The Lost Founding Father: John Quincy Adams and the Transformation of American Politics

William J. Cooper

Oct 2017 · Liveright Publishing

About this ebook

“A vivid and convincing account of one of the most significant—but too often overlooked—figures in our history.”—Jon Meacham, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of American Lion Overshadowed by both his brilliant father and the brash and bold Andrew Jackson, John Quincy Adams has long been dismissed as an aloof intellectual. Viciously assailed by Jackson and his populist mobs for being both slippery and effete, Adams nevertheless recovered from defeat in 1828’s presidential election to lead the nation as a lonely Massachusetts congressman in the fight against slavery. Award-winning historian William J. Cooper’s “balanced, wellsourced, and accessible work” (Publishers Weekly) demonstrates that Adams should be considered our lost Founding Father, his moral and political vision the final link to the visionaries who created our nation. With his heroic arguments in the Amistad trial forever memorialized, Adams stood strong against the expansion of slavery that would send the nation hurtling into war. This “well-crafted” (William McFeely) biography reveals Adams to be one of the most battered, but courageous and inspirational, politicians in American history.

About the author

William J. Cooper is the author of Jefferson Davis, American, which won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and We Have the War Upon Us. A Boyd Professor Emeritus of History at Louisiana State University, he lives in Atlanta, Georgia.