[ Massachusetts constitution] was [John Adams] attempt to justify that structure by the traditional notion of social estates … - Gordon S. Wood

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Gordon S. Wood

[ Massachusetts constitution] was [John Adams] attempt to justify that structure by the traditional notion of social estates - that the executive represented the monarchical estate, the senate the aristocratic estate, and the house of representatives the estate of the people.

House, John, Massachusetts, People, Represented

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The relationship between [John] Adams and [Tomas] Jefferson was extraordinary. They differed on every conceivable issue, except on the Revolution and the love of their country.

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History is the queen of the humanities. It teaches wisdom and humility, and it tells us how things change through time.

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[The Massachusetts constitution] resembles the federal Constitution of 1787 more closely than any of the other revolutionary state constitutions. It was also drawn up by a special convention, and it provided for popular ratification - practices that were followed by the drafters of the federal Constitution of 1787 and subsequent state constitution-makers.

Drawn, Massachusetts, Practice, Practices, Revolutionary, Special

[Benjamin] Franklin may be a great philosopher, [John Adams] told his diary in 1779, but "as a Legislator in America he has done very little. "

1779, America, Benjamin, Diaries, Done, John

This rationale, which justified the mixed constitution of Great Britain, might have made some sense in 1776, but by 1787 most American thinkers had come to believe that all parts of their balanced governments represented in one way or another the sovereign people. They had left the Aristotelian idea of mixed estates - monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy - way behind. [John] Adams had not, and his stubbornness on this point caused him no end of trouble.

Aristotelian, Believe, Caused, Democracy, Government, Ideas