John Adams

The presidency of John Adams can be summed up as a man who was perhaps the most professionally prepared for the job, yet the least personally attuned for it. Adams could be stubborn, opinionated, prone to fits of anger and depression and insecure in his abilities. These are traits that one does not generally want in a president. To make matters worse, he came into the job on the heels of George Washington, the only president to date (probably ever) to be unanimously elected to the position twice. As Abigail Adams said, he was the kind of man who could have run for the rest of time and no one would have cared. So how does one manage to live up to such a legacy? Well, you can't, not that Adams did not try.

This begins with Adams and his career before the presidency. He helped to represent the men who committed the Boston Massacre. He helped to see that they were found not guilty. Then he helped to fight against the British by seeking to establish American Independence. To a layman, this may seem like a contradiction in character, but this is not the case. Adams simply felt, that, whatever the problems with Britain as a ruler, the colonists still had rights as natural born Englishman. That is, until what we would come to call the Intolerable Acts were placed on the colonies. One in particular that may have put a twist in Adams' toga was the act stating that all crimes committed by English Soldiers would be tried in England, so that they could receive a fair trial. This would be the moment when Adams would make the faithful change from loyal English subject to a revolutionary American, or treasonous person, depending on your point of view.

After this, Adams worked tirelessly to see independence for the colonies, which was no small thing, since they were sentencing themselves to death because of treasonous activities, if they lost. One fact that I find interesting is how he railed against the Olive Branch Petition, saying that it was of little use, while British Soldiers were marching in the streets and killing his close friends. As a parent, I would think that he wanted to keep his children as safe as possible, and try to avoid war for as long as possible. Instead, he wanted to teach them to stick to their values, I suppose, and decided that they should be able to live in a free country, whatever the risk.

The Declaration of Independence would mean that the new country called America would need to prove that they deserved to be free, and to do that, they needed military might. Adams himself served on an armed forces committee, meant to see that General Washington got whatever he needed. This was not to last, however, as he was soon called to assist Benjamin Franklin in asking the French for arms and men against the British. As an emissary to France, Adams could do relatively little, as Franklin held most of the sway with the people, and Adams found the culture of France very different from his own. In time, he found that he truly loved the country, as he got used to the culture.

Next, he would travel to Amsterdam, to help negotiate a loan with the Dutch. He found this to be his crowning achievement, with the loan meaning that the US would be able to get what they need. He then would spend his time in Paris, again helping Franklin with the French but this time with his wife Abigail. Together they both experienced all that France had to offer, while Congress was hammering out the elements of what would become the Articles of Confederation.
Eventually, Adams and his wife would travel to London to become the first emmasaries to England. This would be their least productive role as foreign advisors, not surprisingly. Adams was not very thick skinned, and he London press was having a field day with him, as he worked to establish a relationship with America's former mother nation. This would be considered a low point in his career, and he returned home to his farm and family. Still, he was the first independent American to look upon the face of King George III, and that is to be greatly commended.


Adams was not to remain idle while at home. He wrote responses and thoughts on the Constitution, and on how the federal government should remain stronger than the state government, as proof, looking to the failed Articles of Confederation. He then worked with others on the Constitution, working to name Washington as it's first president. He then received the nomination as its Vice President. (Back then Vice President and President were chosen separately.)


If there was a low point in his political life, it would have been as Vice President. With the exception of the Presidency, in which people may have expected too much of him, with the Vice Presidency, they expected too little. Adams was known to go on long winded speeches of principles of government. He spent days on the official title of the President, something that he was greatly ridiculed for. Adams believed that the President should have a lofty title, for someone who was a leader of the country, but many people disagreed, saying that they had just gotten independence from one king, they did not need another one. (One of his suggestions for the titles of the President was :His Mightiness, His Excellency, His High Mightiness, The President of the United States and Defender of Our Liberties.)

Regardless, Adams did not have a good time as Vice President, being asked to do little, when he wanted to do much. The only time when he had to vote on much of anything was when he agreed with Washington that they could not afford to go to war with Great Britain, and made the tie-breaking vote in favor of a peace with Great Britain to remain neutral with the Jay Treaty. This would come to define Adams just as much as Washington.

Wanting to remain neutral in war was a theme that carried over into Adams' Presidency as well. Winning by just three votes over Thomas Jefferson, Adams faced war again, but this time with France. The revolutionary fervor that had hit America like a wave, hit France like a hurricane, killing the French nobility and anyone associated with it. While people like Jefferson saw the revolution as a good thing, with will of the people being used to keep the government in check, Adams disagreed, decrying the blood spilt so violently in the name of freedom. He especially did not like how it seemed like the French citizenry descended into chaos, with people on both sides of the Atlantic, in the US and France, calling for a war against England. Adams was extremely unpopular during this time, as he tried, unsuccessfully called for peace and neutrality.

To compound Adam's foreign affairs problem, the French were being particularly rambunctious. In an effort to go to war with everybody it could reach, the French fought not only with most of Europe, but also with America, seizing American ships to stop them from trading with Britain. This angered the American public to no end, and they railed for war. Adams, in an attempt to let cooler heads prevail, sent John Marshall and three other delegates to the French foreign minister Talleyrand in 1797 to see what they could do to achieve peace. Talleyrand, however, demanded a large bribe of over $5 million dollars before he would even see them. The three delegates who came to Marshall asking for the money -secretly known as X,Y,and Z in correspondence, in case it was intercepted- stated that only them may they get a meeting with Talleyrand.

If it was possible, this enraged the American public even more. Adams, for his part, refused to meet with the French on these terms. This boosted his popularity with congress, and they passed a measure that Adams had been calling for for years- the creation of a Navy. Adams was one of the first to add a secretary to his cabinet: Secretary of the Navy, and it was his crowning achievement as president.

Sadly, this popularity was squandard as congress passed, and Adams signed into law the Alien and Sedition Acts in 1798. These laws allowed anyone who decried the problems of the government as seditious and treasonous. They were liable to be thrown in prison. While we today would rightly see this as a violation of Constitutional rights, Adams saw it both then and afterward, as a reaction to the threat of war with France. I suppose this shows that during wartime, personal liberties are always put aside in favor of rooting out the enemy. Play foreboding music I wonder if this happens again in American history?

Regardless, the Anti-Federalists lead by Thomas Jefferson decried this as a violation of personal liberties, and said that the Kingly John Adams was trying to silence those who spoke out against his office. This would end up costing him he election in 1800, and he quietly slipped away into the night, after his last day in office, ready to return home for the quiet time as a farmer.

An element that has made Adams famous is his relationship with his wife Abigail and Thomas Jefferson. Abigail is one of those women who was not afraid to speak her mind to her husband, but who also helped him when he was in time of need. She and Adams comforted each other and it pained both of them when they were apart but she bore it with grace that is demanded of a wife whose husband was called upon to serve his country in such a fashion.

Adam's relationship with Jefferson is so much more complex. Both men with opposing views were friends for both of their lives. Adams was a strong Federalist, having seen what a strong government needed to do, but could not do under the Articles of Confederation. Jefferson was a man who was a staunch Anti-Federalist, and as a member of the Democratic Republicans. He wished to see the US return to an agrarian society, and away from the cities that he had seen cause so much trouble while he was a minister to France. Se two men would soon become enemies during Adams' Vice and actual Presidency. They would only return to correspondence when they were both older and in the last years of their lives. Why the change? Well, I believe that it had to do with Jefferson being the third President. For all of the slander that Jefferson threw at Adams for being a Federalist, Jefferson had probably cooled to Adams' position after Jefferson had become President. Jefferson had realized that he had only gotten done half of what he wanted because he had done a political 180, and used the power of big government. This could have allowed him to open his heart to correspondence with his old friend, and try to rekindle that friendship that they had so long ago. In any case, the friends wrote right up until their deaths on July 4th, 1826.


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This text is one of the singularly most popular biographies on Goodreads. It is either at the top, or is the top book for subjects ranging from Best Presidential Biographies to the American Revolution. This has been said to be the modern definitive account of John Adams' life. So, did this book live up to the hype? Yes, yes it did.


This is most likely because the book tends to balance so many aspects of John Adams life so well. There was the relationship with his family, his friends, his colleagues, and his enemies that the author has to present in an entertaining way. Then there is the history itself, with an account of dates, places, and background necessary as to why people did what they did, and how that affected Adams' life. This is difficult to juggle for the best of writers, but McCullough manages to do this well. It does not hurt that he has a whole breadth of information to work with, since Abigail and John Adams kept the correspondence with each other and their friends safe from harm so later generations could study it. Then there is John Adams' memoirs, which is a fascinating exploration into the man all on their own. McCullough is the kind of man who certainly had a lot of information to shift through to create his narrative of John Adams' life, and he does an excellent job of it.

If you had to twist my arm, I would say that there are a few slight issues with this book. The first being the study of other people in the novel, one of the largest being Thomas Jefferson. Whole pages are being devoted to him and his character in this book. I don't really mind, since I am going to be reading about him next in my quest for reading one book about each President, and they both had such a unique friendship that I did not really care. Many other readers, however, may wonder how this can matter overall within the big picture about John Adams.

Then there is the classic problem of McCullough writing from the standpoint of historical accuracy, whether it makes sense in his writing or not. There are times where, for example, he will be writing about a political problem Adams is facing, then he will abruptly switch to topics about one of the Adams' children because it occurred at that precise point in time. The change can be somewhat abrupt, but this is the cost of writing when it occurred in history, and not by subject.

My final complaint is one that I do not know who to levy to: Adams or McCullough. This book does have the problem of dragging around the middle of the text, when Adams is moving around Europe, from France, to Amsterdam, to England, then back to France again. This was when it got the most boring for me. The issue is, I just can't decide if it is this boring because of McCullough's writing or Adams' life in general. In any case, I'm not going to read another bio of Adams for some time to find out, just take it as a word of caution.

But these complaints are minuscule compared to the breadth of knowledge and learning I experienced when reading this book. It was simply amazing to behold. This is truly a text where I feel as if I knew the man, as much as the President himself. It gives you clues and idea as to why he did what he did, given the political ideas of the time, and the personality of the person presented, as all good biographies should. I know that if anyone were to ask what book to read about Adams, I would suggest this one without hesitation. I give it a five out of five. If you have not already, pick this up and begin reading it, it will not disappoint.