When Adams became President, the war between the French and British was causing great difficulties for the United States on the high seas and intense partisanship among contending factions within the Nation. He complained to his wife Abigail, “My country has in its wisdom contrived for me the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived or his imagination conceived.” James’s, returning to be elected Vice President under George Washington.Īdams’ two terms as Vice President were frustrating experiences for a man of his vigor, intellect, and vanity. From 1785 to 1788 he was minister to the Court of St. A Harvard-educated lawyer, he early became identified with the patriot cause a delegate to the First and Second Continental Congresses, he led in the movement for independence.ĭuring the Revolutionary War he served in France and Holland in diplomatic roles, and helped negotiate the treaty of peace. “People and nations are forged in the fires of adversity,” he said, doubtless thinking of his own as well as the American experience.Īdams was born in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1735. Learned and thoughtful, John Adams was more remarkable as a political philosopher than as a politician. John Adams, a remarkable political philosopher, served as the second President of the United States (1797-1801), after serving as the first Vice President under President George Washington.

The biography for President Adams and past presidents is courtesy of the White House Historical Association.

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The education of henry adams book