Sold – Thomas Jefferson, the U.S. Congress and President Washington Thank France For Honoring B. Fra

Benjamin Franklin was the most potent diplomatic weapon the United States possessed in its struggle for independence from the greatest power on earth. He would eventually bring the French into the war against Britain and sustain that alliance until independence was achieved. Without his presence in Paris all that tumultuous time, the French would never have been as supportive of the Revolution as they were. And without that support, it is doubtful that independence could have been won.

Franklin arrived in France on December 21, 1776, and he was the “celebrated Dr. Franklin” from the beginning. As symbolizing the liberty for which all France was yearning, he was greeted with great popular enthusiasm. Thinkers like Diderot regarded him as the embodiment of practical wisdom. The people gathered in crowds to see and acclaim him and shopkeepers rushed to their doors to catch a glimpse of him as he passed along the sidewalk. The nobility lionized him and placed laurel wreaths on his head on ceremonial occasions, while in evening salons be-jeweled ladies of the court vied with one another in paying him homage. His picture appeared everywhere. For his part, Franklin understood how the French saw him, and exploited that image on behalf of the American cause. Perhaps no person in history has come to symbolize America as Franklin did in Paris.

In France, Franklin acted as diplomat, purchasing agent, recruiting officer, loan negotiator, admiralty court, and intelligence chief and was generally the main representative of the new United States in Europe. His popularity and diplomatic skill, along

with the first major American battlefield success at Saratoga, finally convinced France to recognize American independence and conclude an alliance. A treaty was signed on February 6, 1778. Another invaluable service was Franklin’s negotiation of loans without which it would have been impossible for the United States to carry on the war. He then oversaw the dispatch of French armies and navies to North America, supplied American armies with French munitions, and outfitted John Paul Jones (whose famous ship the Bonhomme Richard was  named in Franklin’s honor). The final victory at Yorktown which caused support for the war in Britain to evaporate was a joint American/French operation. When the war was won and a peace treaty signed, Franklin came home to Philadelphia. Thomas Jefferson, who followed him as ambassador in 1785, was asked by the French Foreign Minister, Vergennes: "It is you who replace Dr. Franklin?" Jefferson replied, "No one can replace him, Sir; I am only his successor."

Franklin died on April 17, 1790.  On June 11, the Comte de Mirabeau rose in the French National Assembly to intone, “Franklin est mort [Franklin is dead].” He called on the National Assembly to honor Franklin, who he said was most responsible for spreading the rights of man throughout the world. The National Assembly declared national mourning for Franklin, and in the summer sent a message to President Washington and the U.S. Congress expressing gratitude for Franklin’s contributions to liberty. It stated that Franklin’s name “will be immortal in the records of freedom and philosophy.”By philosophy they meant what we would call science.

Congress responded with this Document Signed, Philadelphia, December 6, 1790. “Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States in Congress assembled, That the President of the United States be requested to cause to be communicated to the National Assemply of France the peculiar sensibility of Congress to the tribute paid to the memory of Benjamin Franklin by the enlightened and free representatives of a great nation, in their decree of the eleventh of June, 1790.” This resolution was approved March 2, 1791 and signed in type by Frederick Augustus Muhlenburg, Speaker of the House, John Adams, Vice President and President of the Senate, and George Washington as President of the United States. During the Washington administration, the Secretary of State was required to certify that acts, bills and resolutions were official. Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson has done so here by signing this resolution and representing that it had been “Deposited among the rolls in the office of the Secretary of State.”  The document is exquisitely framed in a large presentation with pictures of those associated with it.

Here we have associated in one document the greatest names of the American Revolution – Washington, Adams, Jefferson and Franklin with the patron, France, that made victory possible. Our research has failed to turn up any other example of this signed resolution having reached the marketplace.