The sixth president of the United States and son of founding father John Adams, John Quincy Adams gave this speech to the U.S. House of Representatives on July 4th, 1821, on the 45th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
https://www.biography.com/political-figures/john-quincy-adams
“Wherever the standard of freedom and independence has been unfurled, there will [America’s] heart, her benedictions and her prayers be. But she goes not abroad in search of monsters to destroy.” The speech stresses that the Declaration was more than the “mere secession of territory” and the “establishment of a nation.”
