Download The Treaty of Paris Period: 1783-87

The Treaty of Paris Period: 1783-87
There have been four main periods in the history of the United States.
PERIOD 1: The Continental Congress Period (1774-76)
The first period began when the First Continental Congress met from Sept. 5-26, 1774 and then again as
the Second Continental Congress on Oct. 10, 1775. The term they used was the “United Colonies of
North America” to refer to the 13 British colonies that decided to unite in order to align themselves in
opposition to British taxation after the French and Indian War.
Continental Congress Period Questions:
a. What was the outcome of the French and Indian War?
b. How many total colonies did the British have in North America? Was it only 13?
Answers:
a. In 1702, after Queen Anne ascended to the English throne and the King of Spain, Charles II, died,
England declared war on France to stop the union of France and Spain. This War of the
Spanish Succession was called Queen Anne's War in the colonies, where the English and
American colonists battled the French, their Native American allies, and the Spanish for the next
eleven years. Meanwhile, in 1707, five years after the 1702 war began, Scotland joined England
and Wales to form Great Britain. So after England stopped Spain and France from merging,
they themselves merged with Scotland. The British now set their sights on New France / Canada.
At that time, “Canada” was a French colony—all of it, not just today’s province of Quebec. In
1756, the French and Indian War began between Great Britain and France for continental
supremacy. In 1762, France avoided losing the vast Louisiana portion of New France by turning
it over to Spain. In 1763, the French and Indian War ended and what was left of New France—
Canada—was surrendered to the British. The British renamed it the “Province of Quebec.” The
French no longer had North American colonies.
b. By 1776, after having taken Canada from France, the British had 20 colonies in North America:
1. Acadia, taken from France in 1713.
2. the renamed “Quebec” taken from France.
3. Nova Scotia (which included New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island until 1784)
4. Rupert’s Land, a vast expanse that included territories eventually added to Ontario or Quebec,
broken off to form Alberta, Saskatchewan or Manitoba, or ceded to the United States in
1783—what was left became the NW Territories and then part of Canada in 1867.
5. Newfoundland
6. East Florida
7. West Florida
Thirteen additional British colonies formed a Continental Congress in 1774 and then broke away in 1776.
The other 7 colonies (above) stayed with Great Britain and were soon joined by fleeing Loyalists from the
13 colonies that left. The American Revolution was a second act to the French and Indian War but this
time, the 13 seceding American colonies crossed sides and joined the French, the Spanish and most
Native Americans, who believed British colonial expansion was over and that an American expansion
would begin if the United States became independent. In the French and Indian War, the American
colonists help evict France from the continent. In the American Revolution, France helped the United
States win its independence but they were unsuccessful in both their joint attempt to evict Great Britain
from the continent and to recover Canada.
PERIOD 2: The Declaration of Independence Period (1776-83)
The second period began when the Second Continental Congress declared independence from Great
Britain on July 4, 1776 following military confrontations that had begun on April 19, 1775. On Nov. 15,
1777, Congress, which was a unicameral body made up of delegates from the 13 states, passed the
Articles of Confederation while meeting in York, PA.
From Wikipedia:
“The Articles were created by delegates from the states in the Second Continental Congress out of a need
to have ‘a plan of confederacy for securing the freedom, sovereignty, and independence of the United
States.’ After the war, (many) complained that the Articles were too weak for an effective government.
There was no president, no executive agencies, no judiciary and no tax base. The absence of a tax base
meant that there was no way to pay off state and national debts from the war years except by requesting
money from the states, which seldom arrived.”
Revolutionary War Period Questions:
a. Why was Congress moving from city to city?
b. If there were no presidents, who was in charge?
c. Why were the Articles considered to be “weak”?
d. Why did Congress need to pay off its “national debts from the war years”?
Answers:
a. Congress moved from city to city because they had committed treason could be arrested by the
British, who would arrive in or come close to where Congress was meeting, so they left and and
reconvened somewhere else. Wherever Congress was, that city was the capital of the United
States. Eight cities served as capital before Washington, DC: Philadelphia, York and Lancaster in
PA; Baltimore and Annapolis in MD; Trenton and Princeton in NJ; and New York City (NY).
b. There were presidents: they were Presidents of Congress. True, there were “no executive
agencies” but that does not mean there were no executives/presidents. These men did not create
the budget for Congress by themselves nor did they serve jointly as Commander-in-Chief of the
Armed Forces, but between 1774, when the First Continental Congress met, and 1789, when
George Washington became the first President of the United States under the new Constitution—
and thus both able to design the budget and command the armed forces—14 separate men served
as Presidents of Congress: http://www.nationalcchs.org/
c. The absence of a tax base didn’t make Congress weak as a criticism, but rather as a governing
structure—the Articles of Confederation were designed to be weak, weak in the sense of
political structure and power. There are “strong” and “weak” governors and “strong” and “weak”
mayors—“weak” simply means that the legislature creates the budget; i.e., the state assembly or
the city council creates the budget, rather than the Governor or the Mayor. That is how it works in
Texas and San Diego. In Baltimore and Maryland, the Mayor and the Governor create the budget.
Texas has a “weak” governor; Maryland has a “strong” governor. San Diego has a “weak” mayor;
Baltimore has a “strong” mayor. The Articles were “weak” because they designated that Congress
as a legislative body would create the budget, not the President of Congress by himself. In the
new Constitution, the President creates the budget, not Congress. Interestingly, the supposedly
“weak” Articles of Confederation set up a system of state oversight over the national government
that would make today’s states green with envy: First, Congress could not go into debt unless
three-fourths of the states approved it. Second, Congress could not go to war in peacetime—in
other words, unless attacked first—without approval by three-fourths of the states. And third, if
Congress recessed without finishing their agenda, three-fourths of the states could appoint a
committee to finish it for them. The President of Congress was also a member of Congress, like
the British Prime Minister is also a Member of Parliament. This was all done on purpose.
Thus, the Articles of Confederation were designed by choice as a “weak” system whereby the
Constitution sets up a “strong” system. The systems are either “weak” or “strong” by design; the
terms are not meant as criticism or compliments; thus, you can’t have a system that is “too weak”.
By teaching that the Articles were “weak” without explaining what “weak” means, three things
happen: first, students are never taught that there were Presidents of Congress before George
Washington, and second, students don’t learn the difference between a “weak” and a “strong”
system of government; and third, students don’t learn how the inability of the Articles to pay the
nation’s war debts is why a second, new Constitution eventually had to be written.
d. Congress wasn’t supposed to have any long-term debts. Each state was responsible for both
paying its own debts and contributing money to Congress to fund the national budget, which
between 1775 and 1783 was primarily used for funding the Revolutionary War.
Under the Articles of Confederation, Congress was funded by voluntary contributions from member
states. That is exactly how the European Union and the United Nations are funded today.
How the EU is funded:
http://ec.europa.eu/budget/explained/budg_system/financing/fin_en.cfm#own_res
How the UN is funded:
http://www.un.org/en/ga/about/art19.shtml
If a member of the EU doesn’t voluntarily contribute their portion of the EU budget, that state will
eventually be kicked out of the EU, and then all of their trade with EU states will be subject to taxes,
tariffs and quotas. If a member of the UN doesn’t voluntarily contribute their portion of the UN budget,
they can have their voting privileges revoked until they have paid up. Likewise, the first version of the
United States was a regional organization, very much like the EU; states were independent countries, they
had their own governments, their own militias, their own currency, their own trading relationships. An
attack on one was an attack on all. What changed the United States into a single country from a
collection of countries was the need to pay off its war debts. If the Revolutionary War had not
produced a national debt, or, if the national debt had been paid off by state contributions, there would not
have been a need for a new Constitution—or to form a single country. It wasn’t the fault of Congress or
the Articles that the war debts weren’t paid; the states decided to ignore congressional appeals for what
were, admittedly, voluntary contributions. However, from the view of the states, Congress had agreed to
pay the war debts even though the United States had won the war—by signing the Treaty of Paris, which
contained a provision obligating the United States to pay its war debts to Great Britain in exchange
for Britain releasing its claims to property held by the United States and future territorial claims
(i.e., interfering with American expansion). Think of this exchange as a mandatory condition for
British recognition of American independence. Paying the war debts was part of the “terms of secession.”
PERIOD 3: The Treaty of Paris Period (1783-87)
The Treaty of Paris Period is nothing less than the brief time that the United States was a collection of
countries rather than a single country, governed by a unicameral Congress rather than a bicameral
Congress, from what was soon a permanent capital city, rather than rotating capital cities, led by a
President of a separate executive branch, rather than a President of Congress. The first version of the
United States is very different from the current version, so it is criticized, ignored, forgotten and
ultimately not taught in the schools. Instead, U.S. history jumps from the end of the Revolutionary War to
the Constitutional Convention, as if the Convention happened the following week, without explaining
why it happened at all.
As a result, students never learn why the United States created a new, “strong” political system that gave
added powers to a now bicameral legislature and independent executive in order to govern a new country
composed of formerly independent states now willing to form a single nation, a “more perfect” union.
Treaty of Paris Period Questions:
a. Why was the Treaty of Paris the most important governing document between the Declaration
of Independence and the new Constitution?
b. What could happen if the United States did not pay off its war debts?
c. What specific crisis led to the realization that paying off the nation’s war debts and confronting
military aggression was not possible under the Articles of Confederation?
d. What were the important events took place between the end of the Revolution and the start of
the Constitution?
Answers:
a. The 1763 Treaty of Paris had decided North American continental supremacy once and for all:
Great Britain was unchallenged. The Dutch and French had been evicted and the Spanish
contained to what would become Latin America. The 1783 Treaty of Paris allowed for the
existence of two separate political entities in North America: Great Britain and the United States.
It ended the British monopoly on the continent, but for a price: exclusive trading advantages. The
purpose of the Treaty of Paris was “to forget all past misunderstandings and differences that have
unhappily interrupted the good correspondence and friendship which (we) 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.” As a result, the 1783Treaty of Paris was the first foreign
policy-related governing document for the United States, since it established formal principles for
all interaction with the other political entity on this continent. Once the Treaty of Paris was
formally signed in France on Sept. 3, 1783, the focus of the United States government went from
fighting a war to complying with the terms of the peace. These are the major terms of the peace:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
The United States is recognized as free, sovereign and independent states (note the plural); the British
Crown relinquishes claims to the Government, property, and territorial rights;
The boundaries between the U.S. and the other British colonies in North America were set; American
fishermen were granted fishing rights in the Grand Banks, the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and off the coast
of Newfoundland, and each nation would both have perpetual access to the Mississippi River;
The U.S. Congress must "earnestly recommend" recognition by state legislatures of the rightful owners
of all confiscated lands and "provide for the restitution of all estates, rights, and properties, which have
been confiscated belonging to real British subjects [Loyalists]" and the U.S. must prevent future
confiscations of Loyalist property;
It declares that both sides’ prisoners of war are to be released and all property left by the British army
in the United States unmolested (including slaves); and Territories captured by Americans subsequent
to the treaty will be returned without compensation;
It recognizes that lawful debts will be paid to creditors on both sides.
b. James Madison and Alexander Hamilton argued in The Federalist Papers that if the United States
did not pay off its war debts, the nation could cease to exist. Hamilton said, “We have reached
almost the last stage of national humiliation. There is scarcely anything that can wound the pride
or degrade the character of an independent nation which we do not experience. Do we owe debts
to foreigners and to our own citizens contracted in a time of imminent peril for the preservation of
our political existence? These remain without any proper or satisfactory provision for their
discharge. Have we valuable territories and important posts in the possession of a foreign power
which, by express stipulations, ought long since to have been surrendered?
These are still retained, to the prejudice of our interests, not less than of our rights. Are we in a
condition to resent or to repel the aggression? We have neither troops, nor treasury, nor
government. Ours is at the lowest point of declension.” Madison added, “We must recommend a
proper federal system. Justice is the objective of government. It is the objective of civil society. It
ever has been and ever will be pursued until it be obtained, or until liberty be lost in the pursuit.
In a society under the forms of which the stronger faction can readily unite and oppress the
weaker, anarchy may as truly be said to reign as in a state of nature, where the weaker individual
is not secured against the violence of the stronger.” Hamilton concluded that, “It would greatly
advance the interests of the Union if the States that sent delegations to Annapolis would procure
the concurrence of the other States in the appointment of new delegations to meet at Philadelphia
on the second Monday in May next, to take into consideration the situation of the United States
and to devise such further provisions as shall appear to them necessary to render the constitution
of the Federal Government adequate to remedy the inefficiencies of the current system.”
c. Two weeks before the states could meet in Annapolis in 1786, Shays’ Rebellion broke out in
Massachusetts on August 29, 1786. A huge economic depression had swept over the country
after the end of the Revolutionary War, leading to home and farm foreclosures and harsh
economic policies in Massachusetts to deal with it. Daniel Shays was leading an uprising that
sought to take over Massachusetts by seizing the federal armory at Springfield which, if
successful, threatened to spread to the other states and, eventually, past the boundaries with Great
Britain. Because Congress could neither tax to pay its debts or draft and then pay an army to
confront the uprising; instead, private citizens were organized into local militias that ultimately
defeated Shays and his men by early February of 1787.
d. After Lord Cornwallis surrendered to Washington at Yorktown, VA in 1781, a draft of the Treaty
of Paris was signed on Nov. 30, 1782, followed by these 10 key events:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
1783: Signing the Treaty of Paris: The Treaty of Paris Period began when the official Treaty of
Paris was signed on Sept. 3, 1783 by former President of Congress John Jay, future President of the
United States John Adams and future President of Pennsylvania Benjamin Franklin. It now had to be
ratified by both countries. It took months by ship to get documents from one country to another.
Getting it to Congress: By the time the treaty arrived in the United States, Congress was in Annapolis
(Nov. 26, 1783), making Annapolis the first peacetime capital of the United States (tunnel story).
Washington’s resignation: After the treaty was officially signed, General George Washington
decided to retire as Commander-in-Chief in Annapolis. Washington resigned his Army commission
in front of Congress and President Thomas Mifflin on Dec. 23, 1783.
1784: Ratifying the Treaty of Paris: Without Washington to lead the Army, Congress was
determined to make sure the agreements with the British were implemented, so the Treaty of Paris
was ratified on Jan. 14, 1784 (Ratification Day). It was ratified by acclamation by three-fourths of the
states (nine) and signed by President Thomas Mifflin and Secretary of Congress Charles Thomson.
Diplomatic representation: President Thomas Mifflin appointed delegate Thomas Jefferson as a
minister to France on May 7, 1784, to eventually replace treaty signatory Benjamin Franklin as US
Ambassador to France. This was very symbolic; the transition from someone who had made peace
with Great Britain to the person who wrote the Declaration of Independence signaled an immediate
shift in foreign policy with the British. Later, as President, after the British captured the USS
Chesapeake off the coast of Virginia in 1807 for harboring British naval deserters, it was Jefferson
who placed an embargo on the UK that continued into early 1809; however, the embargo hurt the US
far more since Britain was America’s largest trading partner. The British simply increased their trade
with Latin America to offset the American embargo, which the British countered with the especially
restrictive blockade decrees of January 7, 1807, November 11, 1807, and April 26, 1809—the latter
coming after the United States had voted removed its own blockade of the British. These British
blockades would eventually become the basis for the War of 1812.
6.
7.
8.
9.
Creation of the Patowmack Company: It’s one thing to signal that you won’t let the British push you
around, as Jefferson’s appointment as a minister to France in 1784 suggested, but another thing
entirely to refuse to comply with the terms of the treaty and thus risk another war. Thus, when the
states of Maryland and Virginia disagreed on Potomac River access, it threatened to unravel the
agreements between the United States and Great Britain because if two states within one political
entity could not agree on formal boundaries, then how could states be expected to respect British
sovereignty? It therefore became imperative that Maryland and Virginia resolve the dispute over the
Potomac River. In Virginia, the now retired George Washington strongly recommended to James
Madison that the Potomac River, on which his home sits, be used as a trade route to connect the states
and western territories. The Virginia Assembly appointed George Washington, Horatio Gates and
Thomas Blackburn to approach Maryland about a river use agreement. Even though by this time
Congress had left Annapolis and reconvened in Trenton, New Jersey in November of 1784, James
Madison of Virginia called a meeting in Annapolis in December of 1784 between Virginia and
Maryland. Washington and Gates came to Annapolis and reached an agreement to create a corporation,
the Patowmack Company, to develop the river and settle the disputes over its ownership. Washington
became the corporation’s first president. We don’t know exactly where that meeting took place but we
believe it was at Mann’s Tavern on Conduit Street. George Mann bought this property in 1783 from
the Commissioners of Confiscated Property, who had seized it after Loyalist Lloyd Dulany left
Annapolis at the outbreak of the Revolutionary War. We believe this because Madison was impressed
with the city after the success of the 1784 meeting and eventually decided to come back to Annapolis
for another meeting in 1786, one that we know took place at Mann’s Tavern.
1785: The Mount Vernon Compact: After the agreement in 1784 to create the Potomac Company, in
March of 1785 Madison called for a second meeting in Alexandria, Virginia. The delegates were
Samuel Chase, Thomas Stone and Daniel of St. Thomas Jenifer from Maryland and George Mason and
Alexander Henderson of Virginia. James Madison and Edmund Randolph were appointed to be
Virginia delegates to this meeting, but Governor Patrick Henry failed to inform them of this
appointment. When the two Virginia delegates failed to meet their Maryland counterparts in
Alexandria, the meeting was moved to Washington’s home, Mount Vernon, from March 25-28, 1785.
Washington did not lead the Virginia delegation this time, but his advice and reasoning as host were
invaluable toward crafting the 1785 Mount Vernon Compact which provided for both states to have
navigational rights on the Potomac and Pocomoke Rivers and the Chesapeake Bay, covering tidewater
navigation and extending to such issues as toll duties, commerce regulations, fishing rights, and debt
collection. After signing the 1785 Mount Vernon Compact, Maryland and Virginia agreed to a third
meeting, but the Maryland delegates, led by Samuel Chase, were adamant that if they were to meet a
third time, that it be in Annapolis. When James Madison heard of this, he expressed agreement, since
the first meeting there had gone so well. At this third meeting, Virginia and Maryland were supposed
to return to Annapolis in September of the following year, 1786, accompanied by all of the other states,
who were supposed to discuss not only disputes between any of the states but also interstate trade,
commercial concerns and all outstanding financial issues that had not been resolved by Congress.
1786: Shays’ Rebellion: Congress could neither tax to pay its national debts or draft and then pay an
army to confront an uprising led by Daniel Shays.
The Annapolis Convention: By the time the third multi-state meeting was to take place from
September of 1786, only 5 states sent a total of 12 delegates. By now, in light of Shay’s Rebellion, the
purpose of the 1786 Annapolis Convention also included conducting an overall assessment of whether
the Articles of Confederation gave Congress enough authority to prevent a breach of the terms of the
Treaty of Paris. The delegates were tasked with promoting new laws that the states should pass
collectively, advocating policies that Congress should legislate into law, or else recommend that an
entirely new constitution be written. They were there to determine if the Articles of Confederation
could become more effective through better legislative leadership or by amendments, or whether it
should be replaced with a new constitution. They met from Sept. 11-14, 1786. On the first day, they
introduced themselves and determined what issues they would focus on. John Dickinson, the author of
the Articles of Confederation, asked all of the delegates to take the second day off, Sept. 12, to give
them time to make a list of all of the problems their states had encountered in regard to property,
individual rights, trade, commerce, regulations and defects in the overall federal system.
They reconvened on Sept. 13; on that day, James Madison and Alexander Hamilton argued that the
Articles of Confederation be replaced with a federal system based on a “strong” system of central
government. Dickinson asked Hamilton to draft a report expressing this position to Congress and the
rest of the states. Hamilton’s report called for “a future Convention, with more enlarged powers…the
situation of the United States (is) delicate and critical…for all the members of the Confederacy” and
urged Congress to “procure the concurrence of the other States in the appointment of Commissioners,
to meet at Philadelphia on the second Monday in May next…to take into consideration the situation of
the United States, to devise such further provisions as shall appear to them necessary to render the
constitution of the Federal Government adequate to the exigencies of the Union.”
10. 1787: Constitutional Convention: The report of the 1786 Annapolis Convention to President
Nathaniel Gorham and Congress led to Congress, on February 21, 1787 under the leadership of
President Arthur St. Clair, calling for a new convention on May 14, 1787 in Philadelphia to be attended
by all of the states (it didn’t start until May 25). All states except for Rhode Island attended. The
convention ended on Sept. 17, 1787 with the delegates signing the new Constitution.
The Treaty of Paris is the time between the Revolution and the Constitutional Convention, when
there was neither a war going on nor a Constitution being written. The start of the 1787
Constitutional Convention marked the end of the Treaty of Paris Period. The United States
now had a new document to govern by, one which required 9 states to ratify it in order for it to go
into effect. Eleven states initially ratified it by 1788 (North Carolina and Rhode Island did not)
and then Congress set up elections for the new offices that the Constitution provided for.
Although all 13 states eventually ratified it, Rhode Island was the last one, waiting until 1790,
even though it had already gone into effect on March 4, 1789 when the new bicameral Congress
was sworn in. The unicameral Congress had been meeting in New York since January 11, 1785,
before the Mount Vernon Compact, first at City Hall and then at Fraunces Tavern. On March 2,
1789, the last unicameral session of the Articles of Confederation Congress met, with only one
delegate from New York in attendance. Two days later, on March 4, the first bicameral federal
Congress met at Federal Hall. George Washington was inaugurated as the first President of the
United States under the new Constitution on April 30, 1789. Now the United States entered the
Constitutional Period, which we are still in to this day.
PERIOD 4: The Constitutional Period (1789-Present)
The fourth period, the Constitutional Period, can be further broken up into five distinct blocs: the First
Republic (1789-1861), the Confederacy and Civil War (1861-65), Reconstruction (1865-1877),
Segregation (1877-1964) and the post-Civil Rights era (1964-Present).
Constitution Period Questions (students should be able to answer these questions on their own):
a. What years are called “The Treaty of Paris Period”?
b. How was Congress different during the Treaty of Paris Period?
c. What powers did the Presidents of Congress before George Washington not have?
d. What specific event led to the realization that paying off the national war debts was not possible
under the Articles of Confederation?
e. What city ratified the Treaty of Paris, accepted Washington’s resignation and held a national
convention where it was decided that a new Constitution was necessary?
f. What were the reasons why it was decided that the United States needed to write a new
Constitution in 1787?
g. What powers did states have in the first constitution that they don’t have in the second
Constitution?