American Commissioners of the Preliminary Peace Agreement (1782)

The 1782 preliminary peace negotiations in Paris brought together some of the greatest American minds—including Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and John Jay—to secure a formal end to the war with Great Britain. Despite the pressure from their French allies to follow a specific diplomatic script, the American commissioners showed great "fortitude" by negotiating directly with the British to secure favorable boundaries and fishing rights. The resulting agreement recognized the United States as a sovereign and independent nation for the first time on the world stage. An iconic, unfinished painting of the commissioners reminds us that while the war had been won on the battlefield, the "architecture" of the new nation was still being built. The Treaty of Paris of 1783 remains one of the greatest diplomatic triumphs in American history.