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Lot 258
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Founding Father Samuel Adams in Contemporary Newspapers
Founding Father Samuel Adams in Contemporary Newspapers
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Description:

Samuel Adams
Boston, MA; Worcester, MA, ca. 1795, 1803
Founding Father Samuel Adams in Contemporary Newspapers
Newspaper

The first of these two issues publishes Governor Samuel Adams's address to the Massachusetts legislature in January 1795. Adams served as acting governor from October 1793 to October 1794 and as governor from October 1794 to June 1797. His address discusses the duties of the legislature, the importance of free elections, the ongoing war in Europe and its effect on American commerce, and the recently suppressed Whiskey Rebellion. He had reservations about the U.S. Constitution but ultimately supported its ratification, and unlike some other Republicans, he supported the suppression of the Whiskey Rebellion in 1794.

The second issue announces the death of Adams and eulogizes him as "the foe of tyrants, in every form; the friend of Virtue and her friends, he died beloved, as he had lived respected."

[SAMUEL ADAMS.] Newspaper, Federal Orrery (Boston, MA), January 19, 1795. 4 pp., 10.75" x 16.75". Disbound; toning; very good.
With: Newspaper, National Ægis (Worcester, MA), October 5, 1803. 4 pp., 12.25" x 18.5". Disbound; trimmed tightly at bottom with loss of one or two lines of text on pages 3-4; toning.

Excerpts
[Federal Orrery:]
Address of Governor Samuel Adams, January 16, 1795
"The people of this Commonwealth in their declaration of rights, have recorded their own opinion, that the Legislature ought frequently to assemble for the redress of grievances, correcting, strengthening and confirming the Laws, and making new Laws, as the common good may require. The Laws of the Commonwealth are intended to secure to each, and all the Citizens, their own rights and liberties, and the property which they honestly possess." (p2/c1)
"All elections ought to be free, and every qualified elector who feels his own independence as he ought, will act his part according to his best and most enlightened judgment. Elections are the immediate acts of the people's sovereignty, in which no foreigners should be allowed to intermeddle. Upon free and unbiassed elections, the purity of the government, and consequently the safety and welfare of the citizens, may I not say, altogether depend." (p2/c1)
"We have been under apprehension of being made a party to the desolating contest in Europe. Permit me just to observe, that the first and main principle which urged the Combined Powers to enter into the contest, is in my own opinion unsupportable by reason and Nature, and in violation of the most essential right of nations and of men. The repeated acts of violence which have been committed on the property of American citizens, might in the opinion of some, have justified reprisals.... The wisdom of our own Councils, with the unexampled successes of our magnanimous Ally, the Republic of France, afford the strongest hope, that under the continued smiles of Divine Providence, peace and tranquillity, will in the end be firmly established." (p2/c1-2)
"It is with pain that I mention the insurrection which has lately taken place in a sister state. It was pointed more immediately at an act of the Federal Government.... But the measures adopted by The President of the United States, supported by the virtue of citizens of every description, in that, and the adjacent States have prevailed, and there is an end of the insurrection" (p2/c2)

[National Ægis:]
"SAMUEL ADAMS, IS DEAD!
"We have the painful task to announce to the public, that, on yesterday morning, about a quarter past seven o'clock, at his house in this town, died, in the 82nd year of his age, Samuel Adams, late Governor of this Commonwealth, the consistent and inflexible Patriot and Republican.
"To attempt, at this moment, even to sketch an outline of a character, equally conspicuous for private virtue and public service, would betray a want of that information respecting the deceased, which time and profound reflection alone can justly describe. We shall now only observe, that he has been a prodigy of talents and industry; of which the lapse of ages will not produce a parrallel.
"In his useful career, his soul seemed occupied with but one sentiment, and that comprehended every circumstance which had any relation to the interests and independence of his native country, and the rights and liberty of the human race.
"The foe of tyrants, in every form; the friend of Virtue and her friends, he died beloved, as he had lived respected—Admiring posterity, penetrated by a just sense of his transcendent merits, will emphatically hail him as the undeviating friend of civil and religious friend of civil and religious liberty, and the Father of the American Revolution." (p3/c3)

Additional Content
[Federal Orrery:]
This issue also includes "Remarks on the Jacobiniad—No. IX.": "He then informs them, that it was, by no means, clear, that negroes were of the same species, as white me; but, on the rational and generally received doctrine of the gradation of beings, were, with great probability, supposed to rank between man and the Ouran-Outang.... this liberty and equality must, undoubtedly, be confined to the human species, from which species he had plainly proved, that negroes were excluded." (p1/c3); "Thespiad.—No. V." (p3/c1-2); and a variety of notices and advertisements, including several about the Harvard College Lottery (p4/c3-4).
[National Ægis:]
This issue also includes a copy of a letter by a British spy (p1/c2-4); news from London (p1/c4-p3/c1); news of a new militia company in Worcester: "The militia of the Country is the security of its liberties." (p3/c3); a description of Niagara Falls (p4/c1-2);


Samuel Adams (1722-1803) was born in Boston and graduated from Harvard College in 1740. He earned a master's degree there in 1743. With little interest in business, he soon began writing political essays and was first elected to political office in 1747. In 1756, he became a tax collector but often failed to collect, which made him friends but left him deeply in debt. He opposed British efforts to enforce tighter control over the North American colonies. Adams served in the Massachusetts House of Representatives from 1765 to 1774, where he allied closely with John Hancock. He represented Massachusetts at the First and Second Continental Congresses, where he signed the Declaration of Independence. He and Hancock went their separate ways in the Continental Congress, and their feud continued in Massachusetts. He served as an opponent of the proposed U.S. Constitution at the Massachusetts ratifying convention, but he and Hancock had reconciled, and they both agreed to support the Constitution but wanted the addition of a Bill of Rights. Elected Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts in 1789, Adams served in that office until Governor John Hancock died in 1793, when he became acting governor. Adams was elected Governor in 1794 and served until 1797.

Federal Orrery (1794-1796) was a semi-weekly newspaper published in Boston, Massachusetts, by Ezra Waldo Weld (1765-1818) and William Greenough (1772-1860). It was edited by Thomas Paine (1773-1811), a son of Declaration signer Robert Treat Paine, who graduated from Harvard College in 1792 and had a reputation for scholarship and literary talent. In 1801, he changed his name to that of his recently deceased older brother, Robert Treat Paine Jr. The newspaper had a Federalist outlook.

National Ægis (1801-1831) was a weekly newspaper published in Worcester, Massachusetts, published by Robert Johnson and edited by Hector Ironside [Francis Blake] (1774-1817). It was a Democratic-Republican newspaper devoted to Thomas Jefferson. Later editors included Levi Lincoln, Enoch Lincoln, William Lincoln, and Christopher Baldwin. It merged with an anti-Masonic newspaper in 1831.

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

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  • Dimensions: 10.75" x 16.75"; 12.25" x 18.5"
  • Medium: Newspaper

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