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FINALLY LEAVING THE DESK OF THE VICE
PRESIDENT - JOHN ADAMS 1797
John Adams' Inaugural Address
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John Adams.
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Adams' Inaugural Address.
It follows the full text transcript of
John Adams' Inaugural Address, delivered in the
Congress Hall at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania - March 4, 1797.
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When it was first
perceived, in early times, |
that no middle
course for America remained between unlimited
submission to a foreign legislature and a total
independence of its claims, men of reflection
were less apprehensive of danger from the
formidable power of fleets and armies they must
determine to resist than from those contests and
dissensions which would certainly arise
concerning the forms of government to be
instituted over the whole and over the parts of
this extensive country.
Relying, however,
on the purity of their intentions, the justice
of their cause, and the integrity and
intelligence of the people, under an overruling
Providence which had so signally protected this
country from the first, the representatives of
this nation, then consisting of little more than
half its present number, not only broke to
pieces the chains which were forging and the rod
of iron that was lifted up, but frankly cut
asunder the ties which had bound them, and
launched into an ocean of uncertainty.
The zeal and ardor of the people during the
Revolutionary war, supplying the place of
government, commanded a degree of order
sufficient at least for the temporary
preservation of society. The Confederation which
was early felt to be necessary was prepared from
the models of the Batavian and Helvetic
confederacies, the only examples which remain
with any detail and precision in history, and
certainly the only ones which the people at
large had ever considered. But reflecting on the
striking difference in so many particulars
between this country and those where a courier
may go from the seat of government to the
frontier in a single day, it was then certainly
foreseen by some who assisted in Congress at the
formation of it that it could not be durable.
Negligence of its regulations, inattention to
its recommendations, if not disobedience to its
authority, not only in individuals but in
States, soon appeared with their melancholy
consequences - universal languor, jealousies and
rivalries of States, decline of navigation and
commerce, discouragement of necessary
manufactures, universal fall in the value of
lands and their produce, contempt of public and
private faith, loss of consideration and credit
with foreign nations, and at length in
discontents, animosities, combinations, partial
conventions, and insurrection, threatening some
great national calamity.
In this dangerous crisis the people of America
were not abandoned by their usual good sense,
presence of mind, resolution, or integrity.
Measures were pursued to concert a plan to form
a more perfect union, establish justice, insure
domestic tranquility, provide for the common
defense, promote the general welfare, and secure
the blessings of liberty. The public
disquisitions, discussions, and deliberations
issued in the present happy Constitution of
Government.
Employed in the service of my country abroad
during the whole course of these transactions, I
first saw the Constitution of the United States
in a foreign country. Irritated by no literary
altercation, animated by no public debate,
heated by no party animosity, I read it with
great satisfaction, as the result of good heads
prompted by good hearts, as an experiment better
adapted to the genius, character, situation, and
relations of this nation and country than any
which had ever been proposed or suggested. In
its general principles and great outlines it was
conformable to such a system of government as I
had ever most esteemed, and in some States, my
own native State in particular, had contributed
to establish.
Claiming a right
of suffrage, in common with my fellow citizens,
in the adoption or rejection of a constitution
which was to rule me and my posterity, as well
as them and theirs, I did not hesitate to
express my approbation of it on all occasions,
in public and in private. It was not then, nor
has been since, any objection to it in my mind
that the Executive and Senate were not more
permanent. Nor have I ever entertained a thought
of promoting any alteration in it but such as
the people themselves, in the course of their
experience, should see and feel to be necessary
or expedient, and by their representatives in
Congress and the State legislatures, according
to the Constitution itself, adopt and ordain.
Returning to the bosom of my country after a
painful separation from it for ten years, I had
the honor to be elected to a station under the
new order of things, and I have repeatedly laid
myself under the most serious obligations to
support the Constitution. The operation of it
has equaled the most sanguine expectations of
its friends, and from an habitual attention to
it, satisfaction in its administration, and
delight in its effects upon the peace, order,
prosperity, and happiness of the nation I have
acquired an habitual attachment to it and
veneration for it.
What other form of government, indeed, can so
well deserve our esteem and love?
There may be little solidity in an ancient idea
that congregations of men into cities and
nations are the most pleasing objects in the
sight of superior intelligences, but this is
very certain, that to a benevolent human mind
there can be no spectacle presented by any
nation more pleasing, more noble, majestic, or
august, than an assembly like that which has so
often been seen in this and the other Chamber of
Congress, of a Government in which the Executive
authority, as well as that of all the branches
of the Legislature, are exercised by citizens
selected at regular periods by their neighbors
to make and execute laws for the general good.
Can anything
essential, anything more than mere ornament and
decoration, be added to this by robes and
diamonds? Can authority be more amiable and
respectable when it descends from accidents or
institutions established in remote antiquity
than when it springs fresh from the hearts and
judgments of an honest and enlightened people?
For it is the
people only that are represented. It is their
power and majesty that is reflected, and only
for their good, in every legitimate government,
under whatever form it may appear. The existence
of such a government as ours for any length of
time is a full proof of a general dissemination
of knowledge and virtue throughout the whole
body of the people. And what object or
consideration more pleasing than this can be
presented to the human mind? If national pride
is ever justifiable or excusable it is when it
springs, not from power or riches, grandeur or
glory, but from conviction of national
innocence, information, and benevolence.
In the midst of these pleasing ideas we should
be unfaithful to ourselves if we should ever
lose sight of the danger to our liberties if
anything partial or extraneous should infect the
purity of our free, fair, virtuous, and
independent elections. If an election is to be
determined by a majority of a single vote, and
that can be procured by a party through artifice
or corruption, the Government may be the choice
of a party for its own ends, not of the nation
for the national good. If that solitary suffrage
can be obtained by foreign nations by flattery
or menaces, by fraud or violence, by terror,
intrigue, or venality, the Government may not be
the choice of the American people, but of
foreign nations. It may be foreign nations who
govern us, and not we, the people, who govern
ourselves; and candid men will acknowledge that
in such cases choice would have little advantage
to boast of over lot or chance.
Such is the amiable and interesting system of
government (and such are some of the abuses to
which it may be exposed) which the people of
America have exhibited to the admiration and
anxiety of the wise and virtuous of all nations
for eight years under the administration of a
citizen who, by a long course of great actions,
regulated by prudence, justice, temperance, and
fortitude, conducting a people inspired with the
same virtues and animated with the same ardent
patriotism and love of liberty to independence
and peace, to increasing wealth and unexampled
prosperity, has merited the gratitude of his
fellow-citizens, commanded the highest praises
of foreign nations, and secured immortal glory
with posterity.
In that retirement which is his voluntary choice
may he long live to enjoy the delicious
recollection of his services, the gratitude of
mankind, the happy fruits of them to himself and
the world, which are daily increasing, and that
splendid prospect of the future fortunes of this
country which is opening from year to year. His
name may be still a rampart, and the knowledge
that he lives a bulwark, against all open or
secret enemies of his country's peace. This
example has been recommended to the imitation of
his successors by both Houses of Congress and by
the voice of the legislatures and the people
throughout the nation.
On this subject it might become me better to be
silent or to speak with diffidence; but as
something may be expected, the occasion, I hope,
will be admitted as an apology if I venture to
say that if a preference, upon principle, of a
free republican government, formed upon long and
serious reflection, after a diligent and
impartial inquiry after truth; if an attachment
to the Constitution of the United States, and a
conscientious determination to support it until
it shall be altered by the judgments and wishes
of the people, expressed in the mode prescribed
in it; if a respectful attention to the
constitutions of the individual States and a
constant caution and delicacy toward the State
governments; if an equal and impartial regard to
the rights, interest, honor, and happiness of
all the States in the Union, without preference
or regard to a northern or southern, an eastern
or western, position, their various political
opinions on unessential points or their personal
attachments; if a love of virtuous men of all
parties and denominations; if a love of science
and letters and a wish to patronize every
rational effort to encourage schools, colleges,
universities, academies, and every institution
for propagating knowledge, virtue, and religion
among all classes of the people, not only for
their benign influence on the happiness of life
in all its stages and classes, and of society in
all its forms, but as the only means of
preserving our Constitution from its natural
enemies, the spirit of sophistry, the spirit of
party, the spirit of intrigue, the profligacy of
corruption, and the pestilence of foreign
influence, which is the angel of destruction to
elective governments; if a love of equal laws,
of justice, and humanity in the interior
administration; if an inclination to improve
agriculture, commerce, and manufacturers for
necessity, convenience, and defense; if a spirit
of equity and humanity toward the aboriginal
nations of America, and a disposition to
meliorate their condition by inclining them to
be more friendly to us, and our citizens to be
more friendly to them; if an inflexible
determination to maintain peace and inviolable
faith with all nations, and that system of
neutrality and impartiality among the
belligerent powers of Europe which has been
adopted by this Government and so solemnly
sanctioned by both Houses of Congress and
applauded by the legislatures of the States and
the public opinion, until it shall be otherwise
ordained by Congress; if a personal esteem for
the French nation, formed in a residence of
seven years chiefly among them, and a sincere
desire to preserve the friendship which has been
so much for the honor and interest of both
nations; if, while the conscious honor and
integrity of the people of America and the
internal sentiment of their own power and
energies must be preserved, an earnest endeavor
to investigate every just cause and remove every
colorable pretense of complaint; if an intention
to pursue by amicable negotiation a reparation
for the injuries that have been committed on the
commerce of our fellow citizens by whatever
nation, and if success can not be obtained, to
lay the facts before the Legislature, that they
may consider what further measures the honor and
interest of the Government and its constituents
demand; if a resolution to do justice as far as
may depend upon me, at all times and to all
nations, and maintain peace, friendship, and
benevolence with all the world; if an unshaken
confidence in the honor, spirit, and resources
of the American people, on which I have so often
hazarded my all and never been deceived; if
elevated ideas of the high destinies of this
country and of my own duties toward it, founded
on a knowledge of the moral principles and
intellectual improvements of the people deeply
engraven on my mind in early life, and not
obscured but exalted by experience and age; and,
with humble reverence, I feel it to be my duty
to add, if a veneration for the religion of a
people who profess and call themselves
Christians, and a fixed resolution to consider a
decent respect for Christianity among the best
recommendations for the public service, can
enable me in any degree to comply with your
wishes, it shall be my strenuous endeavor that
this sagacious injunction of the two Houses
shall not be without effect.
With this great example before me, with the
sense and spirit, the faith and honor, the duty
and interest, of the same American people
pledged to support the Constitution of the
United States, I entertain no doubt of its
continuance in all its energy, and my mind is
prepared without hesitation to lay myself under
the most solemn obligations to support it to the
utmost of my power.
And may that Being who is supreme over all, the
Patron of Order, the Fountain of Justice, and
the Protector in all ages of the world of
virtuous liberty, continue His blessing upon
this nation and its Government and give it all
possible success and duration consistent with
the ends of His providence.
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