John Adams was born OCTOBER 30, 1735.
A Harvard graduate, he was admitted to the bar and married Abigail Smith in 1764.
When
the Revolution started, John Adams recommended that George Washington
be the Commander-in-Chief and that Thomas Jefferson pen the Declaration.
John
Adams authored Massachusetts' 1780 Constitution, and was U.S. Minister
to France, where he signed the Treaty of Paris officially ending the
Revolutionary War.
While U.S. Minister to Britain, John Adams met with his former king, George III.
Adams helped ratify the Constitution by writing Defense of the Constitution of the Government of the United States.
In 1765, John Adams wrote A Dissertation on the Canon and Feudal Law:
"I
always consider the settlement of America with reverence and wonder,
as the opening of a grand scene and design in Providence
for the illumination of the ignorant, and the emancipation of the slavish part of mankind all over the earth."
Initially,
the President was the one who received the most votes and the
Vice-President was the one who received the second most votes.
John Adams was elected Vice-President twice, serving under George Washington.
In 1796, John Adams was elected the 2nd U.S. President.
He established the Library of Congress and the Department of Navy.
His son, John Quincy, became 6th President.
In his Braintree Instructions, John Adams wrote:
"The late
acts of Parliament...divest us of our most essential rights and liberties...
The Stamp Act...
a very burdensome, and... unconstitutional tax, is to be laid upon us...We are
subjected to...penalties, to be
prosecuted,
sued for, and recovered, at the option of an informer, in a court of admiralty, without a jury...
Business...would be totally impossible...That act...would
drain the country of its cash,
strip multitudes of
all their property, and
reduce them to absolute beggary...No freeman should be subject to any tax to which he has not given his own consent."
In 1819, John Adams wrote to Jefferson:
"Have you ever found in history, one single example of a nation thoroughly corrupted that was afterwards restored to virtue?...
And without virtue, there can be no political liberty...
Will you tell me how to prevent luxury from producing effeminacy, intoxication, extravagance, vice and folly?...
No effort in favor of virtue is lost."
Be Inspired by the book, Miracles in American History-32 Amazing Stories of Answered PrayerIn Paris, John Adams wrote in his diary, June 2, 1778:
"In
vain are schools, academies, and universities instituted, if loose
principles and licentious habits are impressed upon children in their
earliest years...
The vices and examples of the parents cannot be concealed from the children.
How
is it possible that children can have any just sense of the sacred
obligations of Morality or Religion if, from their earliest
infancy...their fathers (are) in as constant infidelity to their
mothers?"
In
Novanglus: A History of the Dispute with America, from its Origin, in 1754, to the Present Time, John Adams wrote:
"It
is the duty of the clergy to accommodate their discourses to the
times, to preach against such sins as are most prevalent, and recommend
such virtues as are most wanted...
If exorbitant ambition and venality are predominant, ought they not to warn their hearers against those vices?
If public spirit is much wanted, should they not inculcate this great virtue?
If
the rights and duties of Christian magistrates and subjects are
disputed, should they not explain them, show their nature, ends,
limitations, and restrictions, how much soever it may move the gall of
Massachusetts."
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On June 21, 1776, John Adams wrote:
"Statesmen, my dear Sir, may plan and speculate for liberty,
but it is Religion and Morality alone, which can establish the principles upon which freedom can securely stand.
The only foundation of a free Constitution is pure virtue,
and
if this cannot be inspired into our people in a greater measure, than
they have it now, they may change their rulers and the forms of
government, but they will not obtain a lasting liberty."
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