On the day preceding this, intelligence arrived, which was this day laid before Congress, that the preliminaries for a general peace had been signed on the 20th of January. This intelligence was brought by a French cutter from Cadiz, despatched by Count d’Estaing to notify the event to all vessels at sea, and engaged, by the zeal of the Marquis de la Fayette, to convey it to Congress. This confirmation of peace produced the greater joy as the preceding delay, the cautions of Mr. Laurens’s letter of the 24th of December, and the general suspicions of Lord Shelburne’s sincerity. had rendered an immediate and general peace extremely problematical in the minds of many.

A letter was received from General Carleton through General Washington, enclosing a copy of the preliminary articles between Great Britain and the United States, with the separate article annexed.

Mr. CARROLL, after taking notice of the embarrassment under which Congress was placed by the injunction of secrecy as to the separate article, after it had probably been disclosed in Europe, and, it now appeared, was known at New York, called the attention of Congress again to that subject.

Mr. WOLCOTT still contended that it would be premature to take any step relative to it, until further communications should be received from our ministers.

Mr. GILMAN, being of the same opinion, moved that the business be postponed. Mr. LEE seconded the motion.

Mr. WILSON conceived it indispensably necessary that something should be done; that Congress deceived themselves if they supposed that the separate article was any secret at New York after it had been announced to them from Sir Guy Garleton. He professed a high respect for the character of the ministers, which had received fresh honor from the remarkable steadiness and great abilities displayed in the negotiations; but that their conduct with respect to the separate article could not be justified. He did not consider it as any violation of the instruction of June 15, 1781, the Count de Vergennes having happily released them from the obligation of it. But he considered it, with the signing of the preliminaries secretly, as a violation of the spirit of the treaty of alliance, as well as of the unanimous professions to the court of France, unanimous instructions to our ministers, and unanimous declarations to the world, that nothing should he discussed towards peace but in confidence, and in concert with our ally. He made great allowance for the ministers; saw how they were affected, and the reasons of it; but could not subscribe to the opinion that Congress ought to pass over the separate article in the manner that had been urged; Congress ought, he said, to disapprove of it, in the softest terms that could be devised, and, at all events, not to take part in its concealment.

Mr. BLAND treated the separate article with levity and ridicule, as in no respect concerning France, but Spain, with whom we had nothing to do.

Mr. CARROLL thought that, unless something expressive of our disapprobation of the article, and of its concealment, was done, it would be an indelible stain on our character.

Mr. CLARK contended that it was still improper to take any step, either for communicating officially, or for taking off the injunction of secrecy; that the article concerned Spain, and not France; but that if it should be communicated to the latter, she would hold herself bound to communicate it to the former; that hence an embarrassment might ensue; that it was, probably, this consideration which led the ministers to the concealment, and he thought they had acted right. He described the awkwardness attending a communication of it under present circumstances; remarking, finally, that nothing had been done contrary to the treaty, and that we were in possession of sufficient materials* to justify the suspicions which had been manifested.

[Note: Alluding, probably, to the intercepted letter from M. de Marbois.]

Mr. RUTLEDGE was strenuous for postponing the subject; said that Congress had no occasion to meddle with it; that the ministers had done right; that they had maintained the honor of the United States after Congress had given it up; that the manoeuvre practised by them was common in all courts, and was justifiable against Spain, who alone was affected by it; that instructions ought to be disregarded whenever the public good required it; and that he himself would never be bound by them when he thought them improper.

Mr. MERCER combated the dangerous tendency of the doctrine maintained by Mr. Rutledge with regard to instructions; and observed that, the delegates of Virginia having been unanimously instructed not to conclude or discuss any treaty of peace but in confidence and in concert with his Most Christian Majesty, he conceived himself as much bound, as he was of himself inclined, to disapprove every other mode of proceeding; and that he should call for the yeas and nays on the question for his justification to his constituents.

Mr. BLAND tartly said that he, of course, was instructed as well as his colleague, and should himself require the yeas and nays to justify an opposite conduct; that the instructions from his constituents went no farther than to prohibit any treaty, without the concurrence of our ally; which prohibition had not been violated in the case before Congress.

[Note: This construction of the instructions was palpably wrong.]

Mr. LEE was for postponing and burying in oblivion the whole transaction. He said that delicacy to France required this; since, if any thing should be done implying censure on our ministers, it must and ought to be done in such a way as to fall ultimately on France, whose unfaithful conduct had produced and justified that of our ministers. In all national intercourse, he said, a reciprocity was to be understood; and, as France had not communicated her views and proceedings to the American plenipotentiaries, the latter were not bound to communicate theirs. All instructions he conceived to be conditional in favor of the public good; and he cited the case mentioned by Sir William Temple, in which the Dutch ministers concluded, of themselves, an act which required the previous sanction of all the members of the republic.

Mr. HAMILTON said that, whilst he despised the man who would enslave himself to the policy even of our friends, he could not but lament the overweening readiness which appeared in many to suspect every thing on that side, and to throw themselves into the bosom of our enemies. He urged the necessity of vindicating our public honor by renouncing that concealment to which it was the wish of so many to make us parties.

Mr. WILSON, in answer to Mr. Lee, observed that the case mentioned by Sir William Temple was utterly inapplicable to the case in question; adding that the conduct of France had not, on the principle of reciprocity, justified ont ministers in signing the provisional preliminaries without her knowledge, no such step having been taken on her part. But whilst he found it to be his duty thus to note the faults of these gentlemen, he, with much greater pleasure, gave them praise for their firmness in refusing to treat with the British negotiator until he had produced a proper commission, in contending for the fisheries, and in adhering to our western claims.

Congress adjourned without any question.

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