When originally released to theaters, this 21-minute cartoon short was double billed with the Walt Disney film The Living Desert (1953) as a 90-minute package deal. This and "The Living Desert" were the first to be released by Buena Vista. RKO continued to distribute Disney's cartoons until 1956. RKO shut down in 1957.
In the book, some others historical figures have their own mouse companions the way Ben has Amos. Thomas Jefferson's mouse Red, whose name is repurposed in the film as Jefferson's own nickname, writes a document declaring that mice will fight for freedom against cats. Amos proofreads Red's document and repurposes it for the opening passage of the Declaration of Independence. In the film, Amos comes up with the Declaration's opening himself.
When Amos is drawing up the BINDING contract with Ben, watch the gestures of his tail as he spells out this word.
While the movie ends with the Declaration of Independence in 1776, the source novella by Robert Lawson then covers Benjamin Franklin's career as US Ambassador to France. The novella's climax is a humorous epic battle between two tribes of French mice.
Stars Charles Ruggles (Benjamin Franklin) and Hans Conried (Thomas Jefferson) later starred in The Bullwinkle Show (1959), with Ruggles as Aesop in the Aesop & Son (1976) segments, and Conreid as Snidely Whiplash in The Dudley Do-Right Show (1969) segments.