• 8th Secretary of State and 6th President of the United States John Quincy Adams, 1767
• Treaty Adams - Onís (Purchase of Florida), 1819
• Spanish Minister to the United States Luis de Onís y González - Vara, 1762

   

As president, he sought to modernize the American economy and promoted education. Adams enacted a part of his agenda and paid off much of the national debt. He was stymied by a Congress controlled by his enemies, and his lack of patronage networks helped politicians eager to undercut him. He lost his 1828 bid for re-election to Andrew Jackson. In doing so, he became the first President since his father to serve a single term.

Adams is best known as a diplomat who shaped America's foreign policy in line with his ardently nationalist commitment to America's republican values. More recently Howe (2007) portrayed Adams as the exemplar and moral leader in an era of modernization. During Adams' lifetime, technological innovations and new means of communication spread messages of religious revival, social reform and party politics. Goods, money and people traveled more rapidly and efficiently than ever before.

Adams was elected a U.S. Representative from Massachusetts after leaving office, the only president ever to be so, serving for the last 17 years of his life with far greater success than he had achieved in the presidency. Animated by his growing revulsion against slavery, Adams became a leading opponent of the Slave Power. He predicted that if a civil war were to break out, the president could abolish slavery by using his war powers. Adams also predicted the Union's dissolution over the slavery issue, but said that if the South became independent there would be a series of bloody slave revolts.

John Quincy Adams was born on July 11, 1767 to John Adams and his wife Abigail Adams in Braintree, Massachusetts, what is now Quincy, Massachusetts. John Quincy Adams Birthplace is now part of Adams National Historical Park and open to the public. He was named for his mother's maternal grandfather, Colonel John Quincy, after whom Quincy, Massachusetts, is named. Adams first learned of the Declaration of Independence from the letters his father wrote his mother from the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia. In 1779, Adams began a diary that he kept until just before he died in 1848. The massive fifty volumes are one of the most extensive collections of first - hand information from the period of the early republic, and are widely cited by modern historians.

Much of Adams' youth was spent accompanying his father overseas. John Adams served as an American envoy to France from 1778 until 1779 and to the Netherlands from 1780 until 1782, and the younger Adams accompanied his father on these journeys. Adams acquired an education at institutions such as Leiden University. For nearly three years, at the age of 14, he accompanied Francis Dana as a secretary on a mission to Saint Petersburg, Russia, to obtain recognition of the new United States. He spent time in Finland, Sweden and Denmark and, in 1804, published a travel report of Silesia. During these years overseas, Adams became fluent in French and Dutch and became familiar with German and other European languages. He entered Harvard College and graduated in 1787 with a Bachelor of Arts degree, Phi Beta Kappa. Adams House at Harvard College is named in honor of Adams and his father. He later earned an A.M. from Harvard in 1790. He apprenticed as a lawyer with Theophilus Parsons in Newburyport, Massachusetts, from 1787 to 1789. He gained admittance to the bar in 1791 and began practicing law in Boston.

Adams first won national recognition when he published a series of widely read articles supporting Washington's decision to keep America out of the growing hostilities surrounding the French Revolution. Soon after, George Washington appointed Adams minister to the Netherlands (at the age of 26) in 1794. He did not want the position, preferring to maintain his quiet life of reading in Massachusetts, and probably would have rejected it if his father had not persuaded him to take it. On his way to the Netherlands, he was to deliver a set of documents to Chief Justice John Jay, who was negotiating the Jay Treaty. After spending some time with Jay discussing the treaty, Adams wrote home to his father, in support of the emerging treaty because he thought America should stay out of European affairs. Historian Paul Nagel has noted that this letter reached Washington, and that parts of it were used by Washington when drafting his farewell address. While going back and forth between The Hague and London, he met and proposed to his future wife. Though he wanted to return to private life at the end of his appointment, Washington appointed him minister to Portugal in 1796, where he was soon promoted to the Berlin Legation. Though his talents were far greater than his desire to serve, he was finally convinced to remain in public service when he learned how highly Washington felt of his abilities. Washington called Adams "the most valuable of America's officials abroad," and Nagel believes that it was at this time that Adams first came to terms with a lifetime of public service.

He became a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1797. When the elder Adams became president, he appointed his son in 1797 as Minister to Prussia at Washington's urging. There Adams signed the renewal of the very liberal Prussian - American Treaty of Amity and Commerce after negotiations with Prussian Foreign Minister Count Karl - Wilhelm Finck von Finckenstein. He served at that post until 1801. While serving abroad, Adams married Louisa Catherine Johnson, the daughter of an American merchant, in a ceremony at the church of All Hallows - by - the - Tower, London. Adams remains the only president to have a First Lady born outside of the United States.

On his return to the United States Adams was appointed a Commissioner of Bankruptcy in Boston by a Federal District Judge. However, Thomas Jefferson rescinded this appointment. He again tried his hand as a lawyer, but shortly afterwards entered politics. John Quincy Adams was elected a member of the Massachusetts State Senate in April 1802. In November 1802 he ran as a Federalist for the United States House of Representatives and lost.

The Massachusetts General Court elected Adams as a Federalist to the U.S. Senate soon after, and he served from March 4, 1803, until 1808, when he broke with the Federalist Party. Adams, as a Senator, had supported the Louisiana Purchase and Jefferson's Embargo Act, actions which made him very unpopular with Massachusetts Federalists. The Federalist controlled Massachusetts Legislature chose a replacement for Adams on June 3, 1808, several months early. On June 8, Adams broke with the Federalists, resigned his Senate seat, and became a Democrat - Republican.

While a member of the Senate, Adams also served as a professor of rhetoric at Harvard University. Disowned by the Federalists and not fully accepted by the Republicans, Adams used his Boylston Professorship of Rhetoric and Oratory at Harvard as a new base. Adams' devotion to classical rhetoric shaped his response to public issues. He remained inspired by classical rhetorical ideals long after the neo - classicalism and deferential politics of the founding generation had been eclipsed by the commercial ethos and mass democracy of the Jacksonian Era. Many of Adams' idiosyncratic positions were rooted in his abiding devotion to the Ciceronian ideal of the citizen - orator "speaking well" to promote the welfare of the polis. Adams was influenced by the classical republican ideal of civic eloquence espoused by British philosopher David Hume. Adams adapted these classical republican ideals of public oratory to America, viewing the multilevel political structure as ripe for "the renaissance of Demosthenic eloquence." Adams' Lectures on Rhetoric and Oratory (1810) looks at the fate of ancient oratory, the necessity of liberty for it to flourish, and its importance as a unifying element for a new nation of diverse cultures and beliefs. Just as civic eloquence failed to gain popularity in Britain, in the United States interest faded in the second decade of the 19th century as the "public spheres of heated oratory" disappeared in favor of the private sphere.

President James Madison appointed Adams as the first ever United States Minister to Russia in 1809 (though Francis Dana and William Short had previously been nominated to the post, neither presented his credentials at Saint Petersburg). Louisa Adams was with him in Saint Petersburg almost the entire time. While not officially a diplomat, Louisa Adams did serve an invaluable role as wife - of - diplomat, becoming a favorite of the tsar and making up for her husband's utter lack of charm. She was an indispensable part of the American mission. In 1812, Adams reported to Washington the news of Napoleon's invasion of Russia and Napoleon's disastrous retreat. In 1814, Adams was recalled from Russia to serve as chief negotiator of the U.S. commission for the Treaty of Ghent, which ended the War of 1812 between the United States and Great Britain. Finally, he was sent to be minister to the Court of St. James's (Britain) from 1815 until 1817, a post that had first been held by his father.

Adams served as Secretary of State in the Cabinet of President James Monroe from 1817 until 1825. Typically, his views concurred with those espoused by Monroe. As Secretary of State, he negotiated the Adams – Onís Treaty (which acquired Florida for the United States), the Treaty of 1818, and wrote the Monroe Doctrine. Many historians regard him as one of the greatest Secretaries of State in American history.

The Floridas, still a Spanish territory but with no Spanish presence to speak of, became a refuge for runaway slaves and Indian raiders. Monroe sent in General Andrew Jackson who pushed the Seminole Indians south, executed two British merchants who were supplying weapons, deposed one governor and named another, and left an American garrison in occupation. President Monroe and all his cabinet, except Adams, believed Jackson had exceeded his instructions. Adams argued that since Spain had proved incapable of policing her territories, the United States was obliged to act in self - defense. Adams so ably justified Jackson's conduct that he silenced protests from either Spain or Britain; Congress refused to punish Jackson. Adams used the events that had unfolded in Florida to negotiate the Florida Treaty with Spain in 1819 that turned Florida over to the U.S. and resolved border issues regarding the Louisiana Purchase.

With the ongoing Oregon boundary dispute, Adams sought to negotiate a settlement with England to decide the border between the western United States and Canada. This would become the Treaty of 1818. Along with the Rush – Bagot Treaty of 1817, this marked the beginning of improved relations between the British Empire and its former colonies, and paved the way for better relations between the U.S. and Canada. The treaty had several provisions, but in particular it set the boundary between British North America and the United States along the 49th parallel through the Rocky Mountains. This settled a boundary dispute caused by ignorance of actual geography in the boundary agreed to in the 1783 Treaty of Paris that ended the American Revolutionary War. That earlier treaty had used the Mississippi River to determine the border, but assumed that the river extended further north than it did, and so that earlier settlement was unworkable.

By the time Monroe became president, several European powers, in particular Spain, were attempting to re-establish control over South America. On Independence Day 1821, in response to those who advocated American support for independence movements in many South American countries, Adams gave a speech in which he said that American policy was moral support for independence movements but not armed intervention. He stated that America "goes not abroad in search of monsters to destroy." From this, Adams authored what came to be known as the Monroe Doctrine, which was introduced on December 2, 1823. It stated that further efforts by European countries to colonize land or interfere with states in the Americas would be viewed as acts of aggression requiring U.S. intervention. The United States, reflecting concerns raised by Great Britain, ultimately hoped to avoid having any European power take over Spain's colonies. It became a defining moment in the foreign policy of the United States and one of its longest standing tenets, and would be invoked by many U.S. statesmen and several U.S. presidents, including Theodore Roosevelt, Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, John F. Kennedy, Ronald Reagan and others.

As the 1824 election drew near people began looking for candidates. New England voters admired Adams' patriotism and political skills and it was mainly due to their support that he entered the race. The old caucus system of the Democratic - Republican Party had collapsed; indeed the entire First Party System had collapsed and the election was a fight based on regional support. Adams had a strong base in New England. His opponents included John C. Calhoun, William H. Crawford, Henry Clay, and the hero of New Orleans, Andrew Jackson. During the campaign Calhoun dropped out, and Crawford fell ill giving further support to the other candidates. When Election Day arrived, Andrew Jackson won, although narrowly, pluralities of the popular and electoral votes, but not the necessary majority of electoral votes.

Under the terms of the Twelfth Amendment, the presidential election fell to the House of Representatives, which was to choose from the top three candidates: Jackson, Adams and Crawford. Clay had come in fourth place and thus was not on the ballot, but he retained considerable power and influence as Speaker of the House.

Clay's personal dislike for Jackson and the similarity of his American System to Adams' position on tariffs and internal improvements caused him to throw his support to Adams, who was elected by the House on February 9, 1825, on the first ballot. Adams' victory shocked Jackson, who had won the most electoral and popular votes and fully expected to be elected president. When Adams appointed Clay as Secretary of State — the position that Adams and his three predecessors had held before becoming President — Jacksonian Democrats were outraged, and claimed that Adams and Clay had struck a "corrupt bargain." This contention overshadowed Adams' term and greatly contributed to Adams' loss to Jackson four years later, in the 1828 election.

Adams served as the sixth President of the United States from March 4, 1825, to March 4, 1829. He took the oath of office on a book of laws, instead of the more traditional Bible. Adams proposed an elaborate program of internal improvements (roads, ports and canals), a national university, and federal support for the arts and sciences. He favored a high tariff to encourage the building of factories, and restricted land sales to slow the movement west. Opposition from the states' rights faction of a hostile congress killed many of his proposals. He also reduced the national debt from $16 million to $5 million, the remainder of which was paid off by his successor.

Paul Nagel argues that his political acumen was not any less developed than others were in his day, and notes that Henry Clay, one of the era's most astute politicians, was a principal advisor and supporter throughout his presidency. Nagel argues that Adams' political problems were the result of an unusually hostile Jacksonian faction, and Adams' own dislike of the office. Although a product of the political culture of his day, he refused to play politics according to the usual rules and was not as aggressive in courting political support as he could have been. He was attacked by the followers of Jackson, who accused him of being a partner to a "corrupt bargain" to obtain Clay's support in the election and then appoint him Secretary of State. Jackson defeated Adams in 1828, and created the modern Democratic party thus inaugurating the Second Party System.

During his term, Adams worked on transforming America into a world power through "internal improvements," as a part of the "American System". It consisted of a high tariff to support internal improvements such as road building, and a national bank to encourage productive enterprise and form a national currency. In his first annual message to Congress, Adams presented an ambitious program for modernization that included roads, canals, a national university, an astronomical observatory, and other initiatives. The support for his proposals was mixed, mainly due to opposition from Jackson's followers.

Some of his proposals were adopted, specifically the extension of the Cumberland Road into Ohio with surveys for its continuation west to St. Louis; the beginning of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, the construction of the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal and the Louisville and Portland Canal around the falls of the Ohio; the connection of the Great Lakes to the Ohio River system in Ohio and Indiana; and the enlargement and rebuilding of the Dismal Swamp Canal in North Carolina. One of the issues which divided the administration was protective tariffs, of which Henry Clay was a leading advocate. After Adams lost control of Congress in 1827, the situation became more complicated. By signing into law the Tariff of 1828, quite unpopular in parts of the south, he further antagonized the Jacksonians.

Adams' generous policy toward Native Americans caused him trouble. Settlers on the frontier, who were constantly seeking to move westward, cried for a more expansionist policy. When the federal government tried to assert authority on behalf of the Cherokees, the governor of Georgia took up arms. Adams defended his domestic agenda as continuing Monroe's policies. In contrast, Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren instigated the policy of Indian removal to the west (i.e., the Trail of Tears).

Adams is regarded as one of the greatest diplomats in American history, and during his tenure as Secretary of State, he was the chief designer of the Monroe Doctrine. He had witnessed the Barbary Wars against the Islamic pirates of North Africa, and the Greek War of Independence from the Ottoman Turks. Adams accepted that the Greek fight for independence from the Turks was only the beginning of a long conflict between Islam and the West. Although he sympathized with the Greeks, and held a deep mistrust of the defeated Muslims, he was reluctant to support America's involvement in continuing wars far from home.

On July 4, 1821, he gave an address to Congress:

... But she [the United States of America] goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well - wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.

During his term as president, however, Adams achieved little of long term consequence in foreign affairs. A reason for this was the opposition he faced in Congress, where his rivals prevented him from succeeding. Among his diplomatic achievements were treaties of reciprocity with a number of nations, including Denmark, Mexico, the Hanseatic League, the Scandinavian countries, Prussia and Austria. However, thanks to the successes of Adams' diplomacy during his previous eight years as Secretary of State, most of the foreign policy issues he would have faced had been resolved by the time he became President.

John Quincy Adams left office on March 4, 1829, after losing the election of 1828 to Andrew Jackson. Adams did not attend the inauguration of his successor, Andrew Jackson, who had openly snubbed him by refusing to pay the traditional "courtesy call" to the outgoing President during the weeks before his own inauguration. He was one of only three Presidents who chose not to attend their respective successor's inauguration; the others were his father and Andrew Johnson

After the inauguration of Adams in 1825, Jackson resigned from his senate seat. For four years he worked hard, with help from his supporters in Congress, to defeat Adams in the Presidential election of 1828. The campaign was very much a personal one. As was the tradition of the day and age in American presidential politics, neither candidate personally campaigned, but their political followers organized many campaign events. Both candidates were rhetorically attacked in the press. This reached a low point when the press accused Jackson's wife Rachel of bigamy. She died a few weeks after the elections. Jackson said he would forgive those who insulted him, but he would never forgive the ones who attacked his wife.

Adams lost the election by a decisive margin. He won all the same states that his father had won in the election of 1800: the New England states, New Jersey and Delaware, as well as parts of New York and a majority of Maryland. Jackson won the rest of the states, picking up 178 electoral votes to Adams' 83 votes, and succeeded him. Adams and his father were the only U.S. Presidents to serve a single term during the first 48 years of the Presidency (1789 – 1837). Historian Thomas Bailey observed, "Seldom has the public mind been so successfully poisoned against an honest and high - minded man."

Adams did not retire after leaving office. Instead he ran for and won a seat in the United States House of Representatives in the 1830 elections. He was the first president to serve in Congress after his term of office, and one of only two former presidents to do so (Andrew Johnson later served in the Senate). He was elected to eight terms, serving as a Representative for 17 years, from 1831 until his death.

In authoring a change to the Tariff of 1828, he was instrumental to the compromise that ended the Nullification Crisis. When James Smithson died and left his estate to the U.S. government to build an institution of learning, congress wanted to appropriate the money for other purposes. Adams was key to ensuring that the money was instead used to build the Smithsonian Institution. He also led the fight against the gag rule, which prevented congress from hearing anti - slavery petitions. Throughout much of his congressional career, he fought it, evaded it, and tried to repeal it. In 1844 he assembled a coalition that approved his resolution to repeal the rule. He was considered by many to be the leader of the anti - slavery faction in congress, as he was one of America's most prominent opponents of slavery.

In Congress, he was chair of the Committee on Commerce and Manufactures, the Committee on Indian Affairs and the Committee on Foreign Affairs.

A longtime opponent of slavery, Adams used his new role in Congress to fight it. He refused to honor the House’s gag rule banning discussion or debate of the slavery issue. Since the gag rule prevented him from bringing slavery petitions to the floor, he used a petition from a Georgia citizen over another matter to bring a separate petition to the floor. This petition urged disunion due to the continuation of slavery in the south. Though he certainly did not support it (which he made clear at the time), he was purposely trying to antagonize the pro - slavery faction of Congress into an open fight on the matter. This infuriated his congressional enemies, many of whom were agitating for disunion. They moved that he be censured over the matter. He drew the debate over his censure to a two week - long attack on slavery. He changed the focus from his own actions to those of the slaveholders, knowing he would probably be acquitted. He decided that if he were censured, he would resign and run again - and probably win easily. When his opponents realized what they had gotten themselves into, they tried to bury the censure and move on, but Adams made sure this did not happen and the censure continued to be debated. He attacked slavery and slaveholders as immoral, and condemned the institution while calling for it to end.

Adams took advantage of his right to defend himself in front of the members to deliver days of prepared and impromptu remarks against slavery and in favor of abolition. He spoke against the slave trade and the ownership of slaves. As others continued to attack him and call for his censure, Adams continued to debate the issues of slavery and the evils of slaveholding. Adams also called into question the actions of a House that would limit its own ability to debate and resolve questions internally. After the two week - long debate, a vote was held and he was not censured. The whole time he delighted in the misery he was inflicting on the slaveholders he so hated. Although any move to censure Adams over the slavery petition was ultimately abandoned, the House did address the issue of petitions from enslaved persons. Adams rose again to argue that the right to petition was a universal right granted by God so that those in the weakest positions might always have recourse to those in the most powerful. The gag rule was ultimately retained. The discussion ignited by his actions and the attempts of others to quiet him raised questions of the right to petition, the right to legislative debate, and the morality of slavery. During the censure debate, Adams said that he took delight in the fact that southerners would forever remember him as "the acutest, the astutest, the archest enemy of southern slavery that every existed".

Adams quickly became an important antislavery voice in the Congress. In 1836 Southern Congressmen voted in a rule, called the “gag rule,” that called for the immediate tabling of any petitions about slavery. He became a forceful opponent of this, and almost got himself censured over his opposition to it. He turned the debate on his proposed censure to a two week - long attack on slavery. Later he led a committee that sought to reform congress' rules, and he used this opportunity to try to repeal the gag rule outright. He spent two months building support for this move, though due to northern opposition the rule narrowly survived. He fiercely criticized northern congressmen and senators, in particular Stephen Douglas, who seemed to cater to the slave faction in exchange for southern support. His opposition to slavery made him, along with Henry Clay, one of the leading opponents of Texas annexation and the Mexican – American War. He predicted, correctly, that these would both help lead to civil war. After one of his reelection victories, he said that he must "bring about a day prophesied when slavery and war shall be banished from the face of the earth." He prided himself on being "obnoxious to the slave faction."

Adams sat for the earliest confirmed photograph still in existence of a U.S. president in 1843, although other sources contend that William Henry Harrison had posed even earlier for his portrait, in 1841. The original daguerreotype is in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery of the Smithsonian Institution. Although there is no indication that the two were close, Adams met Abraham Lincoln during the latter's sole term as a member of the House of Representatives, from 1847 until Adams' death. Thus, it has been suggested that Adams is the only major figure in American history who knew both the Founding Fathers and Abraham Lincoln, though Martin Van Buren knew Founding Fathers Thomas Jefferson and his mentor Aaron Burr and met the young Lincoln while on a campaign trip through Illinois.

Besides his opposition to slavery and the gag rule, his congressional career is remembered for several other key accomplishments. Shortly after entering Congress, the Nullification Crisis threatened civil war over the Tariff of 1828. Adams authored an alteration to the tariff, which weakened it and diffused the crisis. Congress also passed the Force Bill which authorized President Andrew Jackson to use military force if Adams' compromise bill did not force the belligerent states to capitulate. There was no need, however, because Adams' compromise defused the issue. The compromise actually did not alter the tariff as much as the southern states had hoped, though they agreed not to continue pursuing the issue for fear of civil war.

Adams also became a leading force for the advancement of science. As president, he had proposed a national observatory, which did not win much support. In 1829 British scientist James Smithson died, and left his fortune for the "increase and diffusion of knowledge". In Smithson's will, he stated that should his nephew, Henry James Hungerford, die without heirs, the Smithson estate would go to the government of the United States to create an "Establishment for the increase & diffusion of Knowledge among men". After the nephew died without heirs in 1835, President Andrew Jackson informed Congress of the bequest, which amounted to about US$500,000 ($10,100,997 in 2008 U.S. dollars after inflation). Adams realized that this might allow the United States to realize his dream of building a national institution of science and learning. Adams thus became Congress' primary supporter of what would become the Smithsonian Institution. He also relentlessly pursued support for astronomical efforts and observatories, seeking a national observatory for the United States. His efforts eventually lead to what is now the United States' oldest, still operational scientific institution, the United States Naval Observatory. In 1825 Adams signed a bill for the creation of a national observatory just before leaving presidential office – which became the Naval Observatory. Adams in fact spent many nights at the Observatory, with celebrated national astronomer and oceanographer, Matthew Fontaine Maury, watching and charting the stars, which had always been one of Adams' avocations.

As for efforts to found the Smithsonian Institution, the money was invested in shaky state bonds, which quickly defaulted. After heated debate in Congress, Adams successfully argued to restore the lost funds with interest. Though Congress wanted to use the money for other purposes, Adams successfully persuaded Congress to preserve the money for an institution of science and learning. Congress also debated whether the federal government had the authority to accept the gift, though with Adams leading the initiative, Congress decided to accept the legacy bequeathed to the nation and pledged the faith of the United States to the charitable trust on July 1, 1836.

On February 21, 1848, the House of Representatives was discussing the matter of honoring US Army officers who served in the Mexican - American War. Adams firmly opposed this idea, so when the rest of the house erupted into 'ayes', he cried out, 'No!' He rose to answer a question put forth by the Speaker of the House. Immediately thereafter, Adams collapsed, having suffered a massive cerebral hemorrhage. Two days later, on February 23, he died with his wife and son at his side in the Speaker's Room inside the Capitol Building in Washington, D.C. His last words were "This is the last of earth. I am content." He passed away at 7:20 P.M.

His original interment was temporary, in the public vault at the Congressional Cemetery in Washington, D.C. Later, he was interred in the family burial ground in Quincy across from the First Parish Church, called Hancock Cemetery. After his wife's death, his son, Charles Francis Adams, had him reinterred with his wife in the expanded family crypt in the United First Parish Church across the street, next to his parents. Both tombs are viewable by the public. Adams' original tomb at Hancock Cemetery is still there and marked simply "J.Q. Adams".

John Quincy Adams and Louisa Catherine (Johnson) Adams had three sons and a daughter. Louisa was born in 1811 but died in 1812 while the family was in Russia. They named their first son George Washington Adams (1801 – 1829) after the first president. Both George and their second son, John (1803 – 1834), led troubled lives and died in early adulthood.(George committed suicide and John was expelled from Harvard before his 1823 graduation.)

Adams' youngest son, Charles Francis Adams (who named his own son John Quincy), also pursued a career in diplomacy and politics. In 1870 Charles Francis built the first memorial presidential library in the United States, to honor his father. The Stone Library includes over 14,000 books written in twelve languages. The library is located in the "Old House" at Adams National Historical Park in Quincy, Massachusetts.

John Adams and John Quincy Adams were the first father and son to each serve as president (the others being George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush). In addition, each Adams served only one term as President.

Adams was the first president to have his photograph taken. He is probably best known as a diplomat who shaped America's foreign policy in accordance with his ardently nationalist views, and is widely considered by historians to have been one of the greatest diplomats in American history. He was key to the negotiation of several important treaties, such as the Treaty of Ghent which ended the War of 1812, and the Florida Treaty which resulted in the annexation of Florida. He also formulated the Monroe Doctrine, which is still evoked to the present day. He is viewed by many as the exemplar and moral leader in an era of modernization. During this era, new technologies and networks of infrastructure and communication brought to the people messages of religious revival, social reform and party politics, as well as moving goods, money and people ever more rapidly and efficiently.

Though he was always quite hostile to slavery, nearly to be point of being an abolitionist (although he doubted the abolitionists could successfully end slavery), he grew even more hostile to it later in life. Adams became a leading opponent of slave power and articulated a theory whereby the president could abolish slavery by using his war powers, a correct prediction of Abraham Lincoln's use of the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863. Adams predicted the likelihood of the Union's dissolution over the slavery issue, and was a key opponent of the Mexican – American War for this reason. Though he later described his presidency as the unhappiest time of his life, scholars rate John Quincy Adams in the second quartile in the majority of historical presidential rankings.

One of Adams' most important legacies is his massive diary, which he began at age 11 with the simple entry "A journal, by me, J.Q.A." It covers, in extraordinary detail, his life and experiences up to his death in 1848. The massive fifty volumes are one of the most extensive collections of first hand information from the period of the early republic, and are cited by historians in a wide range of matters from that period.

Historians have often included Adams among the leading conservatives of his day. Russell Kirk, however, sees Adams as a flawed conservative who was imprudent in opposing slavery.

Adams' personality was much like that of his father, as were his political beliefs. Throughout his life, he always preferred reading in seclusion to social engagements, and several times had to be pressured by others to remain in public service. Historian Paul Nagel argues that, like Abraham Lincoln after him, Adams suffered from depression for much of his life. Early in his life he sought some form of treatment. Adams thought his depression was due to the high expectations demanded of him by his father and mother. Throughout his life he felt inadequate and socially awkward because of his depression, and was constantly bothered by his physical appearance. He was closer to his father, whom he spent much of his early life with abroad, than he was to his mother. When he was younger and the American Revolution was going on, his mother told her children what their father was doing, and what he was risking, and because of this Adams grew to greatly respect his father. His relationship with his mother was rocky; she had high expectations of him and was afraid her children might end up dead alcoholics like her brother. John's brother Charles would eventually follow this fate. He fell in love shortly after he finished school, but his mother did not approve and the relationship ended. When he fell in love with his future wife, Louisa Johnson, his mother likewise disapproved. Nagel argues that this disapproval motivated him to marry Johnson, despite reservations that she, like his mother, was too strong.

Before 1820, Adams was best known as an exponent of American nationalism. Later in life, especially after his election to the House, he was famous as the most prominent national leader opposing slavery. He was not an abolitionist, say biographers Nagle and Parsons. Remini notes that Adams thought the end of slavery would come by either civil war or the consent of the slave South, but definitely not through the work of abolitionists.

The turning point came with the debate on the Missouri Compromise in 1820 when he broke with his friend John C. Calhoun, who became the most outspoken national leader in favor of slavery. They became bitter enemies. Adams vilified slavery as a terrible evil and preached total abolition, while Calhoun countered that the right to own slaves had to be protected from interference from the federal government to keep the nation alive. Adams said slavery contradicted the principles of republicanism, while Calhoun said that slavery was essential to American democracy, for it made all white men equal. Both men pulled away from nationalism, and started to consider dissolution of the Union as a way of resolving the slavery predicament. Adams predicted that if the South formed a new nation, it would be torn apart by an extremely violent slave insurrection. If the two nations went to war, Adams predicted the president of the United States would use his war powers to abolish slavery. The two men became ideological leaders of the North and the South. In the House Adams became a champion of free speech, demanding that petitions against slavery be heard despite a "gag rule" that said they could not be heard.

In 1841, Adams had the case of a lifetime, representing the defendants in United States v. The Amistad Africans in the Supreme Court of the United States. He successfully argued that the Africans, who had seized control of a Spanish ship on which they were being transported illegally as slaves, should not be extradited or deported to Cuba (a Spanish colony where slavery was legal) but should be considered free. Under President Martin Van Buren, the government argued the Africans should be deported for having mutinied and killed officers on the ship. Adams won their freedom, with the chance to stay in the United States or return to Africa. Adams made the argument because the U.S. had prohibited the international slave trade, although it allowed internal slavery. He never billed for his services in the Amistad case. The speech was directed not only at the justices of this Supreme Court hearing the case, but also to the broad national audience he instructed in the evils of slavery.

Adams repeatedly spoke out against the "Slave Power", that is the organized political power of the slave owners who dominated all the southern states and their representation in Congress. He vehemently attacked the annexation of Texas (1845) and the Mexican War (1846 – 48) as part of a "conspiracy" to extend slavery.

Adams occasionally is featured in the mass media. In the PBS miniseries The Adams Chronicles (1976), he was portrayed by David Birney, William Daniels, Marcel Trenchard, Stephen Austin, Steven Grover and Mark Winkworth. He was also portrayed by Anthony Hopkins in the 1997 film Amistad, and again by Ebon Moss - Bachrach in the 2008 HBO television miniseries John Adams; the HBO series received criticism for needless historical and temporal distortions in its portrayal.

   

Spain had long rejected repeated American efforts to purchase Florida. But by 1818, Spain was facing a troubling colonial situation where the cession of Florida made sense. Spain had been exhausted by the Peninsular War and needed to rebuild its credibility and presence in its colonies. Revolutionaries in Central America and South America were beginning to demand independence. Spain was also unwilling to make any further investment in Florida and it worried about the border between New Spain (a large area including today's Mexico, Central America, and other regions) and the United States. Spain had almost no military or government presence in Florida and was unable to stop Seminole warriors who routinely crossed the border and raided American villages and farms.

By 1819 Spain was forced to negotiate because it was losing its hold on its American empire, with its western colonies primed to revolt. While fighting escaped African - American slaves, outlaws and Native Americans in U.S. - controlled Georgia during the First Seminole War, Andrew Jackson had pursued them into Spanish Florida, but at the same time, he attacked and captured Spanish forts in Florida that he felt were assisting the raids into American territory.

To stop the Seminole Indians based in East Florida from raiding Georgia settlements, and offering havens for runaway slaves, U.S. Army led increasingly frequent incursions into Spanish territory, including the 1817 – 1818 campaign by Andrew Jackson that became known as the First Seminole War. The United States now effectively controlled East Florida. Control was necessary according to Secretary of State John Quincy Adams because Florida had become "a derelict open to the occupancy of every enemy, civilized or savage, of the United States, and serving no other earthly purpose than as a post of annoyance to them.". Spain requested British intervention, but London declined to assist Spain in the negotiations. Some of President James Monroe's cabinet demanded Jackson's immediate dismissal, but Adams realized that it put the U.S. in a favorable diplomatic position. Adams was able to negotiate very favorable terms.

Florida had become a burden to Spain, which could not afford to send settlers or garrisons. Madrid therefore decided to cede the territory to the United States through the Adams – Onís Treaty.

Spain and the United States disagreed over the territory of the Louisiana Purchase of 1803. Spain considered it to comprise the west bank of the Mississippi River and the city of New Orleans. The United States on the other hand claimed that the land they bought extended all the way to the Summit of the Rocky Mountains. Eventually the U.S. conceded in their claim to only go as far west as the Sabine River but Spain insisted upon the Arroyo Hondo boundary creating a disputed region known as Neutral Ground.

The treaty was signed at Washington, February 22, 1819, by John Quincy Adams, secretary of state, and Luis de Onís, Spanish minister. Ratification was postponed for two years, because Spain wanted to use the treaty as an incentive to keep the United States from giving diplomatic support to the revolutionaries in South America. As soon as the treaty was signed, the U.S. Senate ratified unanimously; because of Spain's stalling, a new ratification was necessary and this time there were objections. Henry Clay and other Western spokesman demanded that Spain also give up Texas. This proposal was defeated by the Senate, which ratified the treaty a second time on February 19, 1821. Ratifications were exchanged three days later and the treaty was proclaimed on February 22, 1821, two years after the signing.

The Treaty closed the first era of United States expansion by providing for the cession of East Florida, the abandonment of the controversy over West Florida (a portion of which had been seized by the United States), and creation of a boundary with the Spanish province of Mexico that clearly made Texas a part of Mexico, thus ending the vagueness of the boundary of the Louisiana Purchase. Spain also ceded to the United States its claims to the Oregon Country.

The U.S. did not pay Spain for Florida but did agree to pay the legal claims of American citizens against Spain, to a maximum of $5 million. Pinckney's Treaty of 1795 between the U.S. and Spain was to remain in force. Spanish goods received certain tariff privileges in Florida ports.

The U.S. received ownership of Spanish Florida (British East and West Florida 1763 - 1783). The U.S. relinquished its own claims on parts of Texas west of the Sabine River and other Spanish areas.

The Adams–Onís Treaty settled the dispute by attempting to draw clearer borders, roughly granting Florida and Louisiana to the U.S. while giving to Spain everything west of Louisiana from Texas to California. The new boundary was to be the Sabine River north from the Gulf of Mexico to the 32nd parallel north, then due north to the Red River, west along the Red River to the 100th meridian west, due north to the Arkansas River, west to its headwaters, north to the 42nd parallel north, and finally west along that parallel to the Pacific Ocean. Informally this has been called the "Step Boundary", although the step - like shape of the boundary was not apparent for several decades — the source of the Arkansas, believed to be near the 42nd parallel, was not known until John C. Frémont located it in the 1840s, hundreds of miles south of the 42nd parallel.

The claims of Spain on the Oregon Country dated to the papal bull of 1493 which had granted to Spain the rights to colonize the western coast of North America and to the actions of Vasco Núñez de Balboa in 1513, when he claimed all the "South Sea" (the Pacific Ocean) and the lands adjoining the Pacific Ocean for the Spanish Crown. To solidify these 250 year old claims, in the late 18th century Spain established a military and trading outpost in today's British Columbia and performed "acts of sovereignty" in Alaska. As a result of the Adams – Onís Treaty, the United States acquired the claims of Spain to the Oregon Country north of the 42nd parallel.

For the United States, this treaty (and the Treaty of 1818 with Britain agreeing to joint occupancy of Oregon Country) meant that its claimed territory now extended far west from the Mississippi, all the way to the Pacific Ocean. For Spain, it meant that it kept its colonies in Texas and also kept a buffer zone between its colonies in California and New Mexico and the U.S. territories. Historians consider the treaty to be a great achievement for the U.S., as time validated Adams's vision that it would allow the U.S. to open trade with the Orient across the Pacific.

Washington set up a commission, 1821 to 1824, that handled American claims against Spain. Many notable lawyers, including Daniel Webster and William Wirt, represented claimants before the commission. During its term, the commission examined 1,859 claims arising from over 720 spoliation incidents, and distributed the $5 million in a basically fair manner. The treaty reduced tensions with Spain (and after 1821 Mexico), and allowed budget cutters in Congress to reduce the army budget and reject the plans to modernize and expand the army proposed by Secretary of War John C. Calhoun.

The treaty was honored by both sides, although inaccurate maps from the treaty meant that the boundary between Texas and Oklahoma remained unclear for most of the 19th century. The American boundary was expanded in 1848 by the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo with Mexico.

The treaty was ratified by Spain in 1820, and by the United States in 1821 (during the time that Spain and Mexico were engaged in the prolonged Mexican War of Independence). Spain finally recognized the independence of Mexico with the Treaty of Córdoba signed on August 24, 1821. While Mexico was not initially a party to the treaty, in 1831 Mexico ratified the treaty. However, by the mid 1830s, a controversy developed regarding the border with Texas, during which the United States demonstrated that the Sabine and Neches rivers had been switched on maps, moving the frontier in favor of Mexico. As a consequence, the eastern boundary of Texas was not firmly established until the independence of the Republic of Texas in 1836, and not agreed upon until the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848 which concluded the Mexican - American War. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo also formalized the cession by Mexico of Alta California and today's American Southwest except for the territory of the Gadsden Purchase.

Another dispute occurred after Texas joined the Union. The treaty stated that the boundary between the French claims on the north and the Spanish claims on the south was Rio Roxo de Natchitoches (Red River) until it reached the 100th meridian as noted on John Melish's map published in 1818. The problem was that the 100th meridian on the Melish map was some 90 miles east of the true 100th meridian and the Red River forked about 50 miles east of the 100th meridian. Texas claimed the land south of the North Fork and the United States claimed the land north of the South Fork (later called the Prairie Dog Town Fork Red River). In 1860 the area was organized as Greer County, Texas. The matter was not settled until a United States Supreme Court ruling in 1896 upheld federal claims to the territory, after which it was added to Oklahoma.

Luis de Onís y González Vara López y Gómez was born in Cantalapiedra, Salamanca, in June 4, 1762. He was the son of Joaquin de Onís, one of the main landowners in the village, of noble family and of Asturian origin likely that, by residing in Salamanca, gave his son a brilliant education. It is said that he had begun the study of Greek and Latin by age 8. He studied at the University of Salamanca. and at sixteen had concluded at the university the studies of philosophy, rhetoric, moral philosophy and humanities, plus two years of law.

After studying in the University, went to work at the Spanish embassy in Dresden, Germany, with his uncle José. After four years of the best learning and diplomatic practice with his uncle, he was proposed for the post of interim Chargé d'Affaires, a period that lasted for eight years. He became secretary and business manager, thus visiting all Central Europe. In 1786, when he was 24 years old, Onís moved to Freiberg to follow a course with the famous Prussian mineralogist of orictognosia Werner, winning the friendship of teachers and students and getting to know the reality of life in the mines and the existence of a surplus of workers willing to be hired. Onis was able to choose up to thirty - six men, including six mine managers, who were sent to Spain when nobody expected it. Recognizing his success, Floridablanca proposed him as a minister to the United States. In 1792 he was rewarded with the Cross of Carlos III. In 1798 he was elected officer of the first Secretary of State in Madrid. In March 1800 he was appointed member of the Board of the Royal and Distinguished Order of Carlos III. He then took part in the negotiations and conclusion of the Peace of Amiens and, in October 1802, received the title of secretary to the king by decree. In 1808, be moved to the Administration of Seville, and continued as head of the Secretariat of State in his capacity as senior officer, but soon received a proposal to cover an embassy, ​​first in Russia, then in Sweden and finally to the president and the U.S. Congress.

His appointment, in June 29, 1809, contained a recommendation to come out as soon as possible to his destination. The mission entrusted to him was difficult. This was to ensure peace and friendship between the two States, achieving recognition of Fernando VII, discuss with sincerity and good faith all the points in dispute within limits, maintain and keep united with Spain the Spanish possessions in the New World, buy guns, schooners and supplies to help Spain in its war against the French, and finally, to counter the Bonapartist propaganda in the United States. He was occupied with all this from the start, despite the flat refusal of the Secretary of State to recognize him while the Spanish war was unfolding. The commitments of President James Madison with Napoleon I prevented it, despite their good words and personal messages of commitment to the cause of independence in Spain. However, Onis decided to stay in Philadelphia, using the consular body officially recognized for the maintenance of the minimum official relations, and displaying a tireless work of harassment and rejection of U.S. attempts to penetrate into Florida and its covert support to French agents intruding in the Spanish provinces. Since his arrival, he paid special attention to the activities of Spanish and Latin American revolutionary agents, then increasingly frequent. The Secretaries of State, James Monroe and Smith, rejected his writings and protests, while informally lent their support to insurgent movements. The occupation of West Florida in 1810 was the consummation of a set of facts that had been prolonged for years, caused by the indeterminacy of the border between Florida and Louisiana, when France ceded it to Spain in 1763. At the start of U.S. war with Great Britain in 1812, the danger of invasion of East Florida, a territory that had never been in dispute, escalated and was the subject of constant disputes in Onís' correspondence with Monroe. The U.S. government had to recognize the presence of Onis, who presented his credentials on December 20, 1815, five years after he arrived in New York City. Thereafter, he continued arguing and supporting the Spanish positions with the same emphasis to which he was accustomed. Monroe, meanwhile, sent an ambassador to Madrid, John Erving, who had to wait several months, rejected by the Secretary of State Pedro Cevallos, until the formalization of the appointment of Onis in the United States. At this time, it seemed hasty to start negotiations between the two countries, and Onis tried to postpone discussions through various pretexts. After two years of difficult negotiations and consultations, and through the intervention of the French ambassador Hyde de Neuville, who defended the Spanish argument against the radicalism of Henry Clay in Congress and General Jackson, who emphasized his hostility on East Florida, on February 22, 1819 the "Adams - Onis" treaty was signed.

The treaty consisted of 16 items, half of which came to a complete agreement of the points in dispute since 1783, ceding all Crown lands located east of the Mississippi, known under the name of West Florida and East Florida. The most serious confrontation, setting the borders to the west and northwest of the Mississippi, was maintained until the last moment, because Onís aimed at keeping them away from Texas, New Mexico and California. The signing of treaty elicited, surprisingly, a favorable response from the public and the U.S. Senate. Onis returned to Europe convinced that the alternative to the treaty could have been the loss of all territories up to the Rio Grande and to some extent of the internal provinces of New Spain.

Back in Spain, in mid 1819, he was awarded the Gran Cruz Americana (Grand American Cross), honors of State Councilor, but despite aspiring to become Secretary of State in Madrid, he only managed to be appointed minister in St. Petersburg. The revolution of 1820 prevented him from assuming this office, but the constitutional government that canceled this appointment appointed him instead as ambassador in Naples. In Madrid, he published a work in two volumes entitled "Memorias sobre las Negociaciones entre España y los Estados Unidos de América" (Reports on the Negotiations between Spain and the United States of America) that gave rise to the Treaty of 1819 and was named perpetual fellow of Salamanca, whose title was issued by the approval of the House to be passed to his children and successors. The last diplomatic mission was conferred in February 1821 as minister in London, where he participated in diplomatic exchanges for the recognition of Hispanic American countries by the United States, returning to Madrid in November 1822. Onis managed to prevent the European powers to follow the American example. After that, he settled in Madrid where, a few months after his return, in May 17, 1826 (or 27) died due to illness.

De Onis invited the Circus of Pepin and Breschard to sail from Spain to perform in the United States, which they did in 1807. Don Luis married in Dresden, 9 August 1788, with Federika Christina von Mercklein, and had three children: Mauricio, Narcisa and Clementina.