Abigail Adams was the wife of John Adams, the mother to John Quincy Adams, and the first woman to live in the White House. While she lacked formal education, she was an avid reader and writer who is considered by some to be one of the earliest proponents of the equal rights of women.

Abigail Adams was opposed to slavery, encouraged her daughters to be educated, felt women deserved equal representation under the law, and encouraged her husband to incorporate theses ideas into law. She wrote: "I would desire you would remember the Ladies, and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the Husbands. Remember all men would be tyrants if they could. If particular care and attention is not paid to the Ladies we are determined to foment a Rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any Laws in which we have no voice, or Representation."

A devout and loyal wife and patriot, Abigail Adams was a strong supporter of the Declaration of Independence, and the liberty it represented:

I have sometimes been ready to think that the passion for Liberty cannot be Equally Strong in the breasts of those who have been accustomed to deprive their fellow Creatures of theirs. Of this I am certain that it is not founded upon that generous and Christian principle of doing to others what we would that others should do to us.