His Excellency, the Minister of France, having informed on the part of his Court, that no extraordinary sums will be paid to the Ministers of the United States in Europe, I must request that you will furnish me with an account of their several salaries, payable to the foreign Ministers and their Secretaries, and I will make out bills in your favor on the banker of the United States in Paris for the last quarter, commencing with the present year. I must at the same time pray, you will require of those gentlemen, the state of their several accounts with the public for salaries, that the whole may be adjusted, and all future expenses of that sort be classed under the proper head of the Department of Foreign Affairs.
I have the honor to be, &c.
ROBERT MORRIS.
CIRCULAR LETTER TO THE GOVERNORS OF THE STATES.
Office of Foreign Affairs, Philadelphia, May 2d, 1782.
Sir,
The enclosed resolution of Congress will explain the cause of this letter. The information it refers to, is an assurance that Britain had absolutely declined any interference of the mediating powers between them and what they call their rebel subjects. They persist on every occasion in representing us as a divided people, who anxiously wish to return to our connexion with England. In this they have two objects equally important to them. 1st. They encourage England to continue a war, which they expect to see terminated by our own weariness and languor; and 2dly. They put such a face upon their affairs as will entitle them on a negotiation to make demands at our expense, which they would not presume to think of, if the mediators were acquainted with our firm resolution never to return to our obedience to their Government. Besides which, they cast a degree of odium upon the conduct of France, representing it as the support of a discontented faction, rather than as the generous ally of an oppressed nation.
There is reason to apprehend, that in order the better to secure the advantages of this deceitful policy to themselves, they will make proffers to each of the United States. If any of them should listen to them, (which cannot, however, be presumed,) they will urge this, as a proof of their assertions, even if they should decline receiving their proposals and refer them to Congress, as from the nature of our Union they undoubtedly must; still as the result of the experiment cannot be known for some time in Europe, they will avail themselves of it in part, if negotiations should open.
This artifice of the enemy may be counteracted in two ways, both of which deserve the serious attention of your Legislature. The first and most important is, by making such exertions to procure a respectable army early in the season, that the mediators casting their eyes upon the muster rolls, may there read a full refutation of all that British artifice can suggest. I need not observe, that this measure must go hand in hand with taxation, since an army without the means of supporting it, would only increase our evils. The second is to anticipate the attempt of Great Britain by such resolutions as the information contained in this letter suggests, resolutions which strongly mark a spirited determination in the Legislature of each State to listen to no negotiations, except through the intervention of Congress, which manifest their attachment to the independence of their country, and inviolable regard to the faith they have pledged to each other, and to their allies. These may either prevent the attempt I apprehend, or arrive in time to counteract this effect, which the false expectations built thereon might otherwise have in Europe.
I mention this to your Excellency without any express direction from Congress. It is more than probable, that your judgment, and the zeal and wisdom of the Legislature, may improve these loose hints to the general advantage of the United States. I have the pleasure of assuring your Excellency and the Legislature, that the fairest prospects are now before us of terminating the war by a single exertion, though I am not at liberty to say, that the plan of the ensuing campaign is absolutely determined on, yet I have great reason to believe, that we shall receive such powerful military aid, as, with becoming exertions on our part, will free every State in the Union from the grasp of the enemy.