Postdoctoral fellowship are from Southern Methodist university. Previously, dr. Levinsky worked as a historian at the white house, historical associate asian. Her writing has appeared in the wall street journal, ms. Magazine in the daily beast, bulwark time magazine, usa today, cnn, and the washington post, just to name a few. Dr. Travis, she is the author of the Award Winning book the cabinet, George Washington and the creation of an American Institution and is currently working on her second book, tentatively titled an honest man the inimitable presidency of john adams. Speaking of mr. Adams, help me welcome lindsey to share her presentation. Peace and inviolable faith with all nations. John adams independence and the quest for neutrality. Hello, everyone. It is a joy to be here with you today to talk about john adams independence neutrality and everything in between. One of the mistakes i think we make as a historian, as history lovers, as readers, is we tend to separate our history into three buckets. Colonial, revolutionary. And then the early republic, when in reality, the names that were talking about today often lived throughout all of those three periods. They experienced the events and those experience. Is that knowledge that firsthand leadership experience and intuition they received shaped what they did next. So we really cant treat them as separate. I also want to challenge us to think beyond those tempers. All limitations of north thinking about big like independence, especially as were coming up on the 250th anniversary of that big date. And heres why we can declare something so but that doesnt necessarily make it a reality. I would like to say that i am as tall as scot never going to happen. Never going to happen. There are no shoes tall enough so just by declaring something doesnt actually make it a reality. And that is true for independence. So my discussion today with you is what does it mean to declare someone or a nation independent . And then how do you actually make it happen . When does it actually happen . What is the turning point at which you can say we are actually independent . And for john adams, who was so integral to this process for so many years, for him, it was about when you can declare own Foreign Policy, have it respected by foreign nations, and particularly when it comes to neutrality. So these themes that weve been talking about all day, neutrality, independent nations, whether its in russia and britain or whether its in the United States with france, they were the main central focus of john life. So our story really has to begin with the outbreak of hostilities in lexington and concord. Of course, john adams lived not far from these battles. And then, of course the battles that followed, he was not present for them. He was already in philadelphia at the Continental Congress. And when he arrived in 1774, he was pretty gung ho to get moving with the independence process. Now he was not the first person to suggest independence, but he was very happy to to follow up with it while he was in philadelphia, his wife and his son, john quincy, were updating him from what was happening at home in massachusetts, including firsthand descriptions from their eyewitness testimony overlooking the battle of bunker hill from a nearby little spot on a nearby hill as so as john adams was learning about these things technically the colonies were just that they were colonies, and yet they were fighting a war. So he suggested maybe something should actually be done about that the following year when the declaration was actually written and published. And while jefferson gets all the credit, we should remind ourselves that it was a committee, and any writer knows that the key to good writing is good editing. I do think that credit to belongs to the committee as well. When the committee approved, then the entire Continental Congress decided pass the declaration of independence. The war had been taking place at this point for a year. George washington. And the subject of my first book had already joined the continental army. He was in new york city. He was having the very, very worst summer of his entire war experience. And so this was very much a lived reality. The declaration should have surprise to no one. So it wasnt really a declaration for colonists or americans was a declaration for the world. The declaration should really be seen as an International Announcement of what the colonies intend to do and why they intended to do it. They werent trying to overstate, wrote all monarchies. This was key because this was a world of monarchies. They were trying to make a very specific case that they had good reason and to overthrow this one particular or tyrant all other tyrants should feel very safe for the time being. And they had they wanted those other tyrants to also help them. So they quite literally listed all the reasons why they were justified. And if we read the declaration in this light, when we read it as basically a list of reasons why foreign nations should support this cause, we can see the importance of how foreign nations treated the colonies or the states to their independence. It wasnt enough that they thought themselves independent. It wasnt enough for britain to think they were trying to fight for that independ ence. Other nations had to think so as well. So the next moment i want to take us to our is john adams attempts to try and make this a reality after many, many, many, many years of fighting the war, the Continental Congress sent a multi person delegation in to france to try and come up with a treaty that would actually end the fighting. Right now at this point, Benjamin Franklin had been in france for a very long time. He was very beloved. He was very famous. He was also very sick with gout. He couldnt really get out of bed for most the negotiations. So it was primary left, left up to john jay and john adams to really get the ball rolling, to start this process. John jay and john adams often harsh words for a lot of people. They very rarely had harsh words for each other. And in fact, when this process all wrapped up, adams gave jay most of the credit, which is not something that john adams did very often. So they really respected another. They really got along with one another. They both were very sort of legal minded, very rational, and they agreed on two particular goals for their negotiations. Now, both of these goals kind one against the treaty of 1778, that the United States had had signed with france and kind of went against their instruction ins that they had received from the confederate congress. Nonetheless, they knew better and there were going to be these two rules. First, they were not going to work with france in the negotiation with Great Britain. They grasped very quickly and then had to convince Benjamin Franklin that france didnt really care about an independent United States. France didnt really care what happened in the colonies. France cared about plundering as much as they possibly could from their british enemies and trying to keep the United States subservient because it their purposes so they were going to go it alone. They were going to not really tell france what they were doing, and then they would ask for forgiveness later. Second, rule recognition of independence by Great Britain had to be step one. Any other negotiations had to come after that it was nonnegotiable. So when the time came, i love this picture because the british negotiators kind of refused to sit for it because it was such a positive treaty for the americans. They really got everything wanted a little bit. So, nope, wrong, wrong direction. What it is supposed to look like is there there are several other guys here. I think i have to. I have it here now. I dont. Okay. There is a draft of what its supposed to look like, but they ended up not wanting to sit for because indeed the treaty did capture those two goals. Article two of the treaty specified that the British Empire would recognize the independence of the United States. This treaty was negotiated. Any french participation. They then had to negotiate their own treaty. They also received rights to fisheries outside of newfoundland and which is up in canada. They received huge swaths of territory which really kind of screwed over the native American Allies of the british. It was a very, very favorable settlement and the british didnt want to sit for the painting. But so i love that this treaty is so essential because it demonstrates john adams thinking about what it means to be independent. Again, its not what they thought. Its what other people recognized. So thats all well and fine. They have declared independence. Great britain has recognized independence at this point. France has to, as part of the treaty that they signed in 1778, all is well except what does it mean to actually be an independent nation . They they they want that independence. Yes. Now, what the Confederation Period often i think overlooked or treated sort of a colossal failure, which is understandable because it kind of was. But its very important for a couple reasons. This period was when they had to start figuring out how does one actually manage a nation. It was easy not, easy. It was easier during the war when they had a common enemy and make it all fight against the british. Once that common was gone, they had to figure, how do you have a Foreign Policy how do you have a defense policy . How do you have an Economic Policy when . You have 13 squabbling states who disagree with each other on almost everything and want very different and often conflicting goals. This was particularly problematic. Those european powers that we talked about, france and Great Britain and spain were more than to try and sort of drive wedges between those states and encourage them to split into different factions. And they were welcome to sort of embrace any stragglers that might be interested in breaking off from the United States and returning to those empires. So there were lots of reasons to believe that the european nations were really all that respectful of american independence. Thankfully the United States got a Second Chance. The u. S. Constitution, which we actually just heard a great deal, the ratification process, the Constitutional Convention was a Second Chance. Most nations dont get Second Chances and so the participants, including, of course, George Washington, who is pictured here at his inauguration, recognized the of that moment, the rare opportunity of that Second Chance and were eager to try and make the most of it. Now, every single choice that washington had make as president , he knew might set precedent for those that and he felt that burdens so heavily that he wrote to henry knox on the way to his inauguration that he felt he was a prisoner going to a place of execution. Not exactly the happy sentiments we usually associate with the president ial inauguration. So washington went through a number steps to try and figure out how to build out the institution of the presidency build out the new United States. Give it the legitimacy and sort of the customs and the trappings of office that europeans were accustomed to. So its important to remember at this time, people jefferson and john adams, who had been ministers across the had been to places like versailles and the court of saint james said he wouldnt bend adversaires show of hands. Not exactly too right. Similarly, those Foreign Ministers were expecting maybe not that level of finery, but they were expecting something. And so and adams and many of the other leading individuals at the time were trying to figure out what is the right balance between maintaining their republican virtue. And of course, this is r republican virtue and still getting that respect that is necessary from those foreign nations and there several different moments that i think washington really had to grapple with. So the first was just setting up what it means to be president to day. And he sent a spectacular letter to john adams. Thats the one that we still have in the archives. But he also sent one to John Jay Alexander hamilton. And i think he sent one to henry knox, basically asking a list of questions about what i supposed to do and those questions go Something Like, can i attend private events . Can i have people over to my house . Should i be opening the house to citizens every so often . How much access should i be providing to the presidency . Should i return calls mean these were sort of every single detail might seem a little bit silly until. You have to make all these decisions. The first time. So that was the first hurdle that washington had to overcome as he was making these decisions. He was also welcoming Foreign Ministers for the first time, and that was a big moment because the first time the president received, the credentials of a foreign minister did two things. It recognized their diplomatic relationship. And it also was a sign that the foreign nation thought United States was important enough to send a minister. It was a it was a sign of respect. Unfortunately, the president s house, philadelphia, where washington spent most of his presidency and john adams spent most of his no longer stand the location is at 16 market streets and you can still see a little bit of the outline of the floor but this is a 3d recreation of what the house would have looked like. It was one of the largest private in philadelphia at the time. It actually belonged to robert morris. He basically rented it to the federal government on behalf of the president and then moved to another house he owned door. So it wasnt exactly slumming it. The house was was lovely, was grand washington made some adjustments because unlike mason he could not help himself and was constantly with architecture and finery and draperies and carpets and he was a control freak. So every single detail had to be just so so this was the house where he welcomed Foreign Ministers usually he did so in the first floor in the state dining room. It had a bow window, which is basically a half circle window, which was, by the way, the inspiration for the oval office in the white house. And he would stand in front of this window, which was a very regal looking backdrop. And the ministers this is a picture of what that may have looked like at a particular time. One of the ministers that washington welcomed proved to be particularly difficult in february of 1793, france declared war on Great Britain and the conflict spiraled into an international war. It included their colonies, their allies, their and the United States with that was tasked with trying to stay of it. The u. S. At this point had almost no army and no so even if it wanted to fight, it had nothing to fight with. It also had no business being in a war. It was just beginning to recover from the revolution financially, physically, emotionally. So neutrality was essential. But what neutral means is actually way more complex it in practice than it is in theory washington. A Cabinet Meeting which he did, he had to make his Big Decisions and he asked them a list of questions about how to proceed over the next eight months. The cabinet met 51 times up to five times per week, sometimes several hours per day in private study, which was a pretty small room in philadelphia, usually in the middle of the summer without air conditioning. And at this point, Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton absolutely despised each other. So you can imagine how fun those meetings would have been. Probably Like Committee meetings, actually, that mason complained. About one of the things that the cabinet recommended was that washington make a proclamation saying that the United States is staying out of the war. And it was a warning to both american citizens not to meddle and it was a warning to foreign actors. However, this proclamation is not law. So what do you do if a citizen decides to go fight anyway . Are they breaking the law . If what court going to hear that case . Is it a jury or is it a judge whos supposed impose a penalty . Where would that penalty if its jail, where would that be . What what jurisdiction . It and these were just the domestic questions, the international questions were even more complex, largely. Thanks to the gentleman on the right whose name was citizen charles ginni. He was the new french minister. He had sailed over from france. Ship had been blown off course and landed in charleston, rather than immediately making his way to philadelphia yet to be presented. Pictured here, he decided itd be great. Enjoy some balls and parades. Celebrations in charleston and to set up some wildly fancy privateer course. Im sure some of you know this, not all audiences do. So a private here is a private ship sailing under a letter of marque or basically a license from a foreign nation to attack that nations enemies. So for example, france hire a private american citizen to take his ship out to attack british ships if they were successful, they would drag that british ship back into harbor, sell off anything valuable turn that british into a new french privateer and repeat t