89. ADAMS (John), Views on English Constitution.—
While Mr. Adams was VicePresident,
and I Secretary of State, I received
a letter from President Washington,
then at Mount Vernon, desiring me to call to
gether the Heads of Departments, and to invite
Mr. Adams to join us (which, by-the-bye,
was the only instance of that being done) in
order to determine on some measure which
required despatch; and he desired me to act
on it, as decided, without again recurring to
him. I invited them to dine with me, and
after dinner, sitting at our wine, having settled
our question, other conversation came on,
in which a collision of opinion arose between
Mr. Adams and Colonel Hamilton, on the
merits of the British Constitution, Mr. Adams
giving it as his opinion, that, if some of
its defects and abuses were corrected, it
would be the most perfect constitution of
government ever devised by man. Hamilton,
on the contrary, asserted, that with its existing
vices, it was the most perfect model of
government that could be formed; and that
the correction of its vices would render it an
impracticable government. And this you May
be assured was the real line of difference between
the political principles of these two
gentlemen. Another incident took place on
the same occasion, which will further delineate
Mr. Hamilton's political principles. The
room being hung around with a collection of
the portraits of remarkable men, among them
were those of Bacon, Newton and Locke.
Hamilton asked me who they were. I told
him they were my trinity of the three greatest
men the world had ever produced, naming
them. He paused for some time: “The
greatest man,” said he, “that ever lived, was
Julius Csesar.” Mr. Adams was honest as a
politician as well as a man; Hamilton honest
as a man, but, as a politician, believing in the
necessity of either force or corruption to
govern men.
To Dr. Benjamin Rush. Washington ed. v, 559.
Ford ed., ix, 295.
(M.
Jan. 1811)
