The proposed treaty was negotiated by the minister to Britain, James Monroe, and his associate, William Pinkney, on behalf of the Jefferson administration and by Lord Holland and Lord Auckland on behalf of the Ministry of All the Talents, a government that was headed by Lord Grenville.
In the desperate war against Napoleon, the British believed that they could not afford to abandon impressment and that offending the Americans was seen as a much lesser evil than losing to Napoleon.
The negotiations were begun on 27 August 1806, and the treaty was signed on 31 December 1806.
Jefferson received the treaty in March 1807 but was disappointed and refused to submit it to the US Senate for ratification.
That failure to resolve differences over the issue of impressment and of neutral trading rights contributed to the coming of the War of 1812.