Sixth President Of The United States

Background.

Perhaps no nineteenth-century president was more groomed for the office than John Quincy Adams. The eldest son of John and Abigail Adams, he was born on 11 July 1767 in Braintree, Massachusetts. His earliest formal schooling was in French and Latin in Passy, France, where he had accompanied his father on a diplomatic mission in 1778. In 1779 he attended the Latin School in Amsterdam and eventually matriculated at Leyden University in 1781. After spending time as the secretary to the United States minister to Russia and as secretary to his father as he negotiated the Treaty of Paris in 1783, he entered Harvard and graduated in 1787. After graduation he studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1791. Having traveled the world before his twentieth birthday, a modest law career must have been unappealing.

Diplomat and Politician.

President George Washington appointed Adams...