FAMILY
As God endowed man with rights, the Creator also gave man the first and most durable of human institutions: the family. God repeatedly affirmed the family as the best means to secure a happy, just, and moral life. Faith and family grew up in tandem as the twin pillars of Judeo-Christian civilization.
Faith gave the Founders context and meaning in their lives; families gave them an outlet for expressing their understanding of the world, and the obligation and privilege to love and be loved in return. The Founders laid their greatest hopes for the American republic on a commitment of free men to faith and family, since these two pillars defend liberty against licentiousness and tyranny.
John Adams, a signer of the Declaration of Independence and later vice president and president of the United States, was a devoted husband of Abigail and father of six children. The couple had known each other since childhood, basing their marriage upon mutual respect and admiration. As they witnessed the birth of a new republic and experienced the fatigue and separation of war, John and Abigail continually looked to each other for emotional, spiritual, and intellectual support.
The struggle for American independence kept Adams away from his family for long periods, sometimes years at a time. But the couple maintained an extensive correspondence, particularly during his time in Philadelphia during the Continental Congress. Their letters reveal an unshakeable commitment and devoted love for one another. They shared a mutual appreciation for philosophy, poetry, and politics, and their letters
show how much John valued Abigailâs counsel on matters of government and public life.
The Adams also understood the importance of education in the lives of their children, and their own responsibility to instill in them the virtues and values vital to the new nationâs success. Early in his legal career, John wrote about the importance of the proper education of youth:
It should be your care, therefore, and mine, to elevate the minds of our children and exalt their courage; to accelerate and animate their industry and activity; to excite in them an habitual contempt of meanness, abhorrence of injustice and inhumanity, and an ambition to excel in every capacity, faculty, and virtue. If we suffer their minds to grovel and creep in infancy, they will grovel all their lives.
In a letter to Abigail in 1780, he likewise explained why he supported the armed struggle to secure the nationâs independence:
I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history and naval architecture, navigation, commerce and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain.
Adamsâ love of family compelled him not only to study politics and war, but to engage in both, to ensure that his children could enjoy the blessings of liberty. He believed that the education of children was central to the maintenance of liberty, and he hoped a free republic would provide an environment where his children could study the greatest expressions of human culture and manâs God-given creativityâpainting, poetry, music, architecture, and other arts. Both John and Abigail understood that the cultivation and protection of these virtues all begin in the family.
Indeed, above their status as citizens, workers, or statesmen, the Founders cherished their role in their families. The family was prized as
the best incubator for love, charity, religion, work, and safety, and a model for all other social relations. As John Adams wrote in a letter to Thomas Jefferson in 1814, âAs long as Property exists, it will accumulate in Individuals and Families. As long as Marriage exists, Knowledge, Property and Influence will accumulate in Families.â Once again, Adams
As God endowed man with rights, the Creator also gave man the first and most durable of human institutions: the family. God repeatedly affirmed the family as the best means to secure a happy, just, and moral life. Faith and family grew up in tandem as the twin pillars of Judeo-Christian civilization.
Faith gave the Founders context and meaning in their lives; families gave them an outlet for expressing their understanding of the world, and the obligation and privilege to love and be loved in return. The Founders laid their greatest hopes for the American republic on a commitment of free men to faith and family, since these two pillars defend liberty against licentiousness and tyranny.
John Adams, a signer of the Declaration of Independence and later vice president and president of the United States, was a devoted husband of Abigail and father of six children. The couple had known each other since childhood, basing their marriage upon mutual respect and admiration. As they witnessed the birth of a new republic and experienced the fatigue and separation of war, John and Abigail continually looked to each other for emotional, spiritual, and intellectual support.
The struggle for American independence kept Adams away from his family for long periods, sometimes years at a time. But the couple maintained an extensive correspondence, particularly during his time in Philadelphia during the Continental Congress. Their letters reveal an unshakeable commitment and devoted love for one another. They shared a mutual appreciation for philosophy, poetry, and politics, and their letters
show how much John valued Abigailâs counsel on matters of government and public life.
The Adams also understood the importance of education in the lives of their children, and their own responsibility to instill in them the virtues and values vital to the new nationâs success. Early in his legal career, John wrote about the importance of the proper education of youth:
It should be your care, therefore, and mine, to elevate the minds of our children and exalt their courage; to accelerate and animate their industry and activity; to excite in them an habitual contempt of meanness, abhorrence of injustice and inhumanity, and an ambition to excel in every capacity, faculty, and virtue. If we suffer their minds to grovel and creep in infancy, they will grovel all their lives.
In a letter to Abigail in 1780, he likewise explained why he supported the armed struggle to secure the nationâs independence:
I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history and naval architecture, navigation, commerce and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain.
Adamsâ love of family compelled him not only to study politics and war, but to engage in both, to ensure that his children could enjoy the blessings of liberty. He believed that the education of children was central to the maintenance of liberty, and he hoped a free republic would provide an environment where his children could study the greatest expressions of human culture and manâs God-given creativityâpainting, poetry, music, architecture, and other arts. Both John and Abigail understood that the cultivation and protection of these virtues all begin in the family.
Indeed, above their status as citizens, workers, or statesmen, the Founders cherished their role in their families. The family was prized as
the best incubator for love, charity, religion, work, and safety, and a model for all other social relations. As John Adams wrote in a letter to Thomas Jefferson in 1814, âAs long as Property exists, it will accumulate in Individuals and Families. As long as Marriage exists, Knowledge, Property and Influence will accumulate in Families.â Once again, Adams
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