Adams, John Quincy 

6th President of the United States, March 4, 1825 – March 4, 1829.  Born: July 11, 1767, Braintree, Massachusetts; Death: February 23, 1848, Washington D.C.   Education: Harvard University (BA, MA).  The son of John Adams, the 2nd President of the United States.  He served as U.S. Minister to the Netherlands (1794-1797), U.S. Minister to Prussia (1797-1801), U.S. Senator (1803-1808), U.S. Minister to Russia (1809-1814), U.S. Envoy to the United Kingdom (1815-1817), U.S. Secretary of State (1817-1825), Member U.S. House of Representatives Massachusetts 11th District: 1831-1833; Massachusetts 12th District: 1833-1843; and the Massachusetts 8th District: 1843-1848.  Adams contested the 1824 Presidential Election, of which no candidate had won a majority of the electoral vote.  The House of Representatives, as per Article I. of the U.S. Constitution, held a contingent vote to determine the president, and Adams won.  Though a Jeffersonian Republican, his roots in his father’s Federalist Party left Adams with big government aspirations.  He called unconstitutionally federally funded infrastructure projects, and the establishment of a national university.  Many of his ambitious projects were rejected, partly because of the civil war being waged in the party between the National Republicans (of which Adams supported) and the Democratic Party (a push for democracy led by Andrew Jackson).  When Jackson decisively defeated Adams in the 1928 presidential election, the Democrats took over the party, and changed its name to the Democratic Party.  After his presidency, Adams remained in public office, serving in the House of Representatives, where he joined the Whig Party and remained an opponent to the Jacksonian Democrats.  Adams also became a vocal opponent of slavery, and the Southern power structure he believed was controlling the Democratic Party.