In the first week of June 1770, Adams accepted a seat in the Massachusetts House,
a step which at the time he considered “a devotion of my family to ruin and myself
to death” (
JA, Diary and Autobiography,
3:294). The doubtful honor devolved upon him when James Bowdoin, chosen in May as a member
of the House from Boston, was elected to the Provincial Council, vacating his seat
in the lower chamber of the General Court. At a special town meeting on the morning
of 6 June, Adams scored an easy victory over John Ruddock, a wealthy businessman with
a strong following among “the Tradesmen and Mechanicks.” Adams made a brief acceptance
speech to the town meeting at Faneuil Hall and set out to take his place in the House
(
same).
To assume his seat in the legislature, Adams was forced to journey across the Charles
River to Cambridge, for the General Court had been moved out of Boston to Harvard
College; its “removal” overshadowed every other issue in the first four months of
Adams' service. (See Donald C. Lord and Robert M. Calhoon, “The Removal of the Massachusetts
General Court from Boston, 1769–1772,”
JAH, 55:735–755 [March 1969].) Gov. Francis Bernard had ordered the transfer in June
1769, acting on instructions from Secretary of State Hillsborough that he exert his
“constitutional Authority” to summon the General Court outside Boston in order to
rescue the legislature from the influence of the town's “licentious and unrestrained
Mob” (Hillsborough to Bernard, 30 July 1768,
MHi:Transcripts of Instructions to Governors of Mass., 1768–1775). After Bernard's return
to England later that year, Lt. Gov. Thomas Hutchinson received somewhat ambiguous
instructions to continue the General Court at Cambridge only if developments arose
“of such a nature as to outweigh” two considerations that Hillsborough mentioned:
the continuation of troops in Boston and the behavior of its citizens (Hillsborough
to Hutchinson, 9 Dec. 1769,
MHi:Transcripts of Instructions to Governors). In March 1770, Hutchinson called the General
Court into session at Cambridge.
“Only from absolute Necessity,” the legislators agreed to proceed to business during that brief session, and they
refused to concede the right of the acting governor to change their meeting place
(
Mass., House Jour., 1769–1770, p. 101).
When a new House was chosen in the annual elections of May 1770, Hutchinson continued
his policy. The House met in Cambridge on 31 May, and, although the representatives
agreed to elect a Council, opposi•
{ 239 } { 240 } tion to their “removal” hardened. Before Adams took his seat on 6 June, the House
had submitted a message challenging Hutchinson's right to remove the legislature,
and the Lieutenant Governor replied with a message asserting his legal and constitutional
right to hold the assembly where he wished. In a second exchange on 5 June, the House
demanded to see the instructions under which Hutchinson acted; he refused, both because
of the ambiguity of Hillsborough's instructions and because other instructions forbade
him to make such communications to the General Court (
Mass., House Jour., 1770–1771, p. 15–16;
Bailyn, Thomas Hutchinson, p. 172–173).
On the morning of 6 June, only a few hours before Adams joined the House, debate opened
on the report of a committee charged with considering “what may be proper further
to be done while the General Court is held out of the Town-House in Boston.” As soon
as Adams took his oath that afternoon, the House resumed debate, and Adams cast his
vote with the majority of 96 representatives who adopted the resolution that “it is
by no Means expedient to proceed to Business” while the assembly was “thus constrained”
to meet outside Boston (
Mass., House Jour., 1770–1771, p. 16–21). Adams' appointment to the committee charged with preparing
an address to Hutchinson after the adoption of this resolution (see calendar entry
for
7 June, below) was the first indication of the part he would play in this controversy between
the House and the executive.
That drama continued throughout the summer. The first session of the House ended in
stalemate, and the legislature was prorogued on 25 June, only to be recalled for a
brief second session, 25 July-3 August (see calendar entry for
31 July, below). By 26 September, when the Lieutenant Governor recalled the Court for its
third session, he had received more specific instructions. Hutchinson's decision to
continue the General Court at Cambridge had been approved by his superiors, and he
was directed to maintain that policy unless it “should be attended with any such inconvenience
as may make it adviseable to hold it in some other place,” in which case he might
“remove it to any other Town in the Province except Boston” (Hillsborough to Hutchinson,
6 July 1770,
MHi:Transcripts of Instructions to Governors).
In the third session of the General Court for 1770–1771, the opposition continued
the fight to maintain the House's refusal to do business outside Boston (see calendar
entries for
28 Sept.,
4 and
5 Oct., below). But in a vote taken during Adams' absence from Cambridge on 9 October,
the House agreed to proceed to official duties “only from absolute necessity” (
Mass., House Jour., 1770–1771, p. 88–91). On 16 October on the motion of James Warren, the House gave
leave to “Members who were absent at the Time
[9 Oct.] when the Resolution pass'd to proceed to Business out of the Town-House in Boston
... to declare their Opinion thereon in the House.” Both Warren and John Adams took
advantage of this opportunity to express their opposition to the change of stance
in the House (same, p. 97–98).
{ 241 } Even as Adams protested the House retreat on the issue of “removal,” he was named
to committees which dealt with other conflicts between the General Court and the executive.
The old issue of the presence of British troops in Boston was revived in the dispute
over the command of Castle William (see calendar entry for
23 Oct., below). Hutchinson's refusal to disclose his instructions, and the style of enacting
provincial laws also drew Adams' attention that session (see calendar entries for
4 and
5 Oct. and
6 Nov., below). Committee appointments arising from the failure of the nonimportation
movement (see calendar entry for
16 Nov., below) and the appointment of a new agent in London (see calendar entry for
17 Dec., below) reflected broader aspects of the local conflicts.
The third session of the legislature ended on 20 November, and the General Court did
not meet again until 3 April 1771. Adams was relatively inactive in this fourth session;
his attendance was not recorded until 10 April, and his diary shows that he attended
no meetings after 17 April, nine days before the session's close (
JA, Diary and Autobiography,
2:6–9). In this session, the most important committee on which Adams served was undoubtedly
that which drafted a bill for Hutchinson's salary as lieutenant governor (see second
calendar entry for
10 April, below). This bill forced the newly commissioned governor to confirm suspicions that
he expected support directly from the Crown, thus becoming financially independent
of the legislature.
Adams' service on committees in the House for 1770–1771 is described below in a list
of calendar entries for those committees for which there is some documentary record
of their work. (Committees about whose recommendations the record gives no hint and
those with ceremonial duties, such as the delivery of messages and votes, are not
described; for a check list including many of these other appointments, see
JA, Works, 2:233–236, note.) The calendar form has been used because the absence of draft versions
of these reports prevents their attribution to Adams or to any of his colleagues.
Adams left no record of his work as a legislative draftsman in 1770–1771, although
he did recall that “this was to me a fatiguing Session, for they put me upon all the
Drudgery of managing all the disputes” (
Diary and Autobiography,
3:295). In listing his published writings in 1783, he concluded with the remark that “these
. . . are all that I recollect to have ever written in America, excepting in a public
Character, as a Member of the Legislature of Massachusetts or of Congress, which it
is unnecessary to mention here” (letter to the Abbé de Mably, 17 Jan. 1783,
LbC,
Adams Papers). “Unnecessary” as such a list may have seemed to Adams at the time, it would have
been of more than passing interest to students of his career two centuries later.