Adams Papers Editorial Project

FAIN: RQ-255721-17

Massachusetts Historical Society (Boston, MA 02215-3631)
Sara Martin (Project Director: December 2016 to June 2021)

Preparation for publication of volumes 19, 20, and 21 of the papers of John Adams (1735-1826) and volumes 14 and 15 of the Adams Family's correspondence. (36 months)

The Adams Papers Editorial Project is a comprehensive documentary edition of the diaries, letters, official records, public writings, and literary miscellanies contained in the Adams Family Papers manuscript collection at the Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston, supplemented by Adams documents in other collections and archives. The project focuses on three generations of Adamses: John Adams, Abigail Adams, John Quincy Adams, Charles Francis Adams, and their families.

Associated Products

Adams Papers Editorial Project (Web Resource)
Title: Adams Papers Editorial Project
Author: Sara Martin
Abstract: The Adams Papers project was founded in 1954 to prepare a comprehensive published edition of the manuscripts written and received by the family of John Adams of Quincy, Massachusetts. The Adams Family Papers manuscript collection at the Massachusetts Historical Society forms the nucleus of the project. This is the project website.
Year: 2017
Primary URL: http://www.masshist.org/2012/adams_editorial

The Adams Papers, Series III, General Correspondence and Other Papers of the Adams Statesmen: Papers of John Adams, Volume 19, February 1787 - May 1789 (Book)
Title: The Adams Papers, Series III, General Correspondence and Other Papers of the Adams Statesmen: Papers of John Adams, Volume 19, February 1787 - May 1789
Author: John Adams
Editor: Sara Martin, Editor in Chief
Editor: Hobson Wodward, Editor
Editor: Amanda M. Norton, Editor
Editor: Neal E. Millikan, Editor
Editor: Sara Georgini, Editor
Editor: R.M. Barlow, Editor
Abstract: “Huzza for the new World and farewell to the Old One,” John Adams wrote in late 1787, wrapping up a decade’s worth of diplomatic service in Europe. Volume 19 of the Papers of John Adams chronicles Adams’s last duties in London and The Hague. In the twenty-eight months documented here, he petitioned the British ministry to halt impressment of American sailors, toured the English countryside, and observed parliamentary politics. Adams salvaged U.S. credit by contracting two new Dutch loans amid the political chaos triggered by William V’s resurgence. Correspondents like Thomas Jefferson and the Marquis de Lafayette mulled over the Anglo–American trade war that followed the Revolution and reported on the French Assembly of Notables—topics that Adams commented on with trademark candor. He wrote the final two volumes of his work, A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America. Adams yearned to return home and see the American republic take shape. “For a Man who has been thirty Years rolling like a stone,” Adams wrote, the choice was whether to “set down in private Life to his Plough; or push into turbulent scenes of Sedition and Tumult; whether be sent to Congress, or a Convention or God knows what.” Back on his native soil of Massachusetts in June 1788, Adams settled into rural retirement with wife Abigail and watched the U.S. Constitution’s ratification evolve. By volume’s end, John Adams again resumes public life, ready to serve as America’s first vice president.
Year: 2018
Primary URL: http://www.worldcat.org/title/papers-of-john-adams-february-1787may-1789/oclc/1028591188&referer=brief_results
Primary URL Description: WorldCat listing
Secondary URL: http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674919280
Secondary URL Description: Publisher's listing
Access Model: Book
Publisher: Cambridge, MA and London, England: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
Type: Scholarly Edition
ISBN: 9780674919280
Copy sent to NEH?: Yes

The Adams Papers, Series III, General Correspondence and Other Papers of the Adams Statesmen: Papers of John Adams, Volume 20, June 1789 - February 1791 (Book) (Book)
Title: The Adams Papers, Series III, General Correspondence and Other Papers of the Adams Statesmen: Papers of John Adams, Volume 20, June 1789 - February 1791 (Book)
Author: John Adams
Editor: Sara Martin, Editor in Chief
Editor: Sara Georgini, Editor
Editor: Gwen Fries, Editor
Editor: R. M. Barlow, Editor
Editor: Amanda Norton, Editor
Editor: Neal Millikan, Editor
Editor: Hobson Woodward, Editor
Abstract: John Adams’s shaping of the vice presidency dominates this volume of the Papers of John Adams, which chronicles a formative era in American government spanning June 1789 to February 1791. As the first federal Congress struggled to interpret the U.S. Constitution and implement a new economic framework, Adams held fast to federalist principles and staked out boundaries for his executive powers. Meeting in New York City, Adams and his colleagues warred over how to collect revenue and where to locate the federal seat. They established and staffed the departments of state, treasury, and war. Adams focused on presiding over the Senate, where he broke several ties. Enduring the daily grind of politics, he lauded the “National Spirit” of his fellow citizens and pledged to continue laboring for the needs of the American people. “If I did not love them now, I would not Serve them another hour—for I very well know that Vexation and Chagrine, must be my Portion, every moment I shall continue in public Life,” Adams wrote. He plunged back into writing, using his Discourses on Davila to synthesize national progress with republican history. Whether or not the union would hold, as regional interests impeded congressional action, remained Adams’s chief concern. “There is every Evidence of good Intentions on all sides but there are too many Symptoms of old Colonial Habits: and too few, of great national Views,” he observed. Once again, John Adams’s frank letters reveal firsthand the labor of nation-building in an age of constitutions.
Year: 2020
Primary URL: https://www.worldcat.org/title/papers-of-john-adams-volume-20-june-1789-february-1791/oclc/1196226768&referer=brief_results
Primary URL Description: Worldcat Listing
Secondary URL: https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674244665
Secondary URL Description: Publisher's Listing
Access Model: Book
Publisher: Cambridge, MA, and London, England, The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
Type: Scholarly Edition
ISBN: 9780674244665

The Adams Papers, Series II, Adams Family Correspondence, Volume 14, October 1799 - February 1801 (Book)
Title: The Adams Papers, Series II, Adams Family Correspondence, Volume 14, October 1799 - February 1801
Author: Abigail Adams
Author: John Adams
Author: John Quincy Adams
Author: Thomas Boylston Adams
Author: Abigail Adams Smith
Editor: Sara Martin, Editor in Chief
Editor: Hobson Woodward, Editor
Editor: Christopher Minty, Editor
Editor: Amanda Norton, Editor
Editor: Neal Millikan, Editor
Editor: Gwen Fries, Editor
Editor: Sara Georgini, Editor
Abstract: John and Abigail Adams’s reflections on an emerging nation as they move into the new President’s House in Washington, D.C., are a highlight of the nearly 280 letters written over seventeen months printed in volume 14 of Adams Family Correspondence. The volume opens with the Adamses’ public and private expressions on the death of George Washington and concludes with John’s defeat in the contentious presidential election of 1800. Electoral College maneuvering, charges of sedition, and state-by-state strategizing are debated by the Adamses and their correspondents as the election advances toward deadlock and finally victory for Thomas Jefferson in the House of Representatives. John’s retirement from public life had some sweet mixed with the bitter. The U.S. mission to France resulted in the Convention of 1800 that ended the Quasi-War, and the so-called midnight appointments at the close of his presidency ushered in the transformative U.S. Supreme Court era of John Marshall—a coda anticipated in Abigail’s request to John in the final days of his administration: “I want to see the list of judges.” The domestic life of the Adamses was equally dynamic. Abigail and John endured the crushing loss of their son Charles, whose struggle with alcohol ended in repudiation and death in New York. Son Thomas Boylston and daughter Nabby spent the period in relative stability, while John Quincy chronicled a tour of Silesia in letters home from Europe. At the volume’s close, the correspondence between John and Abigail comes to an end. As they retired to Quincy, their rich observations on the formation of the American republic would continue in letters to others if not to each other.
Year: 2019
Primary URL: https://www.worldcat.org/title/adams-family-correspondence-october-1799february-1801/oclc/1096491601&referer=brief_results
Primary URL Description: Worldcat Listing
Secondary URL: https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674240902
Secondary URL Description: Publisher's Listing
Access Model: Book
Publisher: Cambridge, MA, and London, England, The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
Type: Scholarly Edition
ISBN: 9780674240902
Copy sent to NEH?: Yes

Adams Papers Digital Edition (Database/Archive/Digital Edition)
Title: Adams Papers Digital Edition
Author: Sara Martin, Editor in Chief
Author: Amanda Norton, Editor
Abstract: Welcome to the Adams Papers Digital Edition, which began life as part of the Founding Families Digital Editions. Here in one, easily accessible resource you will find the content of the previously printed volumes of the Adams Papers, a long-standing documentary edition prepared at the Massachusetts Historical Society. This digital edition includes all text of the historical documents and all editorial text. There is a single consolidated index for volumes published through 2006, while the indexes for more recent volumes appear separately.
Year: 2008
Primary URL: http://www.masshist.org/publications/adams-papers/
Primary URL Description: Adams Papers Digital Edition landing page
Secondary URL: http://www.masshist.org/publications/adams-papers/index.php/volume/ADMS-06-18
Secondary URL Description: Landing page for Papers of John Adams, volume 18 (added during grant period)
Access Model: Open Access

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