(John ADAMS) John WOOD. The History of the Administration of John Adams, esq. Late President of the United States. (New York: 1802), [2], 506 pp. First Edition, second issue. Bound in later three-quarter leather boards.. With bookplate of Frank Cutter Deering affixed to front pastedown. With ownership signature “John Bartlett’s” on title page together with marginalia in his hand.
John Wood, a Burr partisan, did such a masterful job slandering John Adams, that Burr publicly repudiated the work and sought to purchase all extant copies. Likely due to popular demand, the publisher reprinted the title, despite Burr’s opposition, this time omitting the publisher information on the title page. The original owner of the present copy was not scandalized in the least and made several affirmative notes in the margins. When Wood intimated that Adams’ was acting to subvert the republic, by [in Adams’ words], “…a sudden introduction of wasting calamities, would soon convince the people themselves of the necessity of instituting another form for their own security and protection”, Bartlett agreed wholeheartedly in the margin: “the very design of Mr Adams’s Policy”.
Wood’s final conclusion proves an apt summary of the overall tone: “Extravagance and folly characterised [sic] the last as well as 
the first measures of Mr. Adams. The benches of justice were filled with me who fought against American Independence, and those who have been since most active to destroy it. – Mr. Adams determined and declared that he would nominate to the last hour of his presidential existence, and was not sparing of a species of insult an indecency to his successor which no man of command sense and civility could be guilty of … The matter in which Mr. Adams departed from Washington after his power ceased, has even received the censure of his warmest friends: in place of remaining to witness the inauguration of Mr. Jefferson like his illustrious predecessor, he ordered his carriage ready the moment the hour of twelve at night struck and as if ashamed to witness in a private station, the capital of that nation which he had for four years insulted and oppressed, he took his departure before sun rise, and bid (it is to be hoped) a final adieu to the seat of American government.”
Light foxing and toning to some pages, some margins rough, else very good condition overall.
(EXA 4313) $1,000
