"Gentlemen, I pray you to make acceptable to the house the assurance of my profound gratitude for their confidence, and to accept yourselves my thanks for the friendly terms in which you have communicated to me their decision."

The administration of Mr. Adams as president of the United States, commenced on the 4th of March, 1825, and continued four years. A combination having taken place immediately after the election, of a majority of the friends of Mr. Crawford with those of General Jackson, it was soon apparent that the new administration was destined to meet with a systematic and violent opposition. Every effort on the part of Mr. Adams to conciliate his opponents, and to conduct the public affairs with integrity and usefulness, proved ineffectual to turn the torrent of popular opinion which set steadily against him. In the third year of his term the administration was in the minority in both branches of Congress, and the opposition being concentrated on General Jackson as a candidate for president, he was in 1828 elected, by a large majority, over Mr. Adams.

In March, 1829, Mr. Adams retired to private life, carrying with him the esteem of his political friends, and the respect of his opponents, who generally gave him the credit of good intentions, however they might have differed with him in his views of public policy. While holding the high office of president, he uniformly declined the exercise of a proscriptive spirit toward those of his political opponents whom he found in office; magnanimously conceding to all the right of exercising their own free will in the choice of rulers, and in supporting or opposing the administration.

After the inauguration of his successor, General Jackson, Mr. Adams continued a short time at Washington city. He then repaired to his family mansion, and the scenes of his early youth, at Quincy, near Boston, Massachusetts, where, in the possession of a competent fortune, and in the enjoyment of the pleasures of domestic life with his family, he might have expected to pass the remainder of his days. But the people of his own immediate neighborhood were not willing to allow him to remain long in retirement. In 1830 he was elected to represent the district in which he resided, in the Congress of the United States, and the following year, namely, in December, 1831, he took his seat in the house of representatives at Washington city, being then in the 65th year of his age, and having already passed about forty years in the public service. In the national legislature he has taken the stand to which his eminent talents and distinguished services fully entitle him. The continued confidence of his constituents has been manifested by seven re-elections to the house, of which he has now been a member fourteen years.

His reports as chairman of committees on various subjects, particularly on those of manufactures and finance, are among the ablest papers to be found among the national records. He distinguished himself especially on the organization of the twenty-sixth Congress, in December, 1839,

when difficulties of a novel character occurred, in consequence of disputed seats from the state of New Jersey, which prevented for many days the choice of a speaker. On that occasion Mr. Adams was chosen, by

unanimous consent, chairman of the house while it was in a state of confusion and disorder. By his skill and commanding influence, he was enabled to calm the turbulent elements of a disorganized house, and to bring about a settlement of the difficulties which threatened a dissolution of the government.

Perhaps the most striking feature of Mr. Adams's career as a member of the house of representatives, has been his firm adherence to the right of the people to petition Congress, and to be heard through their representatives, on any subject whatsoever. He has taken an active part in debate on nearly every topic of public interest, and his speeches have been frequently marked with the most fervid eloquence, and with that stern and peculiar independence which has characterized his whole life, and command the respect and attention which is due to a man of great experience, and of fearless and uncompromising integrity.

The private character of Mr. Adams has always been above reproach, in his intercourse with his fellow-men, and in all the various duties of a long life. Without any uncommon professions, he has uniformly shown a great respect for the Christian religion, and, like his father, giving a preference to the doctrines of the unitarian church.

In his personal appearance, Mr. Adams is of middle stature and full person, his eyes dark and piercing, his countenance pleasing, and beaming with intelligence; his manners rather awkward and distant. He has always led the most active life, and enjoyed good health, and, accustomed from his youth to habits of early rising and constant improvement of his mind in literary and scientific knowledge, he is at this day considered one of the most (if not the most) accomplished scholars in America.

Mr. Adams has a numerous family of children. In early life, and when engaged in a foreign embassy, he was married in London, to Miss Johnson, a highly-accomplished lady, and daughter of a gentleman of Maryland. During his presidential term, the president's levees were always rendered attractive by the courteous manners and polite attentions of his lady.

The subject of this memoir is now in his seventy-ninth year, and, although "his eye is dim, and his natural force somewhat abated," he is still found at his post in the public service, where, like the earl of Chatham, it may be expected his mortal career will finally close.

JOHN QUINCY ADAMS'S

ADDRESSES AND MESSAGES.

INAUGURAL ADDRESS.

MARCH 4, 1825.

In compliance with a usage coeval with the existence of our federal constitution, and sanctioned by the example of my predecessors in the career upon which I am about to enter, I appear, my fellow-citizens, in your presence, and in that of Heaven, to bind myself, by the solemnities of a religious obligation, to the faithful performance of the duties allotted to me in the station to which I have been called.

In unfolding to my countrymen the principles by which I shall be governed in the fulfilment of those duties, my first resort will be to that constitution which I shall swear, to the best of my ability, to preserve, protect, and defend. That revered instrument enumerates the powers and prescribes the duties of the executive magistrate; and, in its first words, declares the purposes to which these, and the whole action of the government instituted by it, should be invariably and sacredly devoted-to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to the people of this Union, in their successive generations. Since the adoption of this social compact, one of these generations has passed away. It is the work of our forefathers. Administered by some of the most eminent men who contributed to its formation, through a most eventful period in the annals of the world, and through all the vicissitudes of peace and war, incidental to the condition of associated man, it has not disappointed the hopes and aspirations of those illustrious benefactors of their age and nation. It has promoted the lasting welfare of that country, so dear to us all; it has, to an extent far beyond the ordinary lot of humanity, secured the freedom and happiness of this people. We now receive it as a precious inheritance from those to whom we are indebted for its establishment, doubly bound by the examples which they have left us, and by the blessings which we have enjoyed, as the fruits of their labors, to transmit the same, unimpaired, to the succeeding generation.

In the compass of thirty-six years, since this great national covenant was instituted, a body of laws enacted under its authority, and in conformity with its provisions, has unfolded its powers and carried into practical operation its effective energies. Subordinate departments have distributed the ex

ecutive functions in their various relations to foreign affairs, to the revenue and expenditures, and to the military force of the Union, by land and sea. A co-ordinate department of the judiciary has expounded the constitution and the laws; settling, in harmonious coincidence with the legislative will, numerous weighty questions of construction which the imperfection of human language had rendered unavoidable. The year of jubilee since the first formation of our Union has just elapsed; that of the declaration of our independence is at hand. The consummation of both was effected by this constitution. Since that period, a population of four millions has multiplied to twelve. A territory, bounded by the Mississippi, has been extended from sea to sea. New states have been admitted to the Union, in numbers nearly equal to those of the first confederation. Treaties of peace, amity and commerce, have been concluded with the principal dominions of the earth. The people of other nations, inhabitants of regions acquired, not by conquest but by compact, have been united with us in the participation of our rights and duties, of our burdens and blessings. The forest has fallen by the axe of our woodsmen--the soil has been made to teem by the tillage of our farmers; our commerce has whitened every ocean. The dominion of man over physical nature has been extended by the invention of our artists. Liberty and law have marched hand in hand. All the purposes of human association have been accomplished as effectively as under any other government on the globe; and at a cost little exceeding, in a whole generation, the expenditures of other nations in a single year.

Such is the unexaggerated picture of our condition under a constitution founded upon the republican principle of equal rights. To admit that this picture has its shades, is but to say that it is still the condition of men upon earth. From evil, physical, moral, and political, it is not our claim to be exempt. We have suffered sometimes by the visitation of Heaven, through disease; often by the wrongs and injustices of other nations, even to the extremities of war; and lastly, by dissensions among ourselves—dissensions, perhaps, inseparable from the enjoyment of freedom, but which have more than once appeared to threaten the dissolution of the Union, and, with it, the overthrow of all the enjoyments of our present lot, and all our earthly hopes of the future. The causes of these dissensions have been various, founded upon differences of speculation in the theory of republican government; upon conflicting views of policy, in our relations with foreign nations; upon jealousies of partial and sectional interests, aggravated by prejudices and prepossessions, which strangers to each other are ever apt to entertain.

It is a source of gratification and of encouragement to me to observe, that the great result of this experiment upon the theory of human rights has, at the close of that generation by which it was formed, been crowned with success equal to the most sanguine expectations of its founders. Union, justice, tranquillity, the common defence, the general welfare, and the blessings of liberty-all have been promoted by the government under which we have lived. Standing at this point of time, looking back to that generation which has gone by, and forward to that which is advancing, we may at once indulge in grateful exultation and in cheering hope. From the experience of the past, we derive instructive lessons for the future. Of the two great political parties which have divided the opinions and feelings of our country, the candid and the just will now admit, that both have contributed splendid talents, spotless integrity, ardent patriotism, and disinterested sacrifices, to the formation and administration of this government; and that

both have required a liberal indulgence for a portion of human infirmity and error. The revolutionary wars of Europe, commencing precisely at the moment when the government of the United States first went into operation under this constitution, excited a collision of sentiments and of sympathies which kindled all the passions, and embittered the conflict of parties, till the nation was involved in war, and the Union was shaken to its centre. This time of trial embraced a period of five-and-twenty years, during which the policy of the Union, in its relations with Europe, constituted the principal basis of our political divisions, and the most arduous part of the action of our federal government. With the catastrophe in which the wars of the French revolution terminated, and our own subsequent peace with Great Britain, this baneful weed of party strife was uprooted. From that time, no difference of principle, connected either with the theory of government or with our intercourse with foreign nations, has existed or been called forth in force sufficient to sustain a continued combination of parties, or give more than wholesome animation to public sentiment or legislative debate. Our political creed is, without a dissenting voice that can be heard, that the will of the people is the source, and the happiness of the people the end, of all legitimate government upon earth. That the best security for the beneficence, and the best guarantee against the abuse of power, consists in the freedom, the purity, and the frequency of popular elections. That the general government of the Union, and the separate governments of the states, are all sovereignties of legitimated powers; fellow-servants of the same masters, uncontrolled within their respective spheres, uncontrollable by encroachments upon each other. That the firmest security of peace, is the preparation during peace of the defences of war. That a rigorous economy, and accountability of public expenditures, should guard against the aggravation, and alleviate, when possible, the burden of taxation. That the military should be kept in strict subordination to the civil power. That the freedom of the press and of religious opinion should be inviolate. That the policy of our country is peace, and the ark of our salvation, union, are articles of faith upon which we are all agreed. If there have been those who doubted whether a confederated representative democracy were a government competent to the wise and orderly management of the common concerns of a mighty nation, those doubts have been dispelled. If there have been projects of partial confederacies to be erected upon the ruins of the Union, they have been scattered to the winds. If there have been dangerous attachments to one foreign nation, and antipathies against another, they have been extinguished. Ten years of peace, at home and abroad, have assuaged the animosities of political contention, and blended into harmony the most discordant elements of public opinion. There still remains one effort of magnanimity, one sacrifice of prejudice and passion, to be made by the individuals throughout the nation, who have heretofore followed the standards of political party. It is that of discarding every remnant of rancor against each other; of embracing as countrymen and friends; and of yielding to talents and virtue alone that confidence which, in times of contention for principle, was bestowed only upon those who bore the badge of party communion.

The collisions of party spirit, which originate in speculative opinions or in different views of administrative policy, are in their nature transitory. Those which are founded on geographical divisions, adverse interests of soil, climate, and modes of domestic life, are more permanent, and therefore perhaps more dangerous. It is this which gives inestimable value to the VOL. I.-37