Fate, however, had in store for Mr. Adams labors to which he was better suited than those of literature, and tasks to be performed which the nation could ill afford to exchange for an apotheosis of our second President, or even for a respectable but probably not very readable history. The most brilliant and glorious years of his career were yet to be lived. He was to earn in his old age a noble fame and distinction far transcending any achievement of his youth and middle age, and was to attain the highest pinnacle of his fame after he (p. 224) had left the greatest office of the Government, and during a period for which presumably nothing better had been allotted than that he should tranquilly await the summons of death. It is a striking circumstance that the fullness of greatness for one who had been Senator, Minister to England, Secretary of State, and President, remained to be won in the comparatively humble position of a Representative in Congress.
In September, 1830, Mr. Adams notes in his Diary a suggestion made to him that he might if he wished be elected to the national House of Representatives from the Plymouth district. The gentleman who threw out this tentative proposition remarked that in his opinion the acceptance of this position by an ex-President "instead of degrading the individual would elevate the representative character." Mr. Adams replied, that he "had in that respect no scruple whatever. No person could be degraded by serving the people as a Representative in Congress. Nor in my opinion would an ex-President of the United States be degraded by serving as a selectman of his town, if elected thereto by the people." A few weeks later his election was accomplished by a flattering vote, the poll showing for him 1817 votes out of 2565, with only 373 for the next candidate. He continued thenceforth to represent this district until his death, a period of about sixteen years. During this time he was occasionally suggested as a candidate for the (p. 226) governorship of the State, but was always reluctant to stand. The feeling between the Freemasons and the anti-Masons ran very high for several years, and once he was prevailed upon to allow his name to be used by the latter party. The result was that there was no election by the people; and as he had been very loath to enter the contest in the beginning, he insisted upon withdrawing from before the legislature. We have now therefore only to pursue his career in the lower house of Congress.