HIS LEADERSHIP WAS HOPELESSLY WEAKENED

JFK+50:  Volume 7, No. 2215

HOUSE PUTS JOHN QUINCY ADAMS IN THE WHITE HOUSE

Washington, D.C. (JFK+50) 192 years ago today, February 9, 1825, the presidential election of 1824 was decided in the United States House of Representatives.  A majority of the votes went to John Quincy Adams* of Massachusetts who would be sworn in as the 6th President of the United States on March 4, 1825.

Mr. Adams, former Secretary of State under James Monroe, had received the second highest number of electoral votes in the fall election with Andrew Jackson receiving the highest but  because no candidate received a majority of the votes,  the 12th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution gives the responsibility to select the winner to the House of Representatives.**

Senator Henry Clay*** of Kentucky, who personally detested Jackson,  gave his support to Adams and would become Secretary of State in the Adams administration.  Jackson's supporters called that a "corrupt bargain"  which they claimed had cheated their candidate out of his deserved victory. 

The Election of 1824 was historic for another reason.  It was the first presidential election in which no candidate represented the Federalists.  All five of the original candidates were Democratic-Republicans.  In addition to Adams, Clay and Jackson, other candidates were John C. Calhoun and William H. Crawford.


According to the Miller Center, as President of the United States, "John Quincy Adams was hopelessly weakened in his leadership potential as a result of the Election of 1824."

*John Quincy Adams (1767-1848) was born in Braintree (Quincy) Massachusetts & graduated from Harvard in 1787.  He then studied law, earned a MA in 1790 & was admitted to the bar in 1791.

Before becoming POTUS, JQA served as Minister to the Netherlands, Minister to Prussia, US Senator, Minister to Russia, Envoy to UK,  & Secretary of State.
After leaving the presidency, JQA served in the US House of Representatives from 1831 until his death.

**Andrew Jackson won 43% of the popular vote in the Election of 1824 with John Quincy Adams winning 30%.  Of course, our presidents are not elected by popular vote but by majority vote in the Electoral College.

***Henry Clay, Sr. (1777-1852) was born in Hanover County, VA & graduated from the College of William & Mary.  He was admitted to the bar in 1797.  HC served in the US House of Representatives where he was elected Speaker, was Secretary of State and represented the state of Kentucky in the US Senate.


SOURCES

"John Quincy Adams:  Impact and Legacy," The American President, Miller Center, www.millercenter.org/

"The 1924 Election and the 'Corrupt Bargain'," Politics and the New Nation, U.S. History, www.ushistory.org/

John Quincy Adams

6th United States President

by George Peter Alexander Healy
White House Historical Association 

JOHN QUINCY ADAMS I

August 8, 2012

JOHN QUINCY ADAMS I

Knoxville, Tennessee (JFK+50) Today we continue our report on Senator John F. Kennedy's Pulitzer Prize winning book, "Profiles In Courage."  

JFK's book highlights the stories of eight United States Senators who risked their political careers to pursue justice.

In the introduction to the Memorial Edition, Robert Kennedy writes:

"Courage is the virtue that President Kennedy most admired.  That is why this book so fitted his personality, his beliefs."

                     JFK Library Image

The title of Chapter II is John Quincy Adams.*

*John Quincy Adams (1767-1848), the son of John Adams, 2nd President of the United States, was born in Braintree, Massachusetts, graduated from Harvard, & served in the U.S. Senate as a Federalist from 1803-1808.  While in the Senate, Adams also taught Rhetoric  at Harvard.  He was elected 6th U.S. President in 1824 & served a single term 1825-1829.

Senator Kennedy describes John Quincy Adams as "one of the great representatives of that extraordinary breed who have left a memorable imprint upon our Government & our way of life."

And yet, when the former Secretary of State & 6th President of the United States reached the age of 70, he wrote that his

"whole life has been a succession of disappointments."

And while JFK tells us that Adams "held more important offices & participated in more important events than anyone...," it is his single term in the Senate that gives "clear insight" into  his failures.

After his arrival in the Nation's Capital, Adams "promptly" disregarded loyalty to his party but also "customary freshman reticence."

Adams was the only Federalist senator to vote in favor of the funding of Jefferson's Louisiana Purchase & even attended a banquet given in celebration of the purchase.**

**Federalists opposed the Louisiana Purchase for these reasons:  

They believed it was unconstitutional, favored closer ties to Britain rather than France, and were concerned about losing political power in the East to the new settlers of the West.

JFK tells us that Adams had a vision, like Jefferson, "of an America stretched to its continental limits," & that he believed the exclusion of Napoleon from our boundaries was "far more important than the outraged astonishment of his Federalist colleagues."

John Quincy Adams wrote in his diary the following passage which not only "summed up his 1st months in the Senate," but also is applicable to the theme of JFK's book:

"I have already....experience(d) the danger of adhering to my own principles. The country is so totally given up to the spirit of party that not to follow blindfolded.....is an expiable offence.....I see the impossibility of pursuing the dictates of my own conscience without sacrificing every prospect....of advancement."

               John Quincy Adams

Daguerreotype by Philip Haas (1843)

Copy by Southworth & Hawes (1850)

    The Metropolitan Museum of Art