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JOHN QUINCY ADAMS

John Quincy Adams was an American politician. He was born in 1767 at Boston and died in 1848.
The eldest son of John Adams, he was a boy of precocious talents, he was early taken abroad by his father, studied at the University of Leyden, and at fourteen began his public career as secretary to Francis Dana, Minister to Russia. He was graduated at Harvard in 1788, admitted to the bar in 1791, and at once began to write on public affairs. From 1794 to 1797 he was Minister to Holland; from 1797 to 1801, Minister to Prussia. In 1803, the Federalists elected him to the US Senate.

Approving Jefferson's embargo, he became estranged from the Federalists, acted with the Republicans, and in 1808 resigned. In 1809, Madison appointed him Minister to Russia, and in 1814 he was one of the commissioners who negotiated the treaty of Ghent; he then became Minister to England. From 1817 to 1825, he was Secretary of State to President Monroe. In the election of 1824, though he received but eighty-four electoral votes to ninety-nine for Jackson, he was, by a coalition of his friends with those of Clay, chosen President by the House of Representatives, becoming the sixth President of the United States.

He appointed Clay Secretary of State; Richard Rush Secretary of the Treasury;. James Barbour Secretary of War; Samuel L Southard Secretary of the Navy and William Wirt Attorney-General. Calhoun was Vice-President. A cry of 'bargain and corruption' with Clay was raised, though without foundation.

Adams' administration was marked by intelligence and firmness, and by extreme integrity in all matters, especially that of appointments, but was made a stormy one by the bitter attacks of his enemies in Congress and by his own unbending and pugnacious character. He favoured protection and internal improvements at Federal expense. He failed to be re-elected in 1828. In 1831, still vigorous at sixty-four, he entered Congress as an independent member for the Quincy district in Massachusetts, which he continued to represent until his death. A model legislator, active and efficient in every valuable department of congressional business, his most memorable services were in behalf of the right of petition, threatened by the pro-slavery members, and in other assistance to the anti-slavery cause. He died at his post in the Capitol on February the 23rd, 1848. Twelve volumes of his diary have been published, abounding in information and acute though censorious judgments on the events of his long public career, and in evidence of his high character and patriotism.
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