Thank you. Welcome. Good afternoon britt and catherine, president of the Massachusetts Historical Society and i am so happy you could be here with us today as we welcome to celebrated historians as they present their coauthored book, and one. The problem of democracy doubtless, many of you here in this room know mhs is home to the adams family papers and an extensive collection largely comprised of correspondences, letters, books, diaries, literary manuscripts, speeches, legal and business papers of both the senior and junior president s adams as well as all the members of this preeminent political dynasty. These documents remain so vital in our efforts to understand the evolution of american democracy, diplomacy and identity. Mhs strives to make the adams papers and our entire 40 million item collection available to anyone with an interest in american life, culture and history and we do it for free. If you have value resource and enjoyed programming like todays talk and you are not an mhs supporter i encourage you to do so. Tonight represents one of many programs seminars, exhibitions and workshops that we host. If you dont already have a copy of our new Spring Summer calendar grab one on the way out and its on her website. I want to mention we will have copies of the problem of democracy for sale after the program in the lobby and i think we could get them signed by the authors. Now it is my great pleasure to deduce todays speaker, professors Nancy Isenberg and Andrew Burstein. Doctor isenberg is the key Harry Williams professor at Louisiana State university and for 2016 bestselling trash untold history of Cross America has become an International Sensation and tackles one of the intense social themes of class, division and inequality of america and doctor burstein is also finds a home at the Louisiana State university as the professor of history and his 2015 book democracys views illustrate how Thomas Jeffersons life and legacy have been used to support modernday partisan politics on both sides of the aisle and Nancy Isenberg and Andrew Burstein have in regular country bidders and contribute to pieces about modern political and Cultural Affairs for a variety of National News outlets including cspan and mpr. Please join me in welcoming Nancy Isenberg and Andrew Burstein. [applause] thank you, catherine. We love the Massachusetts Historical Society. Thank you all for coming today. Is the candidate likable enough . Inquiring minds want to know. You have to come across as likable and the it factor to be electable. That is what democracy has come to. Like high School Elections the right book in the common touch and its less a question of knowledge or judgment than a popularity contest. This is one problem of democracy and there are others, too. Why should our vehicle be the adams is . John and john quincy, president s two and six because of how profound yet how oddly unknown they are interwoven public lives were because of how they struggled with the perception that their deep study and practical experience would backfire despite being two of the most recognizable faces of American Pride in the courts of europe they were to be remembered as symbols of entitlement, artistic corruption and stodgy resistance to a glorious fullblown democracy. We have written this book because until now no historical investigator has dissected the intertwined lives of the first of only two parents, father and son president. The president s bush were dyed in the wool republicans. The president s adams strongly resisted Party Affiliation and to be true to the values they had to be independent of any Party Orthodoxy and let us start with undisputed fact that the founding generation did not treat the idea of democracy as we do. That is where the adams come in. They foresaw defects or others basked in the american imaginary and we all know how quotable Thomas Jefferson is from we hold these truths to my personal favorite, composed in 1800 i have sworn upon the author of god my total hostility for every form of tyranny over the mind of men. Jefferson wants us to believe in the human spirit. John adams is quotable, too. Though, you would not know it. He perceives jeffersons troops as halftruths. Hes ironic, sarcastic and earthy. This in 1778. A man must be his own trumpeter. He must get his picture drawn, statue made and he must make the mob stare and gape and perpetuate his fame. In later years johnny q, as nancy and i effectually called the son, he denoted himself by the initials j qa and he recalled jefferson as one as, burning ambition coupled with an inventive memory led him to mistreat the first president adams. The second president adams perceived the cold surrounding jefferson as a mass deception. I have always been a prophet of ill and punished accordingly, adams the father to adams the sun. A martyr complex, we might also attribute to him. The adams refused to pander and they do not harm, they did not brewed beautifully like Abraham Lincoln with lincoln melancholy but they argued, stickered, rye and idiosyncratic, hardly mysterious with the slightest in hand shaking the warm and genial but all of that was merely a matter of style. The pair are painted as antidemocratic conservatives yet they were neither antidemocratic or conventionally conservatives. They conceptualized democracy in ways that make sense to a modern student of history and concern concerned, as we are, and should be with the gap between rhetoric and reality. If jefferson is associated with the optimistic crucibles that a democratic spirit lodges and rational educable voters, the adams, older especially probed human psychology and came away with a different, less static view of popular democracy. A tendency to corruption existed on all forms of government and john adams felt even the most educated class of men with hunger for power. They should be isolated in a senate where the able, as he wrote were separated from the mass and unable to dominate on their own. It is why he detested the Unicameral Legislature that benjamin frequent proposed one house was more prone to corruption then two. On the other hand john adams concern about across the board popular election lodged in one highly pertinent fact, the multitude has always been credulous in the few are always artful. Let that sink in. Clever speech could convince Common People just about anyone to support that idea and the system had to protect the public from artifice, imposture, hypocrisy and superstition. Above all, both father and son believed democracy required unfailingly Accurate Information flowing between citizens and their representatives. It is neither conservative nor liberal to campaign for an informed citizenry. Our book is about one made this beautiful imperfect political dynasty tick in the intimate understanding between a father and a son and they shared a library and marveled together at the roman republican Marcus Cicero and profound ways pattern their inner lives after him. Cicero respected the concept of law in favor of justice and prescribed the three branches of government we adhere to today. In their abundant correspondence which history has sadly overlooked the two president s adams resisted local talk of dynasty and was never about outright power but about feelings of inner satisfaction and perhaps their protestations should not always be believed nevertheless across decades of correspondence any reader can see emotion move from the mind to the page with little self censoring. We give emphasis to the. In their public life when they were diplomats in europe and as a teenager and largely without rental supervision john quincy trekked across Eastern Europe and scandinavia. Once he and his father braved the stormy crossing from the english coast and set ashore on an obscure cold backwater in the netherlands and johnny, as he was known, preserve the life of his fate and fragile father who was subject to all sorts of bodily ills. Johnny expertly guided them both back to civilization. The bond formed between the adams is, father and son, and europe from 17781785 condition everything that followed. Representing their Young Country abroad they were literally citizens of the world and to a greater extent than anyone else of the founding era pantheon. They stood as proud americans, not converts to old world forms, as many wrongly indicated. They believed in expertise and in government that promoted expertise over popularity and yet remarkably it was John Quincy Adams, the second president adams who was the first to pronounce in his 1825 inaugural address that america deserves to be called a functional Representative Democracy and it wasnt jefferson who is typically seen as the first man of the people. It wasnt of the freewheeling Andrew Jackson either, the impulsive, clannish, vindictive jackson. Here he is stringing up his hapless predecessor, John Quincy Adams, jackson had composed as formal speeches and created loyalty and richly rewarded his friends and that was his style. Making the land and safer more upstarts like himself to profit in the southern manner as a slave owner and entrepreneurs. Jackson did not read history, let alone imbibe political thought. Jackson was not predisposed to enact democracy in any real way and it seems an odd thing to say but johns adams lived with the frugal republican than Thomas Jefferson and John Quincy Adams was a better democrat than Andrew Jackson. Wrap your mind around that one. Democracy is proclaimed more than it is practiced. That is all the president s adams were saying on the basis of their company as of studies of history and human psychology. John adams was a disciple of the enlightenment is money as jefferson. At the heart of this revolutionary movement was the impulse to unmask superstition like the divine right of kings and cultivate independence of thought. John adams held that a desire for fame could be found in every heart. Fame needed an audience and the ruling few needed the masses to worship their riches and their might. This is why he identified the danger of the cult of personality heard the cult of personality is when the personality of the leader is equated with the nation. The worship title replaces we, the people as the soul of the body politic. Now, adams watched the cult up close and personal, first when he was in france. There, franklin seduced the educated elite as americas first rock star. Adams understood the desire among human beings to be seen and loved. He zoomed in on the forces of spectator ship and then there was the opposite. The fear of obscurity, of insignificance. Long before andy warhol mused that every american wants 15 minutes of fame, adams placed the danger of appellation at the center of his constitutional theory. What glittered in the eyes of men and women was often the superficial of dazzling distraction. He explained that first riches and beauty shored up power and aristocracy. Societies invariably divided people into classes and that Political Parties used the same method and marketing candidates, and attractive appearance, a prominent name, a glamorous reputation. If that was not enough lies, flattery and quackery, his delightful word, would keep supporters mesmerized. John adams understood that politics was a crooked connate game as far back as 1790. His point was that these impulses emerge in all governments. Republics and democracies alike. A society that rewards ambition cannot avert the mad scramble for public recognition. He went further, Group Psychology which was responsible for the sham worship of the lustrous view and since the majority of people would never have taken to the stage they lived vicariously through their idols. Vicarious was his word but he was saying that the people felt a special kind of sympathy for the powerful and it was not just the corrupt politicians rode into office on inflated reputation but it was that voters lived for the show. We document these things in our book and they are not selectively drawn so as to simply resonate with the current political scene which a lot of people think and forget we started researching this book long before the current political scene. Americans tell themselves they value independent thinking in the enlightenment sense of that phrase. But in fact, citizens still swoon over the rich and famous and join crowds as cheering fans and adams strap equated from this to say that my mentality is a dangerous force contained within democracy and it is inflamed by the partisan press. Party organizers from Alexander Hamilton forward have found a way to exploit the imaginary bond between voters and their heralded leaders. In the first president ial election in 1788, 89 hamilton made sure that southern electors withheld their votes for adams by spreading a rumor that new englanders might steal the election from washington. From hamiltons perspective there could be only one surrogate king, one idolized star. Washingtons presidency borrowed the trappings of royalty, the chief executive was housed in a grand mansion, he rode in a lavishly equipped carriage and he held intimate courtly receptions with a capital elite. He made two grand National Tours like the king of england, his birthday was a holiday and washingtons image was known to all. A visiting russian dignitary remarked that americans kept treasured portraits of washington in their homes much like the russians worshiped icons of the saints. Now, adams cleverly dissected the cult of washington and used his satirical skill to explain the worship of washington. The generals first and most important trait was, as adams emphasized, his handsome face. Next, his tall stature. He was 63 and elite briefing was evident in his elegant form and his graceful movements and his large estate. Washington was a man of few words and adams joked that his fellow virginians adored him because among the plantar elite the geese are all swans. Image matters more than genius. Adams knew this. We know it to be true as well. Voters take manufactured qualities as signs of innate character. Adams, of course, suffered by comparison to washington. He acquired the nasty nickname of his rotunda d, a label started while Vice President and was used in the election of 1800. Political gamesmanship became more circus like by the time the second adams entered the president ial contest. In 1824 when then secretary of state, John Quincy Adams, was seeking the presidency a cartoon captured the foot race socalled. It went into posters and pendants to this day that term president ial horse race. This is relevant because tonight is the kentucky derby. In the cartoon John Quincy Adams is ahead of the george and William Crawford by a nose while Andrew Jackson dressed in his military uniform is on their tail and coming up fast. All john adams stands at the front of the crowd cheering on his son. Spectators place wages on the outcome. This is democracy at its worst. Its a spectacle. The Election Campaign isnt about philosophies or policies but a gavel did the excitement of the race is what matters mo most. In 1828 when the second president adams lost the election to jackson he found himself not only running against a National Hero but against a far better organized projects and party machine. The new yorker martyr Martin Van Buren was jacksons electioneering group. Building on the earlier new yorker, hamiltons playbook. Jacksons admirers tried to read mold him into the air of the noble washington but the effort failed. Jackson was known to be imperialist, impulsive and blustering and too many concerned autocratic. The general was promoted with a lavish campaign biography, the first of its kind, his rash, arbitrary behavior was recast as a cardinal virtue and that is, he exhibited frontier boldness and manly vigor. The incumbent, adams, was overly cerebral. There was something even darker at work here. John quincy adams concluded that jacksons lowers were really, this is his words and very important, obsequious champions of executive power. Jacksonian democracy was, in fact, a warrior cult of conquest. Democracy was a smokescreen. Western expansion drove politics. Slaveholders wanted slavery to expand to the pacific and behind screen was a union of land speculators and southern slaveholders. John quincy adams was elected to congress in 1830 after his one term presidency ended. It was an unusual move never to be repeated. He remained in the house onto the died at his desk in 1848. Parties rule in the art of party drilling as he called it was because i military. Party membership became riotous and that is his word, too. Sanctimonious called to liberty allowing southern democrats to purchase auxiliary support for slavery from freemen of the north. What could be a greater irony . Jackson head of the democratic party, jefferson supposedly Small Government Party was now a party of unchecked executive power. Election rhetoric test John Quincy Adams as a princely air, a man comes about with titles and rich rules of the royal european courts where he had so long served with the diplomat. Somehow, like his father before him, he was a secret promoter of monarchy. The sad truth is this, the cult of personality [inaudible] twist the truth and voters often did not care. For John Quincy Adams what happened was that a slaveholding oligarchy had taken hold of the presidency along with the illusion of what textbooks call jacksonian democracy. It would be helpful at this point to elaborate a bit on the two epigraphs both from 1814 that open our book. The first is from expresident john adams, remember, democracy never lasts long but it is soon wastes, exhausts and murders itself. There would never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide. It is in vain to say democracy is less vain, less broad, less selfish, less ambitious or less avaricious than our aristocracy or monarchy. Those passions are the same in all men under all forms of government and when unchecked produced the same affect of fraud, violence and cruelty. He means there needs to be a healthy democratic element in government, a force that promotes Class Balance and there will always be money to interest but these need to be contested within the institutions of the government by those whose interests are not so confined. Democracy, like governments are too few or by a monarch, is inherently unstable because inequality is impossible because some emerge and become privileged and if democracy does not morph into aristocracy or moneyed oligarchy and implodes on his own accord as [inaudible] evolving into anarchy. This is heady stuff. We say democracy tends to civility but we know it does not exhibit a, social media in 2019. Democracy is anxious and it is anxious because of envy and it needs help and needs a survival plan. That is all that adams inurement in referring to democracy suicidal tendencies. Democracy did not, does not, automatically produce equal Educational Opportunity or equal access to government. Good government therefore requires expertise unbiased and representation that does not have to compete with a thousand good caulk of his voices clamoring for something. Here is jq a also writing in 1814. In his case from stockholm during the time where he was a part of the negotiating team seeking to end the unproductive war of 1812. He writes, in truth, human nature itself is little more than a composition of inconsistency. Throughout his political career at the second president adams regarded capitol hill debate as accrual trauma perpetrated by gaming men. The moral philosophy his father read, the moral philosophy he upheld emphasized the dictates of our moral faculties, the manhood of self command here citing adam smith. It is what led them to be independent and to go against the grain and refuse to adhere to the dictates of a party and it was moral ambiguity that the two atoms most disparaged in Human Affairs and politics was in and is about the nature of authority in the character of those who wielded. Human nature rules. People are ruled by the authority they accept. We understand why the atoms are not perceived as democratic in spirit. For them, leaders ought to be in secular terms among the elect yet being electable should not be the sole qualification for election. Under the twoparty system that is what often determines who gets in, electability. Two and adams the elect are meant to perform a positive Public Service to sacrifice ease and fortune in order to be the eyes and ears of the whole people. Through our historical lens we see the president ial election often contribute little to advancing real democracy. The atoms praised the town meeting because of for them it was the true Training Ground where as the elder adams put it, all the inhabitants acquire from infants accustom of discussing, deliberating and judging Public Affairs so they can speak effectively to their representatives. His assignment took us idea to a deeper level and practicing what he preached and rejoining congress after his four years as president. Just as his father praised the town meeting the son became a champion of the right of petition. A petition was the most inclusive form of expressing the will of the people. John quincy adams made it his job to protect the right of petition for women, free blacks and here is the surprise one, slaves and of course, antislavery activists who had been blasted by president jackson as incendiaries. Through a clever maneuver adams forced the house to debate slavery despite southerners having passed a gag rule which made slavery a taboo topic. He believed nothing should be silenced in the peoples branch. Representatives should be accountable to their constituents. Democracy, there is no term in any history book. Maybe there should be. John quincy adams was known as old man eloquent trade he did win victories in the house with the silver tongue. He was scrappy and provoked his Congressional Colleagues into hysterics as he exposed the unsavory and deeply undemocratic character of their beliefs. One arch enemy, henry wise of virginia, nearly 40 years his junior called him the hissing serpent of braintree. Despite the nastiness did, in fact, capture his cat and mouse approach. More cat and mouse then snake. One of John Quincy Adams greatest performances came when he introduced the petition from a group of slaves which led southern colleagues to explode with calls to expel him. Waiting patiently until their fuming dissipated and they drafted language to officially censure him he revealed that the petition for slaves was not a call to end slavery but to preserve it. It was a hoax and the joke was on his colleagues. But then adams took it further and he made an even angrier when he proceeded to legitimate dissent of the right of slaves to Petition Congress he said offending the feeling of a southern member of the house was no reason to silence the representative or refuse to hear a petition. He reminded his colleagues that the south consisted of more than masters. How could one favored class and that is his word, too, the master class, supersede the rights of everyone else and the gag rule, gagging discussion of american slavery was a glaring departure from american justice. Jacksonian democrat will curtailing democracy instead of promoting it. As i offer some concluding remarks i will be a little contentious. They criticize democracies access and that is their legacy and what would be an understanding of todays political jumble, obviously, they would see money in politics as oppressive because it rejects the prince of all of balance and defeats the interests of the American Population as a whole. They hated nothing so much as the money if you lording their power over the rest of us and that is the wealthy receiving special favors under the law. That highly paid lobbyists write legislation. They would classify this as marks of oligarchy. This is the evidence which our book finds an abundance in the adams writings. That even some professional historians have overlooked or dont want to see. New interpretations always meet resistance and those predisposed to write off the atoms will want to make us defenders of the adams. Making excuses for two loser president s. But we are hardworking historians. We are trying to overcome bad, pathetic histories. What would they say about the internet as democratic space . That it is a place where demonstrably does not allege educated opinion and in the cyberspace the opinion does not quite legal and sensational drowns out Everything Else and people tend to seek out whatever confirms their existing biases and the atoms did not perceive the internet obviously but did proceed democracy run amok. That is irrational behavior spurred on by Bad Information with or without russian interference. Freeforall democracy was, is a mess. You dont jettison it altogether. The fact is through an and adams lends every form of government is inherently will be corrupted only especially overcoming imbalances in wealth to avoid spurring class and other resentments. What commentators typically described as identity politics. And then there is the thorniest of all challenges, the credulous or gullible voter responsive to fear tactics. John adams and John Quincy Adams believed the conduct of politics demanded moral courage and they live their lives by these printables and did not seek popularity in the manner others did. They did not usher in the age of anything and did not go down in history as significant president s get their ideas largely buried until now were profound and remain profoundly meaningful today. The problem of democracy is thin ethic that sounds beautiful to principles near impossible to uphold, to egalitarian social relations nonexistent never intended by the founders of this nation. The combined legacy of the president s adams cannot be summed up easily. It may be useful to think of them as antiheroes and they were vein, too honest to be beloved when they voiced truths most americans did not want to hear and they challenged the myths that we have about my chrissy and distrusted human passions but they also believed in analyzing problems so as to yield constructive change. They were, lets say, obsessed with the desire to unmask deception. I like liken them to sherlock holmes. Because truth for them existed in the subtle details. Okay. Turn off the phone. They wore different intellectual hats. As historians, satirists, psychologists, constitutionalists, cosmopolitan wanderers and also new england provincials, they shared the ingrained skepticism of a trained historian plus a concern with human psychology that led them to conclude that it was the duty of government to check the worst excesses of powerhungry factions. Furthermore, and this is something we bring out in our book, they both loved fiction. Its comic sensibility and its tragic depths. Like the study of history literature brought out the human condition better than abstract ideals. They do not believe the National Greatness was inevitable or irreversible. The line weve all heard before that ours is a government of law, not of men is, in fact, john adams line though derived from the 17th century political theorist james harrington. This phrase perfectly captures the view of the cult personality is a real and present danger. Anyone set up as a celebrity is incompletely drawn or even worse, the mirage. Only institutions can safeguard justice and democracy and only rules, principles and their proceedings can be trusted. It is partisan hype that promotes men of the people as lawless leaders. The two atoms is favorite comic novel was [inaudible] and the plot relies on the power of impersonation, a clever servant borrows his masters clothing to facilitate his sexual intrigue and he mocks and upends social norms and now, satire as we know from watching latenight tv, brilliantly exposes counterfeit democracy. It brings National Figures down a notch. It reminds us that the cult of personality seduces voters as easily as the rogue antihero in the 18th century novel saunters through Polite Society and fools everyone he meets. Lets be more [inaudible] and lets see buying the facade and when necessary unmask hidden motives. Lets be ingenious, not hostile with words resistance is not futile. Criticism within the healthy debate keeps democracy alive. Thank you very much. [applause] we were trying to be provocative. We will find out in the q a if we succeeded. Cspan would like for you to approach the mic in the room nor did it deliver your question. I had the dubious honor to find out that im related to Patrick Henry and [inaudible] when you think of jefferson and what he said and the people that said things that we revere more than the adams were the ones that in their living practices had slaves and no freedom but then the atoms dont come off as well . The first problem with Patrick Henry is that give me liberty or give me death and the one soundbite that he is best known for may never have been delivered or at least his earliest and influential biographer william in the early 19th century admitted that romantic truce were were important to him as a biographer to let him go and so, and corresponding with Thomas Jefferson who knew Patrick Henry and was one of the sources for the biography jefferson came back to the biographer and said you know henry was in fact and i wont go into it since this is about the adams what a long train of abuses to cite the declaration of independence. Why do we romanticize those people and not the adams . I would like to raise the issue about slavery because i also wrote a biography about aaron burr and you may have all seen the musical hamilton and the fact that hamilton was someone who purchased slaves and owned slaves and this is part of the problem and part of the problem is that we do have this founder worship and the founders get recycled in each generation finds the perfect founder and makes them reflect what we are rather than what they are. It is true and this is striking issue for today that john adams and John Quincy Adams are people who are not slaveowners. We no, not only were they not slave owners but john adams did not come from wealthy back ground as compared to the virginia dynasty but this is a part of the legacy that we have is that often what happens in history and this is what happens with john adams is that your enemy gets to define who you are and gets to put the label on you and the fact that john adams was targeted during his vice presidency and attacked for being a defender of monarchy and attacked for his writing in a very superficial fashion this lingered on and unfortunately even good historians like to set up the contrast between an ideal live jeffersonian democracy and a backward looking conservative adams political position. As i said it even becomes tricky because even though adams is elected as a federalist he is vastly different from Alexander Hamilton and theres a break in that party and they are not in agreement across the board. Even party labels are very inaccurate but you are right, we should pay more attention to the fact that the adams need to be revisited for understanding and they had a critique of slavery. Abigail adams was horrified by the fact that, not only meant that slavery existed and she wrote this to john during the American Revolution but understood that slave masters took advantage of slave women and use them sexually. That is something that also she passed on to John Quincy Adams. If the cult personality is as important as you say how were they elected . They only served one term and [inaudible] John Quincy Adams because of the house of representatives becomes president so that things change in the four years he was president and did adams suddenly become Something Different in the minds of the voters and if i agree with you that the personality is so important im having trouble deciding how they became president. The popular vote did not matter, first of all. We cannot make a direct correlation between then and now. John adams lost narrowly to Thomas Jefferson and beat jefferson in 1796 in the first contested election narrowly also. This is largely a factor of the what is later described in the sectional divide and adams was contentious but was not as contentious as Alexander Hamilton. Adams had obtained his reputation through his service in europe as a diplomat for many years and so although as Vice President he may have been looked upon as his rotunda d or mocked by some but he retained a sturdy reputation in the northern states. It was a very close election but largely decided on the basis of geography. The other thing that changes is the increasing role of Party Competition but you have to realize that according to the constitution it does not recognize parties. They should have anticipated parties because this is in Great Britain but they did not. What happens is that during washingtons administration you get the rise of what is known as the anti administration movement and eventually that was up the party of madison and jefferson. What comes with parties is what i refer to as that is highly developed by the time that jackson is running. The art of party drilling and the art of Party Organization or in jacksons time, rewarding people with spoils and offices if they support the party. Even at the time they think about what washington is not being contested you have the emergence of the anti Administration Party and that means things that we now accept as part of cultivating and talking about personalities and using them in campaigns in the major vehicle is the rise of partisan news papers. That is just beginning to take shape and it comes to form in the election of 1800 so that is where you see the average voter is not going to know john adams personally but he will get a portrait of john adams about what is being repeated and what will be found in the very partisan newspapers. That is where personality begins to take a much more Important Role in elections. He wasnt really a politician other than he conducted his politics through letter writing and some of these letters were intentionally, although cast as private letters, or intentionally being directed to someone who was going to publish them in newspapers so in many ways the vocabulary we use does not or cannot directly apply and parties themselves not only did the constitution not reckon with the inevitability of the twoparty system but they referred to the spirit of party and its a negative the spirit of party meant action or factionalism and so no one wanted to be identified with a Political Party and they, at best, would refer to themselves as an federal of interest, democratic interest and the word democracy initially was rejected because it was associated with french revolutionary excess of democracy. It wasnt until the 19th century that even the term democracy or to be identified as a democrat was no longer pejorative but something that we braced as a people and it all happened over time. I would say that jefferson was a better or becoming a head of the party and was better surrounding themselves with their supporters and better at john and John Quincy Adams they were much more negative about taking on that role in the fact that basically john adams that he is president he is fighting against Alexander Hamilton, who is taking on that role of the head of the party. I think there are personal differences in style and the way in which they think of using power and this is something jefferson was more than capable of doing behind the scenes and this is a reason john adams often gets criticized because he doesnt take on that role as being the head of the party but to him this was undermining the government for the executive to take on that kind of party head or Party Leadership role. Also understanding these questions from incontext, historical context, we drew upon extensively the extensive diaries and letters that the Massachusetts Historical Society owned and the adams were beautifully recognized not only did they retain so many books and diaries and letters for posterity but john and john quincy communicated about issues political, partisan in ways that just opened this up to present and future historians. Weve got all of this record to cap in the newspapers that are also available in digital editions online that can be readily searched and so the politics of early america and at the state level and local level and the National Level this is an ongoing enterprise that so much fun for all of us were involved in it in reeducating ourselves and the rising generation so that is a shout out for the profession of history. You talk in your book about how much your understanding of democracy was informed by their study and their analysis of history, philosophy, can you comment on something that has always confounded me . Why did a generation of other men, unfortunately just men, but other men who also analyzed and studied politics and democracy in philosophy so misrepresent or so misunderstand what they were talking about or what they were getting at. In particular, someone i know youve written and studied about, James Madison who throughout his whole life expresses nothing but contempt for john adams and his understanding and intellect could i dont know if you have thoughts about particularly in the generation they lived in are so misunderstood or misrepresented . It goes both ways but madison is interesting because all the way back when john adams is a diplomat the factions begin to form and there is a franklin faction and pro adams action and like Everything Else information circulated so i teach a class called american founding this and i show how these quotes get repeated and go from madison to jefferson and how one ones identity gets morphed. What is interesting that id like to add about that is that by the time hes president he changes his mind but this is one reason i like madison because he changes his mind. He changes his mind about john adams and he writes him a supportive letter when he is having his difficulties, very troubled presidency because of the war of 1812 and on top of that john f. Kennedys profiles of courage features John Quincy Adams because he abandoned the party of his father, as it were, the Federalist Party and joined with jefferson and madison but madison was secretary of state for jefferson. As a nationalist and as a patriot John Quincy Adams was above the party. He felt that he knew that he was going to lose his seat in the u. S. Senate or massachusetts by caucusing and he did so, nonetheless, because of principle. His father was wholeheartedly behind him in making that political shift and john adams forgave Thomas Jefferson and they have a beautiful, more than one decade of post president ial correspondence and madison deeply respected John Quincy Adams. So, there is no simple answer and their ideas and their opinions in the personal hatreds change over time and we see that a lot that i wanted to add one other thing. We want dont want to sugarcoat john adams either. He rubbed people the wrong way at times and we include that in our book. One of the things that is important for understanding the founding generation and the generation of John Quincy Adams is to get the full picture but these are human beings and there are elements to their personality that, you know, we today might have trouble with and they are not always perfect and say the wrong things so i think the key thing is that part of the reason his ideas get distorted is again for party advantages. As you know, this is when you look at Politics Today or think about people who are nominated to the supreme court, unless they have written the more likely they are to get put on the Sabine Corporation because there are tons paper and segmentation that then can be selectively used against them but this is one of the things that happens with john adams. He published a really large book called a defense of the constitutions of the United States and then published a discourse and these mentalities were mined for selected quotes to be used against him. Good evening. Over the last couple of years ive had occasions to reflect on john adams remarks upon taking up residency in the white house, may 9 but wise and honest men rule under this honest roof. Do take up at any point in time as president adams wisdom seems to have failed him when he seems to acquiesce to Party Pressure and signed the alien and sedition acts into law . Thank you. That was a subtle way of giving it to us. [laughter] yeah, we are not sugarcoating the alien and sedition acts. Undermining the first amendment. If one were to rationalize why john adams, he did not initiate it but did embrace it. But to understand it in context, the french revolution had an impact on the American National consciousness somewhat akin to how americans reacted after 911 so, there was a fear among federalists and among moderate federalists as well as [inaudible] federalists that french revolution style terrorism and they used the word terrorism would reach american shores and so it was out of that extreme fear that the aliens were regarded as untrustworthy and a president could remove them from american shores. He could send them home. There were newspaper men who were irish, scottish, by birth who came here and shook things up and prior to that even president George Washington in his less glorious second term went along with Alexander Hamilton idea of crushing and internal rebellion, the socalled whiskey rebellion in western pennsylvania. He was at the head of the army that was as large as, if not larger than what washington commanded during the revolution. Then he found that whatever resistance there was disappeared into the forest and there was no real reason for any of this. That is the context in which we can look at the factious 1790s and what led to adams is embrace of the ill considered alien and sedition acts. There were other things but this is the problem when you look at the presidencies. None of the early president s can be looked at as having perfect presidencies. That is true even for Thomas Jefferson pretty is much better firstterm than second term supports the embargo and this is a bad decision and one supported by madison but madison, as i said, has a similar problem in john adams that adams inherited a cabinet from washington and these were people there were not supportive of him and they were getting their directives from hamilton and surprisingly James Madison, by the time he is president is also putting people in his cabinet that hes constantly having to replace. One was a drunk but essentially who are not a well oiled machine so i think we have to i would add that the john adams other problem in his presidency and it is strange, this is a question i always raise, what he writes about government, one of the things that he fears with the design of the american constitution is the executive will be too weak. To enter the war and john adams is going along with it at the end he pulls back and decides that he gets rid of the members of his cabinet and he takes the action to find a diplomatic solution as opposed to go to w war. Guess who is working against him in the election, Alexander Hamilton. Hes trying to undermine john adams was election. Do you think the voters can be educated and they seem to be at odds with the more realistic psychological insight can be credulous, deceitful personality driven. Do you think that it will ever be an ideal or something closer to what we have today. This is another point id like to make. The draft, what was in that constitution . Public support for Public Education which didnt make it into the virginia constitution. Jefferson tried a plan to get a few and the virginia easley to shot it down so he did care about education and he believed that if you needed public support and public funding for education, but the contradictions are built there because it gets back to what andy was saying about the instability of government you cant just assumed you write the constitution and put the government in place and its going to magically solve these problems. I think thats why they felt in the way they position themselves as politicians to constantly unmask the decisions when someone is saying it is a distraction or hyperbole and they do believe in the importance of constitution and the importance of the rules. They would have gathered all the power to themselves because it is built into human nature. They also believe in the potential education. It had to start like the town meeting you have to start at an early age to learn how to argue in a town meeting. The funding wasnt there from as early as the presidency there was the desire among many for there to be a National University establishment. Even Thomas Jefferson in founding the university of virginia. The wealthy citizens support in the institution of Higher Learning when they come into the presidency they are hellbent on funding Public Education and making a more dynamic government but raising money for Public Education is something that succeeded far earlier in new england than it did in the sou south. When they both conspired to die on the 54th of july [laughter] as George Washington theyd sent on the wings of angels. That kind of religiosity that the company has the idea of the nation and america even before the revolution. A lot was already being passed not being attributed beyond. Comically engaging to answer some of his questions. So it was part of their communion, part of their uncensored correspondence of the years there is a current argument. They are very careful of them not putting religion in the constitution anand theconstituty careful about not endorsing that idea. Its something thats become popular recently for a certain fracture of religion that want to reclaim their own. And in fact, as we all know, Thomas Jefferson was very much in support of the church and state. We also know that john adams was open to religion and he went around and attended different congregations to see what was going on because he saw religion as another part of trying to understand human psychology because he is deeply concerned about how people can be manipulated and when he critiques and he is responde had to this dangerous tendency to make washington and to something bigger than a human being and like any other founder. If you are interested in pursuing John Quincy Adams religious life, there is a new book by sarah i would recommend to you. [applause] stop and think ive got just for a minute. They have elected him against all odds to be president of the United States. Think about that for a minute. Thats like the assassination of julius caesar, christopher columbus, one of the greatest events in World History that we were able to achieve that. That. Iand elitist about the ethicl algorithm computer Information Science professors discuss algorithmic design. A lot of people thought about things like privacy and the like. Theyve never had to think about these things in a way that you could absolutely right that into a Computer Program algorithm. Socially and economically more than id ever known and weve interviewed over these others and i want to know why my friends and i had such a narrow perception of this rich cultural position and why my father was somehow outside of this when in many ways he was exemplifying its. My name is adam cook and im a 2018 students can winner. Im here to encourage you to continue to wrap up the conversation as the deadline is getting close but youll still have time. This is about dust high i started my documentary the first year i entered. Entered. Im in the dc office right now and im going to tell you cspan2 student cam is in a Incredible Opportunity to express my views and thoughts about the Political Climate while connecting with some local and state leaders. Im excited that you all are interested in the same pursuingg this because the onceinalifetime opportunity im so excited you all are takintaking its. Theres still time to enter the video competition. You have until january 20 to create a five to six minute video documentary that explores the issues you want the candidates to address during campaign 2020. We are giving away a total of 100,000 in cash prizes for the grand prize of 5,000. For more information go to the website, student cam. Org
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