The progress of Evolution from President Washington to President Grant was alone evidence enough to upset Darwin.

Adams uses ironic, mock-scientific language to comment on American political history. By calling the succession from George Washington to Ulysses S. Grant “Evolution,” he treats the presidency as if it were a biological lineage and then claims that this “evidence” would “upset Darwin.” The joke hinges on a perceived decline (or at least a jarring contrast) from the revered founding figure to a later, more controversial or less idealized leader, implying that “progress” in politics does not follow a steady upward trajectory. The line also reflects Adams’s broader skepticism about simplistic narratives of progress—whether in science, politics, or historical interpretation—and his habit of measuring modernity against earlier republican ideals.