contained conflicting references to the named river. Sullivan's responsibility was to gather relevant maps and legal documents, and then present a legal case for the United States' claim for what the border should be. In addition to researching materials in Massachusetts archives, Sullivan spent a significant amount of time exploring the poorly surveyed and remote Passamaquoddy Bay, attempting to build a case that the Magaguadavic River was the river intended by the treaty negotiators. Which river it was hinged on the location of a 1604 French settlement on an island in the river, and the commissioners and agents explored the area and ordered surveys. The surveys located evidence of the settlement on Saint Croix Island, after which the commission fixed the southern portion of the border on what is now known as the Saint Croix River. (The disposition of some islands in the bay was not settled, and the northern portion of the border would not be fixed until the 1842 Webster-Ashburton Treaty.) Governor Sullivan received the Republican nomination for governor in 1797 and 1798, but lost to Federalist Increase Sumner (in 1798 by a landslide after the XYZ Affair lent strength to the Federalist cause). Republicanism eventually began gaining ground in Massachusetts, and Sullivan was again nominated in 1805 and 1806 for governor, losing both times to the popular incumbent Governor Caleb Strong. In 1806 the Republicans gained control of the Massachusetts legislature, which managed to very nearly deny Strong a narrow victory. With fewer than 200 votes in the balance, the Republican-controlled legislature scrutinized the returns in a partisan manner, discarding ballots that had misspelled Strong's name while retaining those that misspelled Sullivan's and performing tallies in ways that favored their candidate. This process concluded with a finding that Strong in fact lacked a majority of votes, which was what was then required to carry the election, as opposed to the modern plurality requirement. Strong's Federalist allies in the legislature were able to publicize the partisan nature of the analysis, resulting in a hostile public backlash. He was proclaimed the winner after further, less biased, analysis corrected the count in his favor. In 1807 Sullivan again faced Strong, but was this time decisively victorious, carrying the eastern counties (present-day Maine) by a wide margin amid a series of Republican victories throughout New England. Although Sullivan sought in some ways to be a moderate voice in the highly partisan