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Moore History - The Life of John Quincy Adams · Conversations: Special Guests with Preston Scott

0:02
Speaker 1: Welcome friends.
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Speaker 2: It is the third hour of the Morning Show with
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Speaker 2: Preston Scott and we give you a respite from all
0:07
Speaker 2: the noise.
0:08
Speaker 1: Of the news.
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Speaker 2: And monthly we spend some time with our good friend,
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Speaker 2: resident historian, Doctor Ed Moore with a little more history.
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Speaker 2: And we have been We started this year with presidents
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Speaker 2: that you probably don't.
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Speaker 1: Know a whole lot about. You might know their names, but.
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Speaker 2: You you likely are very very sketchy on any knowledge
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Speaker 2: about them. And before there was the Bush family in
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Speaker 2: the White House, there was the Adams family. And joining
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Speaker 2: us is doctor Ed morgand Morning sir.
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Speaker 3: Come on and how you doing. Adams family brings a
0:46
Speaker 3: whole new connotation.
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Speaker 1: Nowadays with you, doesn't it though?
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Speaker 3: With Mortissa and Goldmez Adams TV show.
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Speaker 2: You know, well, this Adams family predated that Adams family.
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Speaker 3: They certainly did they start, did you? John Q. Adam.
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Speaker 3: It's interesting guy in history and really not much has
1:06
Speaker 3: ever talked about about him, and you don't see a
1:08
Speaker 3: lot of books a written about him. But during the era,
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Speaker 3: and you know how I always like to focus on
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Speaker 3: the air of the time frame the US then we
1:17
Speaker 3: had twenty four states by the time he was president,
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Speaker 3: he was a sixth president and about eleven eleven and
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Speaker 3: a half million people. He became president in eighteen twenty five,
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Speaker 3: so there wasn't really a census, but trying to judge
1:30
Speaker 3: by the growth less than half the size of Florida,
1:35
Speaker 3: and that was the entire country. We were still trying
1:39
Speaker 3: to figure out what we were going to be as
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Speaker 3: a republican. There's a democratic republic, I should say, who
1:48
Speaker 3: was really in control? They battled back then, and we're
1:51
Speaker 3: still sort of battling about what who's more important the
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Speaker 3: executive branch, the legislative branch, and the judiciary. Most people
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Speaker 3: don't understand the Supreme Court under Jeffersonian ideas. They didn't
2:06
Speaker 3: think that they should have the nullification the review that
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Speaker 3: they ended up evolving that it all came from John
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Speaker 3: Marshall as a Supreme Court member over he was for
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Speaker 3: about twenty nine years. So we were still struggling during
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Speaker 3: that era, struggling to figure out who really is in charge?
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Speaker 3: What are the rights of the states versus the federal government.
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Speaker 3: I mean that went up all the way through the
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Speaker 3: Civil War. Right now we're talking with that Quincy Adams
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Speaker 3: were talking about eighteen twenty five, so the country was
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Speaker 3: influxed for a very long period of time.
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Speaker 2: Ed how much was John Quincy Adams as a younger
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Speaker 2: man influenced by his father as opposed to serving as
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Speaker 2: Secretary of State under the guy we talked about last month,
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Speaker 2: James Monroe when he was president.
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Speaker 3: Well, he had the benefit really when it comes to
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Speaker 3: what is the role of the United States of growing
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Speaker 3: up basically in Europe because during the time his father,
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Speaker 3: early in the early years for Quincy Adams, his father
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Speaker 3: was Minister to Great Britain, dealt with Russia, did all
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Speaker 3: kinds of issues way back then. And Quincy Adams as
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Speaker 3: he grew up you mentioned he was the eight Secretary
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Speaker 3: of State, but he also was Minister to Great Britain,
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Speaker 3: a minister to Prussia and Russia who's a Massachusetts senator.
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Speaker 3: He had vast experience in government, and he was exposed
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Speaker 3: to government basically his entire life because of the role
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Speaker 3: of his father and his father becoming president and then
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Speaker 3: the other things that he did on his own. He
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Speaker 3: served four different presidents. Quincy Adams served in some kind
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Speaker 3: of role, very very experienced, not eligible guy on what
4:02
Speaker 3: it should be, where our government should be, and what
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Speaker 3: president should do, and he came into office as a
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Speaker 3: very experienced person, but with a very divided country. The
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Speaker 3: country was very split. And we can talk in a
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Speaker 3: minute about how he got elected, which was very highly unusual.
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Speaker 3: It only happened a couple times in our history.
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Speaker 2: Doctor edmore with me, a little more history, and we're
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Speaker 2: talking about John Quincy Adams and his rise to prominence
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Speaker 2: and in this case his election to the White House.
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Speaker 1: You mentioned that it was an oddity.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, very very unusual election of eighteen twenty four. There
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Speaker 3: were Adams, a guy named William Crawford who nobody ever
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Speaker 3: heard of, Henry Clay, and Andrew Jackson. All ran. Andrew
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Speaker 3: Jackson got a plurality of the votes. He had more
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Speaker 3: votes than anybody else, but there was no majority in
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Speaker 3: the electoral votes. So it went to the House of
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Speaker 3: Representative as was required under our constitution, and on February ninth,
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Speaker 3: actually right about now, at eighteen twenty five, the House
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Speaker 3: of Representatives picked him picked John Quincy Adams. One hundred
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Speaker 3: and seventy eight to eighty three was the vote in
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Speaker 3: the House Chamber. Because he had the strong support of
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Speaker 3: Henry Clay, who was the speaker of the House, to
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Speaker 3: which Andrew Jackson then all of his supporters basically went
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Speaker 3: nuts on this, called it the corrupt Bargain because Henry
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Speaker 3: Clay soon became the Secretary of State under John Quincy Adams.
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Speaker 3: That we think now our politics are kind of weird
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Speaker 3: and all kind of machinations going on. It was going
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Speaker 3: on from the very beginning, this crazy giness. You should
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Speaker 3: know that. The interesting thing, so many interesting things to
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Speaker 3: me on this. The election of eighteen twenty four, only
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Speaker 3: three point four percent of the population voted in that election,
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Speaker 3: and in eighteen twenty eight when Jackson won, it only
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Speaker 3: popped up to nine and a half percent. So when
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Speaker 3: we talk about democratic republic and whatever more from landowners,
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Speaker 3: white male landowners to white males generally didn't have to
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Speaker 3: own land. It took a lot of years, all during
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Speaker 3: that eighteen hundreds, fully through the eighteen hundreds, to get
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Speaker 3: where if he lived here and you were a citizen
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Speaker 3: you could vote. Imagine electing a president of the United
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Speaker 3: States with three point four percent of the vote. I mean,
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Speaker 3: that's crazy, absolutely crazy. But what Quincy did is he
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Speaker 3: I'll call him Quincy to John Quincy Adams is a
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Speaker 3: long name He did a lot of things prior to
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Speaker 3: being president, as we talked about, but as the Minister
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Speaker 3: of Great Britain, he was the one negotiating the Treaty
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Speaker 3: of Gaunt, which was ended basically ended the War of
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Speaker 3: eighteen twelve. He negotiated negotiated the Adams Owners Treaty in
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Speaker 3: eighteen nineteen that got Spanish Florida or all of Florida
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Speaker 3: to become part of the United States and really picked
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Speaker 3: up land all the way to the Sabine River in
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Speaker 3: East Texas and Mexico or Spain controlled for a few years.
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Speaker 3: After that, Mexico got their independence. So North America changed
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Speaker 3: tremendously during about fifteen fifteen year time frame. The United
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Speaker 3: States grew and it was a it was a thirst
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Speaker 3: for land. But you could really tie to Jeffersonian Republicans
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Speaker 3: who favored farmers. They believed that farmers were the smartest, strongest,
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Speaker 3: and most dedicated Americans and they wanted to expand land.
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Speaker 3: And that's a large part where the Louisiana purchase came
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Speaker 3: from what they wanted. They wanted land west. They weren't
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Speaker 3: focused on creating states out of that. They were focused
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Speaker 3: on getting land, and so the United States was a
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Speaker 3: place of huge growth during this time frame, Doctor ed Moore. Way, yeah,
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Speaker 3: go ahead, I would say, by the way it cost
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Speaker 3: the Adams down the street. We paid Spain five million
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Speaker 3: dollars for all of that land, which right now would
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Speaker 3: be the equivalent of about one hundred and three hundred
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Speaker 3: and four million dollars in regular dollars for all of
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Speaker 3: that land the Spanish Florida, all the way west of Texas,
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Speaker 3: included Alabama, Mississippi for five million dollars. Not a bad deal.
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Speaker 3: The guy was pretty good negotiator.
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Speaker 1: It was a bargain.
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Speaker 2: Then it would be a bargain now, just quickly before
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Speaker 2: we go to breakhead. If John Adams, the second president,
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Speaker 2: John Quincy Adams father, he lived to see his son
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Speaker 2: take the Oval Office, what we now know is the
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Speaker 2: Oval Office to become the president, right.
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Speaker 3: Yes, no, no, no, he didn't. I forget which year
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Speaker 3: he died.
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Speaker 1: He died in twenty six, so he would have been alive.
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Speaker 3: Well, yeah, he was. He would still be alive, but
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Speaker 3: not not well. He was, he was, he was aware.
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Speaker 3: Remember the famous battle between Jefferson and Adams is or
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Speaker 3: which one would die first? You know, and they died
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Speaker 3: on the same day.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, fifty years after the founding of the nation.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, so yeah, he saw it happen. But he
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Speaker 3: saw some do all kinds of things that we tend
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Speaker 3: to degrade by putting so much emphasis on being president
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Speaker 3: of the United States. Look at the job that Mark or
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Speaker 3: Ruby is doing right now. Secretary of State. Henry Clay
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Speaker 3: wanted to be Secretary of State the way back then.
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Speaker 3: I mean, to be these different things. John Adams Quincy
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Speaker 3: Adams served seventeen years in Congress after being president the
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Speaker 3: United States. He got elected in eighteen thirty and he
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Speaker 3: was a member of five different political parties. That's how
9:42
Speaker 3: transient changing everything was in the United States during those days.
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Speaker 3: It's crazy change changes going on.
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Speaker 2: John Quincy Adams, you just touched on it. Has there
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Speaker 2: ever been another, I mean, serving in Congress after becoming
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Speaker 2: president seems very unique.
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Speaker 3: He was the only one. No one else ever has
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Speaker 3: done that since then. Did some of them have become
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Speaker 3: governors or Supreme Court judges. There are all kinds of things,
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Speaker 3: but he's the only one that served, and he served
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Speaker 3: for seventeen years as a congressman. He served he got elected.
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Speaker 3: Actually when he got elected in eighteen thirty. He ran
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Speaker 3: under the Anti Masonic Party. That's what I said earlier.
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Speaker 3: He was five different parties that the Anti Masonic Party
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Speaker 3: ended up morphing into being the Whigs, both of which
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Speaker 3: were kind of short lived in our history. But Wig
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Speaker 3: lasted until right before Lincoln, and then Lincoln ran as
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Speaker 3: a Republican. But our country was in constant turmoil and
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Speaker 3: fluxter and pretty much that first half about the eighteen hundreds,
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Speaker 3: and he was a major player in all that defining
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Speaker 3: what the role was of Congress with the role of
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Speaker 3: the presidency was, what the role of the United States was.
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Speaker 3: An international law you and I briefly touched on a
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Speaker 3: court case that he actually went before the Scotus, the
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Speaker 3: Supreme Court of the United States, and Quincy Adams as
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Speaker 3: a lawyer, went before on the US versus the Amathad,
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Speaker 3: which they made a pretty good movie out of. Un
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Speaker 3: If everybody saw that movie, that's brilliant movie. And it's
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Speaker 3: an interesting case because it was a guy who owned
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Speaker 3: a Spaniard who lived in Cuba, who owned a ship
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Speaker 3: and the ship basically was just doing transport, taking goods
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Speaker 3: around Cuba from one city to the other. Around in Cuba.
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Speaker 3: But then they ended up hauling and it wasn't designed
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Speaker 3: to haul slaves or potential slaves, but they ended up
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Speaker 3: hauling a large group of slaves, and the slaves revolted.
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Speaker 3: A guy named Sinke led the revolt. He escaped and
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Speaker 3: then released everybody else, and they ended up sailing the ship,
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Speaker 3: and the got captured by the United States off of
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Speaker 3: Montauk Point in Long Island, and it became a cause
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Speaker 3: celeb for everybody as to what Because by this point
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Speaker 3: the United States and Great Britain had banned slavery, they
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Speaker 3: shouldn't be no more slavery, but the Spanish were a
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Speaker 3: little bit loose on that, and there's still a lot
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Speaker 3: of slave trade going on. Actually, the real slave trade
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Speaker 3: that was going on then was on the east side
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Speaker 3: of Africa, between Africa and India and that part of
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Speaker 3: the world. But coming this way, slavery was not no
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Speaker 3: longer allowed. You couldn't trade slaves. So what do you
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Speaker 3: do with a captured ship full of people who had
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Speaker 3: killed the captain and killed the cook and killed the
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Speaker 3: people in charge of the ship, taken over the ship
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Speaker 3: and sailed it. It created all kinds of maritime law,
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Speaker 3: international law, and John Quincy Adams was in the middle
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Speaker 3: of all of that, and they ended up Scotis ended
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Speaker 3: up finding in favor of the Mendies, which were the
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Speaker 3: people that were being held as slaves, found in favor
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Speaker 3: of them, and they were got released. A complex, complex case, uh,
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Speaker 3: and kind of fun. I'd recommend everybody listening to find
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Speaker 3: that movie. And I think what was it called. I
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Speaker 3: think it was called The Amistade.
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Speaker 2: It was simply called Amistad, Yeah, amid Yeah, it cemented,
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Speaker 2: it cemented. John Quincy Adams kind of his name of
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Speaker 2: old man Eloquent because he was brought in near the
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Speaker 2: end of that trial to basically make closing arguments.
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Speaker 3: Yes, you're exactly right, and he he became later in
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Speaker 3: his life. He actually an interesting factoid on him. He
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Speaker 3: died on the house floor. It's kind of like they
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Speaker 3: were in the middle of debate or whatever. Boom wait.
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Speaker 3: John Q was not getting up out of his chair
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Speaker 3: over there. He died on the house floor. But late
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Speaker 3: in his career he was very vehemently anti slavery. He
14:02
Speaker 3: was against the annexation of Texas. He was a very
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Speaker 3: outspoken on those kinds of issues. I think That's probably
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Speaker 3: why he moved from party to party, is the parties
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Speaker 3: left him and he payed true to what he believed in.
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Speaker 3: Although early in his career he was a little bit
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Speaker 3: of a Federalist that then kind of went more Jeffersonian
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Speaker 3: and then they all were shifting like crazy. And if
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Speaker 3: you look at parties now, try to tell me who's
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Speaker 3: the States Right Party, Who's the Individual Freedom Party. They're
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Speaker 3: all over the place, and in those days they were
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Speaker 3: really all over the place. Here was a formulation of
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Speaker 3: a country, and the foundation for who we are now
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Speaker 3: really got laid during the time of Madison, Monroe, Adams
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Speaker 3: and Jackson as to what we were going to be
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Speaker 3: as a country. We give a lot more credit to
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Speaker 3: to Washington and Adams and the early founder and Jefferson.
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Speaker 3: I think these guys were the ones that were the
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Speaker 3: foundation was laid, and these guys are the ones that
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Speaker 3: were putting the bricks and mortar and the structure in place.
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Speaker 2: Doctor Moore as always good stuff, fascinating look into history,
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Speaker 2: and we appreciate the time.
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Speaker 3: Feel better, always great, Thank you, sir, Talk to you.
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Speaker 2: Soon, Doctor Ed Moore with us. Let me ask you,
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Speaker 2: what where would you put John Quincy Adams's greatest impact
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Speaker 2: in the years serving before becoming president when he wrote
15:32
Speaker 2: the Monroe Doctrine. He wrote it, he authored it as
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Speaker 2: president or afterwards, serving in Congress for seventeen years and
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Speaker 2: arguing before the Supreme Court and winning one of the
15:46
Speaker 2: most important cases of its time. Fascinating life John Quincy
15:51
Speaker 2: Adams a little more history on The Morning Show.