not only affected the interests of the United States, but were added elements to inflame the party contests at home.

In 1804, Bonaparte stepped from the Consul chamber to the throne of the French Empire. All Europe was bending to his giant rule. Great Britain alone, with characteristic and inherent stubbornness, had set itself as a rock against his ambitious aspirations, and prosecuted with unabated vigor its determined hostility to all his measures of trade and of conquest. In November, 1807, the British Government issued the celebrated "Orders in Council," forbidding all trade with France and her allies. This measure was met by Napoleon, in December, with his "Milan Decree," prohibiting every description of commerce with England or her colonies. Between these checks and counterchecks of European nations, the commerce of the United States was in peril of being swept entirely from the ocean.

During most of this perplexed and trying period, Mr. J. Q. Adams retained his seat in the United States Senate. Although sent there by the suffrages of the Federal party, in the Massachusetts Legislature, yet he did not, and would not, act simply as a partisan. This in fact was a prominent characteristic in Mr. Adams throughout his entire life, and is the key which explains many of his acts otherwise inexplicable. His noble and patriotic spirit arose above the shackles of party. He loved the interests of his country, the happiness of

MAN, more than the success of a mere party. So far as the party with which he acted advocated measures which he conceived to be wise and healthful, he yielded his hearty and vigorous co-operation. But whenever it swerved from this line of integrity, his influence was thrown into the opposite scale. This was the rule of his long career. No persuasions or emoluments, no threats, no intimidations, could turn him from it, to the breadth of a hair. It was in consequence of this characteristic, that it has so frequently been said of Mr. Adams, that he was not a reliable party man. This was to a degree true. He was not reliable for any policy adopted simply to promote party interests, and secure party ends. But in regard to all measures which in his judgment would advance the welfare of the people, secure the rights of man, and elevate the race, no politician, no statesman the world has produced, could be more perfectly relied upon.

This disposition to act right, whether with or against his party, was developed by the first vote he ever gave in a legislative body. While in the Massachusetts Senate, the Federalists were the dominant party. It was the custom in that State, to choose the whole of the Governor's Council from the party which had the majority in the Legislature. In May, 1802, Mr. Adams was desirous that a rule should be adopted more regardful of the rights of the minority. He accordingly proposed that several anti-Federalists should have seats

in the Council of Gov. Strong, and gave his first vote to that measure.

On a certain occasion, Mr. Adams was asked, "What are the recognized principles of politics?" He replied, that there were no principles in politics-there were recognized precepts, but they were bad ones. But, continued the inquirer, is not this a good one-"To seek the greatest good of the greatest number ?" No, said he, that is the worst of all, for it looks specious, while it is ruinous. What shall become of the minority, in that case? This is the only principle to seek"the greatest good of all."*

A few months after Mr. Adams' entrance into the Senate of the United States, a law was passed by Congress, at the suggestion of Mr. Jefferson, authorizing the purchase of Louisiana. Mr. Adams deemed this measure an encroachment on the Constitution of the United States, and opposed it on the ground of its unconstitutionality. He was one of six senators who voted against it. Yet when the measure had been legally consummated, he yielded it his support. In passing laws for the government of the territory thus obtained, the right of trial by jury was granted only in capital cases. Mr. Adams labored to have it extended to all criminal offences. Before the territory had a representative in Congress, the government proposed to levy a tax on the people for purposes of revenue. This attempt met the decided opposition of Mr. Adams.

* Massachusetts Quarterly, June, 1848.

He insisted it would be an exercise of government, without the consent of the governed, which, to all intents, is a despotism.

In 1805, he labored to have Congress pass a law levying a duty on the importation of slaves. This was the first public indication of his views on the subject of slavery. It was a premonition of the bold, unflinching, noble warfare against that institution, and of the advocacy of human freedom and human rights in the widest sense, which characterized the closing scenes of his remarkable career, and which will perpetuate his fame, when other acts of his life shall have passed from the remembrance of men. Although at that early day but little was said in regard to slavery, yet the young senator saw it was fraught with danger to the Union -conferring political power and influence on slaveholders, on principles false and pernicious, and calculated ultimately to distract the harmony of the country, and endanger the permanency of our free institutions. He labored, therefore, to check the increase of slave power, by the only means which, probably, appeared feasible at that time.

But a crisis in his senatorial career at length ar rived. The commerce of the United States had suffered greatly by "Orders in Council," and "Milan Decrees." Our ships were seized, conducted into foreign ports and confiscated, with their cargoes. American seamen were impressed by British cruisers, and compelled to serve in a foreign navy. The American

rigate Chesapeake, while near the coast of the United States, on refusing to give up four men claimed to be British subjects, was fired into by the English man-ofwar Leopard, and several of her crew killed and wounded. These events caused the greatest excitement in the United States. Petitions, memorials, remonstrances, were poured in upon Congress from every part of the Union. Mr. Jefferson endeavored by embassies, negotiations, and the exertion of every influence in his power, to arrest these destructive proceedings, and obtain a redress of grievances. But all was in vain. At length he determined on an embargo, as the only means of securing our commerce from the grasp of the unscrupulous mistress of the seas. An act to that effect was passed in Dec., 1807. This ef fectually prostrated what little foreign commerce had been left to the United States.

In these proceedings Mr. Jefferson was stoutly opposed by the Federal party. Massachusetts, then the chief commercial State in the Union, resisted with its utmost influence the Embargo Act, as pre-eminently destructive to its welfare, and looked to its Senators and Representatives in Congress to urge an opposition to the extreme. What course should Mr. Adams adopt? On the one hand, personal friendship, the party which elected him to the Senate, the immediate interests of his constituents, called upon him to oppose the measures of the administration. On the other hand, more enlarged considerations presented themselves.