John Adams

John Adams (1735–1826) was the first Vice President (1789–1797) and second President (1797–1801) of the United States.[5][6] He was an early advocate of American independence and a major figure in the Continental Congress, regarded as one of the most significant statesmen of the revolutionary era.[5] His importance as a political thinker, his realistic perspective on American foreign policy, and his patriarchal role as founder of one of the most prominent families in American history have prompted a rediscovery of his contributions in modern times.[5]

Early Life and Education

Adams was born on October 30, 1735, in Braintree, Massachusetts (now Quincy), the eldest of three sons born to Deacon John Adams and Susanna Boylston Adams.[6][5] His father was a farmer and shoemaker, but the Adams family could trace its lineage back to the first generation of Puritan settlers in New England.[5][6] A local selectman and a leader in the community, Deacon Adams encouraged his eldest son to aspire toward a career in the ministry.[5]

As a healthy young boy, John loved the outdoors, frequently skipping school to hunt and fish. He said later that he would have preferred a life as a farmer, but his father insisted that he receive a formal education.[2] While being very bright for his age, John originally had no interest in learning. Returning from dame school one day, John insisted to his father that he had no interest in college; he simply wanted to be a farmer.[7]

Growing up, Adams received a valuable education from a local Latin school, where he learned Latin, rhetoric, arithmetic, and philosophy.[1] Harvard at this time was composed of approximately one hundred students under the tutelage of seven faculty members. John's class of 1755 was put in the care of John Mayhew, a Latin scholar, and with his guidance, John excelled. His favorite subjects were science and mathematics, and with the help of his favorite professor, John Winthrop, Adams distinguished himself from his peers.[7] At sixteen, he entered Harvard University to study under Joseph Mayhew.[1] In keeping with that goal, Adams graduated from Harvard College in 1755.[5]

Professional Development and Legal Career

For the next three years, he taught grammar school in Worcester, Massachusetts, while contemplating his future.[5][6] Young John, who had no interest in a ministerial career, taught in a Latin school in Worcester, Massachusetts, to earn the tuition fees to study law, and from 1756 to 1758, he studied law with a prominent local lawyer in Worcester.[2] He eventually chose law rather than the ministry and in 1758 moved back to Braintree, then soon began practicing law in nearby Boston.[5]

Adams launched his legal career in Boston in 1758. He faced several years of struggle in establishing his practice. He had only one client his first year and did not win his initial case before a jury until almost three years after opening his office. Thereafter, his practice grew.[2] By 1770, Adams was a highly successful lawyer with perhaps the largest caseload of any attorney in Boston.[2]

The Boston Massacre Defense

Adams was chosen to defend the British soldiers who were charged in the Boston Massacre in March 1770.[2] The day after the Massacre, James Forrest, a loyalist merchant, approached lawyer John Adams on behalf of Captain Thomas Preston, who was to be tried separately from his soldiers. Forrest told Adams that Preston "wishe[d] for council, and [could] get none." Lawyers throughout Boston had refused to represent Preston or his soldiers.[28]

Above all, John Adams believed in upholding the law, and defending the innocent. Adams was convinced that the soldiers were wrongly accused, and had fired into the crowd in self-defense.[21] Adams later declared that "the part I took in the defense of Captain Preston and the soldiers procured me anxiety and obloquy enough. It was, however, one of the most gallant, generous, manly, and disinterested actions of my whole life, and one of the best pieces of service I ever rendered my country. Judgment of death against those soldiers would have been a foul stain upon this country."[29]

After several hours of deliberation, the jury acquitted Preston. This result stunned the city, but the defense had been successful in countering the various claims on the basis of self-defense.[26] The jury outright acquitted six of the eight soldiers present the night of March 5, 1770. For the remaining two soldiers, Hugh Montgomery and Matthew Kilroy, the jury found them guilty of manslaughter. By invoking the Benefit of Clergy, an antiquated piece of English law that reduced sentences for first time offenders and could only be used by literate citizens, the defense successfully commuted their sentences from capital punishment to having their right thumbs branded.[28]

Personal Life

Once his practice started to flourish, he began to court Abigail Smith, the daughter of a Congregational minister in nearby Weymouth. They were married in 1764.[2] Five children followed in the next eight years, although one, Susanna, died in infancy.[2] Together, John and Abigail had six children, including future president John Quincy Adams.[1] As David McCullough would note, John's decision to marry Abigail Smith "was the most important decision of [his] life, as would become apparent with time."[7]

Unlike the Virginians that came before and after him, Adams did not own enslaved people. Instead, the Adamses hired white and free African-American workers to provide these services.[15]

Revolutionary War Leadership

In 1776, Adams organized a "Committee of Five" and was placed in charge of drafting the Declaration of Independence. The five-member included John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Robert Livingston, and Robert Sherman. Adams convinced Jefferson to write the document due to his advanced writing skills and positive reputation.[1]

While serving in congress, Adams worked to establish a Continental Navy to aid the army during the Revolutionary War. Congress established the Marine Committee, which consisted of Adams, John Langdon, and Silas Dean. The group was authorized to purchase substantial amounts of guns and ships and establish a Marine Corps.[1]

Early in 1778, after nearly four years service in Congress, Adams was sent to France to help secure French aid. Subsequently, he was sent to The Hague to obtain a much needed loan and to open commerce. In 1781, together with Franklin, John Jay, and Henry Laurens, Adams was part of the commission of American diplomats that negotiated the Treaty of Paris, the pact that brought an end to the War of Independence.[2]

In 1785, he became the first United States minister to England.[2] Adams returned home once during the war, a brief sojourn from July until November 1779, during which time he helped draft the Massachusetts Constitution of 1780.[2]

Vice Presidency

Knowing that George Washington would be the first President, Adams sought the vice presidency. He was elected to that position in 1789, receiving the second largest number of votes after Washington, who won the vote of every member of the electoral college.[2] Adams' two terms as Vice President were frustrating experiences for a man of his vigor, intellect, and vanity. He complained to his wife Abigail, "My country has in its wisdom contrived for me the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived."[17]

Presidency (1797-1801)

Having finished second to George Washington in the first U.S. presidential election in 1789 and serving as Washington's vice president (1789–97), Adams won a narrow victory over Thomas Jefferson to be elected as the second president of the United States in 1796.[5] From the moment John Adams entered the presidency in 1797, the United States was in a state of undeclared war with France. The Quasi-War, as it was known, dominated his presidency, monopolizing both foreign policy and domestic policy.[13]

Foreign Policy Challenges

The chief foreign policy challenge of Adams' tenure was the Quasi-War with France. Stemming from the XYZ Affair—a diplomatic incident in which French agents demanded bribes from American envoys—the undeclared naval war lasted from 1798 to 1800.[14] Adams, like Washington before him, knew the new nation could not withstand another war. But Adams was a Federalist, and in 1797, many in the Federalist Party were pro-war.[13]

On the other hand, Adams avoided war with France, which was his primary diplomatic objective. The Treaty of Mortefontaine, signed in 1800, came too late to help Adams win reelection, but ended the Quasi-War with France and secured a peaceful trade relationship between the two countries.[15]

Domestic Policy

The first of four acts known collectively as the Alien and Sedition Acts is adopted. The Alien and Sedition acts aimed to curb criticism of administration policies and prevent internal subversion. The first act, stipulating requirements for naturalized citizenship, demanded residence in the United States for period of fourteen years and a declaration of intention for five years.[11] His administration vigorously enforced the legislation: under the Sedition Act, the most controversial of the four, several Democratic-Republican newspaper publishers were arrested, and ten were convicted for seditious libel before the acts expired in 1801.[11]

Retirement and Death

John Adams lost the election. Republicans Jefferson and Aaron Burr tied; the House of Representative would later break the tie in Jefferson's favor.[13] After Thomas Jefferson won election to the presidency in 1800, Adams returned home to Peacefield, his home in Quincy, Massachusetts.[15]

Adams divided his time between overseeing his farm and writing letters about his personal experiences as well as more general issues of the day.[6] After their presidencies were over, Adams and Jefferson restored the friendship of their Revolutionary War days through letter writing.[4]

On July 4, 1826, John Adams died at the age of 90; as he was dying, his last words were, "Thomas Jefferson survives," unaware that Jefferson had died only hours earlier. Curiously, they both died on the same day—July 4, 1826, the 50th anniversary of the approval of the Declaration of Independence.[4][1]

Legacy and Impact

Adams's legacy is one of reason, moral leadership, the rule of law, compassion, and a cautious but active foreign policy that aimed both at securing the national interest and achieving an honorable peace.[12] Most historians agree that Adams was correct in not expanding the naval war with France into an all-out conflict. Another protracted war, especially one so soon after the War of Independence with the populace deeply divided along partisan lines, might have been fatal for the nascent American union.[12]

John Adams was indispensable to the cause of American independence, and without his leadership, the republican experiment in America might have failed.[16] John Adams's family could trace its lineage to the first generation of Puritan settlers in New England and made major contributions to U.S. political and intellectual life for more than 150 years. His cousin Samuel Adams was, like John Adams, a lynchpin of the American Revolution. John Quincy Adams, like his father, John Adams, served as U.S. president.[5]