Mayor Josiah Quincy
Served 1823-1828

"Born in Boston, February 4,1772; died July 1, 1864; served during 1823-1828.

No one had taken a greater interest in town affairs than Josiah Quincy. It fell to him to preside at the last town meeting held in Faneuil Hall, and those who wanted an energetic Mayor, ready to take full advantage of the powers under the city government, found in Josiah Quincy a man admirably suited for the task.

He has deservedly been called the Great Mayor, setting a standard of purpose and execution which has rarely been equaled. Josiah Quincy's term of administration covered a period of six years marked by lively controversies and the accomplishment of many important measures, in spite of the charter limitations under which the Mayor had to act. In order to secure the widest possible power, Quincy placed himself at the head of all the committees of the Board of Mayor and Aldermen, and did so without antagonizing his associates in a disturbing degree.

Among the achievements under Quincy's administration were the great extension of Faneuil Hall for market purposes, and the reorganization of the departments of Health, Fire, and Charitable and Correctional Institutions. He also placed the Police Department on a better footing and abolished the Board of Surveyors of Highways. Indeed, Josiah Quincy's interests covered all kinds of municipal activities. He was exceedingly concerned on behalf of the public schools.

Already prior to the organization of Boston as a city he had given much attention to the care of the poor, and, on becoming Mayor, put into effect several important measures for their welfare as well as for that of prisoners.

A memorable event in Quincy's administration was the official visit of General Lafayette to Boston.

When his last year of office drew to a close, Quincy had aroused a feeling of bitterness and even of malignancy on the part of many influential voters, whose private interests had suffered through his reform measures, and who could not forget the increased expenditures due to the many improvements undertaken. In addition, he had the low elements against him because he enforced laws relating to gambling, prostitution, and the sale of intoxicating liquors. In spite of all vilification, no charge could be brought against Mayor Quincy affecting his personal and official integrity. He was a strong man and had used his power to the advantage of the city, if perhaps ruthlessly at times.

Although Mayor Quincy stood for re-election in 1828, he failed to receive a majority of all the votes cast both on the first and second ballots. He then withdrew his name, stating that 'no consideration would induce him again to accept the office.'"

Biographical Sketch (1883)
 

"Born in 1772, and died in 1864, ninety-two years of happy, prosperous, and virtuous life! How was it that, in a world so full of the sick, the miserable, and the unfortunate, Josiah Quincy should have lived so long, and enjoyed, during almost the whole of his life, uninterrupted happiness and prosperity? Let us see.

He was born in Boston, in a house the walls of which are still standing [in 1881], in a part of the city now called Washington Street. His father was that young Josiah Quincy who went away on a patriotic mission to London when this boy was three years of age, and only returned to die within sight of his native land, without having delivered the message with which Doctor Franklin had charged him. Left an orphan at so early an age, his education was superintended by one of the best mothers a boy ever had; and this was the first cause both of the length and of the happiness of his life. This admirable mother was so careful lest her fondness for her only son should cause her to indulge him to his harm, that she even refrained from caressing him, and, in all that she did for him, thought of his welfare first, and of her own pleasure last, or not at all. To harden him, she used to have him taken from a warm bed in winter, as well as in summer, and carried down to a cellar kitchen, and there dipped three times in a tub of cold water. She even accustomed him to sit in wet feet, and endeavored in all ways to toughen his physical system against the wear and tear of life.

This boy…was old enough during the Revolutionary war to remember some of its incidents. "I imbibed," he once wrote, "the patriotism of the period, was active against the British, and with my little whip and astride my grandfather's cane, I performed prodigies of valor, and more than once came to my mother's knees declaring that I had driven the British out of Boston.” Like all other healthy boys, he was a keen lover of out-of-door sports of every kind. "My heart," he wrote, "was in ball and marbles." And yet, in accordance with the custom of the schools of that time, he was compelled to sit on the same hard bench every day, four hours in the morning, and four hours in the afternoon, studying lessons which it was impossible so young a child could value or understand. A boy of less elastic mind and less vigorous constitution of body must have been injured by this harsh, irrational discipline. It seems only to have taught him patience and fortitude. Being a member of a rich and ancient family, he enjoyed every advantage of education which America then afforded, and graduated from Harvard College, in 1790, with honor. He was soon after admitted to the bar; but as he was not dependent upon his profession for a [career], he was not a very diligent or famous lawyer.

I have said that he was a very happy man. This is almost equivalent to saying that he was very happily married, since the weal or woe of most men's lives chiefly depends upon the wisdom with which they choose their life's companion. Josiah Quincy was indeed most fortunately married, and yet he does not appear to have exercised his judgment in the choice of a wife. In seven days after he first saw her face, he was engaged to be married to her. It happened thus: —

On a certain Sunday evening, in 1794, being then twenty- two years of age, he went, according to his custom, to visit one of his aunts, who lived in Boston. He found at his aunt's house, a Miss Morton, a young lady from New York, of whom he had never before heard, and who was so little remarkable in her appearance, that she made no impression on his mind. In the course of the evening, a female relative who was present asked him to go into the next room, as she wished to consult him on some affair of business. While they were talking, the strange lady began to sing one of the songs of Burns with a clearness of voice, and with a degree of taste and feeling, which charmed and excited him beyond anything he had ever experienced. He immediately threw down the law papers which he had been examining, and returned to the company. Miss Morton sang several other songs, to the great delight of all who heard her, and to the unbounded rapture of this particular young gentleman. When the singing was over, he entered into conversation with her, and discovered her to be an intelligent, well informed, unaffected, and kind-hearted girl. In short, he fell in love with her upon the spot, and when the young lady left Boston a week after, he was engaged to her.

Some time elapsed, however, before they were married. She was a young lady of highly respectable connections and considerable fortune. The marriage was suitable in all respects, and they lived together fifty-three happy years. This most fortunate union was, no doubt, one of the main causes of the singular peace and uninterrupted happiness of his life.

It was expected, at that time, that a man of fortune, talents, and education, like Josiah Quincy, would enter public life. In 1805 he was elected a member of Congress by the Federalists of Boston, a party of which he was a warm adherent, and to which he clung as long as it existed. His son tells us, in an excellent biography of his father [had] published, that, to the last of his life, when he was in reality a member of the Republican party, the old man still called himself a Federalist. Having been elected to Congress, he did a most extraordinary thing: he actually set to work to prepare himself, by a study of politics and history, to discharge the duties of the place! He even learned the French language, in order to be able to converse with the foreign ministers and other Europeans whom he might meet in Washington. Besides this, he made a large collection of pamphlets, documents, and books relating to the history of his country, and to the political questions which had agitated it since the close of the Revolution.

He was, unquestionably, the ablest member of the Federal party in Congress at that time, and he served his party with a zeal and eloquence which was highly useful in keeping the administrations of Jefferson and Madison in the true path. Being myself in the fullest sympathy with Jefferson and Madison, I cannot think so highly of his congressional career, as, perhaps, his son would have us. But I can fully appreciate his honesty, his industry, his high-bred courtesy, and his admirable eloquence. His ardor in debate would have led to frequent challenges and duels, if he had not from the first made up his mind never to be bullied into acquiescence with so barbarous a custom. In conversation with Southern members on the subject, he would say: "We do not stand upon equal grounds in this matter. If we fight and you kill me, it is a feather in your cap, and your constituents will think all the better of you for it. If I should kill you, it would ruin me with mine, and they never would send me to Congress again.”

Reasoning of this kind the fire-eaters of 1810 could understand, though they would have been little able to comprehend the lofty moral grounds on which his objections to the practice were really founded.

The most remarkable event of his public life was his opposition to the creation of States, by Act of Congress, out of territory which did not belong to the United States when the Constitution was agreed to. His opinion was that such new States could only be admitted into the Union by the consent of as many of the original thirteen States as had been necessary for the adoption of the Constitution itself. So rooted and passionate was his conviction on this subject, that, in the year 1811, when the act was discussed under which Louisiana was afterwards admitted, he uttered in the House the following words: —

"I am compelled to declare it as my deliberate opinion, that, if this bill passes, the bonds of this Union are virtually dissolved; that the States which compose it are free from their moral obligation; and that, as it will be the right of all, so it will be the duty of some, to prepare definitely for a separation; amicably, if they can, violently if they must."

This looks so much like the secession doctrines of subsequent times, that, I am afraid, many readers will never be able to distinguish the difference. One thing is certain: the admission of new States formed out of new territory by a mere Act of Congress, did actually, for fifty years, make the Southern States masters of this Union; and Josiah Quincy was, perhaps, the first public man who clearly saw and clearly foretold that this would be the case.

Mr. Quincy, in one of his letters from Washington, relates an anecdote of Felix Grundy, of Tennessee, which throws light upon Western politics, as they were conducted half a century ago. Mr. Grundy, after having soundly berated Mr. Quincy in the House, said to him the next day:

"Quincy, I thought I had abused you enough; but I find it will not do."

"Why, what is the matter now? I do not mean to speak again."

"No matter," said Grundy; "by Heavens, I must give you another thrashing."

"Why so?" asked the member from Massachusetts.

"Why," said Grundy, "the truth is, a d—d fellow has set up against me in my District, — a perfect Jacobin, — as much worse than I am as worse can be. Now, except Tim Pickering, there is not a man in the United States so perfectly hated by the people of my District as yourself. You must therefore excuse me. I must abuse you, or I shall never get re-elected. I will do it, however, genteelly. I will not do it as that fool of a Clay did — strike so hard as to hurt myself. But abuse you I must. You understand; I mean to be friends, notwithstanding. I mean to be in Congress again, and must use the means."

The imagination is a great deceiver. We have a curious example of this truth in the different accounts which have come down to us respecting the appearance of General Washington. Josiah Quincy and his wife both saw this illustrious man, and both were persons of eminent intelligence and perfect truth. Nevertheless, how different their impressions! Mrs. Quincy, who was of a highly imaginative temperament, used to speak of him as being as far above ordinary mortals, in grace and majesty of person and demeanor, as he was in character. Mr. Quincy, on the contrary, though revering Washington not less, thought him rather countrified and awkward in his appearance and manners. He used to say that "President Washington had the air of a country gentleman not accustomed to mix much with society, perfectly polite, but not easy in his address and conversation, and not graceful in his gait and movements." We can account for these different representations by supposing that one of the witnesses was, and the other was not, misled by the imagination.

When Josiah Quincy was a young man, about the year 1795, he paid a visit to New York, and while there became acquainted with Alexander Hamilton, who, with Aaron Burr, stood at the head of the New York bar. Upon one occasion, when the conversation turned upon Colonel Burr, Mr. Quincy asked Hamilton whether Burr was a man of great talents. Hamilton's reply, in view of subsequent events, was remarkable.

"Not of great talents," said Hamilton. "His mind, though brilliant, is shallow, and incapable of broad views or continued effort. He seldom speaks in court more than twenty minutes; and, though his speeches are showy and not without effect upon a jury, they contain no proof of uncommon powers of mind. But he has ambition that will never be satisfied until he has encircled his brow with a diadem."

These words were uttered nine years before the duel took place which terminated the life of Alexander Hamilton. It shows that, even at that early period, he had the same ill opinion of Burr, the too careless expression of which afterwards cost him his life.

In the spring of 1812, when President Madison determined, before declaring war against Great Britain, to try once more the effect of an embargo, Mr. Quincy was informed of the President's intention by Mr. Calhoun, a member of the Committee on Foreign Relations. Being authorized to communicate the news to his constituents, he joined another member from Massachusetts in writing to two of the leading citizens of Boston a letter containing the important intelligence. Dispatch in the transmission of the news was, of course, all-important, and they contracted with a stage proprietor to convey the letter from Washington to Boston in seventy-six hours. The contract was performed; and never, perhaps, did news produce a greater excitement.

"On Saturday and Sunday," as Mr. Quincy himself relates, "the whole town was in motion. Every truck and cart was in requisition. The streets and wharves were crowded by the merchants, anxious to send their ships to sea before the harbor was closed by the embargo." All day Sunday those Puritan merchants continued to load their ships; so that, by the time the embargo was laid, all the vessels designed for England were safe at sea.

Some pretty rough politicians used to find the way to Washington from the Western States [in the 1820s]. Matthew Lyon was one of these, a man of great note in his day. Josiah Quincy once asked him how he obtained an election to the House of Representatives so soon after his emigration to Kentucky. He answered, "By establishing myself at a cross-roads, which everybody in the district passed from time to time, and abusing the sitting member."

This Lyon was one of those members who continually sent printed speeches and political letters to their constituents. Mr. Quincy asked him one day how he avoided offending those of his constituents whom he chanced to overlook in this distribution of favors.

"I manage it in this way," said he. "When I am canvassing my district, and I come across a man who looks distantly and cold at me, I get up cordially to him and say : ‘My dear friend, you got my printed letter last session, of course.' 'No, sir,' replies the man, with offended dignity, 'I got no such thing.' 'No!’ I cry out in a passion. 'No! damn that post-office!' Then I make a memorandum of the man's name and address, and when I get back to Washington I write him an autograph letter, and all is put to rights."

After eight years of congressional life, when he was but forty-one years of age, and when he might easily have been reelected, Josiah Quincy withdrew from public life, partly from private and partly for public reasons. The main public reason was, that the Federal party was too powerless even to make a useful opposition; and his chief private reason was, that he loved his wife and children too much to be separated from them. Returning home, he served his native State, first by making costly experiments in agriculture upon his estate, which, though unprofitable to him, were highly beneficial to the community.

For several years he was mayor of Boston, during which he reformed the city government, and rendered services to the city the good effects of which are still apparent. If Boston is the best-governed city in America, it is in part owing to the efficiency and wisdom of Josiah Quincy.

When Mr. Quincy was President of Harvard College, he displayed unusual tact in the management of different college cases. He actually was so eccentric as to believe that when young men complain, their complaints may be not altogether without cause. For several years there had been discontent among the students with the contractor who provided their food. Upon inquiring into the matter, President Quincy discovered that the students were right, and instead of rebuking them for their rebellious disposition, he proceeded to remove the causes of their dissatisfaction. Besides causing the table to be served with abundant and proper food, he ordered a set of china from England, and banished from the college-board the heterogeneous vessels which had formerly disfigured it.

On one occasion the contractor complained that the students would persist in toasting their bread at the stove, — to the great injury of the forks. The contractor said that he complained of this to former presidents, but that none of them had proved equal to putting an end to it.

"What did they do when you complained?" asked President Quincy.

"Why," replied the contractor, "they would admonish the offender, and in case of a repetition of the practice, they would suspend or dismiss him."

"But that seems a rather hard measure," said the President. "Pray, do you not have your own bread toasted for breakfast in winter?"

"Certainly I do," was the reply; "but I cannot afford to toast the bread of all the college on my present terms."

"Very good," said the President; "toast the bread, and charge the additional expense in your bill."

This excellent man carried one of his virtues to excess — early rising. He rose so early in the morning, that he scarcely had sleep enough; so that, when he sat down during the day for ten minutes, he was very likely to fall asleep. John Quincy Adams was also addicted to excessive early rising. One day these two distinguished men went into Judge Story's lecture-room to hear him read his lecture to his class in the law school. The Judge received the two presidents with his usual politeness, and placed them on the platform by his side, in full view of the class, and then went on with his lecture. In a very few minutes both the presidents were fast asleep. The Judge paused a moment, and pointing to the two sleeping gentlemen, uttered these words:

"Gentlemen, you see before you a melancholy example of the evil effects of early rising."

This remark was followed by a shout of laughter, which effectually roused the sleepers, after which the Judge resumed his discourse.

For sixteen years Mr. Quiucy was President of Harvard College, — a difficult and laborious office. This son tells us, that, during the whole sixteen years of his presidency, he was never absent from the six-o'clock morning prayers but three times; and that was occasioned by his being obliged to attend a distant court as a witness on behalf of the college. Upon resigning his presidency, though he was then an old man past seventy, he was still apparently in the very prime of his powers, and he lived many years after in the enjoyment of the most perfect health, and of scarcely diminished vigor. It concerns us all to know the secret of such health and longevity as this. His father died very young, and his mother in middle life. Nor had any of his paternal ancestors lived beyond seventy-four.

In the first place, he was strictly temperate in the use of intoxicating drinks, almost to total abstinence. At breakfast and at night he ate moderately and of plain food. At dinner, which he had the good sense to eat in the middle of the day, he ate heartily of whatever was set before him. He discovered, many years ago, how important perfect cleanliness is to the preservation of health, and he made a frequent use of the bath tub, the flesh brush, and the hair gloves. He was an exceedingly early riser. He was addicted to no vice whatever. His life was blameless and cheerful.

He indulged none of the passions which waste the vitality and pervert the character. All his objects were such as a rational and virtuous man could pursue without self-reproach, and with the approbation of the wise and good. Thus living, he attained nearly to the age of ninety-three, enjoying life almost to the last hour, and passed away as peacefully and painlessly as a child goes to sleep.

He was an eminently handsome man, from youth to extreme old age. His fine set of teeth he kept entire until his death; and this, no doubt, had much to do with preserving the health of his body and the proportions of his countenance. His son says that a bust of him taken in his prime, by Horatio Greenough, might well pass for the head of an Apollo or a Jupiter. Of all the myriads of men that have lived and labored on this earth since its creation, I question if there has ever been one man who lived, upon the whole, a better life than Josiah Quincy, of Massachusetts. He had a sound constitution, and took care of it; he had a good mind, and improved it; he had an excellent wife, and appreciated her value; he had a good fortune, and did not abuse it; he lived in a good country, and faithfully served it; he had an enlightened religion, and lived up to it.

In religious matters, Josiah Quincy displayed a degree of independence and good sense rarely to be met with in his generation in New England. He had a particular aversion to all theological disputes and sectarian exclusiveness. He was accustomed sometimes to sum up his opinions on this subject by quoting the well-known lines: —

"For modes of faith, let graceless zealots fight, He can't be wrong whose life is in the right."

One of the entries in his diary, made when he was past eighty-four years of age, was the following: —

"From the doctrines with which metaphysical divines have chosen to obscure the word of God, such as predestination, election, reprobation, etc., I turn with loathing to the refreshing assurance, which to my mind contains the substance of revealed religion.

'In every nation he who feareth God and worketh righteousness is accepted of him.'"

In these more enlightened days it is easy to believe this truth; but [in the 1790s], when Josiah Quincy was forming his opinions, few persons were able to accept it fully and heartily."

Return to Boston Mayors Page