During the time John Adams and Thomas Jefferson helped launch America in the 1770s, they became close friends.
But two decades later, as they each took a turn as America’s president, they morphed into bitter enemies.
Adams won the election of 1796, narrowly defeating Jefferson, and thus became the nation’s second chief executive. Jefferson returned the favor in 1800, beating Adams in a contested election that had to be decided by the U.S. Senate.
Over time they came to believe the worst about each other. Adams was so bitter about the vote that he didn’t even stick around to see Jefferson’s inauguration. He and his wife Abigail packed up their things and left town.
That appeared to be the sad end to one of America’s most fruitful political collaborations.
But Jefferson and Adams were blessed to have a common friend. He was Dr. Benjamin Rush, a fellow signer of the Declaration of Independence. In 1811, about 10 years after the big falling out, the doctor approached Jefferson.
Rush suggested that Adams might be open to re-establishing a relationship.
The reconciliation of two of America’s Founding Fathers would be wonderful for the country and a blessing for the whole world, he argued. Adams seemed to have softened. And time was growing short. Would Jefferson be willing to give it a shot?
Jefferson pondered things a while, then put pen to paper.
When Adams received the first letter from his old friend he sighed, “I always loved Jefferson, and still love him.” According to historian Jon Meacham, “These eight words were all it took for Jefferson.”
Thus began the most remarkable correspondence in American history. Over the next 15 years they exchanged 158 letters. These days, a motivated teenager might send that many texts in one day. But the distance between Adams’ home in Quincy, Massachusetts, and Jefferson’s home at Monticello, Virginia, was more than 600 miles – a span that had to be traversed by horseback or on foot, sometimes on dirt trails. It took considerable effort to sustain their newfound connection.
Adams famously wrote, “You and I ought not to die before we have explained ourselves to each other.”
That they did.
For a decade and a half they worked through some of their most difficult personal obstacles. They listened to each other. They addressed old wounds with gentler spirits. Along the way they also ruminated on the greatest political, foreign policy, and judicial issues of the day. Meacham writes, “Thus an ancient friendship, shattered by politics, was restored.”
Incredibly, the two men died on the very same day: Tuesday, July 4, 1826, the 50th anniversary of the nation’s beginning.
You may think you’ve had every good reason to give up on a friendship. You may be able to quote chapter and verse about how someone in your life messed things up and let you down. Perhaps today’s political polarization, which is certainly as grievous that of 1800, has led you to vow that you will never again waste time talking to someone so deluded by the Other Side.
But friendships are too rare and beautiful to let slip away just because you think you’re right.
“Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!” (Ecclesiastes 4:9-10).
So, write the letter. Pick up your phone. Send the text. Reach out. Make the first move.
Or play the role of Benjamin Rush and gently help two people who are estranged from each other imagine the possibility that maybe, just maybe, they might still relate to each other in this world.
Life is too short to walk away from God’s gift of a great friendship.
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