reconciliation with Great Britain was impossible; and was therefore one of the most conspicuous members who were appointed to draft the ever memorable Declaration of Independence, which, after considerable discussion, was passed July 4, 1776, declaring these United States free, sovereign, and independent.

In the next year, Mr. Adams was appointed joint commissioner with Drs. Franklin and Lee, to proceed to the court of Versailles, to negotiate a treaty of alliance and commerce.

In 1779 he returned home, and was elected a member of the convention which met to frame a constitution for his native state. In this assemblage of talents and wisdom, his labours as a statesman were pre-eminent; and the constitution indebted for many of her most excellent provisions.

In 1780, he was commissioned by congress to proceed to Europe, to conciliate the favour and obtain assistance from the powers on the continent, in our arduous struggle for independence. By his superior address he procured from the Dutch, the necessary sums for carrying on the war, as well as concluded a treaty of commerce with the republic of the United Netherlands. He afterwards went to Paris, and assisted in concluding the general peace.

Mr. Adams was next appointed the first minister to the court of Great Britain. During his stay in Europe, he published his celebrated Defence of the Constitutions of the United States, in which he advocates, as the principles of a free government, equal representation, of which number, or property, or both, should be a rule; a total separation of the executive from the legislative power, and of the judicial from both; and a balance in the legislature by three independent, equal branches. "If there is one certain truth," says he, "to be collected from the history of all ages, it is this: that the people's rights and liberties, and the democratical mixture

in a constitution, can never be preserved without a strong executive; or in other words, without separating the executive power from the legislative."

Mr. Adams, after having twice filled the office of vice-president of the United States, was, in the year 1796, called by the almost unanimous suffrage of his fellow citizens, to fill the presidential chair, which had been vacated by the resignation of Washington.

This office he filled with his usual ability until the expiration of the term for which he was elected, when, like his great predecessor, he retired from office, after having faithfully served his country, and contributed to her happiness and prosperity, to spend the remainder of his days as a private citizen.

ADAMS, JOHN QUINCY, LL. D. sixth president of the United States, was born at Braintree, Massachusetts, July 11, 1767. At the age of eleven years he accompanied his father to Europe, and before he had attained the age of eighteen, acquired most of her principal languages, and resided in most of her celebrated capitals.

In 1785, at his own request, he was permitted by his father to return home, and finish his education in his own country. In two years afterwards, he graduated at Harvard college, and commenced the study of the law in the office of the late chief justice Parsons.

In 1790, he was admitted to practice in the courts of Massachusetts, and fixed his residence in Boston.

In 1791, he published a series of papers in the Boston Centinel, under the signature of Publicola, containing remarks upon the first part of Paine's Rights of Man, which excited much public notice in this country, as well as in Europe.

In 1793-4, he published various political essays,

which did honour to his talents, and drew upon him the notice of president Washington, who afterwards selected him for the important post of minister resident to the Netherlands.

From this period, until 1801, he was successively employed as a public minister in Holland, England, and Prussia. And during his residence in the latter country, he concluded a treaty of commerce with that power, to the entire satisfaction of our cabinet.

In 1801, he returned to the United States, and the next year was elected a member of the senate of Massachusetts, and in 1803, of the senate of the United States. He passed, altogether, six years in these two bodies, engaged indefatigably and prominently, in the important questions which occupied their attention.

It was during this perplexing period of public affairs, that he nobly sacrificed the interest of party to that of his country, by which he has more firmly interwoven his name in the annals of his country.

In consequence of his appointment of first Boylston professor of rhetoric and oratory in the university of Cambridge, he resigned his seat in the senate of the United States in the year 1808.

He had no sooner completed a most brilliant course of lectures on rhetoric and oratory, in that renowned institution, when he received, unsolicited, from president Madison, the appointment of minister plenipotentiary to the court of Russia.

In 1813, Mr. Gallatin and Mr. Bayard arrived at St. Petersburg, empowered to negotiate, jointly with Mr. Adams, a treaty of peace with Great Britain, under the mediation of Russia. The British government declined the mediation, but proposed a direct negotiation, which finally took place at Ghent, in 1814, with Mr. Adams as its head, on the American side.

This event is too recent and important, to make it necessary to say any thing further in praise of the

abilities and talents of Mr. Adams, as a diplomatist and statesman.

At the termination of this successful mission, Mr. Adams repaired to London, and there concluded, jointly with Mr. Clay and Mr. Gallatin, a commercial convention. Our government having appointed him, immediately after the ratification of the peace of Ghent, envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary to the British court, he remained in London in that capacity, until the summer of 1817, when he was called home by president Monroe, to fill the office of secretary of state.

To give even an outline of his labours, and of the business which has been done since he has entered upon the duties of this high and responsible office, would swell this article to an immoderate size; we shall therefore content ourselves by briefly enumerating a few leading facts only. Under his instructions, a commercial convention was negotiated with Great Britain in 1818.

In 1819, he signed the Florida treaty with Don Luis de Onis, which gave to us not only the Floridas, and an indemnity of five millions of dollars for our merchants, but the first acknowledged boundary from the rocky mountains to the Pacific.

In 1822, he signed with the ambassador of France, a convention of commerce and navigation, which was unanimously ratified by the senate.

To great talent, Mr. Adams unites unceasing industry and perseverance, and an uncommon facility in the execution of business. He is an excellent classical scholar, and an erudite jurist; and speaks and writes several foreign languages. He has all the penetration and shrewdness necessary to constitute an able diplomatist, united with a capacity to perceive, and the eloquence to enforce, whatever will conduce to the welfare and interests of his country...

AMES, FISHER, LL. D. a distinguished statesman, was born at Dedham, Massachusetts, on the 9th April, 1758. At the age of twelve years, he entered Harvard college, and in 1774, he obtained the degree of bachelor of arts.

After spending several years in revising his studies, and acquiring other solid information, he at length commenced the study of the law, in the office of William Tuder, Esq. of Boston, and was admitted to the bar in 1781.

Rising into life about the period of the American revolution, he took a most lively and affectionate interest in her cause, and appeared with great reputation, as a writer of political essays under the signatures first of Lucius Junius, and afterwards of Camillus. At the bar, young as he was, he was remarked as a pleader of uncommon eloquence, and a counsellor of judgment extraordinary for his years./

In 1788, he was a member of the convention called in that state, for the purpose of ratifying the federal constitution. It was here, that for the first time, his powers of eloquence opened with a splendour that astonished, while it dazzled the assembly and the public.

His celebrated speech on biennial elections, delivered on this occasion, was not only able and conclusive in argument, but was justly regarded as a finished model of parliamentary eloquence.

In 1789, he was elected a representative to congress, and for eight successive years, he was a leadin member of the house of representatives.

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His speech on the appropriation bill for cart Deinto effect our treaty with Great Britain, we city most august specimen of oratory he ever exhibit of and perhaps is not exceeded by any event in the history of eloquence.

In consideration of his rank as a statesman and a scholar, the college of Princeton conferred on him the honorary degree of doctor of laws.