John Adams by Gilbert Stuart, c. 1815, oil on canvas – National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

The following is a list and discussion of important scholarly resources relating to John Adams.

1st Vice President of the United States

Vice Presidency

2nd President of the United States

State of the Union Address

Publications

Vice Presidential and Presidential elections

Post-presidency

Biographical

Abrams, Jeanne E. "John Adams An American in Paris." in A View from Abroad (New York University Press, 2021) pp. 23–54.
Akers, Charles W. "John Adams" in Henry Graff, ed. (3rd ed. 2002). The Presidents: A Reference History. online
Bernstein, Richard B. The Education of John Adams (Oxford University Press, 2020).
Chinard, Gilbert (1933). Honest John Adams. Boston, MA: Little, Brown, and Company.
Diggins, John P. (2003). Schlesinger Jr., Arthur M. (ed.). John Adams. The American Presidents. New York, NY: Time Books. ISBN 0-8050-6937-2.
Ellis, Joseph J. (1993). Passionate Sage: The Character and Legacy of John Adams. New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 0393311333.
Ferling, John E. (1992). John Adams: A Life. Knoxville, TN: University of Tennessee Press. ISBN 0870497308.
Georgini, Sara. Household Gods: The Religious Lives of the Adams Family (Oxford University Press, 2019)
Grant, James (2005). John Adams: Party of One. New York, NY: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. ISBN 978-03741-1314-8.
Harness, Cheryl. The Revolutionary John Adams (National Geographic Books, 2006).
McCullough, David (2001). John Adams. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster. p. 144. ISBN 978-1416575887.
Mara, Wil. John Adams (Marshall Cavendish, 2009).
Morse, John Torrey. John Adams. (1899) old scholarly biography online free
Ryerson, Richard Alan, ed. (2001). John Adams and the Founding of the Republic
Ryerson, Richard Alan (2016). John Adams's Republic: The One, the Few, and the Many 555 pp
Shaw, Peter (1975). The Character of John Adams. New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 0393008568.
Smith, Page (1962a). John Adams. Vol. I, 1735–1784. New York, NY: Doubleday & Company, Inc.
Smith, Page (1962b). John Adams. Vol. II, 1784–1826. New York, NY: Doubleday & Company, Inc. ISBN 9780837123486.
Waldstreicher, David, ed. (2013). A Companion to John Adams and John Quincy Adams, ISBN 978-0470655580, emphasis on historiography

Vice Presidency, Presidency and Federalist Party

Allen, Gardner Weld (1909). Our Naval War With France. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin and Company. OCLC 1202325., the Quasi-War of 1798-1800
Bernstein, R. B. "President John Adams and Four Chief Justices" New York Law School Law Review 57 (2012): 441+.
Brown, Ralph A. The Presidency of John Adams. (2004)
Dunn, Susan. Jefferson's second revolution: the election crisis of 1800 and the triumph of republicanism (2004).
Elkins, Stanley M.; McKitrick, Eric (1993). The Age of Federalism. Oxford, NY: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0195068904.
Ferling, John Adams vs. Jefferson: The Tumultuous Election of 1800 (Oxford University Press, 2004).
Freeman, Joanne B. "The Election of 1800: A Study in the Logic of Political Change." Yale Law Journal 108.8 (1999) pp: 1959-1994. online
Graber, Mark A. "Federalist or Friends of Adams: The Marshall Court and Party Politics." Studies in American Political Development 12.2 (1998): 229-266. online
Heidenreich, Donald E. "Conspiracy Politics in the Election of 1796." New York History 92.3 (2011): 151-165. online
Hoadley, John F. (1986). Origins of American Political Parties: 1789–1803. Lexington, Kentucky: University Press of Kentucky. ISBN 978-0813153209.
Holder, Jean S. "The Sources of Presidential Power: John Adams and the Challenge to Executive Primacy." Political Science Quarterly 101.4 (1986): 601-616. online
Kurtz, Stephen G. (1957). The Presidency of John Adams: The Collapse of Federalism, 1795–1800. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.
Kurtz, Stephen G. "The French Mission of 1799-1800: Concluding Chapter in the Statecraft of John Adams." Political Science Quarterly 80.4 (1965): 543-557. online
Larson, Edward J. A magnificent catastrophe: the tumultuous election of 1800, America's first presidential campaign. (Simon and Schuster, 2007).
Lyon, E. Wilson (September 1940). "The Franco-American Convention of 1800". The Journal of Modern History. 12 (3): 305–333. doi:10.1086/236487. JSTOR 1874761. S2CID 144516482.
Miller, John C. (1960). The Federalist Era: 1789–1801. ISBN 978-0061330278.
Miroff, Bruce. "John Adams' Classical Conception of the Executive." Presidential Studies Quarterly (1987): 365-382 online.
Murphy, William J. "John Adams: The Politics of the Additional Army, 1798-1800." New England Quarterly (1979): 234-249. online
Ray, Thomas (Winter 1983). "'Not One Cent for Tribute': The Public Addresses and American Popular Reaction to the XYZ Affair, 1798–1799". Journal of the Early Republic. 3 (4): 389–412. doi:10.2307/3122881. JSTOR 3122881.
Scherr, Arthur. "James Monroe and John Adams: An Unlikely “Friendship”." The Historian 67.3 (2005): 405-433.
Sharp, James Roger. American Politics in the Early Republic: The New Nation in Crisis (Yale UP, 1993).
Sloan, Cliff, and David McKean. The great decision: Jefferson, Adams, Marshall, and the battle for the Supreme Court (PublicAffairs, 2010).
Smith, James Morton. "President John Adams, Thomas Cooper, and Sedition: A Case Study in Suppression." Mississippi Valley Historical Review 42.3 (1955): 438-465. online
Stinchcombe, William (October 1977). "The Diplomacy of the WXYZ Affair". The William and Mary Quarterly. 34 (4): 590–617. doi:10.2307/2936184. JSTOR 2936184.
Thompson, Harry C. "The Second Place in Rome: John Adams as Vice President." Presidential Studies Quarterly 10.2 (1980): 171-178. online
Turner, Kathryn. "Midnight judges." University of Pennsylvania Law Review 109 (1960): 494+ online.
Turner, Kathryn. "The Appointment of Chief Justice Marshall." William and Mary Quarterly (1960): 144-163. online
White, Leonard Duppe. The Federalists: A Study in Administrative History, (1956). ISBN 978-0313201011
Wood, Gordon S. (2009). Empire of Liberty: A History of the Early Republic, 1789-1815. Oxford History of the United States. New York, New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-503914-6.

Books on the Founders

Ellis, Joseph J. (2003). Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation. New York, NY: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. ISBN 978-1400077687.
Holmes, David L. (2006). The Faiths of the Founding Fathers. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. p. 2. ISBN 978-0195300925.
Wood, Gordon S. (2006). Revolutionary Characters: What Made the Founders Different. London, UK: Penguin Books. p. 54. ISBN 1594200939.

Political thought

Fisher, Louis. "John Adams." in The Presidents and the Constitution, Volume One (New York University Press, 2020) pp. 34–46.
Haraszti, Zoltan (1952). John Adams and the Prophets of Progress. Incisive analysis of John Adams's political comments on numerous authors through examining his marginalia in his copies of their books.
Howe, John R. Jr. (1966). The Changing Political Thought of John Adams
Morse, Anson D. "The Politics of John Adams." American Historical Review 4.2 (1899): 292–312. online free
Rous, Sarah A. "Homo sum: John Adams Reads Terence." Classical World 113.3 (2020): 299-334.
Scalia, Eugene. "John Adams, Legal Representation, and the 'Cancel Culture'." Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy 44 (2021): 333+.

Other specialized studies

Boyd, Julian Parks; Gawalt, Gerard W. (1999). The Declaration of Independence: the evolution of the text. Library of Congress in association with the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation. ISBN 978-0844409801.
Chernow, Ron (2004). "29". Alexander Hamilton. London, UK: Penguin Books. ISBN 978-110120085-8.
Herring, George C. (2008). From colony to superpower: U.S. foreign relations since 1776. Oxford, NY: Oxford University Press. p. 150. ISBN 978-0199743773.
Maier, Pauline (1998). American Scripture: Making the Declaration of Independence. New York, NY: Vintage Books. ISBN 978-0679779087.
Moore, George (1866). Notes on the history of slavery in Massachusetts. New York, NY: D. Appleton & Co. p. 201.
Morris, Richard B. The peacemakers: The great powers and American independence (1965) Treaty of Paris 1783
Vinton, John Adams (1858). The Vinton Memorial. S.K. Whipple. p. 298.

Primary sources

Adams, John; Adams, Charles Francis (1851). The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: Autobiography, continued. Diary. Essays and controversial papers of the Revolution. The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States. Vol. 3. Little, Brown.
Adams, John, and Abigail Adams. Selected Letters of Abigail and John Adams (Courier Dover Publications, 2021).
Butterfield, L. H. et al., eds., The Adams Papers (1961– ). Multivolume letterpress edition of all letters to and from major members of the Adams family, plus their diaries; still incomplete. "The Adams Family Papers Editorial Project". Masshist.org. Retrieved March 2, 2010.
- "Founders Online" searchable edition
Butterfield, L. H., ed. Adams Family Correspondence. Cambridge: Harvard University Press
Cappon, Lester J., ed. (1959). The Adams-Jefferson Letters: The Complete Correspondence Between Thomas Jefferson and Abigail and John Adams. Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press. ISBN 0807842303.
Carey, George W., ed. The Political Writings of John Adams. (2001)
John A. Schutz and Douglass Adair, eds. Spur of Fame, The Dialogues of John Adams and Benjamin Rush, 1805–1813 (1966) ISBN 978-0865972872
C. Bradley Thompson, ed. Revolutionary Writings of John Adams, (2001) ISBN 978-0865972858
Adams, John, (1774) Novanglus; or, A History of the Dispute with America.
Hogan, Margaret and C. James Taylor, eds. My Dearest Friend: Letters of Abigail and John Adams. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2007.
Richardson, James D. ed. A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents (1897), reprints his major messages and reports.
Taylor, Robert J. et al., eds. Papers of John Adams. Cambridge: Harvard University Press
Wroth, L. Kinvin and Hiller B. Zobel, eds. The Legal Papers of John Adams. Cambridge: Harvard University Press

Analysis

External video
Booknotes interview with Joseph Ellis on Passionate Sage, September 5, 1993, C-SPAN
Presentation by McCullough on John Adams at the Library of Congress, April 24, 2001, C-SPAN
Presentation by McCullough on John Adams at the National Book Festival, September 8, 2001, C-SPAN

Adams' grandson Charles Francis Adams Sr. edited the first two volumes of The Works of John Adams, Esq., Second President of the United States. These were published between 1850 and 1856 by Charles C. Little and James Brown in Boston. The first seven chapters were produced by John Quincy Adams.^[1]

The premier modern biography was Honest John Adams, a 1933 biography by the noted French specialist in American history Gilbert Chinard, who came to Adams after writing his acclaimed 1929 biography of Jefferson. For a generation, Chinard's work was regarded as the best life of Adams, and it is still an important text in illustrating the themes of Adams' biographical and historical scholarship. Following the opening of the Adams family papers in the 1950s, Page Smith published the first major biography to use these previously inaccessible primary sources; his biography won a 1962 Bancroft Prize but was criticized for its scanting of Adams' intellectual life and its diffuseness. In 1975, Peter Shaw published The Character of John Adams, a thematic biography noted for its psychological insight into Adams' life. The 1992 character study by Joseph Ellis, Passionate Sage: The Character and Legacy of John Adams, was Ellis's first major publishing success and remains one of the most useful and insightful studies of Adams' personality. In 1992, the Revolutionary War historian and biographer John E. Ferling published his acclaimed John Adams: A Life, also noted for its psychological sensitivity.^[1] David McCullough authored the 2001 biography John Adams, which won various awards and was the basis for a 2008 TV miniseries.^[2]

References

Bibliography

Ferling, John E. (1992). John Adams: A Life. Knoxville, TN: University of Tennessee Press. ISBN 0-87049-730-8.

v t e John Adams
2nd President of the United States (1797–1801) 1st Vice President of the United States (1789–1797) U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom (1785–1788) U.S. Ambassador to the Netherlands (1782–1788) Delegate, Second Continental Congress (1775–1778) Delegate, First Continental Congress (1774)
Founding of the United States	Braintree Instructions (1765) Boston Massacre defense Continental Association Petition to the King United Colonies Thoughts on Government (1776) Declaration of Independence May 15 preamble Committee of Five Model Treaty Treaty of Amity and Commerce Treaty of Alliance Board of War Chairman of the Marine Committee, 1775-1779 Continental Navy Staten Island Peace Conference Conference House Constitution of Massachusetts (1780) Treaty of Paris, 1783 Diplomacy
Elections	United States presidential election 1788–1789 1792 1796 1800
Presidency	Inauguration Quasi War with France XYZ Affair Commerce Protection Act United States Marine Corps Convention of 1800 Alien and Sedition Acts Naturalization Act of 1798 Navy Department Library Treaty of Tellico Treaty of Tripoli Midnight Judges Act Marbury v. Madison State of the Union Address (1797 1798 1799 1800) Cabinet Federal judiciary appointments
Other writings	Massachusetts Historical Society holdings Adams Papers Editorial Project A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America Founders Online
Life and homes	Early life and education Adams National Historical Park John Adams Birthplace Family home and John Quincy Adams birthplace Peacefield Stone Library Massachusetts Hall, Harvard University Presidents House, Philadelphia Co-founder and second president, American Academy of Arts and Sciences United First Parish Church and gravesite
Legacy	Bibliography List of memorials Adams Memorial John Adams Building Jefferson Memorial pediment U.S. Postage stamps Treaty of Paris (1783 painting) USS John Adams Adams House at Harvard University Mount Adams (New Hampshire, Washington) Memorial to the 56 Signers of the Declaration of Independence
Popular culture	Profiles in Courage (1964 series) American Primitive (1969 play) 1776 (1969 musical 1972 film) The Adams Chronicles (1976 miniseries) Liberty! (1997 documentary series) Liberty's Kids (2002 animated series) John Adams (2001 book 2008 miniseries) John and Abigail Adams (2006 documentary film) Sons of Liberty (2015 miniseries)
Related	"Adams and Liberty" campaign song Adams' personal library American Enlightenment Congress Hall Federalist Party Federalist Era First Party System republicanism American Philosophical Society Gazette of the United States The American Museum American Revolution patriots Founding Fathers
Family	Abigail Adams wife Quincy family Abigail Adams Smith (daughter) John Quincy Adams son presidency Charles Adams (son) Thomas Boylston Adams (son) George W. Adams (grandson) Charles Adams Sr. (grandson) John Adams II (grandson) John Q. Adams (great-grandson) Henry Adams (great-grandson) Brooks Adams (great-grandson) John Adams Sr. (father) Susanna Boylston (mother) Elihu Adams (brother) Samuel Adams (second cousin) Louisa Adams daughter-in-law first lady
← George Washington Thomas Jefferson → Category

v t e Bibliographies of presidents of the United States
Washington J. Adams Jefferson Madison Monroe J. Q. Adams Jackson Van Buren Lincoln A. Johnson Grant McKinley T. Roosevelt Taft Wilson Hoover F. D. Roosevelt Truman Eisenhower Kennedy L. B. Johnson Nixon Carter Reagan G. H. W. Bush Clinton G. W. Bush Obama Trump
Category · Commons · Author pages