Adams, John Quincy

Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)

John Quincy (1767-1848), the sixth president of the United States. The eldest son of President John Adams, also a graduate of Harvard, 1788. Admitted to the bar, 1791. Minister to Holland, 1794. Minister to Berlin, 1797. United States senator from Massachusetts, 1803-1808. Minister to Russia, 1809. Minister to England, 1815. Secretary of State in the cabinet of Monroe, 1817. In 1824 Mr. Adams was elected president and served one term. He was defeated for reelection by Andrew Jackson. In 1830 he was sent to Congress, a position which he retained for seventeen years. He was the first ex-president to take a seat in the House of Representatives. Mr. Adams was a man of strong feelings and of a constructive mind. As secretary of state he negotiated the purchase of Florida from Spain for $5,000,000. Russia was preparing to assert claims to a large portion of the territory adjacent to Alaska, thus endangering our title to Oregon. Secretary Adams notified the Russian minister that "we should contest the right of Russia to any territorial establishment on this continent, and that we should assume distinctly the principle that the American continents are no longer subjects for any new European colonial establishments." This declaration was the germ of the Monroe Doctrine. As president, Mr. Adams favored a vigorous policy of internal improvement. Four million dollars of national money was expended on canals and roads. The Cumberland Road, the great artery for westward migration, was extended toward St. Louis. During his administration, the bill, dubbed the Tariff of Abomination, was enacted. Mr. Adams' return to public life after his defeat for reelection to the presidency was due to local sentiment. He was in no sense a party leader, and was out of sympathy with American politics. He was elected representative by anti-masonic sentiment and entered the House as an independent, an attitude which he maintained consistently to the end. Adams was an ardent supporter of the anti-slavery cause. He was one of seven congressmen to vote against the Pinckney resolution which declared that Congress had no authority to interfere with or restrict slavery where established. He fought nine years to abolish a congressional rule popularly known as the "gag-law," which forbade the reception of further petitions for the abolition or restriction of slavery. In this he was a champion of the right of petition, and won the name of the "Old Man Eloquent." Mr. Adams died literally "in the harness." He fell on the floor of the House with a stroke of apoplexy, surviving but two days. He was succeeded in Congress by Horace Mann.