" It was the greatest speech that Adams ever delivered. He was “our Colossus on the floor,” Jefferson said later, adding that Adams had spoken “with a power of thought and expression, that moved us from our seats.” Richard Stockton of New Jersey, one of those who had just entered Congress, was mesmerized by Adams’s speech. The “force of his reasoning” made it clear that there was no choice but independence, he wrote to his son. “The man to whom the country is most indebted for the great measure of independency is Mr. John Adams of Boston. I call him the Atlas of American Independence. "

― John Ferling , John Adams: A Life