John Quincy Adams
From Free net encyclopedia
Template:Infobox President John Quincy Adams (July 11, 1767 – February 23, 1848) was an American lawyer, diplomat, politician, and President of the United States (March 4, 1825 – March 3, 1829). Successively a Federalist, Democratic-Republican, National Republican and later a Whig, Adams was the son of U.S. President John Adams and Abigail Adams.
Contents |
Early career
Adams was born in Braintree, Massachusetts in a part of town which eventually became the separate town of Quincy. The John Quincy Adams birthplace, now part of Adams National Historical Park, is open to the public, as is the nearby Abigail Adams Cairn, which marks the site from which he viewed the Battle of Bunker Hill as a seven-year-old boy.
As a child, Adams spent much time overseas, acquired his early education in Europe, at venerable institutions such as the University of Leiden while accompanying his father who was serving as an American envoy to France (1778-79) and the Netherlands (1780). He returned to America and was graduated from Harvard College in 1787 and admitted to the bar, beginning practice in Boston. George Washington appointed him as minister to the Netherlands (1794-96), and Portugal (1796). His father appointed him minister to Prussia (1797-1801). While serving abroad, he married Louisa Catherine Johnson, the daughter of an American merchant.
Adams afterwards returned to Quincy where he lived in the Old House (now a museum). He began his political career in 1802 when he was elected to the Massachusetts Senate. Adams was an unsuccessful Federalist candidate for election to the U.S. House of Representatives in the same year. He was elected as a Federalist to the U.S. Senate, serving from March 4, 1803, until June 8, 1808, breaking with the Federalists and becoming a Republican.
Adams was Minister to Russia from 1809 to 1814, chief negotiator of the U.S. commission for the Treaty of Ghent in 1814, and Minister to the Court of St. James (Britain) from 1815 to 1817.
Adams was Secretary of State in the Cabinet of President James Monroe from 1817 to 1825, a tenure during which he was instrumental in the acquisition of Florida and in keeping the United States from becoming dependent on the United Kingdom. He was sometimes called the "Lone Wolf" for his positions during this time because he often went against the majority opinion. Typically, however, his alone were the ones that Monroe decided upon. As Secretary of State, he negotiated the Adams-Onís Treaty and helped develop the Monroe Doctrine, which warned European nations not to meddle in affairs of the Western Hemisphere.
Election of 1824
Adams ran against three other candidates in the Presidential election of 1824. No one had a majority of electoral votes (or popular votes). The House of Representatives dropped the lowest Henry Clay, who gave his support to Adams. Adams then named Clay Secretary of State, to the angry complaints of Andrew Jackson, who alleged a corrupt bargain and vowed to run again in 1828.
Presidency 1825-1829
Policies
Adams served as President from March 4, 1825 to March 3, 1829. During this time he worked on developing the American System comprising a federal system of roads, canals, bridges, lighthouses, and universities. He and Clay set up a new party, the National Republican Party, but it never took root in the states. He was defeated by Jackson in the Presidential election of 1828
Most of his initiatives were thwarted in Congress by Jackson's supporters who remained outraged over the 1824 election.
Administration and Cabinet
Image:John quincy adams stamp.JPG
| OFFICE | NAME | TERM |
| President | John Quincy Adams | 1825–1829 |
| Vice President | John C. Calhoun | 1825–1829 |
| Secretary of State | Henry Clay | 1825–1829 |
| Secretary of the Treasury | Richard Rush | 1825–1829 |
| Secretary of War | James Barbour | 1825–1828 |
| Peter Porter | 1828–1829 | |
| Attorney General | William Wirt | 1825–1829 |
| Postmaster General | John McLean | 1825–1829 |
| Secretary of the Navy | Samuel Southard | 1825–1829 |
Supreme Court appointments
States admitted to the Union
None
Later life
After his presidency, rather than retire, Adams went on to win election as a National Republican to the House, serving from 1831 until his death. He was chairman of the Committee on Manufactures (for the 22nd through 26th, 28th and 29th Congresses, respectively), the Committee on Indian Affairs (for the 27th Congress) and the Committee on Foreign Affairs (also for the 27th Congress).
He was an unsuccessful candidate for Governor of Massachusetts in 1834. In 1841, Adams represented the Amistad Africans in the Supreme Court of the United States and successfully argued that the Africans, who had seized control of a Spanish ship where they were being held as illegal slaves, should not be returned to Spain, but returned home as free people.
Adams's son Charles Francis also pursued a career in politics.
Adams died of a cerebral hemorrhage on February 23, 1848 in the Capitol Building, Washington, D.C.. His interment was in the family burial ground at Quincy, and he was subsequently reinterred after his wife's death in a family crypt in the United First Parish Church across the street, where his tomb can be viewed today.
Trivia
- Adams was the first president whose father was also president. Nearly 200 years later, George W. Bush became the second president whose father (George H.W. Bush) was also president.
- Adams was one of the founders of All Souls Church, Unitarian, in Washington, DC.
- Adams was the first president to wear long pants instead of knee-breeches.
- The couple named one of their sons after George Washington, making Adams the only U.S. President to do so.
- Adams was the first President to give an interview to a woman — however, he did not have much choice. Adams had repeatedly refused requests for an interview with Anne Royall, the first female professional journalist in the U.S., so she took a different approach to accomplish her goal. She learned that Adams liked to skinny-dip in the Potomac River almost every morning around 5 a.m., so she went to the river, gathered his clothes and sat on them until he answered all of her questions.
- While in Russia, Adams and his wife lost to illness an infant daughter, born in 1811.
- Adams was the first U.S. president to be involved in a railroad accident when he was a passenger on a Camden & Amboy train that derailed in the meadows near Hightstown, New Jersey on November 11 1833. His coach was the one ahead of the first car to derail. He was uninjured and continued his journey to Washington, D.C. the following day. Seriously injured in this accident was Cornelius Vanderbilt, future head of the New York Central Railroad, who suffered two cracked ribs and a punctured lung, taking a month to recover.
- Toilets, a novelty during his term, were given the nickname "Quincy" in the honor of the late president.
- Adams County, Illinois and its county seat Quincy, Illinois is named after him, along with Adams County, Indiana.
- The Adams Memorial is proposed in Washington, D.C. for John Adams and his family.
References
- Bemis, Samuel Flagg. John Quincy Adams and the Foundations of American Foreign Policy. vol 1 (1949), the standard biography
- Bemis, Samuel Flagg. John Quincy Adams and the Union (1956), vol 2. Pulitzer prize.
- Holt, Michael F. The Rise and Fall of the American Whig Party: Jacksonian Politics and the Onset of the Civil War. 1999
- Nagel, Paul C. John Quincy Adams: A Public Life, a Private Life (1999)
- Remini, Robert V. John Quincy Adams (2002) short
- Withers, Bob, The President Travels by Train - Politics and Pullmans, TLC Publishing Inc., Lynchburg, Virginia, (1996, ISBN 1-883089-17-4.)
Primary sources
- Butterfield, L. H. et al., eds., The Adams Papers (1961- ). Multivolume letterpress edition of all letters to and from major members of the Adams family, plus their diaries; still incomplete.[1]
See also
- U.S. presidential election, 1820
- U.S. presidential election, 1824
- U.S. presidential election, 1828
- Mount Quincy Adams
- Adams-Onis Treaty
- Treaty of Ghent
External links
Template:Wikisource author Template:Wikiquote Template:Commons
- John Quincy Adams Biography and Fact File
- July 4, 1821 Independence Day Speech
- Inaugural Address
- Biography of John Quincy Adams
- Template:Gutenberg author
- Unitarian Universalist site - article on John Quincy Adams
- Armigerous American Presidents Series
- White House Biography
Template:Start box Template:U.S. Senator box Template:Succession box Template:Succession box Template:Succession box Template:Succession box Template:Succession box Template:Succession box Template:Succession box Template:Succession box Template:Succession box Template:Succession footnote Template:End box Template:Start box Template:USpresidents Template:End box Template:USSecStateang:John Quincy Adams ar:جون كوينسي آدامز bg:Джон Куинси Адамс da:John Quincy Adams de:John Q. Adams es:John Quincy Adams eo:John Quincy Adams et:John Quincy Adams fa:جان کوئینسی آدامز fr:John Quincy Adams ga:John Quincy Adams gl:John Quincy Adams ko:존 퀸시 애덤스 id:John Quincy Adams it:John Quincy Adams he:ג'ון קווינסי אדמס nl:John Quincy Adams ja:ジョン・クィンシー・アダムズ no:John Quincy Adams nn:John Quincy Adams pl:John Quincy Adams pt:John Quincy Adams ro:John Quincy Adams ru:Адамс, Джон Куинси sq:John Quincy Adams simple:John Quincy Adams sl:John Quincy Adams fi:John Quincy Adams sv:John Quincy Adams tr:John Q. Adams uk:Адамс Джон Квінсі zh:约翰·昆西·亚当斯
Categories: 1767 births | 1848 deaths | Adams family | Ambassadors of the United States | Children of Presidents of the United States | Massachusetts State Senators | Members of the United States House of Representatives from Massachusetts | Presidents of the United States | Unitarians | United States presidential candidates | United States Secretaries of State | United States Senators from Massachusetts | Unsuccessful nominees to the United States Supreme Court