Papers of John Adams, volume 20
th[
May] 1790
I have received with a mixture of pleasure and gloomy melancholy
your favour of the 17th. What motives the eastern members
can have to support the silly petition of Franklin and his Quakers, I never could
conceive: but it was not that conduct which sowered the minds of the Southern members
against an assumption of the State debts. The seat of government is more likely to have
had such an effect on some minds.1 What
is the reason that bills should be ten or twelve per Ct below par here, and only five at
Boston The demand from Europe for grain would not alone have produced so great and
sudden a change in the price of bills. The sudden rise of stock which was certainly
occasioned by the new government contributed a great share to this symptom of
prosperity. If no measures would ever be 358 carried in the State
Legislature to encourage the fisheries I leave you to Judge whether it is probable that
bounties can be obtained from the general government.
Ships before the revolution were built upon British capitals. There
are no capitals in Boston I fear but such as consist in credits to the nation or the
State or employed in speculations in the Stocks. The carrying trade is the only resource
for shipbuilding. The English are in possession of this. They not only have ships ready;
but they own the crops for the most part. To dispossess the English from this business
requires a system of measures and a course of time and our people are so fickle and
unsteady, that it is doubtfull whether they would bear with patience the trial of a fair
experiment The Massachusetts a few years ago, made a navigation act, which if it had
been preserved to this day would in my opinion have found full employment for her
shipwrights: but Mr Sullivan and Parson Thatcher, I heard in
London became declaimers if not preachers against it and it was repealed.2 If Congress should make a similar law, it will
be opposed by powerful interests, who will continually grumble against it and there is
neither vigour nor constancy enough in the government, I am afraid, to persevere. That
Congress will take some measures to bring into circulation the monies locked up, I
cannot doubt. This must be done— I am assured that considerable sums of money are
ordered to America from Europe, so that I hope we shall not have so great a scarcity of
money long. The State debts, I fear will not be assumed this session.
Without a national government and steady measures we shall never be prosperous, and there is too powerful a party in Massachusetts against both. I hope we shall see better times, but my hopes are not sanguine
Yours &c
LbC in CA’s hand (Adams Papers); internal address: “Thomas Crafts
Esqr Boston”; APM Reel 115.
By late spring, congressional battle lines were drawn over two
major issues: settling war debts and siting the capital. Within Congress,
Massachusetts and South Carolina favored the federal assumption of state debts, while
Virginia and North Carolina stood opposed to it. An antislavery petition, submitted by
Benjamin Franklin, complicated both sets of debates. James Madison joined New England
representatives in supporting calls to end slavery, but he led the opposition in the
House of Representatives regarding assumption (Elkins and McKitrick, Age of
Federalism
, p. 147, 152, 160).
The Mass. General Court’s navigation act of 23 June 1785
prohibited imports sent via British ships, restricted foreign ships to entering only
three regional ports, and laid duties on all other foreign ships that were double
those paid by American ships. Massachusetts politician James Sullivan backed the
measures, but he worried that internal division 359 and a love of
luxury kept Americans under Great Britain’s economic sway, writing: “Our Merchants
have a supreme regard to her Commerce perhaps the large Sums they owe there keeps them
in Awe.” Peter Thacher (1752–1802), Harvard 1769, who was the General Court’s
chaplain, sided with Sullivan. On 29 Nov. 1790 Massachusetts lawmakers repealed the
restrictions and heavy duties on foreign vessels, retaining the provisions against
British ships (vol. 17:83,
535, 605;
Sibley’s Harvard
Graduates
, 17:237, 245, 246).
Having an opportunity of writing by Mr Rutledge1 I embrace it with
great pleasure to convey to you a few lines & some tracts & to convince you
that you are often in my memory & could I find conveyances easy you would hear
often from me being interested in the progress that Novi homines new men make in
virtue & knowledge.
The state of the publick in general is astonishingly changed since we parted & I see with rapture the scenes which are opening on this world of ours from the English revolution the seeds of Freedom were sown you encouraged & promoted their progress to a Surprising degree of perfection the French Nation tho suffering from every quarter the utmost indignities that human nature could bear were not deterred from aiding & assisting the culture till at last the Sun of Liberty arose with healing in his wings & with undiminished splendor brought forth fruits worthy of Paradise to maintain envigorate & illumine mankind.
This last revolution being supernatural the hand of heaven is
still with them to effect greater purposes This affair of Nootka Sound will have its
consequences whither a war or not it will open that sea to America2 Khamchatzar will be well known Japan will be
practised & open to people of that Hemisphere Mexico will be independent Quebeck
will gain a free constitution not granted by the English & United with America3 the Chinese will alter their manners the
Malese will navigate those seas as the inhabitants of sandwich Island do at present in
American ships— Persia India Tibet & the great Lama will be accessible Asia will
throw of her Tyrants Egypt will be formed by the French into a regular government
& Africa cease to be the market for slaves but enjoy their native innocent &
peace which will prevail all over the world in spight of the Despots. the time is
approaching fast when Dr Jebbs wish will be
accomplished.4 a general hunt of
kings—in this universal regeneration I fear England will be the last.
when we consider how rapidly the french revolution took place like 360 an electrical stroke we may hope such great events are not very distance & to the improvement of government Franklyn’s Idea may succeed that old age may be kept of & even life prolonged for a great period if not continued.5 do not think me wild Some of these events have happened & the progress of science & knowledge promise the consequences.
Bruce’s travels to Abyssinia are published at length have just begun it—to condemn it is the fashion for wch there may be some reasons but it opens almost a new part of the world & there are many valuable facts the stile is that of a proud man unpractised in the mechanism of writing— the designs of antique buildings of wch he had many have been purchased some time past with publick money & kept from that publick which ought to have been gratified with the publication of them for which they have paid & are willing to pay liberally!6
Poor Lidiard the American was lost for want of money probably he
was to have gone to the internal parts of Africa from Cairo— it seems there is a tract
from the River Gambia or serra leone of 700 miles mostly by water to mourzouk capital
of Fezzan & Gonjah is only 46 days from Assenti the gold coast—wch is much shorter than from Tripoli wch is 3000 miles & through desarts
a pompous book is printed but not sold!
two large black cities inland Cushnak & Bornou civilized & mahomitons—perfect religious liberty—they are larger than tripoli—Caravans go there7
The dissenters for want of proper spirit have again lost their cause but the subject is more genally understood & next application will come with greater force & strength—8 Vailliants account of Africa is a valuable work He reinstates the Apron & the Cameliopardalis of Pliny9 the tract on The Feudal tenure is by a friend of yrs a good & excellent performance10
my best compts to Mrs Adams herself & family are in perfect health at the
Hide which I wish her sincerely to enjoy with her family—compts to mr & mrs smith
and am Dear Sir with great esteem / Your affectionate friend
In the chronicle of Kings is there an instance of a Jewish King having 6 millions in bank & 12 hundred thousand a year coming to his people to pay his Doctors bill?. in a recent application the struggle was who Should give most as it is said not to be a question which concerns the civil list!.11
RC (Adams Papers); endorsed by CA: “Thomas / Brand Hollis / May 28— 90”; notation by CFA: “T. B. Hollis. / May 28. 1790.”
John Rutledge Jr. was returning to the United States following
his grand tour of Europe, for which see vol. 19:215. He sailed from Falmouth, England, on the British packet
Chesterfield, Capt. Schuyler, and reached New York City
on 2 Aug. (New-York Journal, 3 Aug.).
Competition for the lucrative fur trade and access to the Northwest Passage drew British, Spanish, and Russian merchants to the largely undeveloped trading post of Nootka Sound, located on the coast of present-day Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. For the diplomatic crisis that challenged American neutrality throughout the summer and autumn of 1790, see John Brown Cutting’s letter of 3 June, and note 1, below.
Responding to loyalists’ dissatisfaction with the terms of the
1774 Quebec Act, Parliament passed the Constitutional Act of 1791, splitting the
province into Upper and Lower Canada. Each region operated under a separate government
with a representative assembly and a governor (Donald Grant Creighton, The Commercial Empire of the St. Lawrence 1760–1850,
Toronto, 1937, p. 114–115).
Under John Jebb’s ideal constitution, the people were empowered
to bestow and to revoke the status of monarchs and nobility (Anthony Page, John Jebb and the Enlightenment Origins of British
Radicalism, Westport, Conn., 2003, p. 203).
Writing to Joseph Priestley on 8 Feb. 1780, Benjamin Franklin
speculated that “all Diseases may by sure means be prevented or cured, not excepting
even that of Old Age, and our Lives lengthened at pleasure even beyond the
antediluvian Standard” (Franklin,
Papers
, 31:455–456).
Scottish explorer James Bruce (1730–1794), of Kinnaird, published
Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile, 5 vols.,
Edinburgh, 1790. During his travels in Algiers and Tunis, Bruce made three volumes of
drawings of classical ruins that he presented to George III (
DNB
).
Great Britain’s African Association hired American explorer John
Ledyard to travel south from Egypt. Ledyard arrived in Cairo in Aug. 1788 but died of
a “bilious disorder” several months later. Hollis read an excerpt of secretary Henry
Beaufoy’s Proceedings of the African Association, London,
1790, which had appeared in the London St. James’s
Chronicle, 8 April 1790, and described the trading capitals of Cashnah (now
Katsina, Nigeria) and the former empire of Bornu, Nigeria (vol. 18:96; A. Adu Boahen, “The
African Association, 1788–1805,” Transactions of the
Historical Society of Ghana, 5:45, 56 [1961]).
For the parliamentary debates over the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, see Hollis’ letter of 29 March, and note 7, above.
Pliny the Elder wrote about wild boars and giraffes in the eighth
book of his Natural History, as did François Le Vaillant
in his Travels from the Cape of Good-Hope, into the Interior
Parts of Africa, 2 vols., London, 1790, 2:184, 457.
Hollis meant the Abbé de Mably’s Observations sur l’histoire de France, Geneva, 1765, a copy of which is in
JA’s library at MB.
Widely reprinted in 1788, Mably’s work chronicled the social history of rural
feudalism and aristocratic tyranny (vol. 17:72;
Catalogue of JA’s Library
).
Under the Civil List Act of 1782, Parliament oversaw the
expenditures of the monarchy. On 17 May 1790 George III requested a pension for his
doctor, Francis Willis (1718–1807), of Lincoln, England. Ten days later, Parliament
granted Willis an annual sum of £1,000 for 21 years (vol. 19:195; London St. James’s Chronicle, 18, 29 May, 8 July;
DNB
).