| Abstract | In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content: Can you account for the apathy, the antipathy of this nation to their own history? Is there not a repugnance to the thought of looking back while thousands of frivolous novels are read with eagerness and got by heart; the history of our own native country is not only neglected, but despised and abhorred. —John Adams The first family member to hold national public office was one of the most important founders of the United States. Thanks to him, in large part, the initial boundaries of the United States were set at the Mississippi River rather than the Appalachians. In the 1790s, he undertook unpopular diplomatic negotiations but thereby played a crucial role in preserving the peace as England and France warred both with each other and for the affections of Americans. While in Europe, he corresponded regularly with his intelligent and practical wife, whom he adored, who managed his household and affairs in his absence and kept him up-to-date on national and local politics as well as family news. He took his eldest son to Europe where the youth received a wide experience and education that prepared him for his own prominent role in civic life. After he held his highest national office, the patriarch retired to a rural retreat where he lived as a gentleman farmer for about a quarter of a century. The second generation built on the Founder's achievement. The Founder had abhorred human slavery; the son became a national leader in the cause to abolish it. For this he was both reviled and revered. A grandson continued to fight slavery and joined in the struggle against government corruption as well. A prominent Republican, he became the American minister to a major European country. His writings, along with his public services, which in large part memorialized his family's contributions to the nation's history and mourned the passing of such highly moral leadership, caused him to be highly regarded by the emerging historical profession. The eighteenth-century house (with additions) in which they all lived remained in the family until well into the twentieth century, when it became a memorial to its illustrious inhabitants. If I had not given away the game that this essay would also deal with the family of the first chief justice of the United States, John Jay (1745–1829), most readers would guess that my sole topic was the oft-studied Adams family of Massachusetts. Yet similarities in the historical trajectories of the two families are as pronounced as their mutual admiration for each other. John Adams did not give unqualified praise easily, and yet criticisms of John Jay are absent from his writings. "When my confidence in Mr. Jay shall cease," he wrote, "I must give up the cause of confidence and renounce it in all men." Jay came immediately to mind as the most important savior of the nation when Adams considered the situation in the late 1790s. The High Federalist faction was "dizzy" with the prospect of warring with France and crushing domestic dissent and "a civil war was expected . . . they saw not the precipice on which they stood." Adams realized it was insane to attempt a war with France both because there was no plausible location to attack the enemy, and it was madness to attempt to lead so bitterly divided a nation into a conflict. Fortunately the Federalists split: "All the old supporters of the Constitution, and of Washington's administration, had foreseen the evil and hid themselves." Adams singled out Jay from among them as "one more important than any of the rest, indeed of almost as much weight as all the rest" whose refusal to participate had foiled these schemes. Adams then went on to note something later historians, overawed by the future reputations of Madison and Hamilton, sometimes forget: Jay "had as much influence . . . in obtaining its [the Constitution's] adoption, as any man in the nation." His "known familiarity with Madison and Hamilton, his connection with them in writing the Federalist, and his then connection with all the members of the old Congress, had given to those writings more consideration than both the other writers could have given...
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