt charged against Cuba, which the Spanish wished assumed by either Cuba or the United States. Eventually Spain yielded on both points. An attempt by the U.S. commissioners to secure the island of Kusaie in the Carolines was blocked by Germany, which had opened negotiations for the purchase of these islands. The treaty was signed 10 December. The Senate, after bitter debate over the adoption of an imperialistic policy, exemplified in the annexation of the Philippines, consented to ratification by a close vote on 6 February 1899. The United States subsequently fought a three-year war to suppress the Filipino independence movement.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Beisner, Robert L. Twelve against Empire: The Anti-Imperialists, 1898–1900. Chicago: Imprint Publications, 1992.
Pratt, Julius W. Expansionists of 1898: The Acquisition of Hawaii and the Spanish Islands. New York: P. Smith, 1951.
Julius W.Pratt/t. g.
See alsoPhilippine Insurrection ; Philippines ; Spain, Relations with ; Spanish-American War ; Treaties with Foreign Nations .
Paris, treaty of
Muriel Evelyn Chamberlain
Paris, treaty of
Muriel Evelyn Chamberlain
Paris, treaty of
J. A. Cannon