John Adams to Congress and the Judiciary

To the assembled powers of Congress and to the guardians of the law. John Adams, once servant of the Republic, now writes with the indignation of Heaven itself.

“Gentlemen and Ladies entrusted with the sacred offices of the Constitution,

When I stood with my compatriots in the heat of the Revolution, when the ink upon our Declaration was not yet dry, when the gallows and the musket stood waiting should we falter, it was not for trifles that we pledged our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor. It was for the establishment of a government of laws, and not of men.

And yet, surveying the present age, I cannot but ask: has that sacred promise been forgotten? For I behold in your chambers a spectacle most grievous; representatives who bow not to reason nor to conscience, but to party, ambition, and the purse of faction. I see judges who were sworn to impartial justice yet are spoken of as the partisans of men and the defenders of corruption. What greater betrayal could there be than that the very sentinels of liberty should open the gates to tyranny?

The Constitution, which we labored to frame, was no idol, no ornament to be bent at pleasure. It was designed as a chain upon ambition, a bridle upon corruption, and a refuge for the people against every species of oppression. But what avail are parchment barriers if those appointed to uphold them trample upon their plain meaning? You have suffered executive power to swell beyond its due bounds, you have countenanced the intrusion of wealth into every vein of the body politic, and you have permitted the very notion of truth to be drowned in the clamors of faction.

I tremble to behold that which we most feared; not foreign conquest, but domestic decay. For republics, like men, seldom perish by blows from without, but rot from within, when virtue is abandoned and honor sold. The Roman Senate did not fall to Hannibal, but to the corruption of its own patricians. If you, the chosen guardians of America, prefer the favor of mobs and magnates to the stern voice of justice, then you will prove yourselves the undertakers of the Republic.

To the Congress I say this: remember you are not courtiers of a king, nor flatterers of power. You are trustees of a people. To betray their confidence for party gain is perfidy of the highest order. Debate, disagree, contend with vigor, but remember always that you sit beneath the constitution, not above it.

To the Judiciary I say: recall that justice must be seen to be blind, not peering through the lens of factions. If the bench becomes but another council of partisans, then the sword of the law is broken, and the Republic left defenseless.

I speak not in malice, but in warning. If you do not reform your conduct, if you do not remember that liberty is a flame easily extinguished, then history shall record that the heirs of Washington and Lincoln surrendered the temple of the constitution for baubles and applause.

Posterity will ask: did they not hear the warnings of their forefathers? Did they not know that republics rest on virtue? And if your answer is silence, then you shall stand condemned by the tribunal of eternity.

Awake, therefore, before it is too late. Govern with honesty, judge with integrity, and remember that you are but stewards of a trust far greater than yourselves. Let not the tree of liberty, watered with the blood of patriots, be consumed by your neglect.

So writes, with a heavy heart but unyielding hope, John Adams, 2nd President of the United States and Servant of Posterity.

-From the desk of Heaven’s Secretary, Abby Jo Adams, in the voice of John Adams

Subscribe now