6 
Indiana University 
induced England to prefer open war in order that she might 
recoup herself for some of her losses at sea and at the same 
time reduce the advantages of her commercial rival. When 
the Dutch were at the point of getting their position as neutral 
traders defended by the members of the Armed Neutrality 
League, the British ceased their dallying at once and declared 
war. The Van Berckel-Laurens draft treaty was at best a pre- 
text.^^ The Dutch made a sorry showing in their military en- 
deavors against Britain.^^ The Patriot party was composed 
of capitalists and merchants naturally averse to a war policy. 
They went on debating about whether to build ships or raise 
an army while England seized a large part of the Dutch col- 
onies. The Dutch allowed the French to recapture most of 
these possessions from the British and restore them to the 
Dutch. The moneyed men and merchants entered only half- 
heartedly into the war, and the only real engagements occurred 
when convoyed Dutch merchant fleets encountered British 
fleets. But now that the Dutch were at last at open war with 
the English they drew closer to the Americans. Some of them 
had as early as 1778 feared that if the Americans won their 
independence without assistance from the Dutch the latter 
might lose important trade advantages which the Americans 
would be in a position to grant. It was this idea that led Van 
Berckel, with the connivance of the offlcials of Amsterdam, 
to agree with Lee upon a draft treaty of commerce set- 
ting forth the trade relations that should hold between the 
Netherlands and the United States as soon as the latter should 
have their independence recognized by Britain.^ ^ This treaty 
was ratifled by neither the Continental Congress nor the 
States-General, and, as was stated, was only to be considered 
after Britain herself had recognized the independence of the 
United States. The British government therefore could not 
legally claim that the Dutch government had hereby conducted 
itself improperly in the conflict between England and her re- 
volted colonies. It must, however, be said that the status in 
which this draft treaty had left relations between the United 
States and Holland was practically what the Dutch wanted. 
They did not have to provide for trade with the Americans 
Adams, op. cit., VII, 345, 848. 
I. 343. 
Francis Wharton, The Revolutionary Diplomatic Correspondence of the United 
States (6 vols., Washington, 1889), II, 674, 738, 739, 789. 
