For days John Quincy had been sorting and unpacking papers and books, and a lashing storm having at last subsided, on the frigid Tuesday of January 5, 1802, he moved into his first-floor office on State Street. His upstairs neighbor was the Columbian Centinel, published by the ardent Federalist Benjamin Russell.
He faced his future with grave uncertainty, courage blended with guarded optimism. Though he continued to write in lofty terms, even with grandeur, of the larger issues of his life, on closer view, the challenges, hazards and compromises concerning his travels, his profession, his Louisa and her interminably poor health and the care of their infant George Washington loomed vividly. As he wrote a few days later: “The commencement of my old profession again is attended with difficulties somewhat embarrassing and prospects not very encouraging.” The landscape bleak, the cold penetrating, he was immensely frustrated about his books. He had brought some along with a bookcase to his office, but here at home, having spent an evening unpacking a chestful, he had no place to put them and mournfully faced the fact that he was “Much stinted for want of a room.”1
As to where he would settle, John Quincy had just a few months earlier confided to his brother Thomas his alternate plan to consider Boston as a temporary residence. In this newer plan, he thought of moving to New York State to make his home on lands belonging to his brother-in-law, the compulsively entrepreneurial speculator William Smith, and Smith’s brother Justus, property that he might take in settlement for a loan that, due to declining land values, they could not repay.
The lands were “the most promising spot on the continent for enterprise and industry,” John Quincy told his brother. They also promised, at least at that moment, “independence, thrift and sport.” And, though unspoken, they symbolized his last quest for a different destiny. “What say you to joining me in the plan, and going with me. . . . Why,” he continued, “should we wither away our best days, and sneak through life, pinch’d . . . for the sake of a few luxurious indulgences in a large town? Reflect on it and let me know.”2
Thomas, John Quincy’s devoted companion and secretary, now 30, was a game recipient of his brother’s invitation. He wanted but little time to look at it, for golden prospects could not sooner tempt him than rustic independence, thrift and sport. He was ready to embrace with “zeal, ardor, any practicable enterprise which may justify a renunciation of my present ill-required labors in an ungracious profession.”3
He was quite ready to leave the law and the journal called Port Folio: “No more words—I am your man, for a new country & manual labor. Head-work is bad business, and I never was fond of it.” Almost jubilantly, he had signed his letter: “My capital is chiefly in my hands & feet, and they are at your service.”4
The plan, however, if it had ever been serious one, fell through. As did John Quincy’s earlier determination, also confided in Thomas, that he was “more and more determined not to concern myself whatsoever in politics.” Besides, there was not a party in their country which an honest man could join without blushing, for a politician “must be the man of a party—I would fain be the man of my whole country.”5
But he was already involved. His second week in his Boston office, Dr. Welsh had come round to hint at the probability that Judge Thomas Dawes would quit the Massachusetts Supreme Court to move to a municipal judgeship and that John Quincy might be nominated in his place. This hadn’t worked out, but by February 20 John Davis, another respected judge, had personally asked him to join the Commission on Bankruptcy and by March 3 he was formally sworn into office. It was a service that began cordially but would terminate with bitter repercussions, especially, to put it mildly, on his mother’s part. As for his election only one month later to the Massachusetts State Senate, and confirmed on April 5, he claimed to have “little desire to be a senator, for whether it will interfere with my duties as a commissioner or not, it will interfere with pursuits much more agreeable to me than politics.”6
He was in fact striving for some peace of mind, judging from the affectionate exchange mid-March with his father. When the weather and the woods kept them at a distance for days if not weeks, John, in robust thanks for John Quincy’s recent gift of the work of the provocative French literary critic Jean-François de La Harpe was nearly ecstatic: “I am in love with La Harpe, I know not there was such a man left. If I had read the work at 20 years of age, it would have had, I know not what affect. If it had not made me a poet or philosopher, it certainly would not have permitted me to be a public man.” John Quincy was in complete agreement, in principle. But for the present time, he gently explained, there were other considerations, in need as he was of “repairing the dilapidations of seven years upon my stock of legal learning.”7
Then too, there was “a second pursuit” that had captured his attention (and he might have added passion). He had been invited to join the Society for the Study of Natural Philosophy, whose members were required to systematically record their experiments, essays or lectures in a Book of Transactions. In a sense, the society offered him the same consolation that his father had discovered in the companionship of La Harpe, but with far greater consequences. These amateur experiments would prove to be of lifelong interest, influence and accomplishment. In time, he would be celebrated as “one of the greatest political spokesmen for science, especially for pure and basic science, in the nineteenth century.”8
On January 7 he had gone with his cousin Josiah Quincy, future president of Harvard, to attend his first meeting: Membership was limited to ten; the textbook was to be Jones’s edition of the British scientist George Adams Jr.’s essays.9
By the end of the month, he rose mornings between 4 and 7, made his fire, brought up his accounts, wrote in his journal and read Adams’s lectures until breakfast at 9. Whether these studies were more challenging than he anticipated he did not say. He had graduated from college with honors in mathematics and would write, as a future secretary of state for whom “science and education were passions and amounted to a religion,” his “Report on Weights and Measures” which his father John Adams admired as a “mass of historical, philosophical, chemical, metaphysical and political knowledge” intended to improve man’s life through scientific learning. Meanwhile, he did vow that during the course of the present year, he would undertake to do little or nothing: “My object will be to learn. It is late, in the progress of my life to complete my education, and perhaps after my age, a man can claim but little—Yet must I not despair.”10
A quarter of a century later, as president of the United States, in his stirring first State of the Union Address on December 6, 1825, he included what one distinguished historian called the “clearest statement ever made by a president of the government’s duty toward knowledge.” In that address, John Quincy called on America to contribute her share of labor and expense for “the improvement of those arts of knowledge which lie beyond the reach of individual acquisition.”11
Half a century had passed, he continued, since the declaration of America’s independence, and bearing in mind that France, Great Britain and Russia had devoted the genius, the intelligence, the treasures of their respective nations to the common improvement of man in these branches of science, was it not incumbent upon the United States to contribute “our portion of energy and exertion to the common stock?” He urged most specifically the erection of an astronomical observatory in order to study “the phenomena of the heavens.” Europe had 130 of these “lighthouses of the skies.” And further, weren’t we cutting ourselves off from the means of returning light for light while we had neither observatory nor observer on our half of the globe “and the earth revolved in perpetual darkness to our unsearching eyes?”12
Later still, his role in the creation of the Smithsonian was a crowning achievement. Its establishment had been misunderstood, suspect (British money was tainted) and bitterly fought (by British would-be heirs). Its donor of half a million dollars, James Smithson—the British mineralogist and illegitimate son of the Duke of Northumberland—was even “supposed to be insane.” John Quincy had wondered about the attitude of his political colleagues: “so strange is this donation of half-a-million dollars for the noblest of purposes that no one thinks of attributing it to a benevolent motive.” Whereas he, almost biblical in his reverence, “regarded the bequest as a high and honorable sentiment of philanthropy, and a glorious testimonial of confidence in the institutions of the Union.”13
Despite John Quincy’s nearly negative appraisal of his service in the Massachusetts Senate, his son Charles Francis in editing his father’s papers would evaluate that year in office as the “most critical of his whole career.” More specifically, John Quincy revealed in that time a maverick’s pattern of voting that spanned his entire lifetime of public service: He followed no pattern but only the strictures of his conscience and ideals.14
In his own words years later, the first act of his legislative life “marked the principle by which my whole public career has been governed.” John Quincy was referring to his second day in office, May 27, when he had proposed adding to the council of the Commonwealth two or three members of the opposite party to his own, in a conciliatory procedure to achieve a proportional representation of the minority as it existed in the two houses. “But no,” he wrote in his diary, “they would not hear me.”15
That same session, the Senate was divided on a petition for the removal of two Republican judges, and while the Federalist members voted in the affirmative, John Quincy had voted with the Republicans in the negative. In defense of his vote he had written: “Because of the decision of the Senate in this case, affecting in the highest degree the rights, the character and reputation of two individuals, citizens of this Commonwealth ought not to have been taken, without giving them an opportunity previously to be heard in their own defense.” Echoing his party colleagues’ displeasure, the Independent Chronicle and Boston Patriot reported the same day that “The Federal leaders said, ‘this man is not our friend, but against us.’”16
Again in February 1803, he was not to be considered a party loyalist in regard to the proposal of a new bank, apparently the talk of the town for the past three years, to which his opposition was known and his consent was critical. The ardent Federalist James Otis had taken him aside to win his backing, to tell him that he had “no conception of the interest and agitation which that affair had excited; the application embraced a great multitude of the most respectable persons in this town, and almost the whole commercial interest.” But the next day, to the dismay of his Federalist colleagues, John Quincy spoke in opposition to the bank on grounds that the subscription to the stock should be open to all the citizens of the Commonwealth, and again cast a negative vote on the final passage of the bill. As one outraged colleague wrote: “A great bank in Boston, of twelve hundred thousand dollars, is now in debate in the Senate, having passed the House. It is supported by the principal moneyed men in this town, about twenty altogether, and opposed by John Q. Adams, whose popularity is lessened by it. They say also he is too unmanageable.”17
When in 1825 John Quincy took measure of what he called “the noviciate” of his legislative labors in the year 1802, he had concluded with honesty and humility that he was not able “either to effect much good, or to prevent much evil. I attempted some reforms, and aspired to check some abuses. . . . I wanted the authority of experience, and I discovered the danger of opposing and exposing corruption.”18
Yet despite his dismal self-appraisal, John Quincy was proud of the two orations he delivered that year that formed, he said, “not inconsiderable incidents in the history of my life.” The first, “An Address to the Massachusetts Charitable Fire Society” on May 28, was a testament to his own horror at finding “their wooden city . . . a vast tinderbox, kindling at every transient spark.” It was his rousing plea to his fellow citizens to “secure the lives and properties of our fellowmen from destruction by fire.” As a worldly historian, he would remind his audience that Augustus Caesar had “found the Roman metropolis of brick and would leave it of marble.” Improvements had followed, and John Quincy believed that the speech “had contributed to rebuild the city of Boston.”19
In his second notable talk, “Oration at Plymouth . . . of the First Landing of Our Ancestors at that Place,” he stated proudly that there was no previous example of a nation “shooting up in maturity and expanding into greatness with the rapidity, which has characterized the growth of the American people.” And he also made a brief argument “on the right of Europeans to form establishments in the American wilderness, and to extinguish upon just and reasonable terms all the natural rights of the aboriginal Indians conflicting with it.” Writing about this premise after a lapse of more than 20 years, “I still think unanswerable” was his puzzling comment.20
Heading for Quincy the day before his thirty-fifth birthday on July 11, 1802, which John Quincy planned to spend with his parents, the stage was so crowded that he left it at Milton to walk the rest of the way to Quincy. The next morning he swam, strolled the hills with his father, was visited by family friends and continued his summer reading, Plutarch’s treatise (this day, on the tranquility of mind), and more of Madame de Sévigné’s Letters with which he was very pleased.
Back in Boston the following week it was, more or less, business and pleasure as usual until July 20, when he noted “This day the new appointment of General Commissioners of Bankruptcy arrived here” and that “none of the former Commissioners are appointed” with the exception of Judge John Dawes. Eleven days later, the last of the month, he quite reasonably concluded “As a new set of Commissioners of Bankruptcy have been appointed, I shall henceforth have but little of that business to do.”21
This would seem to be John Quincy’s last reference to the presidentially appointed commission, but not so his family’s. That his mother most heatedly resented his not being reappointed as a commissioner, and blamed Thomas Jefferson for it, was revealed in a correspondence two years later that began with her response to the news of the death of Jefferson’s daughter Mary (called Polly) on April 17, 1804, whom she had known and loved. Eventually the Commission on Bankruptcy would prove, in Abigail’s words, to be “a small object.”22
In November John Quincy was urged to stand as the Federalist candidate for election to the House of Representatives, a race he lost by 40 or 50 votes due, the party claimed, to a rainy election day and poor attendance in remote parts of town such as Charlestown, Medford and Malden. But such excuses were not acceptable to the failed candidate. In his opinion the loss was “one of a thousand proofs how large a portion of Federalism is a mere fair-weather principle, too weak to overcome a shower of rain.” Personally, he admitted, he was somehow relieved from a heavy burden and a thankless task of blind party loyalty. In fact, he seemed to look back on the last year with some pride. “I have been able to preserve my principles and my independence,” he wrote on December 31.23
Just over one month later, on February 2, 1803, John Quincy would learn that his name was listed for the nomination as United States senator from Massachusetts. After days of negotiations, on February 8, he was elected by the committee to a six-year term, to begin in late fall 1803. John Quincy would speak of it after only two months in Washington as “the only important incident of my political career. It has opened to me a scene in some sort, though not altogether new, and will probably affect very materially my future situation in life.”24
John Quincy maintained that in the year just passed, 1802, not only had he enjoyed better health than he had for many years before but, most curiously, that his wife also had “on the whole been more favored in this respect than at any period since their marriage.” It was true that they had 40 guests to their home the past January—had opened all the rooms, upstairs and down, served refreshments at “prettily ornamental” small tables—and that John Quincy had danced the whole evening. But it was also true that Louisa suffered constantly from headaches, and might be taken very ill after a walk or on a random evening. She had been “excessively affected” when told on April 27, 1802 of her father’s death, to such an extreme that she had refused to see Dr. Welsh.25
Louisa was pregnant that spring of 1803, and again John Quincy’s dismal notations of her physical and mental suffering mirror those of previous years, and obviously they took their toll on him as well.
John Quincy had spent the weekend in Quincy—both parents had been ill—and returned early to Boston on Independence Day, July 4, 1803, to learn that he had a second child, born about three that morning. Mother and child were as well as he could hope: “for this new blessing,” he offered his “humblest gratitude to the high throne of Heaven.” Thomas, in jovial mood, congratulated the couple, writing that his opinion of Louisa grew more favorable in proportion to the increase of the male branch of her family. Also, in recalling his joyless state of celibacy, he hoped the compassionate regard of his fruitful (he had crossed out prolific) relatives should at least be willing to perpetuate his given name.26
By contrast, Louisa’s mother, obviously moved by the event, wrote with restraint, editing her words to “My Dear Sir” with great care. “Last evening’s mail presented me your welcome letter, announcing the pleasing intelligence of [my dear Louisa] of the safety of my beloved child. Permit me to offer my sincere congratulations on this happy event. The memorable day which gave birth to the little stranger is I hope a presage to his independence, the greatest blessing (health excepted) this world has the power to bestow.” Weighing six-and-a-half pounds at birth, the infant was baptized John, presumably after his grandfather.27
In the next days, Louisa was “as well as her condition admits;” “unwell,” then “suddenly, and for some time excessively ill.” On July 11, his thirty-sixth birthday, John Quincy noted “with sorrow to think how long I have lived, and how little purpose.”28
In September he packed glassware and china, leased the house in Court Street, deposited all letters, letterbooks, journals and diaries in a large trunk in his father’s office, and concluded, on the eve of departure, that the past two years, like every other period of his life, “had its pleasures and its pains.” His finances, perpetually a challenge to him and to Louisa, would always figure in the latter category. The transition from his European post had not been, as he put it, “agreeable,” and yet he found it less mortifying than he might have expected. Easily connecting his mind to it—so he claimed—he was able to endure and surmount with the help of friends the collapse of Bird, Savage & Bird; the London banking firm’s collapse had wiped away a significant amount of the Adams family capital, greatly affected John Quincy and his parents, and had necessitated the sale of his Hanover Street house in Boston.29
On October 4, John Quincy, Louisa, her sister Caroline, young George, three-month-old John and the maid Patty embarked on the packet Cordelia—boisterous weather accounted for grievous delays—and arrived at Paulus Hook (across the Hudson River from Manhattan) on October 9. Nine miles away, at Gifford’s Tavern, crowded with people who had fled New York’s epidemic of yellow fever, “it was no small difficulty” with which John Quincy was able to find a single room to lodge the whole family. They were barely installed, however, when Louisa, suffering from “violent fatigue and agitation” fell suddenly and violently ill, at which point John Quincy sent for a Doctor Johnson who treated her with a powerful opiate that put her to sleep.30
With family and friends to lend a hand—John Quincy had deposited George with his sister Nabby, who lived nearby—they were able to leave on October 12. Planning ahead, John Quincy had written Thomas in Philadelphia to ask him to reserve a private carriage and four horses—Louisa could not possibly travel night and day as they must do if they were to take the stage, and besides they had a lot of luggage—and to make the cost as favorable to them as he could. At last, having traveled since the first week of the month, at dusk on the evening of October 20 they arrived in Washington. It was day four of the session of Congress, and by curious coincidence they had encountered Secretary of the Senate James Otis, who was going from the Capitol to the president’s home to inform Jefferson of the Senate’s ratification of the Treaty of Cession enabling the Louisiana Purchase, which passed in the Senate with 24 yeas and 7 nays.
Regrettably, the “accidental illness” in John Quincy’s family, which detained him on his way to Washington to take his seat in the Senate, had prevented him from voting for the ratification of the treaties, “one of the happiest events which had occurred since the adoption of the Constitution.” It would also turn out to be one of the thorniest personally, given John Quincy’s scrupulous reading and interpretation of the Constitution.31
The family headed for the home of Louisa’s sister Nancy and her husband, Walter Hellen, with whom they would board, two-and-a-half miles from the Capitol, located on what would be identified in later years as (approximately) 2600 K Street NW in Georgetown.
At 11 the next morning, October 21, John Quincy proudly took his seat in the Senate immediately after delivering his credentials and being sworn to support the Constitution of the United States. Ten days later, in his monthly review, he sounded almost serene with contentment. Now his mode of life was more uniform. Rising at 7, he wrote until 9, took breakfast, dressed, and soon after 10 began his 45-minute walk. Two-and-a-half miles later, he reached the Capitol around 11 and usually found the Senate assembled, sitting until 2 or 3; when adjournment was earlier, he went to hear the debates in the House of Representatives.
Home at 4 for dinner, he passed the evening idly with George in his room or with the ladies. Supper was at 10, the hour for bed was 11. He noted, somewhat prophetically, “the interest with which my mind seizes hold of the public business is greater than suits my comfort or can answer any sort of public utility.”32