objected to the appointment of separate Commissioners, the whole negotiation would not have been entrusted to Grenville, who however according to the view of Shelburne would have had to correspond with both Secretaries of State, according to that of Fox with the Foreign Office alone.
The Memoirs of the Duke of Grafton, which at this period are written in a spirit far from favourable to Shelburne, contain no allusion whatever to any duplicity of conduct on his part in regard to the appointment of Oswald as Commissioner with formal full powers to treat. But it was of this appointment that Fox, founding his case on the Minute of the 23rd of May, complained. To this does the whole question when closely examined narrow itself down.
On the 15th of June, Grenville received an amended copy of his full powers. The instrument was in the same terms as its predecessor, except that after the power to treat with the King of France or his Ministers, the words "and any other Prince or State" were added. Armed with this instrument, Grenville formally declared to Vergennes, that he was authorized to acknowledge the independence of America in the first instance and to offer to France the treaty of 1763 as the basis for negotiation. Vergennes recognizing at once the object of the English Government, and understanding the position in which he was placed, coldly replied that he would send a written answer to Fox.
Grenville next visited Franklin, and under his amended powers claimed the right of negotiating with America. To this Franklin distinctly demurred.[1] He asked Grenville if the Enabling Act was passed. Grenville replied in the negative. Franklin thereupon said "that though the Americans considered themselves as a distinct independent Power or State, yet as the British Government had always hitherto affected to consider them only as rebellious subjects, and as the Enabling Act was not yet passed, he did not think it could be fairly supposed that
- ↑ Diary of Franklin, June 1782. Works, viii. 541-543.
