John Methuen (diplomat) the Treaty on 16 May 1703, a step of great significance in the War of the Spanish Succession. John, on his return from England, concluded a commercial treaty on 27 December 1703, opening Portugal to the English cloth trade in return for preferential rates of duty on the import of wine. How beneficial to either country the Treaty was in the long run has been debated; possibly its most important result was the development of the port wine trade, and it was later referred to humorously as "the Port-Wine Treaty". Methuen in later life increasingly suffered from gout and rheumatism;
Treaty of Amity and Commerce (United States–France) their lands in the Americas after the French and Indian War. As a result, John Adams began drafting conditions for a possible commercial treaty between France and the future independent colonies of the United States, which declined the presence of French troops and any aspect of French authority in colonial affairs. On September 25 the Continental Congress ordered commissioners, led by Benjamin Franklin, to seek a treaty with France based upon Adams's draft treaty that had later been formalized into a Model Treaty which sought the establishment of reciprocal trade relations with France but declined to mention any possible military