Washington -- When John Adams arrived in the Republic of the United Netherlands in January 1781, his task was not a small one. The fledgling United States of America had battled for nearly six years for its independence from the mighty British Empire. Both the new nation’s army and its treasury relied heavily on a French ally whose ultimate diplomatic objectives diverged significantly from those of the Americans. The United States hoped to find political support — and financial credit — in the Netherlands, a sister republic in an international order dominated by monarchies and hereditary rule.

The dour Adams was not his government’s first choice. Although “his abilities are undoubtedly equal to the mechanical parts of his business,” one critic observed, “that is not enough. He cannot dance, drink, flatter, promise, dress, swear with the gentlemen, and make small talk and flirt with the ladies.” But Henry Laurens, who was Congress’ first choice, had been captured by a British cruiser and imprisoned in the Tower of London. Adams was already in Paris, beyond the Royal Navy’s reach, and he eagerly agreed to work toward establishing formal relations between the Dutch and American republics.

Despite these misgivings, Adams proved a flexible and even revolutionary diplomat. His initial task in Holland was to persuade the Dutch government to recognize him as minister, i.e., the formal diplomatic representative of an independent nation. He faced formidable obstacles. Stadhouder-generaal William V was a first cousin of Britain’s King George III and determined to pursue Anglophile policies. Count Vergennes, the French foreign minister, worked behind the scenes to block Dutch recognition of the United States and thus maximize American dependence on France.

Adams matched wits with Vergennes’ agents in the Netherlands and worked hard to build Dutch public support for ties with the United States. Both nations, Adams recalled at every opportunity, had to win their independence — the Netherlands from Spain, the United States from Britain — and each had adopted a republican form of government. As Adams put it in his April 1781 appeal to the States-General (Parliament): "In general usages and in the liberality of sentiments in those momentous points of freedom of inquiry, the right of private judgment and the liberty of conscience … the two nations resemble each other more than any other."

When the Dutch government refused to accept Adams’ diplomatic credentials, the American then, in the words of biographer David McCullough, "in effect, took his case to the people of the Netherlands." Adams urged the Dutch public to petition its government to recognize the United States. He lobbied States-General delegations, visiting personally representatives from 18 cities in the province of Holland alone. At every house, McCullough writes, "the reception was the same — approval, affection, esteem for the United States."

Events aided Adams’ efforts. Trade between the two nations increased as Americans boycotted British goods. When the Netherlands aligned with the Russian-sponsored League of Armed Neutrality, a group of nations determined to resist British searches of neutral vessels, Britain declared war. Now the Dutch and the Americans shared a common foe. Then, in October 1781, British forces under General Lord Cornwallis surrendered to a combined French and American force at Yorktown, Virginia. The prospects of American success seemed brighter than when Adams arrived at The Hague 10 months earlier.

In February 1782, the province of Friesland instructed that its States-General delegates move to acknowledge Adams as an official diplomatic representative. That April, the Netherlands extended its formal recognition of the United States as an independent nation. Adams then negotiated a badly needed loan and, in October 1782, concluded a full treaty of amity and commerce between the two nations. It was the American nation’s second treaty, preceded only by the wartime French alliance.

John Adams would return home to serve his nation as a major contributor at the 1787 Constitutional Convention, and then as its first vice president and second president of the United States. But by many accounts, Adams always considered his forging of ties between the United States and the Netherlands his greatest achievement. "One thing, thank God, is certain," he wrote. "I have planted the American standard at The Hague. There let it wave and fly in triumph. … I shall look down upon the flagstaff with pleasure from the other world."