Happy Birthday, Sam Adams!

The Patriotism of Samuel Adams 

By Lawrence W. Reed

Oh, what I would give to have an hour with Sam Adams! (The man, not the beer.) I would mostly listen, but I certainly would find a moment to thank this quintessential patriot for his indispensable role in the American Revolution.

Born in Boston on the 27th of September in 1722, today is his 303rd birthday.

In his 1918 book, The Eve of the Revolution, historian Carl L. Becker wrote,

No one, in the year 1770, was better fitted than Samuel Adams, either by talent and temperament or the circumstances of his position, to push the continent into a rebellion. Unlike most of his patriot friends, he had neither private business nor private profession to fall back upon when public affairs grew tame, his only business being, as one might say, the public business, his only profession the definition and defense of popular rights. ...the serious business of a man who during ten years had abandoned all private pursuits and had embraced poverty to become a tribune of the people.

Consider these highlights in the life of Adams: Founder of the Sons of Liberty. Author of the Massachusetts Circular Letter that urged resistance to Britain. A major figure in the formation of the Committees of Correspondence that worked to unite the 13 colonies against the King. A signer of the Declaration of Independence. Co-author of the Articles of Confederation and the Massachusetts Constitution. State senator. Governor. Consummate agitator for the noble cause of liberty. You would need a monster of a headstone to carve all his contributions and accomplishments as an epitaph.

With America’s 250th anniversary now only ten months away, Samuel Adams is one of those exquisitely interesting Founding Fathers with whom Americans ought to become reacquainted. Books about him abound. It’s also the perfect moment to be reinspired by the cause to which he dedicated so much of his life. Check out Happy Birthday, Freedom! from the Free Society Coalition on whose board I proudly serve.

More than any words I could write, those of Sam Adams himself deserve your attention. Here is a sample of his passionate wisdom:

Neither the wisest constitution nor the wisest laws will secure the liberty and happiness of a people whose manners are universally corrupt. He therefore is the truest friend to the liberty of his country who tries most to promote its virtue, and who, so far as his power and influence extend, will not suffer a man to be chosen into any office of power and trust who is not a wise and virtuous man…The sum of all is, if we would most truly enjoy this gift of Heaven, let us become a virtuous people. From his essay published in The Advertiser in 1748.  

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The truth is, all might be free if they valued freedom, and defended it as they ought. From his essay in The Boston Gazette in 1771.

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The liberties of our Country, the freedom of our civil constitution are worth defending at all hazards: And it is our duty to defend them against all attacks. We have received them as a fair Inheritance from our worthy Ancestors: They purchased them for us with toil and danger and expense of treasure and blood; and transmitted them to us with care and diligence. It will bring an everlasting mark of infamy on the present generation, enlightened as it is, if we should suffer them to be wrested from us by violence without a struggle; or be cheated out of them by the artifices of false and designing men. From The Rights of the Colonists in 1772.

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Among the natural rights of the Colonists are these: First, a right to life; Secondly, to liberty; Thirdly, to property; together with the right to support and defend them in the best manner they can. These are evident branches of, rather than deductions from, the duty of self-preservation, commonly called the first law of nature. From The Rights of the Colonists in 1772.

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Were the talents and virtues which Heaven has bestowed on men given merely to make them more obedient drudges, to be sacrificed to the follies and ambition of a few? Or, were not the noble gifts so equally dispensed with a divine purpose and law, that they should as nearly as possible be equally exerted, and the blessings of Providence be equally enjoyed by all? From his speech in the State House of Pennsylvania, August 1, 1776.

When Sam Adams died at the age of 81 in 1803, a Boston newspaper celebrated him as “the Father of the American Revolution.” President Thomas Jefferson echoed those sentiments when he declared Adams “truly the Man of the Revolution.”

Who wouldn’t want to spend an hour with Sam Adams?!

For additional information, see:

America’s Founders Were Heroes to the World by Lawrence W. Reed

You Lucky Americans by Lawrence W. Reed

This is TJ’s Day by Lawrence W. Reed

America: The Roman Connection by Lawrence W. Reed

Centenarians for Liberty by Lawrence W. Reed

Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death! – 250 Years Later by Lawrence W. Reed

America’s Republic and How the Great Experiment Came About by Lawrence W. Reed

The Origins of “No Taxation Without Representation” by Lawrence W. Reed

Joseph Warren, Founding Father Killed at Bunker Hill by Lawrence W. Reed

Mercy Otis Warren: Conscience of Great Causes by Lawrence W. Reed

Remembering the Ides of March and the Newburgh Conspiracy by Lawrence W. Reed:

https://fee.org/articles/remembering-the-ides-of-march/

Lawrence W. Reed is President Emeritus, Humphreys Family Senior Fellow, and Ron Manners Global Ambassador for Liberty at the Foundation for Economic Education in Atlanta. Georgia. He blogs at www.lawrencewreed.com