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2.0 out of 5 stars
A repetitive, biased, mischaracterization of John Adams, both biography and man, December 14, 2006
This review is from: John Adams (Barnes and Noble Reader's Companion) (Barnes & Noble Reader's Companion) (Paperback)
John Henriksen's "JH" Reader's Companion to David McCullough's "DM" John Adams, a mere 59 pages in length, would be more appropriately titled, "The Faults of John Adams, Repeated Ad Nauseam without Footnotes." Henriksen mentions Adams' flaws excessively; of his appearance (p 12) "was comical rather than formidable, with his huge belly and small head" (p 13) "dumpy and bald" and (p 23) "short, fat, bald" of his personality (p 6) "wishy-washy and indecisive" (p 7) "anxious and unschooled in human nature" (p 9) "fretful" and (p 32) "excessive self-regard." Again, in his comments about Adams unsuccessful bid for a second term as president, he overemphasizes the negative (p 41), "Adams was the first incumbent president to lose in the history of America." He tends to revisit situations in which Adams makes poor choices. The fact that John Adams "JA" did not purchase government securities at the suggestion of his wife, Abigail, is mentioned thrice by JH (pp 12, 16, 31), while both his non-opposition to the Alien and Sedition Acts (pp 7, 35, 36, 39, 41) and Adams' suggestion to address the president as "His Majesty" are mentioned a whopping five times (pp 7, 17, 19, 21, 33). He provides his own conclusions about Adams' actions as statements of fact, in some cases misrepresenting McCullough's handling of same, as in the case of farmer John Fries and two others who "appealed to the President for a pardon" having been "found guilty of treason and sentenced to hang" after an armed uprising (p 540). Henriksen refers to the case four times (pp 8, 9, 25, 37, 39) and proclaims (pp 8,9) that Adams pardoned Fries "on the official grounds that the insurrection had no calamitous consequences" noting the "real" reason as, "Fries had become a symbol of rural America" and "Adams hoped that a pardon would help heal the rift between urban power centers and the frontier regions." David McCullough said no such thing, but instead that when John Adams concluded his review of the case, he determined simply that Fries had, "led a riot, not an insurrection, and was therefore not guilty of treason." On the issue of compensation for government leaders, JH states that Adams believed that public officials should receive salaries (p 4) because, "the presidency was a job like any other and that it should be compensated accordingly, "while DM states (p 400) that Adams did not want the rich to monopolize the offices, "the poor and middling ranks would be excluded and an aristocratic despotism would immediately follow." Eventually (in paragraph two but not three of page 20) JH's account agrees with DM's. In Henriksen's discussion of the troubles of Adams' children (p 5) who "were responsible for giving him gray hair," he inexplicably fails to mention at all Thomas, who certainly contributed his share to the gray (DM p 634) "...son Thomas, who, having failed at the law, was drinking heavily..." Later, in providing a present day example of the feelings of betrayal felt by the Federalists upon learning that Adams had reversed his pro-war stance and chosen to send an envoy to France to work for peace (successfully achieved), JH seems to be saying that Republicans (as opposed to Democrats) are warmongers by stating (p 25), "We might imagine a similar scenario today if a Republican president heavily in favor of war with a country suddenly retreated and became a pacifist." Additionally, although he contends (p 17) that "John Adams is sometimes referred to as revisionist history" due to DM's negative portrayal of Benjamin Franklin, he fails to include in his Other Books of Interest section, one could support the "negative portrayal" contention, The First American by H.W. Brands, which portrays Franklin very favorably; yet includes The Jefferson Scandals: A Rebuttal by Virginius Dabney. In his many comparisons of Adams and Jefferson, he does not include the fact (DM p 648) that "John Adam's net worth at death was approximately $100,000...Jefferson, by sad contrast, had died with debts exceeding $100,000." Granted, the eloquent Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence, and granted, Adams was opposed to the inclusion of one of its most famous lines, "All men are created equal..." (although for reasons unrelated to slavery), but of the two, John Adams was arguably the better man, if for no other reason than that from the top of his (bald) head to the tips of his (undoubtedly unattractive) toes, he, DM (p 116) "abhorred" the idea of slavery "all his life." Lastly, of all of the information that Henriksen writes about John Adams, true, false, repetitive, negative or otherwise, not a single reference to David McCullough's John Adams by page number is provided. A wealth of information about John Adams, the book and the man, as well as David McCullough, the amazingly talented author who so skillfully brought him to life, can certainly be found on the world wide web, saving the reader the cost and disappointment of this sometimes incomplete, repetitive, overly-negative take on John Adams.
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