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

TO BENJAMIN RUSH. - 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.

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TO BENJAMIN RUSH.

Quincy, 12 April, 1809.

Thank you for your favor of the 1st. I might have quoted Job as well as St. Paul as a precedent, but as I mix religion with politics as little as possible, I chose to confine myself to Cicero. You advise me to write my own life. I have made several attempts, but it is so dull an employment that I cannot endure it. I look so much like a small boy in my own eyes, that, with all my vanity, I cannot endure the sight of the picture. I am glad you have resolved to do yourself justice. I am determined to vindicate myself in some points while I live. Inclosed is a whimsical specimen.1 In future I shall not be so goguenard.

The dialogue between Deodati and me is literal truth; that is, it is a literal translation from the French, in which language the conversation was held, and which I reduced to writing. You may ask what reason I had for foreseeing such consequences. I will give you a few hints among a thousand.

1. When I went home to my family in May, 1770, from the town meeting in Boston, which was the first I had ever attended, and where I had been chosen in my absence, without any solicitation, one of their representatives, I said to my wife, “I have accepted a seat in the House of Representatives, and thereby have consented to my own ruin, to your ruin, and the ruin of our children. I give you this warning, that you may prepare your mind for your fate.” She burst into tears, but instantly cried out in a transport of magnanimity, “Well, I am willing in this cause to run all risks with you, and be ruined with you, if you are ruined.” These were times, my friend, in Boston, which tried women’s souls as well as men’s.

2. I saw the awful prospect before me and my country in all its horrors, and, notwithstanding all my vanity, was conscious of a thousand defects in my own character as well as health, which made me despair of going through and weathering the storms in which I must be tossed.

3. In the same year, 1770, my sense of equity and humanity impelled me, against a torrent of unpopularity, and the inclination of all my friends, to engage in defence of Captain Preston and the soldiers. My successful exertions in that cause, though the result was perfectly conformable to law and justice, brought upon me a load of indignation and unpopularity, which I knew would never be forgotten, nor entirely forgiven. The Boston newspapers to this day show that my apprehensions were well founded.

4. You can testify for me that in 1774 my conduct in Congress drew upon me the jealousy and aversion, not only of the tories in Congress, who were neither few nor feeble, but of the whole body of quakers and proprietary gentlemen in Pennsylvania. I have seen and felt the consequences of these prejudices to this day.

5. I call you to witness that I was the first member of Congress who ventured to come out in public, as I did in January, 1776, in my “Thoughts on Government, in a letter from a gentleman to his friend,” that is, Mr. Wythe, in favor of a government, in three branches, with an independent judiciary. This pamphlet, you know, was very unpopular. No man appeared in public to support it, but yourself. You attempted in the public papers to give it some countenance, but without much success. Franklin leaned against it. Dr. Young, Mr. Timothy Matlack, and Mr. James Cannon, and I suppose Mr. George Bryan were alarmed and displeased at it. Mr. Thomas Paine was so highly offended with it, that he came to visit me at my chamber at Mrs. Yard’s to remonstrate and even scold at me for it, which he did in very ungenteel terms. In return, I only laughed heartily at him, and rallied him upon his grave arguments from the Old Testament to prove that monarchy was unlawful in the sight of God. “Do you seriously believe, Paine,” said I, “in that pious doctrine of yours?” This put him in good humor, and he laughed out. “The Old Testament!” said he, “I do not believe in the Old Testament. I have had thoughts of publishing my sentiments of it, but, upon deliberation, I have concluded to put that off till the latter part of life.” Paine’s wrath was excited because my plan of government was essentially different from the silly projects that he had published in his “Common Sense.” By this means I became suspected and unpopular with the leading demagogues and the whole constitutional party in Pennsylvania.

6. Upon my return from France in 1779, I found myself elected by my native town of Braintree a member of the Convention for forming a Constitution for the State of Massachusetts. I attended that convention of near four hundred members. Here I found such a chaos of absurd sentiments concerning government, that I was obliged daily, before that great assembly, and afterwards in the Grand Committee, to propose plans, and advocate doctrines, which were extremely unpopular with the greater number. Lieutenant-Governor Cushing was avowedly for a single assembly, like Pennsylvania. Samuel Adams was of the same mind. Mr. Hancock kept aloof, in order to be governor. In short, I had at first no support but from the Essex junto, who had adopted my ideas in the letter to Mr. Wythe. They supported me timorously, and at last would not go with me to so high a mark as I aimed at, which was a complete negative in the governor upon all laws. They made me, however, draw up the Constitution, and it was finally adopted, with some amendments very much for the worse. The bold, decided, and determined part I took in this assembly in favor of a good government, acquired me the reputation of a man of high principles and strong notions in government, scarcely compatible with republicanism. A foundation was here laid of much jealousy and unpopularity among the democratical people in this State.

7. In Holland, I had driven the English party and the stockholders’ party before me, like clouds before the wind, and had brought that power to unite cordially with America, France, and Spain against England. If I had not before alienated the whole English nation from me, this would have been enough to produce an eternal jealousy of me; and I fully believed that whenever a free intercourse should take place between Britain and America, I might depend upon their perpetual ill will to me, and that their influence would be used to destroy mine.

8. In all my negotiations in France and Holland in 1778, 1779, 1780, 1781, 1782, 1783, and 1784, I had so uniformly resisted all the arts and intrigues of the Count de Vergennes and M. de Sartine and all their satellites, and that with such perfect success, that I well knew, although they treated me with great external respect, yet in their hearts they had conceived an ineradicable jealousy and aversion to me. I well knew, therefore, that French influence in America would do all in its power to trip me up.

9. Dr. Franklin’s behavior had been so excessively complaisant to the French ministry, and in my opinion had so endangered the essential interests of our country, that I had been frequently obliged to differ from him, and sometimes to withstand him to his face; so that I knew he had conceived an irreconcilable hatred of me, and that he had propagated and would continue to propagate prejudices, if nothing worse, against me in America from one end of it to the other. Look into Benjamin Franklin Bache’s Aurora and Duane’s Aurora for twenty years, and see whether my expectations have not been verified.

With all these reflections fresh in my mind, you may judge whether my anticipations in the good-humored conversation with Deodati were rash, peevish, or ill grounded.

In short, I have every reason to acknowledge the protecting providence of God, from my birth, and especially through my public life. I have gone through life with much more safety and felicity than I ever expected. With devout gratitude I acknowledge the divine favor in many instances, and among others for giving me a friend in you, who, though you would never follow me as a disciple, have always been my friend.

[1 ]A copy of the letter immediately preceding this.