John Quincy Adams's Last Crusade
A Review of His Post-Presidential Life in Congress by Joseph Wheelan
May 12, 2008
Son of the American Revolution
Joseph Wheelan shows us that no other person had the revolutionary pedigree and education that John Quincy Adams received. From his father, second President of the United States, he was bequeathed a fiery nature that even defended the rights of those British officers who perpetrated the “Boston Massacre”. From Samuel Adams, he acquired the uncompromising spirit and fight that would doom his presidency but secure his claim as America’s foremost defender of freedom as a U.S. Congressman. From the father of his country, George Washington, he was given the chance to refine and develop the unique diplomatic skills that had eluded both John and Samuel Adams.
Adams’s “Failed” Presidency
Ascending to the highest office in the land under a cloud of controversy, Wheealn relates how Adams played by the old school, for that time, political rules prohibiting a candidate from campaigning for himself. This may have been a major cause for the close 1824 presidential race that ended up in the House of Representatives. Two Candidates had a shot at being elected when the Electoral College results did not declare a clear winner. One needed 131 Electoral College votes to win. Here were the results:
Andrew Jackson – 99, John Q. Adams – 84, William Crawford – 41, Henry Clay – 37
Controversy ensued when Henry Clay swung his votes to Adams and then was appointed Secretary of State. That Clay’s political views were closely aligned with Adams and Clay’s unanswered challenge to a duel to defend his honor, did not override popular sentiment that this was true. Andrew Jackson rode this horse to his own election as president four years later.
Nullification and the Indissoluble Union
Adams raised tariffs during his presidency that were disdained by many southern states. During his first term in congress there was a proposal to raise them. While he strongly opposed this, he took a very strong stance with his recent bitter rival against the States Rights principle of nullification. South Carolina was determined to “nullify” this federal tariff. Jackson threatened to raise federal troops to enforce the law and Adam’s wholeheartedly backed Jackson's claim the “the Constitution and the laws are supreme and the Union is indissoluble.”
The Gag Rule and Freedom of Speech
It is an interesting irony that the greatest mistake of his father’s presidency may have been the infamous Alien and Sedition Act, which tightly curtailed free speech in the criticism of the American government. Wheelan contrasts this with John Q’s longstanding fight on the House floor against the Gag Rule that stifled the American public’s constitutional right to petition their elected representatives with regard to the hypocrisy of slavery that curtailed millions of American’s participation in the liberty that their country espoused as every man’s right. Adams, who was not a firebrand abolitionist, became more convinced that the evils of slavery must be dealt with as he brought hundreds of petitions against the practice to the House floor. In 1836, when southern members of the house tired of this attack on their way of life they voted in the “Gag Resolution” that in its several iterations had the effect of forbidding anti-slavery petitions from being heard. This began a twelve year battle that Adams won when the Gag Rule was finally overturned. Many saw this as the turning point in the American process that culminated in the Emancipation Proclamation freeing all southern slaves in 1863. Adam’s, himself, would see this as the crowning achievement of his political career.
The Smithsonian and The Amistad
Finally, Wheelan outlines two more achievements in Mr. Adams’s Last Crusade. The first was Adams’s leadership of the House committee overseeing James Smithson’s great contribution to the preservation of American Culture. This obscure and amateur English scientist, who had never set foot in America, willed his considerable fortune to the American people to establish a “Smithsonian Institution” for the “increase & diffusion of Knowledge among men”. Adams heroically defended this grant against the congressional onslaught for trivial misuse and was responsible for organizing this most noteworthy institution that is still, today, the predominant repository of American Science. Adams also became one of the most eloquent and effective voices for American Freedom when he successfully argued, in the Supreme Court, for the freedom of kidnapped Africans who mutinied and took over the slave ship Amistad from their Spanish captors.
An Honest Politician?
Wheelan has done a great service for Americans or any other nation that desires to have government run by the republican principles of self determination. His gift is the picture of a great statesman who eschewed political popularity to champion the rights of men. He reveals, through the work of John Quincy Adams, the hope in this cynical world that there are still people who truly want to serve their country rather than their own self interests. He gives us historical proof and that it is possible for the populace to elect people of principle who will consistently lead, prolonged by the strength of their own character, rather than being led by popular opinion polls which only serve to prolong their own unproductive tenure.
Source
Mr. Adams's Last Crusade, John Quincy Adams's Extraordinary Post-Presidential Life in Congress by Joseph Wheelan, 2008, Public Affairs - Perseus Book Group
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