John Adams

When I decided in March 2021 that I needed to know more about the presidents of these United States, I decided to read one book a month on a president, in order in which they served.  Since we started with George Washington in March 2021, I next read and reviewed the book John Adams by David McCullough, review initially posted on YouTube on April 26, 2021. You can watch the review on Rumble or listen to it on PodBean.

Now, John Adams has long been my favorite founding father, and this book reinforced that admiration.  He led a completely remarkable life. Adams was born October 30, 1735, in Braintree, MA, just outside Boston. He was really smart as a kid, he loved to read, and did so well with his studies that he was admitted to Harvard at 15.  Now, that sounds impressive and today it would be, but that was not necessarily unusual back then. He achieved this because he was much loved as a child, when the schoolhouse he was attending was not meeting his needs, he told his father, who immediately switched him to a different school.

So, enrolled in Harvard at 15, graduated at 19, and then spent several years as a teacher to save money to study law.  Now, law school was way different in the 18th century, you paid a lawyer a fee to teach you directly while you clerked for him, and after a period of study, you would take the bar exam, which Adams did on November 6, 1759 at 24 years old, and immediately set up to start practicing law, which did not start auspiciously as he lost his first case.

He met his future wife Abigail Smith in the summer of 1759, and he was not at first much taken with her, fancying himself in love with another young lady. But by the time of his friend Richard Cranch’s marriage to Abigail’s sister Mary, Adams was quite taken with Abigail.  She was 15 when they met and he was 23, which age difference was not at all unusual or unseemly for the 18th century.  But Adams wanted to make sure he was set up with his law practice and able to support a wife, so they courted for 5 years before marrying on October 25, 1764. Now, with Washington, he married Martha Custis for property and status, and while they probably esteemed each other and possibly came to love each other, their marriage was likely business to start. But with John and Abigail, they were very much in love, and they remained in love until she died.  Pretty sure he loved her until he died.

They had five children, Abigail (Nabby), John Quincy, Susanna, Charles, and Thomas. Susanna died at 2 years old, which devastated Adams, the rest of the children survived to adulthood, which is a not inconsiderable blessing given childhood mortality in the 18th century.

Adams career was good in Boston. He was a successful lawyer, he was able to support his family, he was semi-active in politics, writing dissertations on laws that were passed that affected the colonies. And it was his impassioned writings on freedom that helped spark the revolution as much as anything, demanding that people think, read, speak, and write for themselves. But he also believed that we are a land of laws, not just people.  That laws governed, not man. And that belief was truly tested in 1770, during the Boston Massacre, when John Adams was asked to defend the soldiers, which he did, due to his belief that in a free country, no man should be denied counsel and a fair trial. Even more remarkable, he won his case, proving that the soldiers were doing no more than defending themselves against a violent mob, saying that “Facts are funny things,” during his closing statement, before laying out the exact sequence of events that made it very clear that self defense is certainly allowable, even when one is a soldier. His defense of the soldiers impacted his practice, and he experienced a slump, which gradually picked back up, resulting in him being chosen as one of the delegates from Massachusetts to the First Continental Congress in Philadelphia in 1774. Adams argued passionately for independence, so much so, that the argument could definitely be made that without his impassioned speech and gift for oratory, the Revolution might not have happened.  The British certainly seemed to think so, as at one point early in the war, an envoy was sent to meet with Lord Admiral Richard Howe, which included John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and Edward Rutledge. Adams made a good presentation, and it is likely Admiral Howe liked him, this based on information Adams received later in life, namely that Admiral Howe had been given a list of rebels who were to be granted pardons. Adams was not one of them.  Had the war been lost, Adams would have been hanged as a traitor.

So politically, he was assigned as a delegate from MA to the Continental Congress from 1774 to 1777.  While on assignment to Congress, Congress assigned him to be the US Envoy to France, a position shared with Benjamin Franklin and eventually Thomas Jefferson. He was the Minster to the Netherlands from 1782 to 1788, and the minister to England from 1785 to 1788. He was reassigned to France while also serving in the Netherlands. Throughout some of these postings, he had various of his children, John Quincy, joined him for a stretch, Charles was overseas, Abigail and Nabby joined him. While in the Netherlands, Adams was instrumental in securing loans for the fledgling nation, while in France he helped secure the treaty that ended the Revolution. In England, he was treated graciously by King George III and reviled by the English, which I don’t think he really expected anything less. While stationed overseas, he and Abigail formed a really strong friendship with Thomas Jefferson and Nabby met her future husband Colonel William Stephen Smith.

When he returned to the US in 1788, it was just in time for the first presidential election. In the 18th century, the person who garnished the most electoral college votes won the presidency while the runner up was granted the vice-presidency. There were no tickets as we know them now. So, George Washington won the presidency, John Adams became the first vice-president. Like every other job he ever undertook, Adams was diligent as VP, attending every single meeting of the Senate and casting some 29 tie-breaking votes, ALWAYS in favor of protecting the executive branch and a strong central government.

What was really interesting about this book is the behind-the-scenes intrigues that are writ out. Jefferson comes across as a bit of a vapid hypocrite and I’m not sure that author David McCullough had a single kind word to say about Alexander Hamilton.  I mean, Hamilton comes across as a political fucktard, just a vile creature that manipulated everyone to his own end but failed in the end due largely to being out maneuvered by Adams, which ended up being a genuine blessing for America.  Abigail saw Hamilton as a miniature Napoleon, set on securing his own power as the head of the new Army.  Adams cut him off at the knee by making peace with France before the war could touch our shores.  But that maneuver cost him.  Long before the election of 1800 occurred, Adams was sure he was going to be a one term president. Following the peace treaty with France, Hamilton posted a letter to the press that blasted Adams, killed Hamilton’s own career, and left Jefferson the guaranteed winner, with Aaron Burr as the Vice President. Gotta say, I feel like eventually I’m going to have to read about Hamilton. Because seriously, Hamilton comes across as a total cockbag.

Anyway, the day of Jefferson’s inauguration, Adams quietly left at 4am, because that was when the coach for home left. And with leaving the political arena as the second president of the United States that he helped to create, Adams settled into retirement, enjoying time with family and friends, renewing written correspondence with his old friend Benjamin Rush.  Adams received hundreds of correspondences and replied to all, reading books, and enjoying being a farmer.  In Approximately 4 years after Jefferson retired from politics, in 1812, Adams and Jefferson resumed their friendship by means of a written communication that lasted until they both died. In 1800, Adams son Charles died, having been disinherited by Adams for alcoholism. In 1816, Adams daughter Nabby died of breast cancer.  In October 1818, Abigail died, leaving Adams alone. He continued correspondence with Jefferson and other friends, enjoying time as the grandfather of nations, until his death on July 4, 1826.  Among his last words were that “Jefferson survives” which is a legendary story, since he did not know that Jefferson had died on the same day, several hours earlier. The fact that both great men, the framer of the Declaration of Independence and its most ardent champion both died on the 50th anniversary of the “signing” were seen as divine providence, God’s blessing on this nation.

This was a 650-page book, a detailed story of John Adams life, and my synopsis does not do it justice. Adams was an ardent defender of freedom and liberty, ideologically consistent, he did believe in freedom for all.  He believed there was nothing so abhorrent as slavery and never in his life owned a slave. When the family was located overseas on diplomatic missions, Abigail left the care of their house in the hands of a free black woman Phoebe and her husband. Abigail and John both championed the rights of everyone and decried slavery as blatant hypocrisy in a country whose founding principle was freedom. That hypocrisy was among the wedges that Abigail could not forgive Jefferson and helped end the friendship between Abigail and Jefferson. Adams did believe in a strong central government and every decision he made both as VP and President supported that cause. He was 90 years old when he died, having lived a remarkable life as a passionate champion of everything he believed, a faithful friend to those he loved, and impartial even to those he disliked. He still remains my favorite founding father, not least of which was his utter consistency on the matter of freedom.  He believed freedom belonged to all God’s creatures, and among the founding fathers who sat as Presidents, he was the only one to never own a slave.  The odd question that floats around, if you could have a conversation with anyone, dead or alive…John Adams is someone I wish very much to have met in life.