Life & Politics of President John Adams

1. John Adams was born in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1735. A Harvard-educated lawyer, he soon became identified with the patriot cause and became a delegate to the First and Second Continental Congresses. He was one of the leaders in the movement for independence from England. Adams also has the distinction of being the only founding father not to own slaves during his life. The World Almanac & Book of Facts reports that during the Revolutionary War he served in France and Holland in diplomatic roles. From 1785 to 1788, he was minister to the Court of St. James. Adams found himself on the ballot in the presidential election of 1789. He finished second to Washington. This resulted in three events. First, his reputation as a powerful politician was confirmed. Second, his combative personal style and his controversial political writings convinced voters that he was not the right choice to become America's first President. Lastly, according to the electoral rules established in the recent ratified Constitution, as the person with the second highest number of electoral votes he became America's first Vice President ("John Adams" 565).

In the first contested presidential election in American history, Adams won a narrow electoral majority over Thomas Jefferson. Adams became America's second President, and Jefferson became a reluctant and unhappy Vice President. Jefferson's presence hampered Adams efforts to be an eff

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expanded. In the first ten years of marriage, Abigail and John had three sons and two daughters. In 1784, Abigail joined him at his diplomatic post in Paris. In 1786, she filled the difficult role of wife of the first United States Minister to Great Britain. Edith Gelles writes in The Economist that Abigail spent most of her time writing letters to her sister in New England. In her letters, she expressed restlessness and uneasiness in England. Since her husband was the official embodiment of American independence from the British Empire, Abigail and her husband were largely ignored and relegated to the periphery of the court during his nearly three years in the Foreign Service in London (Gelles 76). As wife of the first Vice President, Abigail became a good friend to Mrs. Washington. She was an excellent host and entertained official visitors, often drawing on her experience in European high society. Laura Scanlan writes in Humanities that John and Abigail were the first political couple of the United States. After 1791, however, poor health forced her to curtail certain of her activities. When John Adams was elected President, she continued a formal pattern of entertaining even in the primitive conditions she found at the
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Approximate Word count = 1337
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page)