This post first appeared in two parts "Passing of Hon. John Quincy Adams" and "Dred Scot v. Sandford ruling saves the Union" on Today in Alternate History.
Feb 23, 1848 - Passing of Hon. John Quincy Adams
On this sad day, Justice John Quincy Adams passed away in the nation's capital where a quarter of a century earlier he had served the will of the people by stepping away from the presidency.
Driven by unfulfilled and misunderstood ambition tinged with nepotism he had always hoped to emulate his illustrious father by serving as Chief Magistrate to the United States. However, he narrowly lost out to a force of nature in the hard-fought 10th quadrennial presidential election of 1824. In hindsight his defeat--and the graceful manner in which he accepted it--was a vindication of the great republican principles that the young nation had fought so hard to secure.
But at the time, it was notable precedent but for a completely different reason. Since the passage of the Twelfth Amendment, this was the only election to have been decided by the House of Representatives in accordance with its provision to turn over the choice of the president to the House when no candidate secures a majority of the electoral vote. In declaring that "America shall have no dynasties," the House pronounced Andrew Jackson the winner over John Quincy Adams, who bowed to the decision gracefully and entered the judiciary as a Jackson appointee. A true American hero, by giving way to popular sentiment he had richly deserved to be titled "the Honorable" John Quincy Adams.
In retrospect, there was unending irony in that his father's stalwart defense of the monarchical principle had inadvertently created the misperception that he had wanted to found such a dynasty. Instead, his son's defeat led to a well known American tradition: children of prominent politicians rarely ever enter public life.
Beyond John Quincy Adams's bid for the executive branch, he made an impressive legal legacy, including the groundwork for the day the US Supreme Court ruled that Dred Scott was free - but only because he spent time in a Free state not a Free territory.
This landmark decision marginalized the Fire-eaters by drawing the rising anger from States Rights advocates who were reassured that the US Congress had no power to restrict slavery in the territories; the States could do anything they wanted as regards to the institute of slavery. The ever-present fear that the North had been trying to impose its own lifestyle on the South sharply diminished, as did the terrifying prospect of a civil war over the matter.
This opportunity, this brief pause for peace, had been created by the late Justice John Quincy Adams. It was his hard work in the earlier case of Strader v. Graham that had steered the course for the anti-slavery direction. If he had not gracefully ceded the hard-fought 10th quadrennial presidential election, then he would never had served on the US Supreme Court at all. His appointment was a sporting gesture by the winning candidate Andrew Jackson, but as time would tell it was highly significant actually having a dramatic effect upon the events of the second half of the nineteenth century. Not only had John Quincy Adams vindicated the great republican principles that the young nation had fought so hard to secure, he may even have saved the Union from dissolution.
Provine's Addendum:
The informal "No Dynasties" rule among Americans would be tested through the centuries, including the 1888 Republican National Convention where William Henry Harrison's grandson, Benjamin, made a stirring speech that was nonetheless unable to win him enough votes to come out of the shadows as a dark horse candidate. Instead, John Sherman would win the candidacy and later election (though he later wrote that some people may have voted for him mistakenly thinking he was General William Tecumseh Sherman from the Spanish War that resulted from American intervention in war in Cuba in the 1870s). The Roosevelts, distant cousins, would toe the line of the policy with the election of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, but FDR would break another tradition with his third election anyhow.
The biggest test would come in the year 2000 with the aggressive campaign of George W. Bush, son of George Herbert Walker Bush. While the Republican National Convention overwhelmingly voted to put the younger Bush up for candidacy, the nation as a whole determined they wished to keep families out of the White House. Florida, ironically governed by Bush's brother Jeb at the time, proved the matter when it was called early on Election Day for the Democrats. Gore's term would be marred with the 9/11 terrorist strike and economic fallout with his policies encouraging new, greener initiatives rather than propping up established investments with loosened banking rules.
