Episode 403: Lindsay M. Chervinsky, From Crisis to Peace: Re-Evaluating the Presidency of John Adams

Did you know that John Adams, not George Washington, solidified the precedents of the executive branch and the presidency?

Lindsay Chervinsky, an award-winning presidential historian and the Executive Director of the George Washington Presidential Library, has written a book Making the Presidency: John Adams and the Precedents that Forged the Republic. She joins us to investigate the presidency of the United States’ second president, John Adams.

About the Show

Ben Franklin’s World is a podcast about early American history.

It is a show for people who love history and for those who want to know more about the historical people and events that have impacted and shaped our present-day world.

Ben Franklin’s World is a production of Colonial Williamsburg Innovation Studios.

Episode Summary

Lindsay Chervinsky is a presidential historian and the Executive Director of the George Washington Presidential Library. She’s an award-winning historian who regularly writes for The Wall Street Journal, Ms. Magazine, The Daily Beast, Time, and The Washington Post. She is the author of two books, The Cabinet: George Washington and the Creation of an American Institution and Making the Presidency: John Adams and the Precedents that Forged the Republic.

During our investigation of John Adams’s presidency, Lindsay reveals precedents that George Washington set for the presidency that John Adams solidified for the future. The political and international crises John Adams inherited, including tensions with Great Britain and France and vicious political discord between the Federalist and Democratic-Republic parties. And, how John Adams navigated these crises to secure peace with France and the peaceful transition of power between political parties in the United States.