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Subject Area: Political Theory
Topic: The American Revolution and Constitution

TO CHARLES SPENER. - John Adams, The Works of John Adams, vol. 9 (Letters and State Papers 1799-1811) [1854]

Edition used:

The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: with a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations, by his Grandson Charles Francis Adams (Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1856). 10 volumes. Vol. 9.

Part of: The Works of John Adams, 10 vols.

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


TO CHARLES SPENER.

The Hague, 24 March, 1784.

I have received the almanac you were pleased to send me, and I beg of you to accept of my thanks for it. I beg your acceptance also of a couple of medals which the Baron de Thulemeier has been so good as to convey for me to you. These medals were not struck by any public authority. They are the invention and execution of the medallist Holtzhey, of Amsterdam, solely. Another has been struck by the society, Liberty and Zeal, in Friesland, but I have it not.

You ask my opinion of some things you have in contemplation for next year, and you shall have it with candor and sincerity. General Washington never was, and unless my countrymen run generally mad, never will be summoned by Congress to become the legislator of America. The legislation of America has been long since complete, but if it were not, she has hundreds of citizens better qualified than any officer of her army to be her legislators.

No town has been, and perhaps none will be, surveyed for the meeting of Congress.1 The portrait of Mr. Hancock has some resemblance in the dress and figure, but none at all in the countenance. I have not Mr. Paine’s portrait. I am sorry you have any marks of an order of Cincinnatus, which is the first step taken to deface the beauty of our temple of liberty.

We have had three grand objects in view, in all our political transactions. 1. Political and civil liberty. 2. Liberty of commerce. 3. Religious liberty. Whatever tends to illustrate these would be proper for your use. These are our real glory. But perhaps it might contribute more to the sale of your almanac to insert some things which arise more from our vanity and folly.

My poor head is scarcely worth preserving even in an almanac; but as you request it, if I can conveniently get it done, you may perhaps have it before the year comes about.

[1 ]Mr. Spener was a bookseller at Berlin, who had proposed to Mr. Adams the two supposed events alluded to, as the leading designs for his next almanac. 1. General Washington summoned by Congress to be the legislator of America. 2. The foundation, by a survey, of a town for the meeting of Congress.