Britain responded harshly to the Boston Tea Party and effectively closed the Port of Boston to outside trade and rigged the Massachusetts Council with royal appointees. However, contrary to earlier actions, Bostonians showed few signs of weakening in the face of harsh British treatment. Adams's long-time ploy of provoking the British to the point of punishing the colonies was paying off. Every punishment and tribulation now only underscored Adams's warnings of tyranny and oppression and helped to unite the colonies. Adams crafted the "Solemn League and Covenant," which suspended all colonial trade with Britain until the restrictions on the Boston port were lifted.
The sweeping agreement went far beyond earlier nonimportation agreements, and the citizens of Massachusetts were sure that the British bankers–who had extended more than four million pounds' worth of loans to colonists–would not let the British government throw the colonies away. Adams knew such an agreement would force Britain to act. Although heartily adopted in Massachusetts, the agreement met resistance in other colonies. Adams had seriously misjudged his national support, particularly that of the middle and southern colonies. New York countered with the idea of a Continental Congress, where the various colonies could meet to draw up a list of grievances and adopt a "national" policy. Adams gladly agreed, as he had been urging such a meeting since 1773.
Adams joined delegation
When Massachusetts voted to send delegates to the Congress, Adams proudly joined the delegation. Still remarkably poor, his friends first outfitted him with "dressy" clothes (including a new wig) and paid for his travel to Philadelphia. The delegates traveled in comfortable style to Philadelphia and along the way met a hearty reception: church bells and cannons greeted them in Connecticut and the New York merchants treated the group to the best dinner John Adams had ever seen.
ORIGINAL LETTER to John Hancock, from distributors of East India tea, November 18, 1773.
However nice the journey, the delegates met with hostility from many other delegates once they arrived. Several colonies, most of them southern, feared that Massachusetts would attempt to seize control of the colonies if Britain left. The Bostonians' dogma was far advanced from that of the south and mid- Atlantic colonies. However, their fears expressed only an ignorance of Samuel Adams, since much of his political theory stemmed from Locke, who had argued that the purpose of government was to protect property.
Working with Lee and Gadsden
Thus, Adams and the other Massachusetts delegates tried to alleviate the concerns of the other delegates by lying low through the early days of the convention. Adams worked closely behind the scenes with Virginian Richard Henry Lee and Christopher Gadsden of South Carolina to carry out the intended course of the Congress. The patriots' most determined opponent, though, was Joseph Galloway of Pennsylvania.
On September 28, 1774, Galloway, while acknowledging the power of Parliament, introduced his plan for America and Britain to form a strong "political union." In Galloway's plan, the colonies would be governed by an American Grand Council, the equivalent of a local Parliament, and a Crown-appointed Resident General would oversee the Council. By a vote of six to five, the Congress agreed to continue the bill's deliberations the following day. But Adams stopped it cold that night, by inflaming a Philadelphia mob to the point that Galloway feared for life if the bill came up again.
Before leaving for the Congress, Adams had asked that his supporters in Massachusetts rally and pass resolutions in protest of Britain's policies. When the Suffolk Resolves–which denied the legitimacy of the Port Bill, urged defensive preparations and ordered committees of correspondence to ready militias–arrived in Philadelphia it took a long, hot debate before the Congress would agree to them. The resolves became the equivalent of a mutual defense clause, and it implied that an attack on Boston would be responded to with military force from across the colonies. The Congress also passed a less- sweeping version of the Solemn Covenant, but none doubted the measures would still have an effect. Richard Henry Lee wrote that he believed the ship that carried news of the Congress to England would return with a promise of compromise and reconciliation by the Crown.
Anti-British tempers flared throughout the colonies. When a rumor announced that six men had been killed by British troops in Boston, thousands of armed men from Connecticut, Rhode Island, and New York set off to drive the British armies back into the sea–only to turn back when word reached them that the rumor was false. Meanwhile, Adams returned to Boston to find it radically changed. Tories from across the area had fled into the city rather than take their chances in the patriotic countryside. Suddenly Boston, guarded by British troops and men-of-war, had become a Tory safe-haven. Orders arrived for the British troops to find and arrest Adams and other leading patriots, but Adams fled safely to Lexington along with John Hancock before the British could locate him.
British troops marched on Lexington
On April 18, 1775, British troops marched on Lexington and Concord in an attempt to locate supposed stores of weaponry that had been massed there for possible rebellion. Alerted by several riders, including Paul Revere, colonial militiamen lay in wait for the troops. Fighting broke out on the Lexington Green, and Adams–hiding nearby–remarked, "Oh, what a glorious morning is this!" The redcoats fought a running battle with the Continental soldiers, called Minutemen, all the way back to Boston.
As war began, the Continental Congress met to chose a commanding general for the fledgling military. George Washington, a delegate from Virginia, was the only member of the group to appear in a military uniform, and thus after much hemming and hawing, John Adams placed his name in nomination for the post. Sam Adams had much wanted to see a New Englander in charge of the army but realized that such a move was unpopular among the southerners. When Sam Adams rose to second Washington's nomination, Hancock turned pale. He had long hoped to be the commander, and the split ended his friendship with both Adamses for the remainder of the war.
Independence from Britain
The next issue for the Congress proved to be more divisive. Both Adamses now pushed for the Congress to declare independence from Britain, a move that the southern conservatives were loathe to make. Over the coming months, John and Sam Adams made many enemies in the Congress, and for a while, John Adams found himself almost an outcast. They argued that the tardiness in declaring independence made the colonies seem weak and helped strengthen Tory resolve. Instead, the Congress waited until the British attacks had grown to such a point where it was forced to declare independence.
By then, Sam Adams was recognized across the colonies as the leader of the revolutionaries. Thomas Jefferson called him the "Man of the Revolution," and one Tory called him the "Machiavelli of Chaos." More popularly, though, he had become known as the "Father of America." However popular or infamous he might have been across the country, though, Adams showed a marked lack of statesmanship. His career in the Congress was marred by missteps, fights, and scandals, and he never achieved the level of recognition that other members did, even of his cousin John.
America is Born
After the Continental Congress, Sam Adams returned to his home of Boston to try to restore order in an increasingly chaotic atmosphere. Massachusetts had long before fallen behind other states in forming a constitution and a stable form of self-government. By 1779, when a Constitutional Convention was called and both John Adams and Sam Adams were nominated as delegates, the state had already rejected one draft constitution. Sam Adams fell sick during the convention and all but one section of the constitution was written by John Adams. Article III, though, was written solely by Sam Adams.
Puritan underpinnings
His Puritan underpinnings and reactionary religious feelings showed through as the article proclaimed that everyone would pay taxes to support the local Congregational Church, except Quakers, Baptists, and Episcopalians who would pay taxes to support their own church. All other sects would face a lengthy legal battle before they might be recognized. That section of the document survived until 1833. Adams also tried to establish a unicameral legislature, but that met with little support among the delegates.
Nonetheless, as the Constitution of 1780 was adopted, Sam Adams welcomed the new government and marked the end of his days as a revolutionary. He now stood solidly behind the government. In 1781, Adams was elected president of the Massachusetts Senate. Later, as Daniel Shay advocated rebellion in western Massachusetts, Adams denounced the efforts and called him a traitor.
At the Old Granary Burial Ground in Boston, this is the grave of Samuel Adams
From the Articles of Confederation to the Constitution
The move from the Articles of Confederation to the Constitution, though, caused Adams much concern. He fully believed that the United States were too large and had too many different needs to be adequately represented under a single government. Adams also wondered if the Constitution provided adequate protection for civil liberties, and his belief in natural law–the very basis for all of his revolutionary work–made him wary of any attempts to strengthen a central government. Adams remained silent on the issue until after he was elected to the Constitutional Convention as a Massachusetts delegate.
The other delegates immediately recognized the danger Adams's opposition posed, and they cultivated and organized a vote among Boston workingmen and artisans–Adams's core supporters–to rebuke Adams for his anti-Constitution outbursts. They met in January 1788 and voted to support the new document and the ensuing government. The vote effectively muzzled Adams for the remainder of the debate. He seemed increasingly to have lost his "edge" and appeared to be drifting away from his former supporters–although he and Hancock had mended their friendship to fight against the Constitution together. Adams lost a key Boston election to a fellow Convention delegate that had supported the Constitution. It appeared from many respects that the age of Sam Adams was waning.
Adams now wished that America would be purified by its return to freedom and independence–that his Puritan ideals of a simple society would once again be made true. Unfortunately, the days of post-revolutionary America were ones filled with profiteers and speculators, hardly the saints, for whom Adams had hoped. Adams's troubles were just beginning. His old friend John Hancock, who remained bitter that Adams had not supported him for commander-in-chief of the American armies, had built up a solid political base in Massachusetts while Adams worked at the Continental Congress. In 1778, Adams received word that he had been reprimanded for his conduct by the Boston town meeting–a personal blow to a man who had led the town meetings for decades. And instead of electing a "pure" man to be the first governor of Massachusetts, perhaps Adams himself, the people elected Hancock–who partied and paraded through the city in victory and quickly doused any hope Adams held that the commonwealth might be returned to its Puritan roots.
Fight in 1784
Adams found his next fight in 1784 when young Bostonians founded the Sans Souci Club, and Boston's nightlife began to rival that of New York's. Rumors even swirled that the city might become home to a gambling club that allowed girls over the age of sixteen inside. Adams began writing editorials as vitriolic and sour as any he wrote during the period before the revolution. He hinted that the city would fall just as the mass orgies had once brought about the fall of Rome. The city could be corrupted so soon after it won its freedom and cleansed itself of the impurities of Britain. In 1792, Adams even attempted to have a traveling theater group jailed. Harvard students complained of his efforts as crusader of morals, and others charged he merely wanted to raise another mob. However, years of abuse had thickened Adams's skin, and he merely replied that "I know by their roaring I have hit them right."
Adams's popular spirit saw a brief reawakening in 1793 as the French Revolution erupted in Paris. After Hancock's death in 1793, Adams became the leader of the Jacobin faction of Massachusetts government, and the former revolutionary managed to hold on to enough of his late friend's supporters to be elected governor of the state. It appeared for a moment that Adams might launch a new revolution with Jacobinism as the new motto and spirit.
French tricolors began to appear around Boston and gangs of Jacobin supporters roamed the streets in a throwback to the days of the Sons of Liberty. Now in failing health, Adams tried to attend as many celebratory dinners as he could. His opponents screamed that he appeared more like a French diplomat than the governor. However, Adams's influence steadily waned through the 1790s, and by 1795, his opponents managed to remove his supporters from office. In 1796, John Adams ran for the presidency on a pro-Constitution ticket and when Sam Adams failed to win selection as an elector opposed to his cousin, he announced he would step down as governor.
In his final years, Adams was but a shell of his former self. The country had gone solidly in favor of the Constitution and palsy had robbed Adams of the ability to write. Adams kept hoping that the fever of the successful French Revolution would sweep across the United States; the Father of America died in 1803, disappointed.