GAZETTE OF THE UNITED STATES, New York, April 17, 1790  

* President George Washington
* John Adams - Thomas Jefferson
* Letter to Quakers - address to Congress

Page 3 has an Act of Congress for regulating duties on imports, signed in type: John Adams, George Washington & Thomas Jefferson.
The back page has a lengthy address from a deputation of the "Society of Free-Quakers" to President Washington concerning religious and civil liberty. A gracious reply to this address is signed in type: George Washington.
Four pages, great condition.

Background: This April 17, 1790 issue of the Gazette of the United States stands as a monumental cultural artifact because it captures the practical scaffolding of the newly born American republic at the ultimate historical crossroads of its founding generation. Printed in the temporary capital of New York City, page three brings together the "holy trinity" of early American statecraft—George Washington, John Adams, and a newly arrived Thomas Jefferson—formally certifying early tariff and import acts that established the vital economic framework needed to keep the young country solvent under its fresh Constitution. Simultaneously, the back page documents a profound philosophical dialogue on the true boundaries of religious and civil liberty via an address from the "Free Quakers" (pacifists disowned by their traditional meetings for fighting in the Revolutionary War) and Washington's gracious response. This exchange solidified the unprecedented American commitment to individual freedom of conscience, ensuring that those who risked their lives for the nation's independence would not be marginalized by the state. Adding an immense layer of bittersweet significance to the publication date, this very day—April 17, 1790—marked the death of Benjamin Franklin in Philadelphia; thus, as the newspaper's iron press set the words of Washington, Adams, and Jefferson into type to build the nation's future, the final titan of the Revolutionary vanguard was passing into history, cementing this specific artifact as a perfect, tangible witness to the literal changing of the guard in early America.