Neptune's Needle

Second president of the United States, diplomat, and political theorist. Born in Braintree, Massachusetts just minutes from the Atlantic Ocean. Early law practice heavily involved with maritime cases, including defending John Hancock, whose ship Liberty was seized in 1768 for smuggling wine. In 1769 Adams defended a seaman named Michael Corbet, who killed a lieutenant from a naval press gang in self-defense. Adams was enraged when Chief Justice Thomas Hutchinson declared Corbet innocent before he could even present the critique of impressment he had prepared.

The "right" of New England to fish off the Grand Banks in the Atlantic Ocean he supported with massive erudition and documentation, refusing even the British willingness to write this "liberty" into the treaty.

As president, Adams wholeheartedly supported a navy bill that led to the construction of the USS Constitution ("Old Ironsides") and other frigates, which more than held their own with French warships during the Quasi-War with France fought on the high seas from 1797 to 1800. Can correctly be identified as the prime moving force behind the creation of a permanent American navy.

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Peter Richards