The Adamses Declare Independence (episode 278)

Transcript

Music

Jake:
[0:04] Welcome to Hub History where we go far beyond the Freedom Trail to share our favorite stories from the history of Boston, the hub of the universe.
This is episode 2 78 the Adamses declare independence.
Hi, I’m Jake.
This week, I’m talking about the Adams family and the declaration of Independence, between the John Adams miniseries on HBO and the musical 17 76.
Everybody knows that John Adams was one of the leading voices calling for independence in the Continental Congress.
I mean, you might as well call it the declaration of Indep-Adams, am I right?

[0:42] And along with negotiating the Treaty of Paris and keeping the US out of the quasi war.
Adams always considered the declaration, one of his chief political accomplishments.
50 years after Congress adopted it, John Adams remembered that declaration on the morning of July 4th 18 26.
Remarking it is a great day.
It’s a good day that evening.
He died with many sources reporting that his last words were Jefferson still lives.
He was wrong though earlier that day, Jefferson had woken briefly asked, is it the fourth and then declined further medical treatment before slipping into a coma and himself dying, for someone who is so closely associated with America’s founding document.
Why did John Adams believe we should celebrate independence on July 2nd?
And how did his closest and most trusted advisor, his wife abigail urge him on toward independence in a letter that history remembers for other reasons.
We’ll find out in just a moment. But first, I just want to pause and say thank you to carry w our latest sponsor on Patreon.

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Just go to patreon dot com slash hub history or visit hub history dot com and click on the support us link and thanks again to all our new and returning sponsors, and now it’s time for this week’s main topic.
This week’s episode is gonna run a little bit shorter than usual because of work.
But I wanted to be sure that something went out in the feed in time for the fourth of July holiday.
Honestly get used to it because my calendar is jam packed this summer, especially in August.
So you may see some shorter episodes and probably some reruns.

[3:18] Anyway, this week America celebrates its birthday, the anniversary of our Declaration of Independence.
But we came awfully close to watching parades and fireworks on a different day.
None other than founding father John Adams himself believed that we’d be celebrating Independence Day just a couple of days sooner.
Writing the second day of July 17 76 will be the most memorable epic in the history of America.
I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival.
It ought to be commemorated as the day of Deliverance by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty.
It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires and illuminations from one end of this continent to the other.
From this time forward forever more.
You will think me transported with enthusiasm, but I’m not, I am well aware of the toil and blood and treasure that it will cost us to maintain this declaration and support and defend these states.
Yet through all the gloom, I can see the rays of ravishing light and glory.
I can see that the end is more than worth all the means and that posterity will triumph in that day’s transaction.
Even although we should rue it, which I trust in God, we shall not.

[4:44] So wait just a minute. Did John say the second day of July?
But he’s talking about a day of Deliverance and fighting to maintain a declaration and he’s not talking about the fourth of July.
Nope, the fourth hadn’t even happened yet when he wrote that letter on July 3rd 17 76.
In another letter to Abigail on that same day, he doubled down on those sentiments even using some of the familiar language of our declaration.
But making it clear that any such declaration was still to come yesterday, the greatest question was decided which ever was debated in America and a greater perhaps never was or will be decided among men.
A resolution was passed without one dissenting colony that these united colonies are and of right ought to be free and independent states, and as such, they have and of right ought to have full power to make war conclude, peace, establish commerce and to do all the other acts and things which other states may rightfully do.
You will see in a few days a declaration setting forth the causes which have impelled us to this mighty revolution and the reasons which will justify it in the sight of God and man, a plan of confederation will be taken up in a few days.

[6:08] Now, that language about colonies that of right ought to be free in independent states did appear in our declaration of independence.
But that’s not the first place that John encountered it.

[6:20] After months of wrangling, John Adams and the New England delegations believed that they finally had enough votes on their side to pass a resolution declaring the 13 rebellious colonies free of the parent country.
Britain knowing that the New Englanders were considered radicals by the Southern colonies.
It was important that John Adams not be the public voice of independence.
Luckily, the Virginians were finally on board.
On May 15th, the legislature in Williamsburg took a vote and that’s the real Williamsburg, not the Phony baloney reconstruction that I visited last spring.

[6:56] The vote authorized their delegation to the Continental Congress to introduce a measure calling for independence.
And on June 7th, that’s exactly what happened.
Delegate Richard Henry Lee introduced the bill and in a show of unity between divided regions, John Adams immediately seconded it.
The text of the bill said resolved that these United Colonies are and of right, ought to be free and independent states, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain is and ought to be totally dissolved, that its expedient forthwith to take the most effectual measures for forming foreign alliances.
That a plan of confederation be prepared and transmitted to the respective colonies for their consideration and approbation.

[7:53] It took a year to put together a plan of confederation or a national government that all the new states could live with.
But the vote on independence went somewhat quicker in a process that’s dramatized equally well but varied differently.
In the 17 76 musical and the John Adams Miniseries.
The delegates debated independence for almost a month.
Virginia was on board because after all, it was their proposal in the first place, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut and New Hampshire had been at war for over a year.
So they had been early and enthusiastic supporters of independence, Georgia and the Carolinas seem prepared to vote against the measure in order to protect their local economies for commentary on their hesitance.
Check out the number molasses to Rum from 17 76.
If you can, the middle colonies were stuck somewhere in between New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland.
And the Jerseys had many delegates who supported independence, but a few staunch opponents as well.

[8:57] More importantly, they didn’t all have the same authorization from their home legislatures to vote for independence that Virginia had, one by one over the course of a hot Philadelphia summer minds were changed the committee of the whole called for a vote on July 1st but a straw poll that day showed that South Carolina and Pennsylvania would have voted no.
And of course North Carolina would have followed South Carolina’s lead while the delegation from Delaware would have split its votes.

[9:27] South Carolina asked for a day’s delay in hopes of coming to a unanimous vote.
And the next day, things had changed.
Edward Rutledge had convinced the rest of the South Carolina delegation to vote.
Yes, bringing North Carolina along with them, some of the dissenting Pennsylvania delegates called out sick and New York still without instructions from Albany abstained from the vote.
Finally, the Lee resolution passed and without a single dissenting vote, allowing the declaration that we all know to be titled the Unanimous Declaration of the 13 United States of America.
John Adams could hardly contain his astonished joy writing to Abigail, when I look back to the year 17 61 and recollect the argument concerning writs of assistance in the Superior court, which I have hitherto considered as the commencement of the controversy between Great Britain and America and run through the whole period from that time to this and recollect the series of political events, the chain of causes and effects.
I am surprised at the suddenness as well as the greatness of this revolution.

[10:39] Though she didn’t know it yet.
And although John was shocked by the suddenness of the revolution, the Lee resolution in the declaration that followed was the answer to one of abigail Adams long and fervently held desires.
She had written her most famous letter on March 31st 17 76.
Just two weeks after the Red Coats evacuated the town of Boston on Saint Patrick’s Day after a nearly year long siege, some of the troop transports and nearly all of the warships were still lingering in the outer harbor waiting for a favorable wind to take them to Halifax.
She opens the letter with a description of the latest smallpox outbreak in Boston then gives a brief update on the improving security of the harbor and finally updates John on the state of their Boston house which she had finally seen for the first time after the red coats took it over for a few months.
That’s not what makes the letter so famous though. This is her, remember the lady’s letter.
But that passage starts with another sentiment.
She says, I long to hear that you’ve declared an independency.

[11:52] The new England colonies were ahead of their Southern neighbors in calling for independence. And Abigail Adams was a New Englander.
By the time the second Continental Congress adopted the Lee resolution on July 2nd, she had been imagining an independent nation for months or maybe even longer.
And she’d been urging her husband in that direction.

[12:13] The rest of that famous letter was dedicated to the new and more just government that she envisioned the new nation adopting.
After of course, they declared an independency by the way, in the new code of laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make.
I desire you would remember the ladies and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the husbands.
Remember that all men would be tyrants if they could, if particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies.
We are determined to foment a rebellion and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or representation, that your sex are naturally tyrannical is a truth so thoroughly established as to admit of no dispute, but such of you as wish to be happy, willingly give up the harsh title of master for the more tender and endearing one of friend.
Why then not put it out of the power of the vicious, lawless to use us with cruelty and indignity with impunity.
Men of since in all ages abhor these customs which treat us only as the vassals of your sex regard us.
Then as beings placed by providence under your protection and an imitation of the supreme being, make use of that power only for our happiness.

[13:36] John responded to this letter on April 14th first urging his closest advisor to be patient on the issue of independence, saying, as to declarations of independency, be patient, read our privateer laws and our commercial laws.
What signifies a word?
He was trying his best to follow his own advice, whining and dining his fellow delegates and whipping votes for independence behind the scenes to abigail.
He continued his response playfully with an example of the word play in verbal sparring that dots their decades of letters as to your extraordinary code of laws.
I cannot but laugh, we have been told that our struggle has loosened the bands of government everywhere that Children and apprentices were disobedient.
That schools and colleges were grown turbulent that Indians slighted their guardians and Negroes grew insolent to their masters.
But your letter was the first animation that another tribe more numerous and powerful than all the rest were grown discontented.
This is rather too course a compliment, but you’re so saucy that I won’t blot it out.

[14:47] Depend upon it. We know better than to repeal our masculine systems.
Although they are in full force, you know that they’re a little more than theory.
We dare not exert our power in its full latitude. We are obliged to go fair and softly and in practice, you know, we are the subjects we have only the name of masters and rather than give this up, which would completely subject us to the despotism of the Petty Coat.
I hoped General Washington and all our brave heroes would fight.

[15:21] John may have been inspired to laugh at Abigail’s saucy letter.
But I think she was serious to her friend and fellow patriot mercy otis Warren.
She noted her disappointment at her husband’s dismissive response.
On April 27th. She wrote he is very saucy to me in return for a list of female grievances which I transmitted to him.
I think I will get you to join me in a petition to the Congress.
I thought it was very probable that our wise statesmen would erect a new government and form a new code of laws.
I ventured to speak a word on behalf of our sex who are rather hardly dealt with by the laws of England which gives such unlimited power to the husband to use his wife. Ill.

[16:08] She goes on to summarize John’s response and her disappointment with it concluding.
So I have helped the sex abundantly. But I will tell him that I’ve only been making trial of the disinterestedness of his virtue.
And when weigh in the balance have found it wanting, abigail must have given a response to John Moore thought because she waited about 10 days to write back to him in her letter dated May 7th, she starts out with further encouragement to dissolve the political bands that have bound our nation to Britain.

[16:42] A government of more stability is much wanted in this colony and they are ready to receive it from the hands of Congress.
And since I have begun with maxims of state, I will add on other that a people may let a king fall yet still remain a people.
But if a king let his people slip from him, he is no longer a king.
And as this is most certainly our case, why not proclaim to the world in decisive terms? Your own importance?
Shall we not be despised by foreign powers for hesitating so long at a mere word, it’s been a long time since my freshman political philosophy classes.
But that’s some pretty heady social contract theory.
She’s essentially saying that political responsibility flows both ways and that a sovereign who doesn’t protect his subjects will lose the consent of the governed.

[17:35] In a more playful tone than she adopted with mercy otis Warren.
And Abigail continues with a warning to John that the women of America might withhold their consent to be governed by men.
I cannot say that I think you’re very generous to the ladies for whilst you are proclaiming peace and goodwill to men, emancipating all nations.
You insist upon retaining an absolute power over wives, but you must remember that arbitrary power is like most other things which are very hard, very liable to be broken, and notwithstanding all your wise laws and maxims, we have it in our power to not only free ourselves but to subdue our masters and without violence, throw both your natural and legal authority at our feet.

[18:22] Abigail and John then let the topic drop which anyone who’s been married can tell you was probably a good idea for their remaining decades of wedded bliss, unbeknownst to her, John actually took up abigail’s arguments in a letter to another correspondent later that month using the example of women as an example of the social contract.
It is certain in theory that the only moral foundation of government is the consent of the people.
But to what extent shall we carry? This principle, shall we say that every individual of the community, young and old, male and female, as well as rich and poor must consent expressly to every act of legislation.
No, you will say this is impossible.
How then does the right a rise in the majority to govern the minority against their will.
Wince arises the right of men to govern women without their consent.
Win the right of the old divine, the young without theirs. wince arises the right of the majority to govern and the obligation of the minority to obey from necessity.
You will say, because there can be no other rule.
But why exclude women?

[19:36] Unfortunately, for women everywhere, Adams didn’t follow this argument to the logical end that we might expect.
Instead of concluding that women were an important constituency that should be represented in law and government, he instead goes in another direction concluding that not only were women not fit to vote, but neither were white men without property.
Just a couple of weeks after this exchange of letters, John was given a new task by his colleagues in Congress.
After months of debate, it started to sound more likely that some sort of resolution for independence would come before the Congress that summer.
In anticipation, five delegates were named to a committee to draft language for some sort of proclamation or declaration to explain to the American public the reasons behind the political separation.
They started work on the document on June 11th with Roger Sherman and Robert Livingston mostly offering feedback behind the scenes.
John Adams and Ben Franklin were the idea men and Thomas Jefferson is the one who put quill to paper and wrote the flowery prose about how all men are created equal.
Of course, that was a few years before he converted Monticello from a tobacco based economy to one where enslaved Children who knew how to make nails were his main cash crop.

[20:59] Over the next 17 days, this committee of five produced a draft document completely revised it and removed all critiques of slavery and then produced a new draft.
This new draft was presented to the entire Congress on June 28th who then debated it and suggested more edits.
Finally, on July 2nd, the committee of the whole could live with the language of the declaration.
They appended the text of the Lee resolution as the final paragraph and got every delegation except New York to vote for it.
This is about where we came in with John Adams celebrating July 2nd as the great anniversary worthy of celebration across the continent for generations to come.
His heart was in the right place. He just didn’t realize how that big July 4th plastered across the top of the formal ceremonial copy of the declaration would catch the eye.
Meanwhile, back in Boston, the final official text of the declaration that John Adams and the committee of five had worked on arrived in town by July 15th.
It was published in some local papers on the 16th. And then on the evening of July 18th, 17 76 the commander of a local artillery unit read the declaration publicly from the balcony of the old State house, which of course was not yet old at that point and was still the seat of government in Massachusetts.

[22:23] In a letter to John written a few days later, Abigail describes the moment when she heard his ideas in the most famous document in American history.
I went with the multitude into King Street to hear the Proclamation for Independence read and proclaimed some field pieces with the train were brought there.
The troops appeared under arms and all the inhabitants assembled there.
When Colonel Krafts read from the balcony of the statehouse, the proclamation, great attention was given to every word.
As soon as he ended, the cry from the balcony was God save our American States.
And then three cheers which rendered the air.
The bells rang. The privateers fired the forts and batteries.
The cannon were discharged, the platoons followed and every face appeared joyful.
Mr Bowden then gave a hearty sentiment, stability and perpetuity to American independence.
After dinner, the king’s arms were taken down from the statehouse and every vestige of him from every place in which it appeared and burned in King Street.
Thus ends royal authority in this state and all the people shall say amen.

[23:40] Minus the part where they tear down the lion and unicorn from the top of the old State house and burn them.
This is one of my favorite Independence Day rituals in Boston.
You’ll never catch me on the esplanade with a million of my closest friends on the evening of the fourth.
But many years, you might spy me among the multitude who gather in King Street, which of course now is State Street in the morning of the fourth, after the parade and after the fifes and drums and a few brief remarks, an officer of the ancient and honorable artillery company will emerge on the same balcony where Colonel Thomas Craft of the colonial train of artillery stood 247 years before.
As he clears his throat and begins to speak, the crowd will fall into a reverent silence as the words ring out.
When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another.

Declaration Readers:
[24:36] And to assume among the powers of the earth with a separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitle them a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self evident that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness that to secure these rights.

Jake:
[25:13] To learn more about John Adams, Abigail Adams and the Declaration of Independence.

Declaration Readers:
[25:14] Governments are instituted among men deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.

Jake:
[25:18] Check out this week’s show notes at hub history dot com slash 278.

Declaration Readers:
[25:22] That whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends.

Jake:
[25:24] I’ll have links to the full text of Abigail Adams. Remember the lady’s letter.

Declaration Readers:
[25:27] It is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it.

Jake:
[25:28] As well as the back and forth that it inspired between her and John as well.

Declaration Readers:
[25:32] And to institute new government laying its foundation on such principles and.

Jake:
[25:33] As her letter to mercy Otis Warren where she complains about John’s Cavalier response.

Declaration Readers:
[25:37] Organizing its powers in such form as to them shall seem most likely to affect.

Jake:
[25:38] Plus, I’ll also include John’s letter to James Sullivan concluding that women and men without property should be denied the vote.

Declaration Readers:
[25:43] Their safety and happiness.

Jake:
[25:47] I’ll include John’s two letters describing his shock and joy at finally securing American independence on July 2nd, as well as Abigail’s letter describing how she went with the multitude into King Street to hear the declaration read out loud.
I can’t exactly include the whole thing in the show notes. But if you can, you should watch both 17 76 and the HBO Adams miniseries.
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That’s all for now. Stay safe out there listeners.

Declaration Readers:
[26:57] Therefore solemnly publish and declared these are and of right, ought to be free and independent states.
And for the support of this declaration with a firm reliance on the protection of divine providence.
We mutually pledge to each other, our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.

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