TREATY OF PARIS

Congress ratifies the Treaty of Paris

After years of war and months of negotiation, delegates of the Confederation Congress gathered in Annapolis to ratify the peace treaty that had been signed in Paris the previous year. By approving the agreement on January 14th, 1784, the United States formally ended the Revolutionary War in the eyes of European powers and secured recognition of its independence and new borders. For officers and enlisted veterans of the Continental Army, this legal act confirmed that their sacrifices had created an internationally acknowledged nation. The ratification also opened the door to demobilization, western settlement, and debates over how to manage a peacetime military establishment. The decision marked a pivot from rebellion to statecraft, and from wartime improvisation to the long, uneven work of building lasting institutions.