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| Colorized Photo of John Quincy Adams, Wikimedia Commons Photograph by Philip Haas |
At the age of eleven, John Quincy Adams was already traveling with his father on diplomatic tours for the fledgling nation. By the age of fourteen, John Quincy was already fluent in four languages, had helped translate the Treaty of Paris talks to end the American Revolution, and began serving as an emissary in Russia. At sixteen, he traveled alone from Russia to the Hague. He returned home and completed his law degree at Harvard University. As a young man, he served as a diplomat during the Washington Administration and then served again for subsequent administrations. He later became Secretary of State under James Monroe, President of the United States, and then -- when he could have justifiably retired from public service -- he served in the House of Representatives until his death on February 23, 1848. The man was indefatigable; as Timothy Walker called him, "an intellectual vampire" whose mind was always active and consuming the latest in literature, art, and science. Above all, he was, as he referred to himself, a Christian Statesman -- rooting his life in a biblical worldview determined to work toward perfection in the pursuit of benefitting his nation and the oppressed.
What led a man, who arguably lived a lifetime by the time he was twenty, to continue to press forward in public life? It was his Christian duty as he explained in a letter to his son, "In my last [letter], I showed you, from the very words of our Saviour, that he commanded his disciples to aim at perfection; and that this perfection consisted in self-subjugation and brotherly love..." It was his moral duty to put aside what he desired in life to continue fighting the good fight. In his article, "John Quincy Adams: Virtue and the Tragedy of the Statesman," Greg Russell explains that John Quincy Adams, the American statesman, believed that a good statesman and a democratic nation must be rooted in Christianity in order to provide a sense of moral and religious obligation. Anything less was not to be trusted as man was always waging war against his baser nature. Adams's devotion to America's Christian heritage refused to allow him to retire from public life.
Nowhere was this intellectual vampire's intellect and the Christian Statesman's Christian belief more prominently displayed than in his fight to end slavery. Never a man to mince words, "Old Man Eloquent" consistently tried the patience of the House of Representatives and rebuked and challenged the American people to rise up against an institution that was "inconsistent with the Declaration of Independence" and the character of a Christian nation. In two separate Fourth of July Commemorations (1837 and 1843), Adams quoted the prophetic and partial fulfillment of Christ as the liberator setting captives free. Biblical prophecy meant abolition was on the horizon. Adams believed that God had used the United States to fill earlier prophecies (a nation fighting for its freedom) and emancipation was a prophecy that had yet to be fulfilled. However, he reminded his listeners and readers (and perhaps himself) that this [abolition] was "not the work of a day; it is not the labour of an age; it is not the consummation of a century, that we are assembled to commemorate. It is the emancipation of our race. It is the emancipation of man from the thraldom of man!" Christians in the nation and in government were duty-bound to continue the fight.
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| Illustration of John Quincy Adams in the House of Representatives Lives of the Presidents of the United States of America, From Washington to the Present Time |
Despite calls to censure him in Congress for not only repeatedly violating the unconstitutional "Gag Rule" of January 18, 1836 (This was a rule that banned the introduction of any petitions regarding slavery or abolition) and for his "unconscionable and unseemly" attempts to introduce a petition purportedly written by enslaved people, Adams handled it with his usual acerbic humor in his letters to his constituents. Attempts to coerce him into silence were unsuccessful because he believed that true Christianity was found in "stubborn resistance against the evil impulses of others." The passions of man led them to violate the law and man's God-given natural rights -- and Adams was duty-bound to resist. His belief in a faithful God gave him an unshakeable certainty that even the evilest and most entrenched slaveholder could be regenerated through God's grace. His job, as a Christian Statesman, was to stand firm in his faith -- struggle and labor harder -- and trust that God would bring about the abolition of slavery because Christ had come to set all captives free. As Timothy Walker said, "Whatever his hands found to do, he did with all his might."
If my intellectual powers had been such as have been sometimes committed by the Creator of man to single individuals of the species, my diary would have been, next to the Holy Scriptures, the most precious and valuable book ever written by human hands, and I should ahve been one of the greatest benefactors of my country and of mankind. I would, by the irresistable power of genius and the irrepressible energy of will and the favor of Almight God, have banished war and slavery from the face of the earth forever. But the conceptive power of mind was not conferred upon me by my Maker, and I have improved the scanty portion of His gift as I might and ought to have done. - John Quincy Adams, Memoirs
Sources:
Abbott, John S.C., Conwell, Russell. Lives of the Presidents of the United States of America, From Washington to the Present Time. Portland: Hallett and Company, 1882. https://archive.org/details/livesofpresident00abbottj/page/203/mode/1up
Adams, John Quincy. An oration delivered before the inhabitants of the town of Newburyport, at their request, on the sixty-first anniversary of the Declaration of independence, July 4th, 1837. Newburyport [Mass.]: Printed by Morss and Brewster, [1837]. Sabin Americana: History of the Americas, 1500-1926 (accessed November 14, 2022). https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/CY0101705521/SABN?u=vic_liberty&sid=bookmark-SABN&xid=b8c38b86&pg=65.
Adams, John Quincy. Letter from Hon. John Quincy Adams. [Bangor, Me.]: [s.n.], [1843]. Sabin Americana: History of the Americas, 1500-1926 (accessed November 14, 2022). https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/CY0107565908/SABN?u=vic_liberty&sid=bookmark-SABN&xid=6eabc269&pg=1.
Adams, John Quincy, and John Greenleaf Whittier. Letters from John Quincy Adams to his constituents of the Twelfth congressional district in Massachusetts : to which is added his speech in Congress, delivered February 9, 1837. Boston: I. Knapp, 1837. Sabin Americana: History of the Americas, 1500-1926 (accessed November 14, 2022). https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/CY0101101967/SABN?u=vic_liberty&sid=bookmark-SABN&xid=3df3864a&pg=1.
Quincy, Josiah. Memoir of the life of John Quincy Adams. Boston: Phillips, Sampson, 1858. Sabin Americana: History of the Americas, 1500-1926 (accessed November 14, 2022). https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/CY0101468121/SABN?u=vic_liberty&sid=bookmark-SABN&xid=76745daf&pg=1.
Russell, Greg. “John Quincy Adams: Virtue and the Tragedy of the Statesman.” The New England Quarterly 69, no. 1 (March 1996): 56-74. JSTOR.
Seward, William H. Life and public services of John Quincy Adams, sixth president of the United States : with the eulogy delivered before the legislature of New York. Auburn [N.Y.]: Derby, Miller, 1849. Sabin Americana: History of the Americas, 1500-1926 (accessed November 15, 2022). https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/CY0101529884/SABN?u=vic_liberty&sid=bookmark-SABN&xid=24eab797&pg=8
Walker, Timothy. An oration on the life and character of John Quincy Adams : dellivered before the citizens of Cincinnati, on the twenty-second day of March, 1848. Cincinnati [Ohio]: J.F. Desilver ; Gazette Office Wright, Fisher & Co., Printers, 1848. Sabin Americana: History of the Americas, 1500-1926 (accessed November 14, 2022). https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/CY0112280615/SABN?u=vic_liberty&sid=bookmark-SABN&xid=7be0c33e&pg=1.
