Misplaced Pages

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 71.254.84.160 (talk) at 16:00, 2 November 2007 (→Biography). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Samuel Adams
4th Governor of Massachusetts
In office October 8 1793 – June 2 1797
Lieutenant	Moses Gill
Preceded by	John Hancock
Succeeded by	Increase Sumner
3rd Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts
In office 1789–1793
Governor	John Hancock
Preceded by	Benjamin Lincoln
Succeeded by	Moses Gill
Personal details
Born	September 27 [O.S. September 16] 1722 Boston, Massachusetts
Died	October 2, 1803(1803-10-02) (aged 81) Boston, Massachusetts
Political party	None
Spouse(s)	Elizabeth Checkley, Elizabeth Wells
Signature	File:SamuelAdamsSig.png

Samuel Adams (September 27 [O.S. September 16] 1722 – October 2 1803) was an American statesman, politician, writer and political philosopher, brewer, and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. Adams was instrumental in garnering the support of the colonies for rebellion against Great Britain, eventually resulting in the American Revolution, and was also one of the key architects of the principles of American republicanism that shaped American political culture.

Born in Boston, Massachusetts, Adams was brought up in a religious and politically active family. After being educated at Boston Latin School and Harvard College, Adams became a mercantile businessman, but this proved not to be his vocation and he soon turned to politics, and became an influential political writer and theorist. Adams established himself as one of the voices of opposition to British control in the colonies; he argued that the colonies should withdraw from Great Britain and form a new government. Adams called for the colonists to defend their rights and liberties, and led town meetings in which he drafted written protests against Parliament's colonial tax measures such as the Stamp Act of 1765. Adams played a prominent role during protests against the Stamp Act, and in the events of the Boston Tea Party in 1773. He participated in the Continental Congress. He also advocated the adoption of the Declaration of Independence at the Second Continental Congress.

After the United States declared its independence in 1776, Adams helped write the Massachusetts Constitution with John Adams, his cousin, and James Bowdoin. Afterwards, Adams helped draft the Articles of Confederation. Following the end of the American Revolutionary War, he ran for the House of Representatives in the 1st United States Congressional election, but was unsuccessful in his bid. He was elected Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts in 1789, and after John Hancock's death in 1793, Adams served as the acting governor until he was elected governor in January of the following year. He served in that position until June 1797 when he retired from politics. He died six years later on October 2 1803.

Fuck the police

Legacy

Adams has been regarded as a controversial figure in American history. In his 2006 biography Samuel Adams: Father of the American Revolution, historian Mark Puls describes Adams as a pre-Revolutionary political visionary and leader, who was described as the "Patriarch of Liberty" by Thomas Jefferson and as the "Father of the American Revolution" by others of his time. After Samuel Adams's death, his cousin John stated:

Without the character of Samuel Adams, the true history of the American Revolution can never be written. For fifty years his pen, his tongue, his activity, were constantly exerted for his country without fee or reward.

Samuel Adams had introduced his second cousin John Adams to the political scene in Boston by encouraging him to write for Boston newspapers. In his diaries, John Adams described his cousin as being "always for softness and prudence, where they will do; but is staunch, and stiff, and strict, and rigid, and inflexible in the cause." Adams is associated with laying down the groundwork needed towards solidifying the thirteen colonies. In the pre-Revolutionary days, the patriotic Adams emerged as a leader and a strategic and influential political writer. From 1764, Adams struggled to persuade his fellow colonists to move away from their allegiance to King George III and rise against British control. He was the first leader to proclaim that the British Parliament had no legal authority over America. Adams pioneered strategies of using the media to spread his revolutionary goals and ideas. In his monumental work, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, historian and politician George Bancroft said, "o one had equal influence over the popular mind" in the movement leading up to the war. American philosopher and historian John Fiske ranked Adams second only to George Washington in terms of importance to the founding of the nation.

Still, Adams has been overlooked by many biographers and historians because he did not have a major role in national politics during the time after the United States became an independent nation. More thorough examinations of his record as a leader have produced works depicting Adams in a negative light. In his 1923 biographical work Samuel Adams—Promoter of the American Revolution: A Study of Psychology and Politics, author Ralph V. Harlow portrays Adams as a zealot and a propagandist for the American independence movement. A similar view is also presented in John C. Miller's 1936 biography, Samuel Adams: A Pioneer in Propaganda. More recent works have depicted Adams as a propagandist who used the independence movement to further his own political ambitions, as stated in Russell Kirk's 1974 book The Roots of American Order, in which Kirk labels Adams as a "well-born demagogue".

In her 1980 biographical work The Old Revolutionaries: Political Lives in the Age of Samuel Adams, historian Pauline Maier argues that Adams was not the "grand incendiary" or firebrand of Revolution and was not a mob leader. She says that he took a moderate position based firmly on the English revolutionary tradition that imposed strict constraints on resistance to authority. That belief justified force only against threats to the constitutional rights so grave that the "body of the people" recognized the danger and after all the peaceful means of redress had failed. Within that revolutionary tradition, resistance was essentially conservative, intended to preserve what Adams described in 1748 as "the true object" of patriotic loyalty, "a good legal constitution, which … condemns every instance of oppression and lawless power." It had nothing in common with sedition or rebellion, which Adams, like earlier English writers, charged to officials who sought "illegal power".

Samuel Adams' name has been appropriated for various commercial and non-profit ventures since his death. The most familiar usage stems from his roots as a brewer, and is applied as the brand name for "Samuel Adams: America's World Class Beer", a product of the Boston Beer Company. Adams' name is also used by a pair of non-profit organizations, the Sam Adams Alliance and the Sam Adams Foundation. These groups take their names from Adams in homage of his ability to organize citizens at the local level in order to achieve a national goal.

Further reading

Many of the foremost works on Adams' life are from the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Much of the information in more recent biographies is attributed to these earlier works.

• Alexander, John K. Samuel Adams: America's Revolutionary Politician. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, 2002. ISBN 0-7425-2115-X.
• Beach, Stewart. Samuel Adams, the Fateful Years, 1764–1776. New York: Dodd, Mead, 1965.
• Cushing, Harry A., ed. The Writings of Samuel Adams. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1908. No ISBN available.
• Fischer, David H. Paul Revere's Ride. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994. ISBN 0-19-508847-6.
• Fradin, Dennis B. Samuel Adams: the Father of American Independence. New York: Clarion Books, 1998. ISBN 0-395-82510-5.
• Hosmer, James K. Samuel Adams. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1885. No ISBN available.
• Irvin, Benjamin H. Sam Adams: Son of Liberty, Father of Revolution. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. ISBN 0-19-513225-4.
• Maier, Pauline. From Resistance to Revolution: Colonial Radicals and the Development of American Opposition to Britain, 1765–1776. New York: W. W. Norton, 1992. ISBN 0-393-30825-1.
• Maier, Pauline. The Old Revolutionaries: Political Lives in the Age of Samuel Adams. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1980. ISBN 0-394-51096-8.
• Miller, John C. Sam Adams, Pioneer in Propaganda. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1936. No ISBN available.
• Puls, Mark. Samuel Adams: Father of the American Revolution. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006. ISBN 1-4039-7582-5.
• Wells, William V. The Life and Public Services of Samuel Adams: Being a Narrative of His Acts and Opinions, and of His Agency in Producing and Forwarding the American Revolution, with Extracts From His Correspondence, State Papers, and Political Essays. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1865. No ISBN available.

References

1. Wells, William Vincent (1865). Life and Public Services of Samuel Adams, Being a Narrative on his Acts and Opinions, and of his Agency in Producing and Forwarding the American Revolution with Extracts from his Correspondence, State Papers, and Political Essays. Boston: Little, Brown and Company. pp. Vol. 2, p221.
2. Hosmer, James Kendall (1888). Samuel Adams. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. pp. p402. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help)
3. Puls, Mark (2006). Samuel Adams: Father of the American Revolution. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. pp. p14. ISBN 1-4039-7582-5. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help); Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
4. Puls (2006), p235–237.
5. Puls (2006), p235.
6. Puls (2006), p204–206.
7. Puls (2006), p213–214.
8. Hosmer (1888), p402.
9. Puls (2006), p225.
10. Puls (2006), p14.
11. Adams, John (2000). George W. Carey (ed.). The Political Writings of John Adams. Washington, D.C.: Regnery Gateway. pp. p697. ISBN 0-89526-292-4. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help); Unknown parameter |authorlinks= ignored (help)
12. John Adams, John Adams Papers, diary entry for December 23 1765.
13. Puls (2006), p235.
14. Bancroft (1882), Vol. 3, p77.
15. Hosmer (1888), p370.
16. Puls (2006), p15.
17. ^ Puls (2006), p16
18. Wells (1865), Vol. 1, pp16–17.
19. "The Boston Beer Company—About Us". Boston Beer Company. Retrieved 2007-06-01.
20. "The Sam Adams Alliance—Why Sam Adams?". The Sam Adams Alliance. Retrieved 2007-06-01.

External links

• United States Congress. "Samuel Adams (id: A000045)". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.
• Samuel Adams quotes at Liberty-Tree.ca
• Works by Samuel Adams at Project Gutenberg
• Official Commonwealth of Massachusetts Governor Biography
• Biography by Rev. Charles A. Goodrich, 1856
• Find-A-Grave profile for Samuel Adams

v t e Governors of Massachusetts
Colony (1629–1686)	Endecott Winthrop T. Dudley Haynes Vane Winthrop T. Dudley Bellingham Winthrop Endecott T. Dudley Winthrop Endecott T. Dudley Endecott Bellingham Endecott Bellingham Leverett Bradstreet
Dominion (1686–1689)	J. Dudley Andros Bradstreet
Province (1692–1776)	W. Phips Stoughton Bellomont Stoughton Governor's Council J. Dudley Governor's Council J. Dudley Tailer Shute Dummer Burnet Dummer Tailer Belcher Shirley S. Phips Shirley S. Phips Governor's Council Pownall Hutchinson Bernard Hutchinson Gage
Commonwealth (since 1776)	Hancock Cushing Bowdoin Hancock Adams Sumner Gill Governor's Council Strong Sullivan Lincoln Sr. Gore Gerry Strong Brooks Eustis Morton Lincoln Jr. Davis Armstrong Everett Morton Davis Morton Briggs Boutwell Clifford E. Washburn Gardner Banks Andrew Bullock Claflin W. Washburn Talbot Gaston Rice Talbot Long Butler Robinson Ames Brackett Russell Greenhalge Wolcott Crane Bates Douglas Guild Draper Foss Walsh McCall Coolidge Cox Fuller Allen Ely Curley Hurley Saltonstall Tobin Bradford Dever Herter Furcolo Volpe Peabody Volpe Sargent Dukakis King Dukakis Weld Cellucci Swift Romney Patrick Baker Healey
Italics indicate acting officeholders

Template:Persondata

• American revolutionaries
• Signers of the U.S. Declaration of Independence
• Continental Congressmen
• Governors of Massachusetts
• Lieutenant Governors of Massachusetts
• Members of the Massachusetts House of Representatives
• Adams family
• People from Massachusetts
• People of Massachusetts in the American Revolution
• Massachusetts colonial people
• Harvard University alumni
• History of Boston, Massachusetts
• People from Boston, Massachusetts
• American Congregationalists
• English Americans
• 1722 births
• 1803 deaths