AHC: John Quincy Adams is Remembered as a Great President

[Amadeus]

I recently started a thread which discussed how John Adams, the 2nd US President, could have been remembered as a great President. (Linked here: https://www.alternatehistory.com/fo...ms-is-remembered-as-a-great-president.549131/). Adams' son, John Quincy Adams, is one of my favorite historical figures although he was not a very successful President. When I toured the Adams house in Quincy, Massachusetts, the tour guide said that Adams the Younger had "two successful careers and a Presidency in the middle." This referred to the fact that JQA had a stellar career as a diplomat before becoming President, and he waged a noble crusade against slavery as a Member of Congress after he lost the 1828 presidential election, but his four years in the White House were not that productive. Adams oversaw the construction of various roads and canals, negotiated trade agreements with foreign states which helped the US economy, and he worked to prevent the state of Georgia from removing the Muscogee tribe. But most of Adams' legislative proposals failed in Congress, and he was defeated in a landslide in the 1828 election.

Your challenge is to alter the course of history so that John Quincy Adams is remembered as a great President. I propose a few ideas of my own:
1. Instead of making a deal with Henry Clay after the 1824 election (where Clay endorsed Adams in the contingent 1825 House election in exchange for being appointed Secretary of State), Adams approaches Clay before the election and promises to appoint him Secretary of State in return for his endorsement in the general election. Clay accepts this offer, allowing Adams to win at least a plurality of the popular and electoral votes (if not an outright majority). This prevents charges of a "corrupt bargain" between Adams and Clay, and Andrew Jackson can not claim to be the rightful winner of the 1824 election. Adams has a mandate to govern, making Congress more amenable to passing his ambitious legislative proposals. After scoring a series of legislative wins during his first term, a more popular Adams wins the 1828 election.
2. The 1812 election was relatively close. Had Pennsylvania gone for DeWitt Clinton, James Madison would have lost re-election. An alternative POD would see Clinton win Pennsylvania in 1812, and he appoints John Quincy Adams Secretary of State. After being re-elected in 1816, Clinton endorses Adams as his successor in 1820. If Adams runs for President earlier, he would be running at a time when Jackson's popularity would be weaker so he would be more likely to win an outright majority.
3. Instead of making a deal with Clay after the 1824 election, Adams approaches Jackson and proposes to endorse him in the House election in return for being re-appointed Secretary of State under Jackson. Jackson accepts this deal, and Adams embarks on a third term as Secretary of State under Jackson in 1825. After Jackson is re-elected, he endorses Adams as his successor in 1832 and Adams has a relatively successful Presidency in the 1830s.

 

[Flavius Iulius Maiorianus]

What were Quincy Adams's legislative proposals?

 

[jacob ningen]

What were Quincy Adams's legislative proposals?

Clays American System ie intense infrastructure and industrialization. Fighting the gag rule. Sponsoring the Smithsonian. Trying to get the US to follow the metric system. Think Hamilton Clay and Lincoln.

 

[jacob ningen]

I recently started a thread which discussed how John Adams, the 2nd US President, could have been remembered as a great President. (Linked here: https://www.alternatehistory.com/fo...ms-is-remembered-as-a-great-president.549131/). Adams' son, John Quincy Adams, is one of my favorite historical figures although he was not a very successful President. When I toured the Adams house in Quincy, Massachusetts, the tour guide said that Adams the Younger had "two successful careers and a Presidency in the middle." This referred to the fact that JQA had a stellar career as a diplomat before becoming President, and he waged a noble crusade against slavery as a Member of Congress after he lost the 1828 presidential election, but his four years in the White House were not that productive. Adams oversaw the construction of various roads and canals, negotiated trade agreements with foreign states which helped the US economy, and he worked to prevent the state of Georgia from removing the Muscogee tribe. But most of Adams' legislative proposals failed in Congress, and he was defeated in a landslide in the 1828 election.

Your challenge is to alter the course of history so that John Quincy Adams is remembered as a great President. I propose a few ideas of my own:
1. Instead of making a deal with Henry Clay after the 1824 election (where Clay endorsed Adams in the contingent 1825 House election in exchange for being appointed Secretary of State), Adams approaches Clay before the election and promises to appoint him Secretary of State in return for his endorsement in the general election. Clay accepts this offer, allowing Adams to win at least a plurality of the popular and electoral votes (if not an outright majority). This prevents charges of a "corrupt bargain" between Adams and Clay, and Andrew Jackson can not claim to be the rightful winner of the 1824 election. Adams has a mandate to govern, making Congress more amenable to passing his ambitious legislative proposals. After scoring a series of legislative wins during his first term, a more popular Adams wins the 1828 election.
2. The 1812 election was relatively close. Had Pennsylvania gone for DeWitt Clinton, James Madison would have lost re-election. An alternative POD would see Clinton win Pennsylvania in 1812, and he appoints John Quincy Adams Secretary of State. After being re-elected in 1816, Clinton endorses Adams as his successor in 1820. If Adams runs for President earlier, he would be running at a time when Jackson's popularity would be weaker so he would be more likely to win an outright majority.
3. Instead of making a deal with Clay after the 1824 election, Adams approaches Jackson and proposes to endorse him in the House election in return for being re-appointed Secretary of State under Jackson. Jackson accepts this deal, and Adams embarks on a third term as Secretary of State under Jackson in 1825. After Jackson is re-elected, he endorses Adams as his successor in 1832 and Adams has a relatively successful Presidency in the 1830s.

both of those maybe also the Quasi War goes different

 

[Flavius Iulius Maiorianus]

Clays American System ie intense infrastructure and industrialization. Fighting the gag rule. Sponsoring the Smithsonian. Trying to get the US to follow the metric system. Think Hamilton Clay and Lincoln.

Oh, cool. He was also anti-slavery, correct?

 

[jacob ningen]

Yes especially with the Amistad case in 1840. And died of a stroke in the House opposing the annexation of Texas

 

[jacob ningen]

What were Quincy Adams's legislative proposals?

One of the things that killed his presidency was the Jacksonians passing a bill they themselves wanted vetoed but would deprive JQA of Southern support if it passed beiing protectionist of Northern Industry which is why he would lose his own base the North and especially New England support if he vetoed it. This led to the Nullification crisis of 1832. Which actually if it doesnt butterfly him outright gives another way for him t be remembered better or at least have smoother sailing 3/5 compromise never happpens.

 

[GuildedAgeNostalgia]

Oh, cool. He was also anti-slavery, correct?

Not until after he left the presidency.

 

[GuildedAgeNostalgia]

John Quincy Adams would have respected the Supreme Court and protected the Cherokee and Muscogee.

 

[Amadeus]

John Quincy Adams would have respected the Supreme Court and protected the Cherokee and Muscogee.

A two term JQA presidency would certainly be better for Native Americans. If Jackson never becomes President, then I doubt that the Indian Removal Act is ever passed. Although the Five Tribes could have been forced out by the state governments, it was JQA who fought to prevent that from happening to the Muscogee in Georgia and I imagine that he would do the same in his second term.

 

[ramones1986]

John Quincy Adams would have respected the Supreme Court and protected the Cherokee and Muscogee.

John Quincy Adams would have respected the Supreme Court and protected the Cherokee and Muskoge
A two term JQA presidency would certainly be better for Native Americans. If Jackson never becomes President, then I doubt that the Indian Removal Act is ever passed. Although the Five Tribes could have been forced out by the state governments, it was JQA who fought to prevent that from happening to the Muscogee in Georgia and I imagine that he would do the same in his second term.

I wonder how he would tackle the Native American grievances.

 

[Flavius Iulius Maiorianus]

So from what I can gather, a more successful, two term Quincy Adams would:

1. Stick up for Native Americans much more than the OTL US did
2. Push through infrastructure improvements, though he was generally successful at this in OTL
3. Oppose slavery, though what form this opposition would take I'm not sure
4. Persue policies that favor industrialization and commercialization, strengthening the north
5. At the same time, try to build a more national economy to smooth over regional differences
6. Protect the national bank
7. Avoid conflicts with other countries
8. Attempt to buy Texas from Mexico
9. Give more support for the sciences
10. Establish a national university

Might we see some more progress made towards womens' rights? After all, Quincy Adams spoke up for the rights of women to petition in OTL when opposing the gag rule.

 

[GuildedAgeNostalgia]

I wonder how he would tackle the Native American grievances.

He would pressure Native Americans to assimilate into the United States. He protected Native Americans but he certainly was not their friend and had a "white man's burden" mindset towards them.

He wouldn't outright murder them and force them West, but his expectations was that the US is going to move West whether they like it or not and the Native Americans would need to adopt private property rights, learn English and naturalize into American citizens, and he would certainly pressure them to do it.

Example to look at is the Eastern Band of Cherokee, but apply that to all Native Americans.

At the same time though he will tell the state of Georgia to fuck off and respect federal authority on the matter, and he will respect the will of the Supreme Court.

 

[C. McKay]

Would the slaveholding states have tried to secede? If so, how might JQA have reacted?

 

[Amadeus]

He would pressure Native Americans to assimilate into the United States. He protected Native Americans but he certainly was not their friend and had a "white man's burden" mindset towards them.

He wouldn't outright murder them and force them West, but his expectations was that the US is going to move West whether they like it or not and the Native Americans would need to adopt private property rights, learn English and naturalize into American citizens, and he would certainly pressure them to do it.

Example to look at is the Eastern Band of Cherokee, but apply that to all Native Americans.

At the same time though he will tell the state of Georgia to fuck off and respect federal authority on the matter, and he will respect the will of the Supreme Court.

This seems problematic, but at least it is better than what Jackson and many other politicians of the day wanted to do.

Would the slaveholding states have tried to secede? If so, how might JQA have reacted?

If Adams still signs the 1828 Tariff or something similar, South Carolina may try to nullify it but I imagine that they back down for the same reasons as in OTL. Slavery was not as a powerful political issue in this time period, and secession was a relatively rare viewpoint held by a small minority of people even within the South itself. It wasn't until the 1850s that the idea of secession started to become taken seriously within the South as a whole.

 

[jacob ningen]

Would the slaveholding states have tried to secede? If so, how might JQA have reacted?

Probably not they still have enough power in the Senate and House that Calhoun in 1832 notwithstanding they are content to wield the legislative power for the time being and with an eye to take back the executive in 4 years. At this point the only two non-Virginian presidents were the John Adams father son duo. In the Clintonian scenario maybe. In 1 and 3 probably not in 2 it may happen.

 

[Mildtryth]

John Quincy Adams would have respected the Supreme Court and protected the Cherokee and Muscogee.

Would he, though?

OTL, when the government basically "acquired" all Muscogee lands in a fraudulent treaty, Adams tried to suspend the cession and negotiated a new agreement restoring a small portion of their lands, but when the governor of Georgia decided to go through with taking the land given in the first treaty anyway and threatened to fight it out if the federal government insisted on interfering, Adams folded. I don't really see what could cause him to be firmer on that situation:

Of special interest to land-hungry Georgians, planters and backcountry farmers alike, were nearly five million acres of rich cotton lands, lying between the Chattahoochee and Flint rivers in the northwestern part of the state, legally occupied by Creeks and Cherokees. Since 1802, the Indian tribes had lost huge tracts of land in extortionate federal treaties. By the 1820s, the Indians were fed up, and the Monroe administration, led by Secretary of War Calhoun, agreed to let them stay put. But Governor Troup, working with a part-Creek cousin of his named William McIntosh, arranged for a total cession of Creek lands with paltry compensation in the so-called Treaty of Indian Springs, signed on February 12, 1825. Amid the confusion following Adams’s election as president, the Senate quickly approved the treaty, and Adams agreed to it—but after learning about its fraudulence, he suspended the cession. Governor Troup forced a crisis by ordering a survey of the lands in question preparatory to their distribution by lottery. On the Indian question, Troup insisted, the federal government was now powerless to interfere with the State of Georgia [...] Embarrassed by the Indian Springs treaty, the administration tried to save face by negotiating a second agreement, the Treaty of Washington, which restored to the Creeks a tiny portion of their original lands and which the Senate duly ratified. But Governor Troup and the Georgia legislature, smelling blood, refused to recognize the new agreement, then ordered the commanders of two Georgia militia divisions to prepare to repel a hostile federal invasion.
In an inflammatory declaration sent to Secretary of War James Barbour, Troup scorned federal authority: From the first decisive act of hostility, you will be considered and treated as a public enemy; and, with the less repugnance, because you, to whom we might constitutionally have appealed for our own defense against invasion, are yourselves the invaders, and, what is more, the unblushing allies of the savages whose cause you have adopted. Troup’s constitutional presumptions were veering toward what would soon be an even more radical theory of undivided state sovereignty. [...] Yet after the White House announced it would, if necessary, meet force with force, first the Senate and then President Adams yielded to the Georgians and allowed them to regain the entirely of the Creek lands and commerce the Creeks’ final expulsion. In the first menacing assertion of what came to be known as southern state-rights sectionalism, Adams permitted the nation to surrender to a state.

 

[Amadeus]

Would he, though?

OTL, when the government basically "acquired" all Muscogee lands in a fraudulent treaty, Adams tried to suspend the cession and negotiated a new agreement restoring a small portion of their lands, but when the governor of Georgia decided to go through with taking the land given in the first treaty anyway and threatened to fight it out if the federal government insisted on interfering, Adams folded. I don't really see what could cause him to be firmer on that situation:

It sounds like Wilentz is spinning the situation to blame Indian Removal on Adams in order to paint Jackson in a more positive light by making it look like his most insidious act was not *really* his fault.

 

[GuildedAgeNostalgia]

Would he, though?

OTL, when the government basically "acquired" all Muscogee lands in a fraudulent treaty, Adams tried to suspend the cession and negotiated a new agreement restoring a small portion of their lands, but when the governor of Georgia decided to go through with taking the land given in the first treaty anyway and threatened to fight it out if the federal government insisted on interfering, Adams folded. I don't really see what could cause him to be firmer on that situation:

I don't think Adams "folded". According to Wiki a showdown between Georgia and the Federal Government was avoided when the Muscogee agreed to a third treaty, making the issue null and void.

 

[Amadeus]

I don't think Adams "folded". According to Wiki a showdown between Georgia and the Federal Government was avoided when the Muscogee agreed to a third treaty, making the issue null and void.

I agree with this interpretation. I have not read the rest of Sean Wilentz's book, but this excerpt seems to portray Indian Removal as an inevitability that Jackson inherited from a weak President. This is similar to some of the scholarship I have read by Jackson apologists who undermine or whitewash his role in Indian Removal by placing the blame on Georgia.

Following the Treaty of Washington, the Creeks were removed from Georgia in 1827 but they were not removed from the South. Instead they were relocated to Alabama. Wilentz (at least in this excerpt) does not explain that it was Jackson who advocated the removal of the Creeks from the South entirely, after the issue had apparently been settled under Adams, and it was Jackson who aggressively pushed for the passage of the Indian Removal Act to force the Creeks and other tribes into what is now Oklahoma. The bill passed by a margin of five votes in the House, and it passed because of Jackson's advocacy of the bill. If not for Jackson, the bill would not have passed and the "Five Civilized Tribes" would not likely have been forced west of the Mississippi River. The blame for Indian Removal should lie squarely at Jackson's feet, whatever his apologists may say.