The Nexus Archive
Constitutional Republicanism · Essay
Novanglus
by John Adams · The Honest Pessimist · American Founding, 1735-1826
Adams's revolutionary argument about rights, law, and British authority.
- Advanced
- ~5 hr read
- 8 chapter guides
- Public domain
Start reading · Read the Novanglus II guide free
Before the text
Editor's Prelude
The Argument Before Independence
John Adams wrote Novanglus in the dangerous winter before Lexington, when the American argument had not yet become a declaration of independence. Boston was under pressure, imperial patience was thinning, and Adams was still trying to prove something more exacting than outrage: that resistance to Parliament could be lawful, historical, and morally necessary.
The essays appeared as a newspaper duel. Adams, writing as “Novanglus,” answered the loyalist “Massachusettensis,” who urged the colonists toward obedience. Adams still wanted a lasting connection with Britain. The urgent question was who could make the colonies’ laws and take their money. Could Americans remain loyal to the king while refusing Parliament’s claim to rule them in every matter?
That question brings old charters, court decisions, and conquered kingdoms into a fierce public argument. A charter is a grant that establishes a government and its rights. For Adams, such agreements place duties on rulers as well as subjects. His legal distinctions sit beside accusations of ambition, corruption, and betrayal. He is not writing for a quiet library. He is arguing in public while the ground is moving beneath him.
The opening pages
Novanglus I: January 23, 1775
Addressed to the Inhabitants of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay,
January 23, 1775.
MY FRIENDS,
A writer, under the signature of Massachusettensis, has addressed you, in a series of papers, on the great national subject of the present quarrel between the British administration and the Colonies. As I have not in my possession, more than one of his Essays, and that is in the Gazette of December 26, I will take the liberty, in the spirit of candor, and decency, to bespeak your attention, upon the same subject.
There may be occasion, to say very severe things, before I shall have finished what I propose, in opposition to this writer but there ought to be no reviling. Rem ipsam dic, mitte male loqui, which may be justly translated, speak out the whole truth boldly, but use no bad language.
It is not very material to enquire, as others have done, who is the author of the speculations in question. If he is a disinterested writer, and has nothing to gain or to lose, to hope or to fear, for himself more than other individuals of your community; but engages in this controversy from the purest principles, the noblest motives of benevolence to men, and of love to his country, he ought to have no influence with you, further than truth and justice will support his argument. On the other hand, if he hopes to acquire or preserve a lucrative employment, to screen himself from the just detestation of his countrymen, or whatever other sinister inducement he may have, as far as the truth of facts and the weight of argument, are in his favor, he ought to be duly regarded.
He tells you "that the temporal salvation of this province depends upon an entire and speedy change of measures, which must depend upon a change of sentiments respecting our own conduct and the justice of the British nation."
The task, of effecting these great changes, this courageous writer, has undertaken in a course of publications in a newspaper. Nil desperandum is a good motto, and Nil admirari, is another. He is welcome to the first, and I hope will be willing that I should assume the last. The public, if they are not mistaken in their conjecture, have been so long acquainted with this gentleman, and have seen him so often disappointed, that if they were not habituated to strange things, they would wonder at his hopes, at this time to accomplish, the most unpromising project of his whole life. In the character of Philanthrop, he attempted to reconcile you to Mr. Bernard. But the only fruit of his labor was, to expose his client to more general examination, and consequently to more general resentment and aversion. In the character of Philalethes, he essayed to prove Mr. Hutchinson a patriot, and his letters not only innocent, but meritorious. But the more you read and considered, the more you were convinced of the ambition and avarice, the simulation and dissimulation, the hypocricy and perfidy of that destroying angel.
Chapter guides · 8
Novanglus II
The Stakes Become Slavery
Adams defines political freedom as having a voice in the laws that bind you.
Consent is the dividing line
For Adams, a people cannot be free if a distant legislature can rule them without their consent. He calls that condition slavery. Here the word means political subjection: the colonists would have no say in the laws imposed on them.
How the argument unfolds
Adams traces the tax plan to colonial officials who wanted more power. He quotes Franklin against taxation without consent, then examines Governor Bernard’s proposals. Bernard wanted to replace colonial charters and create a rank of nobles appointed for life. Adams also describes a plan to pay governors and judges from tax revenue, freeing them from the people’s control. He ends by saying that even a wise and virtuous Parliament would make unrepresented Americans slaves. Under today’s corrupt Parliament, they would be the most abject slaves of all.
Novanglus IV
The Duty To Speak
Adams argues that public virtue gives clergy a duty to oppose abuses of power.
Public office should serve the public
Adams argues that officials hold office for the good of the people, not for private gain. He argues that clergy should speak about corruption and the duties of rulers. Those are moral questions, even when powerful people call such preaching treason.
How the chapter closes
He contrasts this public duty with promises of church appointments for obedient clergy. He then acknowledges outrages by the colonists and refuses to excuse them. Against those acts, he sets killings and punishments by the government’s supporters. A final postscript corrects an earlier printing error: he meant the harsh “Cawings” of cormorants, not the gentle “Cooings” the newspaper printed.
Novanglus V
The Charter Becomes The Battlefield
Adams says paying judges from the Crown undermines the colony’s charter.
Novanglus VI
Resistance Becomes Organization
Adams defends committees that share news and help the colonies act together.
Novanglus VII
The Crown Is Not Parliament
Adams separates loyalty to the king from submission to an unrepresentative Parliament.
Novanglus VIII
Empire Without Consent
Adams uses Wales to separate allegiance to the Crown from membership in the English kingdom.
Novanglus X
Ireland As A Warning
Adams argues that Ireland’s history cannot establish Parliament’s authority over America.
Novanglus Closing Note
The Argument Meets Events
The closing note places the last published essay beside the outbreak of fighting.
Questions readers ask
- How long does it take to read Novanglus?
- About 5 hr in total.
- How difficult is Novanglus?
- Advanced. A long essay; about 5 hours of reading.
- Can I read Novanglus for free?
- Novanglus is part of Nexus Premium, so reading it needs an account and a Premium subscription. The opening above and two chapter guides on this page are free to read.
- How many chapter guides are there?
- 8 chapter guides, written by the Nexus editors. Two open in full here; the rest show their opening line.
About John Adams
John Adams was a revolutionary leader, diplomat, constitutional thinker, and the second president of the United States. His writings stress law, balance, virtue, ambition, and the dangers that threaten republican government from within.
“What kind of people can actually keep a republic?”
Adams gives Nexus the harder, less romantic side of the American founding: liberty requires structure, restraint, and character.
Source text: public domain. Chapter guides: original Nexus writing. Novanglus is part of The Nexus Archive, guided Quests through the great works.