Note 412 — Chapter XXVI

History of the United States, Vol. II., Chap. xv., pp. 242, 243.

The same historian observes: "On the 11th of June, Congress appointed a Committee to prepare a plan of a treaty to be proposed to foreign powers. The discussion of this novel subject engaged their attention till the latter end of September. Congress having agreed on the plan of the treaty which they intended to propose to the King of France, proceeded to elect commissioners to solicit its acceptance. Dr. Franklin, Silas Deane, and Thomas Jefferson were chosen. The latter declining to serve, Arthur Lee, who was then in London, and had been very serviceable to his country in a variety of ways, was elected in his room. It was resolved that no member should be at liberty to divulge anything more of these transactions than 'that Congress had taken such steps as they judged necessary for obtaining foreign alliances.'"—Ib.,p., 242, 243.

It is worthy of remark, that although Dr. Franklin consented to act as one of the commissioners to France, he opposed the application itself; for he himself wrote a few months afterwards as follows: "I have never yet changed the opinions I gave in Congress, that a virgin state should preserve a virgin character, and not go about suitoring for alliances, but wait with decent dignity for the applications of others. I was overruled, perhaps for the best." (Works, Vol. VIII., p. 209.)