Charles Sumner

“ Sumner loved England — had loved her as long as he lived — from a feeling of consanguinity, for the treasures of literature she had given to the world, for the services she had rendered to human freedom, for the blows she had struck at slavery, for the sturdy work she had done for the cause of progress and civilization, for the many dear friends he had among her citizens. Such was his impulse, and no man was more incapable of pandering to a vulgar prejudice. ”

“ It is safe to say that to-day there are no American statesmen better known or more highly esteemed in England than Charles Sumner and Charles Francis Adams. Mr Sumner was a close attendant at the debates in Parliament, and in the courts at Westminister, where he was frequently invited by the Judges to sit-by their side at the trials. ”

“ Through the door that was too narrow to freely let out the bearers that bore Charles Sumner’s inanimate form from the Senate Chamber, where he had been stricken down by the assassins of the Slave Power, Charles Sumner to-day marched back, leading a negro by the hand, and, standing upon the very spot that had been stained with his blood for demanding freedom and equality for the blacks in America, demanded of the Supreme Court of the United States to enroll among its members an African lawyer, and to license him to practise at its bar. ”

“ It was a blow struck at the very Tree of Liberty. It speaks to us in words not to be mistaken. It says to us that Northern men shall not be heard in the halls of Congress, except at the peril of the bowie-knife, the bludgeon, and revolver. Nor is this any new thing.
“The bludgeon, heretofore only brandished, has at last been brought down; and now is the time for the North to fight. Charles Sumner needs not our sympathy: if he dies, his name will be immortal,—his name will be enrolled with the names of Warren, Sidney, and Russell; if he lives, he is destined to be the light of the nation.” ”

“ Is it well to make them believe that he who dares to be himself must be hunted as a political outlaw, who will find justice only when he is dead? That would have been the sad moral of his death, had Charles Sumner died a year ago.
Let the American people never forget that it has always been the independent spirit, the all-defying sense of duty which broke the way for every great progressive movement since mankind has a history; which gave the American Colonies their sovereignty and made this great Republic; which defied the power of slavery, and made this a Republic of freemen ”

“ Upon its summit was a figure representing Charles Sumner holding his Kansas speech in his right hand. On either side were the figures of Justice and Freedom, crowning him with a wreath of laurels. A winged genius sits at his feet, and is inscribing his name on a tablet. Figures representing Victory are upon the arms of the vase, heralding the triumph of Freedom. Above the inscription to Mr. Sumner, and in the centre, was the coat of arms of Massachusetts. ”

“ I am not sure whether I should have the courage to say those things to the men who are scowling around him."
Of all men in the Senate Chamber, Sumner was probably least aware that the thing he did required pluck. He simply did what he felt it his duty to his cause to do. It was to him a matter of course. He was like a soldier who, when he has to march upon the enemy's batteries, does not say to himself, "Now I am going to perform an act of heroism," but who simply obeys an impulse of duty, and marches forward without thinking of the bullets that fly around his head. ”

“ Charles Sumner is a man of large heart,—not of that class of politicians who calculate availability, and the numbers of the opposition, but a man who takes an enlarged view of a noble system of action, and places his shoulder to the wheel to move it forward. He is now doing more to impress on the country a new and powerful moral sentiment in connection with the movement than any man or any ten men in the country. If Boston is what Boston was, she would be doing herself honor and the country benefit by electing him. ”

“ Sumner found his place and there he grew great, for that moral impulse was stronger in him than in most of the world around him; and it was in him not a mere crude, untutored force of nature, but educated and elevated by thought and study; and it found in his brain and heart an armory of strong weapons given to but few; vast information, legal learning, industry, eloquence, undaunted courage, an independent and iron will, profound convictions, unbounded devotion and sublime faith. ”

“ Charles Sumner entered the Senate not as a mere advocate, but as the very embodiment of the moral idea. From this fountain flowed his highest aspirations. There had been great anti-slavery men in the Senate before him; they were there with him, men like Seward and Chase. But they had been trained in a different school. Their minds had ranged over other political fields. They understood politics. He did not. He knew but one political object,—to combat and overthrow the great wrong of slavery; to serve the ideal of the liberty and equality of men ”

“ There stood up in the Senate a man who was no politician; but who, on the highest field of politics, with a concentrated intensity of feeling and purpose never before witnessed there, gave expression to a moral impulse, which, although sleeping perhaps for a time, certainly existed in the popular conscience, and which, once become a political force, could not fail to produce a great revolution.
Charles Sumner possessed all the instincts, the courage, the firmness and the faith of the devotee of a great idea. ”

“ Sumner was an idealist—neither a constitutionalist nor a practical statesman. He could pull down, but he could not construct—could declare what he considered humane, right, and proper, and act upon it regardless of constitutional compromises or conventional regulations which were the framework of the Government. No man connected with the Administration, or in either branch of Congress, was more thoroughly acquainted with our treaties, so familiar with the traditions of the Government, or better informed on international law than Charles Sumner ”

“ Mother of American liberty! a brilliant light you have given to illuminate this world of sin and vice; a true friend of humanity; nobly hast thou repaid us for the blood of Chrispus Attucks, that baptised thy bosom in 1770, by the noble deeds of chaste Charles Sumner, whom we have lost. ”

“ Charles Sumner never made a charge which he did not himself firmly, religiously believe to be true. Neither did he condemn those he attacked for anything he did not firmly, religiously believe to be wrong. ”

“ He cherished in his mind a high ideal of what this Republic and its government should be: a government composed of the best and wisest of the land; animated by none but the highest and most patriotic aspirations; yielding to no selfish impulse; noble in its tone and character; setting its face sternly against all wrong and injustice; presenting in its whole being to the American people a shining example of purity and lofty public spirit. Mr. Sumner was proud of his country; there was no prouder American in the land. He felt in himself the whole dignity of the Republic. ”

“ Blows fell upon it and its authors fast and furious from Seward, Chase, Wade, Fessenden, Giddings and Gerrit Smith. But Sumner was the colossus of the hour, the flaming sword of his section. It was he who swung its ponderous broadsword and smote plot and plotters with the terrible strength of the northern giant. Such a speech, as was his “Landmarks of Freedom,” only great national crises breed. ”

“ Charles Sumner has been delivering a speech before a crowded audience in New York which will cause much pain and disappointment to all friends and well-wishers of the Federal United States. It is weak in argument, unfair and unjust in its representations, and bitter in tone and temper. If men of Mr. Sumner’s education and position in America really believe the things they say and indulge the feelings to which they give utterance, it is clearly hopeless to attempt either to enlighten their understanding or to allay their irritation.... ”

“ The manner of the orator on this occasion, a manner which marked all of his utterances, was that of a man who defers to no one, prefers no one to himself—the imperious manner of a man, conscious of the possession of great powers and of ability to use them. Such a man the crisis demanded. God made one American statesman without moral joints when he made Charles Sumner. He could not bend the supple hinges of the knee to the slave power, for he had none to bend. He must needs stand erect, inflexible, uncompromising, an image of Puritan intolerance and Puritan grandeur. ”

“ Sumner marshalled the armies of the nation against the institution of slavery, but his blood marshalled the armies of heaven.
The trio of so-called fanatics above referred to, Sumner, Chase and Hale, could not have made the impression in years with the most learned and elaborate arguments that was made in a day after Sumner fell by the fatal-aimed blow of a ruffian, and wallowed in his own blood.
Mr. Sumner was no politician, he was every whit a statesman; like Webster, he was an orator, but unlike Webster he was inflexible; like Everit he was a philosopher, learned and sagacious ”

“ Sumner display the majesty of a statesman, and dwell in such convincing power as he did on giving the negro the ballot. Here he showed the resources of his exhaustless intellect as no other statesman living did or could. He challenged the world—he met our foes from every clime and of every dialect, he rebutted their objections by quotations from the reformers of all nations, he made the moralists, the poets, the theologians, the jurists, the scientialists, and the axiomatics of every age and clime contribute to this object. ”

“ Such were the sentiments which inspired that resolution. Such were the sentiments which called forth a storm of obloquy. Such were the sentiments for which the legislature of Massachusetts passed a solemn resolution of censure upon Charles Sumner,—Massachusetts, his own Massachusetts, whom he loved so ardently with a filial love,—of whom he was so proud, who had honored him so much in days gone by, and whom he had so long and so faithfully labored to serve and to honor! ”

“ His deeds, his example, and his fame, he left as a legacy to the American people and to mankind; and it is my office to speak of this inheritance. I cannot speak of it without affection. I shall endeavor to do it with justice.
Among the public characters of America, Charles Sumner stands peculiar and unique. His senatorial career is a conspicuous part of our political history. But in order to appreciate the man in the career, we must look at the story of his life. ”

“ Charles Sumner has at length been elected to the United States Senate, for the full term of six years. He has taken no prominent part in politics, but is widely known as a scholar and philanthropist.—Soon after the decision of an exciting Fugitive Slave case in Boston, a number of citizens who had invited Mr. Webster to address them on the political condition of the country, petitioned the Board of Aldermen for the use of Faneuil Hall on that occasion. ”

“ Charles Sumner who had become known to the public as an orator and scholar by three or four great orations, was just at the threshold of his brilliant career. Charles Francis Adams, who had served respectably but without great distinction, in each branch of the Legislature, brought to the cause his inflexible courage, his calm judgment, and the inspiration of his historic name. John A. Andrew, then a young lawyer in Boston, afterward to become illustrious as the greatest war Governor in the Union, devoted to the cause an eloquence stimulant and inspiring as a sermon of Paul. ”

“ We have known him as the intimate friend of Charles Sumner, and are grateful that in the last, somewhat lonely, hours of that noble life, Charles Sumner had in Carl Schurz a friend in whose devotion and affection he could wholly trust; and we listened with gratitude to the voice which in Music Hall recounted the great services and defended the spotless fame of our own great Senator.
Those of us who have known all this have not found it necessary to examine very critically any charges against the fidelity of such a man. After observing such a career, we either know a man or we do not know him. ”

“ Before taking action, it was best to consult an old subscriber, Charles Sumner, then on the Allegheny Mountains, recovering from the Brook's assault. I took baby and went to see him.
He was domiciled in the family of Dr. Jackson, Pennsylvania State Geologist, and seemed to be one of it. In the sitting-room were his desk and lounge, where he wrote or lay and talked, principally with Dr. Furness, of Philadelphia, who was with him, devoting an ever-growing store of information to the amusement of his friend. Dr. Jackson was full of instruction, and no man more ready than Sumner to learn. ”

“ Lincoln was the only man living who ever managed Charles Sumner, or could use him for his purpose. Sumner's end has always seemed to me most pitiful. Removed from his high position as chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee of the Senate, followed relentlessly by the enmity of President Grant, than at the very acme of his fame; drifting from the Republican party, his own State repudiating him, Charles Sumner died of a broken heart. ”

“ Sumner's natural abilities were not of the very first order; but they were supplemented by acquired abilities of most remarkable power. His mind was not apt to invent and create by inspiration; it produced by study and work. Neither had his mind superior constructive capacity. When he desired to originate a measure of legislation, he scarcely ever elaborated its practical detail; he usually threw his idea into the form of a resolution, or a bill giving in the main his purpose only, and then he advanced to the discussion of the principles involved. ”