Adams Family Correspondence, volume 15
I inclose you a letter from my wife, who would have written you earlier but that George has been very ill with a fever, for several days— He is however, thank God now recovered.
I have not written to you so often myself as I ought to have done, the only reason for which has been the ardour with which I have thoughtlessly thrown myself into the vortex of public business— The only object or use of which is to engross all my time—
We have pass’d an Amendment to the Constitution to designate persons in the choice of President and Vice-President— It is in a strange form, owing to the extraordinary difficulty of getting a Constitutional number of the Senate to agree to it.1
We are also going on swimmingly about Louisiana— More swimmingly than heedfully as I suppose.2
Your’s faithfully.
RC (Mount Vernon Hotel Museum & Garden, New
York, owned and operated by the Colonial Dames of America); addressed: “John Adams
Esqr. / Quincy. / Massachusetts.—”; internal address:
“Mrs: A. Adams.”; docketed: “J. Q. Adams to his / mother
Dec. 9. 1803.”
On 17 Oct. Democratic-Republican John Dawson of Virginia introduced in the House of Representatives a resolution to amend the constitutional process for electing a president and vice president, while on the 21st party colleague DeWitt Clinton of New York introduced a similar resolution in the Senate. Initiated in response to the congressional impasse in the election of 1800, the measures eventually became the 12th Amendment, reforming a system that awarded the presidency to the highest vote getter and the vice-presidency to the second place finisher. Under the proposed new system, separate elections would be held for the offices of president and vice president, virtually ensuring that both would be of the same party. In races in which there was no majority winner, the House would decide the contest, with each state casting a single vote.
Debate took place in the House from 19 to 28 Oct. 1803 and in the
Senate from 23 Nov. to 2 Dec., with a key issue being the number of candidates for
each office that would receive consideration in the event the House decided the
election. House Democratic-Republicans proposed two, but Federalists argued for five.
The Senate compromised at three, the number in the resolution when it passed on 2 Dec.
by a 22 to 10 vote, with JQA among those opposed. In a speech near the
close of the debate, JQA voiced his support for an effort “to establish
the single principle of discrimination in the choice of the two highest officers of
the union” but claimed the amendment as constituted did so at the expense of northern
states and was “founded upon a manifest intention to attack the fundamental federative
principle of the constitution.” The House adopted the Senate version on 8 Dec.,
sending the amendment to the states for ratification. The amendment was 310 ratified by thirteen of the seventeen states
between 21 Dec. and 27 July 1804, while Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Hampshire, and
Delaware either rejected the amendment or took no action on it at the time. Secretary
of State James Madison declared the amendment adopted on 25 Sept. (Joshua D. Hawley,
“The Transformative Twelfth Amendment,” William & Mary Law
Review, 55:1542–1561 [2014]; Thomas J. Wickham, Constitution, Jefferson’s Manual, and Rules of the House of Representatives of the
United States One Hundred and Fourteenth Congress, Washington, D.C., 2015, p.
95–98;
Annals of
Congress
, 8th Cong., 1st sess., p. 209; Jefferson, Papers
, 42:153; Washington Federalist, 2 Jan.).
Thomas Jefferson in a 16 July 1803 proclamation (Adams Papers) called for Congress to convene
on 17 Oct. to consider the 30 April Franco-American treaty and two conventions
regarding Louisiana, for which see Descriptive List of Illustrations, No. 4, above. The Senate ratified the
treaty and conventions by a vote of 24 to 7 on 20 Oct., and Jefferson proclaimed the
ratifications the following day. While Jefferson and other Democratic-Republicans saw
the acquisition of the territory as a triumph, Federalists believed it would erode the
power of the northern states and therefore attempted to block subsequent legislation.
JQA, who took his seat in the Senate the same day the ratification was
proclaimed, split his vote on several pieces of related legislation. The first
authorized the president to take possession of the ceded territory. It was introduced
in the Senate on 21 Oct. and passed on the 26th by a vote of 26 to 6, with
JQA joining the Federalist opposition. A bill to fund the purchase was
introduced on 28 October. During debate on 3 Nov. JQA broke with his
Federalist colleagues, arguing that the constitutional objections they raised could be
overcome and declaring his support because of “the immense importance to this Union of
the possession of the ceded country.” The bill passed the same day with
JQA among the majority in the 26 to 5 vote. The House passed the bill
on 7 Nov., and Jefferson signed it into law on 10 November. Summarizing his first
weeks of congressional service, JQA described “the danger of adhering to my own principles,” writing in his
Diary: “The Country is so totally given up to the Spirit of party, that not to follow
blind-fold the one or the other is an inexpiable offence. … Yet my choice is made, and
if I cannot hope to give satisfaction to my Country, I am at least determined to have
the approbation of my own reflections” (Jefferson, Papers
, 41:67; Miller, Treaties
, 2:498, 512, 516;
U.S. Statutes at Large
, 2:245–248; U.S. Senate, Exec.
Jour.
, 8th Cong., 1st sess., p. 449–450;
Annals of Congress
, 8th Cong.,
1st sess., p. 9, 16, 17, 26, 65–68, 73, 546–548, 558, 1231;
D/JQA/27, 3 Nov., 31 Dec., APM Reel 30).
We have not a printer in Boston who gives us any of the debates in
either house of Congress: I have seen the National intelligencer for a few weeks past. I
there read the debate which I presume was the cause of Dr Eustice writing to mr Jos Hall
the following, “You will probably have heard of the bold an independant manner in which
J Q A. voted away from his party, having gained credit with
us, it is to be expected he will proportionably lose with them”1 When I wrote You last Sunday I did not mention
this in my Letter—2 I only observed, that
[I] was sure you would as much as possible keep your mind free [fro]m party influence,
and vote as your conscience aided by your judgement should dictate, and tho upon some
occasions I might think Your Vote would have been different, it is 311
312 impossible to judge accurately, because we see not
the reasons causes which have opperated, towards
the decision— I did not however so soon expect to see dr Eustices observation verified—
You will see read in Ben Russels centinal of
Saturday the 10th an extract of a Letter from Washington to the Editor; Who the writer
is I know not, But the Letter is evidently intended to convey an Idea that you was
attaching yourself to the Majority, and with the Notes of admiration & the Lattin
quotation.3 I do not like this Stabing
in the dark Russel publishes, but takes care to omit the debate—which gave occasion to
the Motion: You will proceed in a consistant uniform tenor of conduct, regardless of the
goads & Stings you will have to encounter—
Your Brother has this moment arrived— I must quit my pen to welcome him. we are all well
Your affectionate Mother
RC (Adams Papers). Some loss of text due to the placement of the seal.
JQA’s 3 Nov. speech during the Senate debate over
funding the Louisiana Purchase was printed in the Washington, D.C., National Intelligencer, 25 Nov., and reprinted in the
Boston Gazetteer, 14 December. The response that
AA noted by Massachusetts congressman William Eustis was echoed
elsewhere. On 10 Dec. Boston lawyer Joseph Hall wrote to JQA (Adams Papers), supporting JQA’s
stance but cautioning that the Federalist stalwarts would disapprove. JQA
in his 20 Dec. reply to Hall defended his actions and declared a lack of surprise at
the criticism: “When I accepted the station I hold, it was not with the expectation of
giving satisfaction at all times to all my constituents.— I expected to be often
censured & from various & opposite quarters” (MHi:Misc. Bound Coll.).
AA to JQA, 3 Dec., above.
The Boston Columbian Centinel, 10
Dec., printed an anonymous letter criticizing JQA’s actions in the
Louisiana debate and inaccurately predicting that he would join Democratic-Republicans
in voting for the 12th Amendment. The article included an extract from Virgil, Aeneid, Book II, lines 6 and 8. JQA soon
learned that the writer was Massachusetts representative William Stedman, for which
see William Smith Shaw to
JQA, 7 Jan. 1804, and note 1, below.