951To John Adams from William Tudor, 9 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
However you & I may have been taught by Civilians, & however History confirms the Maxim, that an Imperium in Imperio is a Solecism, this Country will continue to learn from its own limited School, & by the most expensive Experiments, those Truths which Statesmen, Legislators & enlightened Politicians have in vain pointed out to them.— Our present Confederacy is not very unlike the Monster of...
952To John Adams from Theophilus Parsons, 8 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
Conscious of the persecutions you would meet with, by applications for your influence in the appointment to offices, I had determined not to increase the number of them; but being just informed, that the President proposes to nominate as officers, for the collection of the national revenue, those persons who hold the like offices in the collection of the state revenues, unless complaint was...
953To John Adams from Stephen Higginson, 4 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
Since I had the honour of seeing you at your own house, I have been so unwell, & so much occupied with my private Business, when able to attend to it, that I have not had an opp y of writing to you, as you requested & I engaged to do. Nor can I now do more than just to inform you, that, as the British are coming fast into their old practice, of taking from hence the Rum necessary for their...
954To John Adams from James Sullivan, 2 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
When I had the honor of addressing a Letter to your Excellency, upon a subject of allowed importance to the united States, I did not indulge a hope, that you would step aside from the important concerns in which you are engaged, to acknowledge the receipt of it. nor was I vain enough to imagine, that I was able to Suggest one thought, which was not fully possessed by the Learned body of...
955To John Adams from James Boyd, 30 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
Your Excellency will pardon the freedom of my addressing you, when you are acquainted with my sufferings & my present Indigence. which is such as urges me to request your Influence with Congress respecting the resolv’s of this Court (relative to my sufferings) which was sent on to Congress, by Order of Government. bearing date Nov r. 10 th: 1786, Copy of which by the desire of the Hon be. M r....
956John Quincy Adams to John Adams, 28 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
It has not been altogether from a neglect of my duties that I have hitherto omitted writing you; from situation as well as from inclination, I have been in a great measure secluded from such political information, as might afford you any entertainment, and from a proper modesty, I thought it best to forbear transmitting, any insignificant details concerning my own person.— Even now the same...
957To John Adams from Francis Dana, 26 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
When you was last at Cambridge at my house, in consideration of the weight of the business of my present office, and of the feeble state of my health, I was induced to suggest to you, that if any office under the United States, which your partiality for me might lead you to think me capable of filling, and the duties of which wou’d be less burthensome than those of my present one, shou’d be...
958To John Adams from William Tudor, 21 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
I thank you for correcting my careless Appellation of federal Republic as applied to the National Government. We are so used to Absurdities & indefinite Terms when speaking of the great Constitution, that I am now to ask your Indulgence in future for sometimes hastily adopting Expressions which are so often improperly used by our Massachusetts Politicians. And yet notwithstanding your just...
959To John Adams from Jabez Bowen, 16 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
I Returned yesterday from attending the Gen l Assembly, the great matters on which the in s. & outs differ were bro’t on. we lost the Convention by 11 Votes. The Repeal of the Tender by 9. on the whole we gain a little. but our progress is so slow that we shall never arive at our wish’d for point except something like M r Bensons motion in Congress, could be obtained. it was usual for us to...
960To John Adams from Joseph Mandrillon, 15 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
Le tems peut sans doute avoir detruit le souvenir dont vous m’honoriez, lorsque les interêts del’Amérique vous appellerent dans differentes cours del’Europe, en quittant ces Provinces: mais quand la renomée ne m’auroit pas Sans cessé rappellé votre merite, et votre personne, il m’auroit suffit de penser à l’acceuil flateur dont vous m’avez honoré ici, et aux conversations intéressantes dont...
961To John Adams from Eliphalet Pearson, 15 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
President Willard having resigned the office of corresponding secretary to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, your goodness will pardon his successor, in diverting your attention, for a moment, from more important objects, while I request a favor, with which the honor of the society may be connected. At our last meeting, & upon the recommendation of M r. Gardoqui, through General Knox,...
962To John Adams from Richard Peters, 15 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
I am honoured with yours of the 5 th. instant I thank you for your kind & polite Offers of Hospitality. Experience has convinced me of your Friendship on this Head— I find from the Reflexions occasioned by the just Observations in your Letter that I have expected too much & am therefore not entitled to the Right of complaining under Dissappointment. Tho’ placed in a new Situation, we are the...
963To John Adams from Benjamin Rush, 15 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
I have been so long accustomed to regard all your opinions upon goverment with reverence, that I was disposed upon reading your last letter, to suspend my belief in republican Systems of political happiness; but a little reflection led me again to adopt them, and upon this single principle, that they have Never had a fair tryal. Let us try what the influence of general science & religion...
964Abigail Adams to John Adams, 14 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
I last Evening received your Letter of june 7th I will set of on Wednesday for Providence and embark in the first packet for New-york. pray get an oz of glober salts and half oz manna & take immediately, an oz of antimonial wine & take 30 drops three time a day. I will be with you however as soon as possible. Barnard got in on fryday. we had two days of voilent and incessant Rain, which tho...
965To John Adams from C.W.F. Dumas, 13 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
L’affection dont vous m’avez honoré pendant votre séjour en Europe, & les sentimens inaltérables de mon attachement pour Votre Excellence, m’engagent à vous présenter l’expression de ma joie, à l’agréable nouvelle de l’important Poste auquel le Peuple le plus libre du monde vient de vous élire, & que votre zele pour la patrie vous a fait accepter. Puisse ce zele trouver sa récompense dans le...
966To John Adams from James Searle, 10 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
I was duely favoured with your obliging letter of the 15 th. of last Month and feel myself not a little gratified with the renewal of a correspondence with M r. Adams, a friend for whom I feel a most exalted respect and affection.— When I took the liberty to write to you last I mentioned my happy situation in business, and my independent feelings, but I hope I have not been misunderstood by M...
967To John Adams from James Sullivan, 10 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
The Communicating our Sentiments to men in power, when done with the respect due to their characters, and without a troublesome intrusion, is at all times a mark of Veneration and esteem. upon these ideas I Venture to address a letter to the Vice President of the United states, and which he will read, when his leisure will admit a moment of heedless employment. I am very deeply impressed with...
968Abigail Adams to John Adams, 7 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
I this day received the Federal Gazzet, tho I got no Letter from you, I was in hopes to have heard this week in replie to what I wrote on Sunday last. Since that time mr Smith has been in Treaty for me, with two conneticut sloops one of which demanded 50 pounds freight for 2 thirds of his vessel. the other 40, each of them were about 70 Tuns he then applied to Blagett, Barnards owner & has...
969To John Adams from Thomas Brand Hollis, 6 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
your long silence gave me much uneasiness but I endeavour’d, to assign a thousand reasons which must have prevented you & some of them most natural at last however your favor restored my calm. I should have been surprised indeed, had Cato’s house stood uninjured in the general conflict for Existence life & liberty. remember the glorious contest the Anxious fears the painful doubts the dreadful...
970To John Adams from William Tudor, 6 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
That I was right in my Position “that a considerable Time must elapse before the united States can arise to Greatness” I find confirmed by your last Letter. That our Situation, Resources and Population may & ought to rank Us high on the Scale of Nations is indisputably true. But the heterogeneous Materials which compose our extensive federal Republic; the Jealousies, the Ignorances, & the...
971To John Adams from Benjamin Rush, 4 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
I find you, & I must agree , NOT to disagree , or we must cease to discuss political questions. I could as soon believe that the British parliament, never had once a right to tax America, as believe that a fourth major part of the citizens of New york were federal , or that many of the federal minority were so, from proper motives.— I know from good authority that some of the leading...
972To John Adams from Samuel Barrett, 1 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
On Advice of my very excellent Friend the hon be Mr Bowdoin I inclose you Copies of my Letter to Major General Knox & his Answer, with a rough Draught of a Letter to his Excellency the President of the United States; requesting you to peruse them & to give me your opinion as to the best Mode of Conducting my intended Application, & if you approve of this mode & see any Prospect of Success to...
973Abigail Adams to John Adams, 31 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
I received yesterday your Letter of May the 24 th and shall begin tomorrow to get such things in readiness as will enable us to keep House. I feel a reluctance at striping this wholy at present, because I am well persuaded that we shall in some future period if our lives are prolonged return to it, and even supposing a summer recess, we might wish to come & spend a few months here. an other...
974To John Adams from Jeremy Belknap, 30 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
I should not have thought of troubling you with the inclosed sermon, if it had not been suggested to me by a friend who heard it that it seemed to be formed on the principles which were advanced in your defence of the American Constitutions & to recommend such Checks and Balances in Ecclesiastical as you had thought necessary in civil Government. If in this view of it, or any other it may be...
975To John Adams from James Bowdoin, 30 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
The attachment of M r. Boid to the American Cause has, as you are Sensible, occasioned the forfeiture to the British Government of all his Lands upon the Schoodac: to which river they have extended their Province of New Brunswick.— The Papers that relate to his Case, as well as to that encroachment, were by order of Congress, as I have understood, transmitted to you, during your residence in...
976To John Adams from Richard Peters, 28 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
Until I met with your Letter to Day I could not conceive I had been so remiss as not before this Time to have acknowledged the Favour of it. It lay in Town for some Days & I was mortified at not receiving it soon enough to pay the wished for Attention to M r Beal who left the Letter at a Friend’s House in the City & tho’ I made every Enquiry after that Gentleman I had not the Pleasure of...
977To John Adams from Paul R. Randall, 27 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
I take the liberty of laying before you a memorial epistle, I have presented to the President stating my right to presume upon the publick attention— As I have availed myself of an opportunity of mentioning your name, I think it my duty in apprising you of it, to solicit your patronage in support of those pretensions which you sir in a great measure have put it in my power to claim. My long...
978Abigail Adams to John Adams, 26 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
I hope Barnard has arrived with the things which I sent by him. if there is any person in the House they had better be sent immediatly to it there to lie untill I arrive on the Recept of your Letter May 3’d I sent directly to Town and finding Barnard almost ready to sail I got him to take as many things as I could get ready, they are carpets linnen &c. after I had done this I sat out to visit...
979To John Adams from Jabez Bowen, 19 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
On the 6 th. of this Month was held our General Election for Officers for the Ensuing Year; they are nearly the same as the last, saving a few more Federal Charecters in the Lower-house. Their was Instructions from the Towns of Newport & Providence to their Deputies to use their Influence for a State Convention the Business was taken up, but we soon found Their was no probability of succeding,...
980To John Adams from William Smith, 19 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
As the Revenue Act has past the House & it is probable may now be before the Senate, I will take the freedom to hint to you the uneasiness that prevails here respecting the duty of 5 Cents fixed on Molasses, without permitting a drawback on the Rum exported to foreign Markets. 6 to 7000 Hh ds of Rum are exported from this State annually to foreign ports, & the quantity is encreasing, as New...
981To John Adams from Benjamin Lincoln, 18 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
I have just been honoured by the receipt of your favor of the 8 th. instant— I have not time, as I must soon leave town, to observe now on that part of it which is in answer to a sentiment of mine on which we seem to differ— There is no proposition, to which I can more fully accede than to the one which affirms how important it is to People that the President, the vice President, the Senate...
982To John Adams from William Tudor, 18 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
Your very obliging & confidential Letters of the 3 d. and 9 th. of May I received on the 15. I mention their coming to my Hands together only to mark the Difference between the Dispatch of the Post & the Punctuality of Individuals. I am rejoiced to find You, Sir, pronouncing the upper House of Congress a wise, mild and noble Body of Men. From such a Body we must find dignified, firm & national...
The President of the United States wishes to avail himself of your sentiments on the following points— 1 st Whether a line of Conduct, equally distant from an association with all kinds of Company on the one hand, and from a total seclusion from Society on the other ought to be adopted by him?— and in that case how it is to be done? 2 d: What will be the least exceptionable Method of bringing...
984Abigail Adams to John Adams, 16 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
I yesterday received yours of May the 3 d by Captain Beal’s in which you request that I would come on imediatly Yours of May the first mentions several articles which you suppose it will be necessary for me to send forward, but add all is as yet uncertain, so that I am in doubt what to do, particularly as I have laid before you Since, a state of my difficulties to which I could have wish’t...
985To John Adams from John Bondfield, 15 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
Permit me join in the United Voice of America. Accept my sincere Congratulation on the Nomination to the High Office Confer’d on you by the Choice of a free People An Honor superior to any in the Gift of Europe I hope in a few days to receive the Journals of the Opening and proceedings of Congress much more interesting than the Mock scheens of present Assembled States General of many of the...
986To John Adams from Joseph Willard, 13 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
I have just received a letter from D r Price, enclosing one to your Excellency, which he desires me to convey to you, and I now transmit it. Your Excellency may remember the application to you, respecting D r Minto.— So many and weighty are the national affairs, in which you are engaged, that the Corporation can hardly expect that you should have opportunity to attend to the matter yourself;...
987To John Adams from Samuel Allyne Otis, 11 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
You will pardon me a few observations upon some apprehended arrangements, by a Committee of conference now in being— When M r Thomson was my competitor, it was a doctrine, that the Secretary of the Senate and the Secretary of State were inseparably blended by the Constitution, and to elect other than M r Thomson Secretary of the Senate, would be an exclusion of him— The doctrine was admitted,...
988To John Adams from James Searle, 11 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
I persuade myself that even surrounded as you are with the Plaudits of a gratefull & Sensible Country, you will not be displeased to receive the heartfelt expressions of respect and esteem of an old friend, of one who has never ceased to love and admire you from the time he first saw you in Europe in the Service of his Country. I am my dear Sir now happily settled in business in this City in...
989To John Adams from Thomas Jefferson, 10 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
Since mine of Jan. 14. yours of Jan. 2. & Mar. 1. have been handed to me; the former by mr̃ Jones, whom I am glad to know on your recommendation and to make him the channel of evidencing to you how much I esteem whatever comes from you. the internal agitations of this country & the inactivity to which England is reduced by the State of imbecillity in which the madness of the king has...
990From George Washington to John Adams, 10 May 1789 (Washington Papers)
The President of the United States wishes to avail himself of your sentiments on the following points. 1st Whether a line of conduct, equally distant from an association with all kinds of company on the one hand and from a total seclusion from Society on the other, ought to be adopted by him? and, in that case, how is it to be done? 2d What will be the least exceptionable method of bringing...
991From Thomas Jefferson to John Adams, 10 May 1789 (Jefferson Papers)
Since mine of Jan. 14. yours of Jan. 2. and Mar. 1. have been handed to me; the former by Mr. Jones, whom I am glad to know on your recommendation and to make him the channel of evidencing to you how much I esteem whatever comes from you.—The internal agitations of this country and the inactivity to which England is reduced by the state of imbecillity in which the madness of the king has...
992Abigail Adams to John Adams, 7 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
our parson has been praying for you to day that you may be enabled to discharge the high and important Trust committed to you with equal integrity and abilitis as you have heretofore excercised in Negotiations at Foreign courts & embassies abroad, and with equal Benifit & satisfaction to your Country. I have been reading with attention the various addresses to the Pressident & his replies....
993To John Adams from Mercy Otis Warren, 7 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
Presuming on the Confidential & unremiting Friendship that has long subsisted between us; Grounded on the close connextion commenced with mr Warren in the early part of your life; I again address you without waiting an answer to my last, which according to your usual politeness & punctuallity I doubt not will be noticed as soon as the particular engagments that have lately occupied your...
994Abigail Adams to John Adams, 6 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
Brisler arrived last Evening and brought yours of May the 1 st I have not time to notice all I want to in it, I wish to know whether you would like that I should engage Daniel as coachman who drove you to Newyork when you get to House keeping, and what are the wages given. Tom we can never keep if we wish fer peace— would not the House out of Town be most agreeable to you and most for your...
995Abigail Adams to John Adams, 5 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
Mr Dawes sent me word that he was going to Newyork this week. I would not omit any opportunity of writing to you, tho I know I must sometimes perplex you with domestick matters I would not do it, but that I wish your advise and direction. I wrote you in my last that the wall was compleated between mr Bass & you, and Barley has been sown. the Hill before the window, your Brother has had cleard...
996Abigail Adams to John Adams, 1 May 1789 (Adams Papers)
I received your kind favours of the 19 & 22 of April. the printers were very obliging in taking particular care to supply me daily with the paper’s by which I learnt the arrival and Reception of the Pressident, & vice Pressident. if I thought I could compliment in so courtly and masterly a stile, I would say that the address to the Senate was exactly what it ought to be, neither giving too...
997To John Adams from Wilhem & Jan Willink, 30 April 1789 (Adams Papers)
We had the pleasure of waiting on you in may & in Oct r. A o . D o: in forming you by the latter of your good luck of your number 995. of the Obligat s. of 4 per C t. wh ch. had a price drawn of f 1000:— one thousand Guild s. among those drawn Last Year conform the agreem t. wh