In after years, Johnstone became a member of Parliament, and attracted much attention by casting, in the House of Commons, one of the only two negative votes on the Boston Harbor Bill, Edmund Burke casting the other. His course on that memorable occasion secured him such consideration with the Americans as to induce the British government to select him as one of the five commissioners who were sent to America in 1778, under Lord North’s conciliatory bill, intended to concede to the colonies all, and even more, than they had demanded at the beginning of the controversy with the Mother country. But the sequel of his mission proved his unfitness for the position. Besides venturing to enter into correspondence with Robert Morris and Francis Dana, he attempted, through a lady, to bribe General Joseph Reed of Pennsylvania by an offer of £10,000 and the highest office within the gift of the crown in America in the event his efforts at conciliation proving successful. To that offer Reed made the memorable reply: “I am not worth purchasing, but such as I am the King of Great Britain is not rich enough to do it.” The other commissioners, Mr. Eden, General Clinton, and Lord Carlisle, at least, disavowed all knowledge or connection with Johnstone’s course. His conduct became the subject of resolutions passed by Congress, in which it was declared: “That it is incompatible with the honor of Congress to hold any manner of intercourse with the said George Johnstone, especially to negotiate with him upon affairs in which the cause of liberty is interested.” From that reflection he sought to vindicate himself by an ill-tempered address, which was followed by his resignation from the commission. Though a Scotchman, he seems in this affair to have acted with more of the impulse of a Frenchman, like Genet, than with the cool deliberation characteristic of his race. Though he had been a commodore in the British navy, after his appointment of governor of West Florida his historical designation is “Governor Johnstone.” By virtue of his being lieutenant-governor, Monteforte Brown became Johnstone’s successor. The troops stationed at Pensacola during Governor Johnstone’s time were the Thirty-first regiment of infantry and the second battalion of Royal Artillery, under General Taylor. In 1765, these troops suffered from scurvy, as a remedy for which the governor undertook means to provide them with fresh meat, a provision which it would seem a thoughtful and considerate ruler would have employed as a preventive, instead of waiting until disease required it as a remedy.