John Adams

John Adams (1735–1826) was a Harvard-educated lawyer, the second President of the United States, and one of the most intellectually rigorous of the Founding Fathers. He believed that the law required honest representation regardless of political pressure — which is why, as a committed patriot, he defended the eight British soldiers charged after the Boston Massacre. Six were acquitted. Adams considered it one of the most important things he ever did.

The quote on the Quoteiac design — "Facts are stubborn things" — comes from that closing argument, delivered December 4, 1770. It is not a philosophical observation. It is a courtroom argument: that what you want to be true cannot override what the evidence shows.

Adams served as the first Vice President under Washington and the second President, 1797–1801. His late-life correspondence with Thomas Jefferson — written after decades of political rivalry — is one of the great epistolary records in American history. Both men died on July 4, 1826, the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.