[Danae]

Do you have access to the Library of Congress?

Ooooooo this makes me wonder sonething... I have access to the InterLibrary Loan system through American Military University... I wonder.... nah... well, its worth a try. I will check with our librarians and see what information I can get.. but it sounds as if that might be reinventing the wheel.

In some ways this is a moot point, many of the founders were not only fluent in spoken French, they could read it just fine.

[dinodino]

You beat me to it. Why people assume the Founders couldn’t read French is beyond me. I would assume that most could.

[devattel]

Danae said: Do you have access to the Library of Congress?

All citizens of this country do. In order to access this you must visit the library personally and request special access to this book. As it is in the rare books collection, you must be escorted in to this section of the library via appointment only. I managed to get a peek at this version from a collector back in 2007, which was not in the Library of Congress. The value of this version (as well as many of de Vattel's 18th century copy) is quite high.

There are very few copies of this manuscript still alive today. Let us hope that these don't "disappear" inadvertently.