I have the honor to enclose to your Excellency some remarks upon the articles, to serve as a basis of the negotiation for the re-establishment of peace, which you did me the honor to communicate to me.
As I am unacquainted, whether you desired my sentiments upon these articles merely for your own government, or with a design to communicate them to the Imperial Courts, I should be glad of your Excellency's advice concerning them. If your Excellency is of opinion there is anything exceptionable, or which ought to be altered, I should be glad to correct it; or if I have not perceived the points, or questions, upon which you desired my opinion, I shall be ready to give any further answers.
I have the honor to be, &c.
JOHN ADAMS.
ANSWER
Of the Minister Plenipotentiary of the United States of America, to the Articles to serve as a Basis to the Negotiation for the Re-establishment of Peace.
Article i. The United States of America have no objection, provided their allies have none, to a treaty with Great Britain, concerning the re-establishment of peace in America, or to another concerning the re-establishment of commerce between the two nations, consistent with their obligations to France and Spain, without the intervention of any of the other belligerent parties, and even without that of the two Imperial Courts, at least, unless their mediation should be formally demanded and granted upon this object, according to the first article communicated to me.
Art. ii. The United States have nothing to say, provided their allies have not, against the second article.
Art. iii. To the armistice, and the statu quo, in the third article, the United States have very great objections, which indeed are so numerous and decisive, and at the same time so obvious, as to make it unnecessary to state them in detail.
The idea of a truce is not suggested in these articles; but as it is mentioned in some observations shown me by his Excellency, the Count de Vergennes, it may be necessary for me to add, that the United States are so deeply impressed with an apprehension, that any truce whatsoever would not fail to be productive of another long and bloody war at the termination of it, and that a short truce would be in many ways highly dangerous to them, that it would be with great reluctance that they should enter into any discussion at all upon such a subject.