Entries from Come Sit a While that draw on the words of John Adams.
John Adams (1735–1826) was a farmer’s son from Braintree, Massachusetts, who became a lawyer, a leading voice for American independence, and the second President of the United States. He was stubborn, honest, and often unpopular for it — he once defended the British soldiers of the Boston Massacre in court because he believed every man deserved a fair trial, and he counted it among the most principled things he ever did. He spent long, lonely years in Europe as a diplomat, negotiating the treaties and loans that kept a fragile new nation alive, separated by an ocean from Abigail, the wife he adored and to whom he wrote some of the most tender and searching letters in American history. In one of history’s quiet wonders, he died on the Fourth of July, 1826 — the fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration he had fought so hard to bring about — within hours of his friend and rival Thomas Jefferson.
Entries featuring John Adams
- The Liberty to Study Poetry (2026-07-03)
Drawn from 1 entries · refreshed July 24, 2026