APPENDIX.

“they who, to be sure of Paradise,Dying, put on the weeds of Dominic,Or in Franciscan think to pass disguised.”

“they who, to be sure of Paradise,

Dying, put on the weeds of Dominic,

Or in Franciscan think to pass disguised.”

But character is not changed in a day; and that “Southern heart,” which was “fired” against the Union, still preserves its vindictive violence. Even if for a moment controlled, who can tell how long it will continue in this mood? There is an ancient well-known fable, where a cat was transformed into a beautiful woman;but, on the night of her marriage, hearing the sound of a mouse, she sprang from bed with all her original feline nature. And so a Rebel, transformed by political necromancy into a loyalist, will suddenly start in full cry to run down a national freedman or national creditor. So strong is nature. Horace tells us, “Drive it out with a pitchfork, and it will return.” Therefore do I insist, put not political trust in the man who has been engaged in warring upon his country. I ask not his punishment. I would not be harsh. There is nothing humane that I would reject. Nothing in hate. Nothing in vengeance. Nothing in passion. I am for gentleness. I am for a velvet glove; but for a while I wish the hand of iron. I confess that I have little sympathy with those hypocrites of magnanimity whose appeal for the Rebel master is only a barbarous indifference towards the slave; and yet they cannot more than I desire the day of reconciliation. To this end I am with them,so far as is consistent with safety; but I cannot see my country sacrificed to a false idea. Pardon, if you will. Nobody shall outdo me in clemency. But do not trust the Rebel politically. The words of Shakespeare are not too strong to picture the danger of such attempt:—

“Thou may’st hold a serpent by the tongue,A chafèd lion by the mortal paw,A fasting tiger safer by the tooth,Than keep in peace that hand which thou dost hold.”

“Thou may’st hold a serpent by the tongue,

A chafèd lion by the mortal paw,

A fasting tiger safer by the tooth,

Than keep in peace that hand which thou dost hold.”

4. In obtaining guaranties we must rely upon acts rather than professions, and light our footsteps by “the lamp of experience.” Therefore we turn from recent rebels toconstant loyalists. This is only ordinary prudence. As those who fought against us should be forthe present disfranchised, so those who fought for us should be at once enfranchised, and thus a renovated state will be built secure on an unfaltering and natural loyalty. For a while the freedman will take the place of the master, verifying the saying that the last shall be first and the first shall be last. In the pious books of the East it is declared that the greatest mortification at the Day of Judgment will be when the faithful slave is carried to Paradise and the wicked master is sent to Hell; and this same reversal of conditions appears in the Gospel, where Dives is exhibited as suffering the pains of damnation while the beggar of other days is sheltered in Abraham’s bosom. Therefore, in organizing this change, we follow divine justice. Surely nobody can doubt that Robert Small, the heroic slave who carried a Rebel steamer to our fleet and then became our pilot, deserves more of the Republic than a South Carolina official occupied at that very time as commissioner to regulate impressments in the Rebel army. To accept the latter and to reject the former will be not only the height of injustice, but the height of meanness. It will be a deed “to make heaven weep, all earth amazed.”

5. Still further, in obtaining guaranties we mustlook confidently to Congress, which has plenary powers over the whole subject. Congress can do everything needful. It has already begun by excluding Rebels from office. It must continue its jurisdiction; whether through the war powers, or the duty to guaranty a republican form of government, or the necessity of the case, as in Territories, is a matter of little importance. It is of less importance under which of its powers this is done than that it is done. Continuing its jurisdiction, Congress must supervise and fix theconditions of order, so that the National Security and National Faith shall not suffer. Here is a sacred obligation which cannot be postponed.

6. All these guaranties should be completed and crowned byan Amendment of the Constitution of the United States, especially providing that hereafter there shall be no denial of the electoral franchise or any exclusion of any kind on account of race or color, but all persons shall be equal before the law. At this moment, under a just interpretation of the Constitution, three fourths of the States actually coöperating in the National Government are sufficient for this change. The words of the Constitution are, that Amendments shall be valid to all intents and purposes, “when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States,” or, according to practical sense,by three fourths of the States that have Legislatures. If a State has no Legislature, it cannot be counted in determining this quorum, as it is not counted in determining the quorum of either House of Congress, where precisely the same question occurs. Any other interpretation recognizes the Rebellion, and plays into its hands, by conceding its power, through rebellious contrivance, to prevent an Amendment of the Constitution essential to the general welfare.

Such are practical points to be observed in obtaining the much needed guaranties. Congress will soon be in session; and to its courageous conduct, in the exercise of unquestionable powers, we all look with hope and trust. Meanwhile the President, as commander-in-chief, has large military powers, which may be exercised without control until the meeting of Congress. To him Inow appeal. Speaking from this platform, surrounded by this concourse of his friends, and giving voice to the sentiments of my heart, in harmony with the sentiments of Massachusetts, I cannot fail in respect or honor, while I address him with that plainness which belongs to republican institutions:—

Sir, your power is vast. A word from you may make an epoch. It may advance at once the cause of Universal Civilization, or quicken anew the Satanic energies of a fearful barbarism. It may give assurance of security and reconciliation for the future, or it may scatter uncertainty and distrust, while it postpones thatTruce of Godwhich is the longing of our hearts. As your power is vast, so is your responsibility. Act, we entreat you, so that our country may have no fresh sorrow. Do not hazard Emancipation, which is the day-star of our age, and the special jewel in the crown of your martyred predecessor, by any concession to its enemies. Do not put in jeopardy all that we hold most dear, by untimely attempt to bring back into the national copartnership any of those ancient associates who have warred upon their country. Let them wait. You have said that treason is “crime,” and not merely difference of opinion. Do not let the criminals bear sway. The patriot dead cry out against such surrender, and all their wounds bleed afresh. Congress has set the example, by declaring that no person engaged in the Rebellion shall hold office. For the present, follow Congress. Follow the Constitution also, which knows no distinction of color, and do not sacrifice a whole race by resuscitating an offensive Black Code, inconsistent with the National Security and the National Faith. There also is the Declaration of Independence,which now shines like the sun in the heavens, rejoicing to penetrate every by-way and every cabin, if you will not stand in its light. Let it shine, until the Republic has completely dispelled that disgusting pretension which is at once a stupendous monopoly and an impious caste. Above all, do not take from the loyal black man and give to the disloyal white man; do not confiscate the political rights of the freedman, who has shed his blood for us, and lavish them upon his Rebel master. And remember that justice to the colored race is the sheet-anchor of the national credit.

Speaking always with the same frankness, I ask leave to address the Secretary of War very briefly:—

Sir, there is yet room for your energies. That region won to Union and Liberty by the victory you organized must not be allowed to lapse under its ancient masters, the perjured assertors of property in man. It must not be abandoned. Let it be held by arms until it smiles with the charities of life, and all its people are guarded by an impenetrable shield.

And still speaking with equal plainness, I venture to press one controlling consideration upon the Secretary of the Treasury:—

Sir, you are the guardian of the national finances. Use the peculiar influence belonging to this position so that nothing shall be done to impair the National Credit. See to it especially that no person is admitted to political power in any Rebel community who spurns the National Faith, sacredly plighted to the national freedman as well as to the national creditor. Such is the ordinance of Providence, that the fortunes of the two are joined inseparably together. Credit issensitive. It needs that all the resources of the country should be brought into activity,—that agriculture should be fostered, that commerce should be revived, that emigration should be encouraged; but this cannot be done without thatsecuritywhich is found in equal laws and a contented people. The farmer, the merchant, the emigrant must each feel secure. Land, capital, and labor are of little value, except on this essential condition. The loyal people who have contributed so much, and now hold your bonds, trust that this essential condition will not fail through any failure on your part, and that you will not consent to open a political volcano, spouting smoke and red-hot lava, in an extended region whose first necessity is peace. There is an order in all things; and any concession to the criminal enemies of our country, until after the confirmation of the National Security and the National Faith, is simply an illustration, on a gigantic scale, of the cart before the horse.

For myself, fellow-citizens, pardon me, if I say that my course is fixed. Many may hesitate; many may turn away from those great truths which make the far-reaching brightness of the Republic; many may seek a temporary favor by untimely surrender: I shall not. The victory of blood, which has been so painfully won, must be confirmed by a greater victory of ideas, so that the renowned words of Abraham Lincoln may be fulfilled, and “this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of Freedom; and government of the people,by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”[245]To this end I seek no merely formal Union,seething with smothered curses, but a practical, moral, and political Unity, founded on common rights, knit together by common interests, inspired by a common faith, and throbbing with a common love of country,—where our Constitution, interpreted anew, shall be a covenant with Life and a league with Heaven,[246]and Liberty shall be everywhere not only a right, but a duty. John Brown, on his way to the scaffold, stooped to take up a slave child. That closing example was the legacy of the dying man to his country. That benediction we must continue and fulfil. The last shall be first; and so, in this new order, Equality, long postponed, shall become the master principle of our system and the very frontispiece of our Constitution. The Rebellion was to beat down this principle, by founding a government on the alleged inferiority of a race. The attempt has failed, but not, alas! the insolent assumption of the conspirators. Pursuing our victory, I now insist that this assumption shall be trampled out. A righteous government cannot be founded on any exclusion of race. This is not the first time that I have battled with the barbarism of Slavery. I battle still, as the bloody monster retreats to its last citadel; and, God willing, I mean to hold on, if it takes what remains to me of life.

The appearance and condition of Andrew Johnson before the Senate, and representatives of foreign powers, when taking the oath as Vice-President, March 4, 1865, was not calculated to inspire general confidence. But, in the absence of further display of the same kind, the public had become silent, hoping something better. The memory of that incident threw a shadow over the great office he was called to assume. Some were favorably affected by the avowals of patriotism in numerous off-hand speeches, although touching but a single chord. Nothing was said of the great principles of Reconstruction, but treason was to be made “odious.” The repetition of himself impressed Chief Justice Chase, as well as Mr. Sumner, and he said to the latter, “Let us see the President, and try to give him another topic.” So, in company, at an early hour of the evening, about a week after the commencement of his Presidency, they called, and united in urging him to say something for the equal rights of our colored fellow-citizens. Though reserved in language, he was not unsympathetic in manner, so that, after the interview, the Chief Justice, on reaching the street, said: “Did you see how his face lighted at your appeal to carry out the Declaration of Independence?” A few days later Mr. Sumner called alone, and received from the President positive assurance of agreement on the suffrage question. His words were, “On this question, Mr. Sumner, there is no difference between us,—you and I are alike.” An account of these interviews, and the sequel, was subsequently given in an address at Boston, October 2, 1866.Very soon it was too apparent that the President had adopted an opposite course. States were to be hurried back by Presidential prerogative on the electoral basis anterior to the war. Mr. Sumner from the beginning had regarded the votes of colored fellow-citizens necessary to a proper reconstruction,—first, as an act of justice to them, and, secondly, as a counterpoise to the disloyal. He had urged this solution in the Senate, and had repeatedly presented it to President Lincoln. The Diary of Hon. Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy,according to an article published by him,[247]shows how Mr. Sumner pressed this duty in the most intimate councils. It appears that this Secretary was at the War Department, Sunday evening, April 16th, the day after President Lincoln’s death, where he met Speaker Colfax, Mr. Covode, the very earnest Representative from Pennsylvania, Messrs. Dawes and Gooch, Representatives of Massachusetts, and Mr. Sumner. After stating that Mr. Stanton read to them the drafts of orders for the reorganization of Virginia and North Carolina, the article proceeds:—“Before concluding that which related to North Carolina, Mr. Sumner interrupted the reading, and requested Mr. Stanton to stop until he could understand whether any provision was made for enfranchising the colored man. Unless, said he, the black man is given the right to vote, his freedom is mockery.“Mr. Stanton said there were differences among our friends on that subject, and it would be unwise, in his judgment, to press it in this stage of the proceedings.“Mr. Sumner declared he would not proceed a step, unless the black man had his rights. He considered the black man’s right to vote the essence, the great essential.”In conformity with this declaration Mr. Sumner continued to act, as appears in correspondence and speech. His Eulogy on President Lincoln, at the request of the municipal authorities of Boston, was an appeal for the black man. So also was his private correspondence, during this summer, with Secretary Stanton, Secretary McCulloch, Secretary Welles, Secretary Harlan, and Attorney-General Speed, all of the Cabinet.Meanwhile the President went forward in his “policy.” The country was alarmed. Hon. Thaddeus Stevens, the acknowledged leader of the House of Representatives, partook of the anxiety which ensued. Though not yet prepared to press the ballot for all, he was strenuous against the assumption and precipitation of the President.As early as May 10th he wrote to Mr. Sumner, from Philadelphia:—“I see the President is precipitating things. Virginia is recognized. I fear before Congress meets he will have so bedevilled matters as to render them incurable. It would be well, if he would call an extra session of Congress. But I almost despair of resisting Executive influence.”This was followed by another letter, under date of June 3d, from Caledonia, Penn., where were his iron-works:—“Is it possible to devise any plan to arrest the Government in its mad career? When will you be in Washington? Can’t we enlist bold men enough to lay the foundation of a party to take the helm of this Government and keep it off the rocks?”Then, under date of June 14th, another, also from Caledonia:—“Is there no way to arrest the insane course of the President in ‘reorganization’? Can you get up a movement in Massachusetts? I have thought of trying it in our State Convention. If something is not done, the President will be crowned king before Congress meets. How absurd his interfering with the internal regulations of the States, and yet considering them as ‘States in the Union’!”Also, under date of August 17th, from Caledonia:—“I have written very plainly to the President, urging delay. But I fear he will pursue his wrong course. With illegal courts and usurping ‘reconstruction,’ I know not where you and I shall be. While we can hardly approve all the acts of the Government, we must try and keep out of the ranks of the Opposition. The danger is that so much success will reconcile the people to almost anything.”August 26th, Mr. Stevens wrote from his home at Lancaster, Penn.:—“I am glad you are laboring to avert the President’s fatal policy. I wish the prospect of success were better. I have twice written him, urging him to stay his hand until Congress meets. Of course he pays no attention to it. Our editors are generally cowardly sycophants. I would make a speech, as you suggest, if a fair occasion offered. Our views (‘Reconstruction and Confiscation’) were embodied in our resolutions [in the Republican State Convention, recently held] at Harrisburg, amidst much chaff. Negro suffrage was passed over, as heavy and premature. Get the Rebel States into a territorial condition, and it can be easily dealt with. That, I think, should be our great aim. Then Congress can manage it.”In the same spirit, Hon. B. F. Wade, of the Senate of the United States, July 29th, wrote from his home at Jefferson, Ohio:—“I regret to say, that, with regard to the policy resolved upon by the President, I have no consolation to impart. To me all appears gloomy.… The salvation of the country devolves upon Congress and against the Executive. Will they be able to resist the downward tendency of events? My experience is not calculated to inspire me with confidence.”Hon. Henry Winter Davis, the able, eloquent, and courageous Representative in Congress from Baltimore, June 20th, in a long letter to Mr. Sumner, on our perils and duties, wrote:—“One way is to pass a law by two-thirds over the President’s veto, prescribing the conditions of reconstruction of any State government, and declaringnonerepublican in form which excludes negroes from voting. Such a law the President will be obliged to obey and execute.… The other mode of solving the problem, over the head of the President, is to pass an Amendment of the Constitution prescribing universal suffrage.… We have the requisite majority to pursue either of these plans; but is there nerve for the work? I have too often failed to inspire my political friends with that elevated sense of their own authority to dictate the course of affairs, to be sanguine of success in measures which require so much unity, energy, and singleness of purpose as these. The last Congress was not equal to it; is the present Congress?… Now do me the favor to give me your views as fully as I have given you mine. I trust you are not, as I am, in despair.”[248]In the course of the summer a pamphlet was published in Boston, entitled “Security and Reconciliation for the Future: Propositions and Arguments on the Reorganization of the Rebel States,”—being a collection of resolutions by Mr. Sumner, with the article in theAtlantic Monthly,[249]the speech on the admission of Senators from Arkansas,[250]and the Louisiana debate.[251]The large edition of this collection drew attention, and helped prepare for the speech at the State Convention. A few extracts will show its reception.Dr. George B. Loring, the agriculturist, afterwards Chairman of the State Committee of the Republican party in Massachusetts, and President of the Massachusetts Senate, wrote from Salem:—“I only wish all our statesmen had taken the ground adopted by yourself; it would have saved us infinite trouble. It entitles you to eternal thanks, and receives daily more and more assent.”Hon. John C. Underwood, District Judge of the United States, wrote from Alexandria, Va.:—“I have read your collected arguments on the subject of Reconstruction with great pleasure and profit. Let me thank you for convincing me, very much against my will, that to allow immediate representation to the Rebel States would be a cruel breach of faith and honor to the freedmen, and that we of the South must be just to these poor people, and submit to a genuine republican government, before we deserve admission again into the American family. I trust no petty personal ambition will prevent my full appreciation of the immensely important work for our country and humanity which you have so well performed.”Hon. Charles Eames, the able lawyer and scholar, former Commissioner to the Sandwich Islands, and Minister at Venezuela, residing in Washington, wrote from the sea-shore at Long Branch:—“It is a noble monumental record, worthy both of the subject and of the Senator, and which will stand a landmark in our parliamentary history. Every new day, as it comes, brings new attestation of your wisdom and foresight, and of the truthful views which from the first, and almost, if not altogether, alone in Congress, you took and faithfully expounded on the whole question of Reconstruction. The idea of hurrying these lately Rebel communities into participation in the enactment and administration of our laws seems to me the most absurd blunder ever perpetrated in history, with the possible exception of that earlier and still more monstrous enormity of error which assigned to them the right to give by silence a negative vote on the purposed change of our fundamental law.”Hon. John Y. Smith, an able and independent thinker, wrote from Madison, Wisconsin:—“Pray, honored Sir, do not be discouraged by the stupid prejudices with which you have to contend, but fight it out, and you may save the nation; for at no time during the war was it in greater peril than it is at this moment. The Ship of State has gallantly borne up through the storms of war, but I fear that President Johnson, with the best intentions, is running her straight upon the rocks.”A few extracts from newspapers attest the impression made by the Speech.The BostonTranscript, which reported the speech on the afternoon of its delivery, said:—“Mr. Sumner has made many powerful addresses, on many important occasions; but we think our readers will admit that he has never presented a more masterly argument, on a more important occasion, than that which he has urged on the Union Republicans in his speech of to-day. Clear and pointed in statement, felicitous in illustration, admirable in arrangement, cogent in logic, affluent in learning, with occasional bursts of eloquence which light up and animate, but never disturb, the course of the argument, the speech cannot fail to exert an immense influence on the formation of that public opinion which is to determine the mode by which one of the most momentous questions ever brought before the American people shall be definitely settled.… Mr. Sumner does not merely attempt to convince the understanding; he strikes through it to the national conscience and sense of humanity and honor. His sentences are full of heat, as well as light,—will lodge in the minds they inform, and influence the will which votes, as well as the judgment which assents.”The AlbanyMorning Expresssaid:—“Let us call Senator Sumner a fanatic, if we will; let us pronounce him a man of one idea, if we choose; but let us at least award him the honor he deserves.… If Charles Sumner is wrong, his example is right. We have not so many politicians true to eternal principle, we have not so many statesmen devoted with a single purpose even to their own conception of the best interests of the country, we have not so many counsellors studious only of strict justice, that we can afford to throw away the Senator from Massachusetts. Whether we regard him as right or wrong, there is something sublime in his steady, persistent, unwavering devotion to his idea. Such honesty cannot be impugned. Such fidelity cannot be misinterpreted.… Senator Sumner has always been in advance of the mass. He is a leader a long way ahead, a pioneer through trackless mazes. It is his mission to discover a path where the throng shall follow.”With different spirit, the New YorkHerald, in an article entitled “Senator Sumner on the Rampage,” said:—“We now have an essay from Senator Sumner, who, mounted on his ‘Bay horse,’ makes a furious assault upon the President and his policy, and, in fact, everybody, except the blacks in the South.… He is determined to fight it out, if it takes the remainder of his life. The public now know his position, and just what the Jacobins intend to do. The President can also understand the nature of the opposition which he is to have arrayed against him in the next Congress.… The Rebellion, he declares, is not ended, nor Slavery abolished. If he means by the former term Northern rebellion, he is not far out of the way; for it is very evident that a rebellion has commenced in the North, and has been inaugurated in Massachusetts, with Senator Sumner as high-priest and prophet.”The New YorkWorld, in an article entitled “The Massachusetts Declaration of War against the President,” said:—“It is not worth while to spend words on the formal resolves of the Massachusetts Convention. They but condense, in more staid and decorous language, the sentiments of Mr. Sumner’s speech; and we prefer to dip out of the fountain. The unanimous election of Mr. Sumner as the presiding officer, the applause which greeted his speech, the panegyrics lavished upon it by the Republican press of Boston, and its harmony with every public utterance in Massachusetts, from the Faneuil Hall meeting in May down, are so many seals of its authentication as a true exposition of the purposes of the Republican party. Charles Sumner is the Republican platform incarnate.”Other papers show how it was received in States lately in rebellion.The MemphisArgus, of Tennessee, said:—“Yesterday we received, under the frank of ‘C. Sumner,’ his recent infamous speech at Worcester, Massachusetts. We use the wordinfamousadvisedly, temperately; for viler or more wilful and malicious slanders of a great, suffering, and submissive people, vanquished in war by overwhelming odds, but honestly accepting all the legitimate results of their defeat, and patriotically anxious to resume their old places in a full, restored Union, were never published to the world by the filthiest political scavenger that ever plied his trade in the foul services of party.”The AugustaTranscript, of Georgia, said:—“To show the infamous slanders to which the fanatical leaders are obliged to resort, in order to goad on their followers to the new crusade against the South, we republish an extract from Mr. Sumner’s last speech in Massachusetts.”In England, Colonel T. Perronet Thompson, the Freetrader, and former Member of Parliament, in his series of articles in the BradfordAdvertiser, after enumerating the topics, said:—“The man who has no curiosity to know what the first statesman in America says on all these heads would go to bed without asking whether the fire in the next street was put out, or if the house next his own began to smoke. The very jobbers in Rebel bonds, or builders of the Shenandoah, might feel a desire to know which way the thing was going.”TheScotsman, a foremost journal at Edinburgh, commenced a leader on this speech as follows:—“It would be at least difficult to name a man in the United States, or rather the States now under process of being reunited, who is better entitled to a respectful hearing, all the world over, than Mr. Charles Sumner. He has had but one object,—a noble object, worthy any calculable amount of struggle and sacrifice; and he has pursued it ardently, bravely, disregarding both party and personal consequences, and letting no other object stand in the way or turn him aside for a moment from the straight path. He has sought only the Abolition of Slavery, and has deemed nothing else worth fighting for.”The response by correspondence was prompt and earnest from various parts of the country. The letters from which extracts are taken, with the exception of that from Great Salt Lake City, were received immediately after the delivery of the speech.Charles Stearns, ardently against Slavery, and familiar with the Rebel States, wrote from Springfield:—“After an absence from good old Massachusetts of eleven years, my heart was made glad, the other day, by seeing a notice in the papers that you were to speak at the Republican Convention at Worcester. I immediately hastened thither, and felt happy beyond measure, as I listened to the deafening applause with which your appearance upon the platform was greeted.”Rev. John T. Sargent, the Liberal clergyman, wrote from Boston:—“That noble speech of yours at the Worcester Convention, so complete in its analysis of our national condition, dangers, and duties, ought to be printed in letters of gold, and emblazoned henceforth as the established moral code of every one of our States.”David A. Wasson, the honest thinker and student of philosophy, wrote from Boston:—“God bless you, and make you strong for the arduous and immense work that is immediately before you! The coming session of Congress will, I think, be preëminently the critical and cardinal day in all American legislation. I look forward to it with unspeakable anxiety. If only your counsels had been accepted, how clear, how easy, all would be! Now the situation is fearfully complicated.”Rev. George C. Beckwith, Secretary of the American Peace Society, wrote from Boston:—“Let me express the earnest hope that you will economize your strength for the great conflict soon to come during the approaching Congress. I never doubted the final success of our arms; but when the sword should be sheathed, I have always expected to see our worst crisis in our last grapple with slaveholders. We shall quite need all your prudence, forecast, energy, courage, and decision, to meet the dangers ahead from returning Rebels.”Rev. Charles Brooks, eminent for his services to education, wrote from Medford:—“I thank you, I thank you a thousand times, for your sound, comprehensive, and patriotic speech at Worcester. Shakespeare says, ‘Things by season seasoned are.’ Never was a word more fitly spoken. It is the best speech I have read for years, and will become historic.”William I. Bowditch, the able conveyancer and Abolitionist, wrote from Boston:—“I read your speech yesterday morning with great satisfaction, and yet with considerable misgiving as to whether its truths will be acted on. I doubt if the North has been punished enough to induce it to forego the attempt of trying again to circumvent God.”P. R. Guiney, on the day the speech was delivered, wrote from Boston:—“I am under an overwhelming conviction, that, unless the views which you express are substantially adhered to, Despotism will have gained all that Liberty won in our recent war. The Battle of Gettysburg was not more of a crisis than this. May God prosper you!”Professor George W. Greene, scholar and author, wrote from East Greenwich, R. I.:—“I received your Worcester speech this morning. I must write a line to say I have read it carefully and thoughtfully, and say ‘Amen’ to it all. God grant it may go into every house and every heart! I look with deep anxiety for the opening of Congress. You have yet your hardest fight to win; but it is the fight of God and Humanity, and you will win it.”Professor Charles D. Cleveland, an ardent Abolitionist and successful teacher, recently Consul at Cardiff in Wales, wrote from Philadelphia:—“Many, many thanks to you for your noble speech at the Worcester Convention. Oh that your words might unite with the heart of the President and bring forth appropriate fruits! For the last two or three months I have been quite desponding as to his course.”John Penington, the scholarly bookseller, wrote from Philadelphia:—“With its matter I fully sympathize; but I was particularly struck with the aptitude and felicity of your illustrations of the various points of your argument.”William Goodell, the early and constant Abolitionist, author of “Slavery and Anti-Slavery,” a history also of the “American Slave Code,” wrote from Bozrahville, Connecticut, where he was then residing:—“In my rural retreat, where I am for the present recruiting my health, a copy of theCommonwealthcontaining your great speech at Worcester, September 14th, providentially falls into my hands, and I cannot forbear trespassing upon your time one moment to congratulate and to thank you, which I do most heartily, upon your great achievement, and for your signal service to your country, in the hour of its greatest peril,—greatestI say, because, as I fear, so little perceived and so little understood.… If you had spent the whole summer in preparing that speech, I see not how you could have improved it, nor how your time and talents could have been more worthily or more usefully employed.… You well say, ‘We must look confidently to Congress’; to which permit me to add, that for the leadership of Congress the country must look toyou, whose ‘course is fixed,’ who ‘will not hesitate,’ who ‘will not surrender.’”Hon. Wayne MacVeagh, Chairman of the Republican State Committee of Pennsylvania, afterwards Minister at Constantinople, wrote from West Chester, Pennsylvania:—“I have just finished reading your superb speech at Worcester, in the complete form in which you sent it to me, and cannot go to bed without thanking you for it. The right word, in the right time, by the right man,—what more should we ask?”William Hickey, Chief Clerk of the Senate, where he had been a life-long officer, and author of a well-known edition of the Constitution with accompanying documents, wrote from Washington:—“Your speech ably maintains the consistency, ability, and patriotism which have uniformly distinguished your course, from your first essay in the sacred cause of Liberty, which has elicited so much of disinterested zeal and indomitable courage and perseverance on your part as to call forth, in my hearing, from the most honorable and intelligent of your political opponents from the South, declarations attributing those qualities to you in an eminent degree, giving you credit for consistency and unmistakable integrity of purpose. Your exertions have in a very great degree contributed towards the defeat of the Rebellion and the victory of the Government over its enemies, and you have now the satisfaction of enjoying the fruits of your labors and the exercise of your literary superiority and transcendent talents.”Hon. John C. Underwood, who had written shortly before on Reconstruction,[252]wrote from Alexandria, Virginia:—“I thank you for your Convention speech. Its positions and arguments are so overwhelming that I feel almost certain that your efforts will succeed with our people, and that you will be acknowledged the wise statesman and enlightened Christian patriot that I know you are.”General Saxton, an Antislavery army officer, commanding in South Carolina, wrote from Charleston:—“I most fully sympathize with and cordially indorse every word and line. In the future, the wisdom of your position will be fully established and vindicated.”Hon. Charles D. Drake, an eminent lawyer and law-writer, afterwards United States Senator from Missouri, and Chief Justice of the Court of Claims, wrote:—“Being detained at home by indisposition, I was glad of the privilege of at once reading your latest views on the great questions of the day in connection with Reconstruction. For them, and for the heroic spirit with which you take your stand, and determine ‘to fight it out on that line,’ I offer you my most sincere and fervent thanks. May God preserve your life and health, and enable you to fight it out to a complete victory!”Hon. Charles Durkee, formerly Senator of the United States from Wisconsin, and then Governor of Utah, wrote from Salt Lake City to Governor Farwell, of Wisconsin:—“I have just finished reading Mr. Sumner’s great speech delivered at the Massachusetts State Convention. What a masterly argument! It embodies the condensation of Calhoun, the strength of Webster, and more than the eloquence of Clay. In logic, in illustration, in simplicity of truth, I have never read a state-paper that equals it. Its timely utterance how fortunate for the country! He inspires some of the most vital parts of the Constitution (which heretofore have been a dead letter) with new life and activity. Washington and Lincoln led in the first and second revolutions, but it was left for Charles Sumner to lead in the third,—a revolution inConstitutional and Republican ideas. Be so kind as to thank him, in my name, for this timely effort in behalf of his country and in the cause of the oppressed.”Such words from distant places were an encouragement to the speaker. Evidently he was not alone, nor had he spoken in vain.

Very soon it was too apparent that the President had adopted an opposite course. States were to be hurried back by Presidential prerogative on the electoral basis anterior to the war. Mr. Sumner from the beginning had regarded the votes of colored fellow-citizens necessary to a proper reconstruction,—first, as an act of justice to them, and, secondly, as a counterpoise to the disloyal. He had urged this solution in the Senate, and had repeatedly presented it to President Lincoln. The Diary of Hon. Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy,according to an article published by him,[247]shows how Mr. Sumner pressed this duty in the most intimate councils. It appears that this Secretary was at the War Department, Sunday evening, April 16th, the day after President Lincoln’s death, where he met Speaker Colfax, Mr. Covode, the very earnest Representative from Pennsylvania, Messrs. Dawes and Gooch, Representatives of Massachusetts, and Mr. Sumner. After stating that Mr. Stanton read to them the drafts of orders for the reorganization of Virginia and North Carolina, the article proceeds:—

“Before concluding that which related to North Carolina, Mr. Sumner interrupted the reading, and requested Mr. Stanton to stop until he could understand whether any provision was made for enfranchising the colored man. Unless, said he, the black man is given the right to vote, his freedom is mockery.“Mr. Stanton said there were differences among our friends on that subject, and it would be unwise, in his judgment, to press it in this stage of the proceedings.“Mr. Sumner declared he would not proceed a step, unless the black man had his rights. He considered the black man’s right to vote the essence, the great essential.”

“Mr. Stanton said there were differences among our friends on that subject, and it would be unwise, in his judgment, to press it in this stage of the proceedings.

“Mr. Sumner declared he would not proceed a step, unless the black man had his rights. He considered the black man’s right to vote the essence, the great essential.”

In conformity with this declaration Mr. Sumner continued to act, as appears in correspondence and speech. His Eulogy on President Lincoln, at the request of the municipal authorities of Boston, was an appeal for the black man. So also was his private correspondence, during this summer, with Secretary Stanton, Secretary McCulloch, Secretary Welles, Secretary Harlan, and Attorney-General Speed, all of the Cabinet.

Meanwhile the President went forward in his “policy.” The country was alarmed. Hon. Thaddeus Stevens, the acknowledged leader of the House of Representatives, partook of the anxiety which ensued. Though not yet prepared to press the ballot for all, he was strenuous against the assumption and precipitation of the President.

As early as May 10th he wrote to Mr. Sumner, from Philadelphia:—

“I see the President is precipitating things. Virginia is recognized. I fear before Congress meets he will have so bedevilled matters as to render them incurable. It would be well, if he would call an extra session of Congress. But I almost despair of resisting Executive influence.”

This was followed by another letter, under date of June 3d, from Caledonia, Penn., where were his iron-works:—

“Is it possible to devise any plan to arrest the Government in its mad career? When will you be in Washington? Can’t we enlist bold men enough to lay the foundation of a party to take the helm of this Government and keep it off the rocks?”

Then, under date of June 14th, another, also from Caledonia:—

“Is there no way to arrest the insane course of the President in ‘reorganization’? Can you get up a movement in Massachusetts? I have thought of trying it in our State Convention. If something is not done, the President will be crowned king before Congress meets. How absurd his interfering with the internal regulations of the States, and yet considering them as ‘States in the Union’!”

Also, under date of August 17th, from Caledonia:—

“I have written very plainly to the President, urging delay. But I fear he will pursue his wrong course. With illegal courts and usurping ‘reconstruction,’ I know not where you and I shall be. While we can hardly approve all the acts of the Government, we must try and keep out of the ranks of the Opposition. The danger is that so much success will reconcile the people to almost anything.”

August 26th, Mr. Stevens wrote from his home at Lancaster, Penn.:—

“I am glad you are laboring to avert the President’s fatal policy. I wish the prospect of success were better. I have twice written him, urging him to stay his hand until Congress meets. Of course he pays no attention to it. Our editors are generally cowardly sycophants. I would make a speech, as you suggest, if a fair occasion offered. Our views (‘Reconstruction and Confiscation’) were embodied in our resolutions [in the Republican State Convention, recently held] at Harrisburg, amidst much chaff. Negro suffrage was passed over, as heavy and premature. Get the Rebel States into a territorial condition, and it can be easily dealt with. That, I think, should be our great aim. Then Congress can manage it.”

In the same spirit, Hon. B. F. Wade, of the Senate of the United States, July 29th, wrote from his home at Jefferson, Ohio:—

“I regret to say, that, with regard to the policy resolved upon by the President, I have no consolation to impart. To me all appears gloomy.… The salvation of the country devolves upon Congress and against the Executive. Will they be able to resist the downward tendency of events? My experience is not calculated to inspire me with confidence.”

Hon. Henry Winter Davis, the able, eloquent, and courageous Representative in Congress from Baltimore, June 20th, in a long letter to Mr. Sumner, on our perils and duties, wrote:—

“One way is to pass a law by two-thirds over the President’s veto, prescribing the conditions of reconstruction of any State government, and declaringnonerepublican in form which excludes negroes from voting. Such a law the President will be obliged to obey and execute.… The other mode of solving the problem, over the head of the President, is to pass an Amendment of the Constitution prescribing universal suffrage.… We have the requisite majority to pursue either of these plans; but is there nerve for the work? I have too often failed to inspire my political friends with that elevated sense of their own authority to dictate the course of affairs, to be sanguine of success in measures which require so much unity, energy, and singleness of purpose as these. The last Congress was not equal to it; is the present Congress?… Now do me the favor to give me your views as fully as I have given you mine. I trust you are not, as I am, in despair.”[248]

In the course of the summer a pamphlet was published in Boston, entitled “Security and Reconciliation for the Future: Propositions and Arguments on the Reorganization of the Rebel States,”—being a collection of resolutions by Mr. Sumner, with the article in theAtlantic Monthly,[249]the speech on the admission of Senators from Arkansas,[250]and the Louisiana debate.[251]The large edition of this collection drew attention, and helped prepare for the speech at the State Convention. A few extracts will show its reception.

Dr. George B. Loring, the agriculturist, afterwards Chairman of the State Committee of the Republican party in Massachusetts, and President of the Massachusetts Senate, wrote from Salem:—

“I only wish all our statesmen had taken the ground adopted by yourself; it would have saved us infinite trouble. It entitles you to eternal thanks, and receives daily more and more assent.”

Hon. John C. Underwood, District Judge of the United States, wrote from Alexandria, Va.:—

“I have read your collected arguments on the subject of Reconstruction with great pleasure and profit. Let me thank you for convincing me, very much against my will, that to allow immediate representation to the Rebel States would be a cruel breach of faith and honor to the freedmen, and that we of the South must be just to these poor people, and submit to a genuine republican government, before we deserve admission again into the American family. I trust no petty personal ambition will prevent my full appreciation of the immensely important work for our country and humanity which you have so well performed.”

Hon. Charles Eames, the able lawyer and scholar, former Commissioner to the Sandwich Islands, and Minister at Venezuela, residing in Washington, wrote from the sea-shore at Long Branch:—

“It is a noble monumental record, worthy both of the subject and of the Senator, and which will stand a landmark in our parliamentary history. Every new day, as it comes, brings new attestation of your wisdom and foresight, and of the truthful views which from the first, and almost, if not altogether, alone in Congress, you took and faithfully expounded on the whole question of Reconstruction. The idea of hurrying these lately Rebel communities into participation in the enactment and administration of our laws seems to me the most absurd blunder ever perpetrated in history, with the possible exception of that earlier and still more monstrous enormity of error which assigned to them the right to give by silence a negative vote on the purposed change of our fundamental law.”

Hon. John Y. Smith, an able and independent thinker, wrote from Madison, Wisconsin:—

“Pray, honored Sir, do not be discouraged by the stupid prejudices with which you have to contend, but fight it out, and you may save the nation; for at no time during the war was it in greater peril than it is at this moment. The Ship of State has gallantly borne up through the storms of war, but I fear that President Johnson, with the best intentions, is running her straight upon the rocks.”

A few extracts from newspapers attest the impression made by the Speech.

The BostonTranscript, which reported the speech on the afternoon of its delivery, said:—

“Mr. Sumner has made many powerful addresses, on many important occasions; but we think our readers will admit that he has never presented a more masterly argument, on a more important occasion, than that which he has urged on the Union Republicans in his speech of to-day. Clear and pointed in statement, felicitous in illustration, admirable in arrangement, cogent in logic, affluent in learning, with occasional bursts of eloquence which light up and animate, but never disturb, the course of the argument, the speech cannot fail to exert an immense influence on the formation of that public opinion which is to determine the mode by which one of the most momentous questions ever brought before the American people shall be definitely settled.… Mr. Sumner does not merely attempt to convince the understanding; he strikes through it to the national conscience and sense of humanity and honor. His sentences are full of heat, as well as light,—will lodge in the minds they inform, and influence the will which votes, as well as the judgment which assents.”

The AlbanyMorning Expresssaid:—

“Let us call Senator Sumner a fanatic, if we will; let us pronounce him a man of one idea, if we choose; but let us at least award him the honor he deserves.… If Charles Sumner is wrong, his example is right. We have not so many politicians true to eternal principle, we have not so many statesmen devoted with a single purpose even to their own conception of the best interests of the country, we have not so many counsellors studious only of strict justice, that we can afford to throw away the Senator from Massachusetts. Whether we regard him as right or wrong, there is something sublime in his steady, persistent, unwavering devotion to his idea. Such honesty cannot be impugned. Such fidelity cannot be misinterpreted.… Senator Sumner has always been in advance of the mass. He is a leader a long way ahead, a pioneer through trackless mazes. It is his mission to discover a path where the throng shall follow.”

With different spirit, the New YorkHerald, in an article entitled “Senator Sumner on the Rampage,” said:—

“We now have an essay from Senator Sumner, who, mounted on his ‘Bay horse,’ makes a furious assault upon the President and his policy, and, in fact, everybody, except the blacks in the South.… He is determined to fight it out, if it takes the remainder of his life. The public now know his position, and just what the Jacobins intend to do. The President can also understand the nature of the opposition which he is to have arrayed against him in the next Congress.… The Rebellion, he declares, is not ended, nor Slavery abolished. If he means by the former term Northern rebellion, he is not far out of the way; for it is very evident that a rebellion has commenced in the North, and has been inaugurated in Massachusetts, with Senator Sumner as high-priest and prophet.”

The New YorkWorld, in an article entitled “The Massachusetts Declaration of War against the President,” said:—

“It is not worth while to spend words on the formal resolves of the Massachusetts Convention. They but condense, in more staid and decorous language, the sentiments of Mr. Sumner’s speech; and we prefer to dip out of the fountain. The unanimous election of Mr. Sumner as the presiding officer, the applause which greeted his speech, the panegyrics lavished upon it by the Republican press of Boston, and its harmony with every public utterance in Massachusetts, from the Faneuil Hall meeting in May down, are so many seals of its authentication as a true exposition of the purposes of the Republican party. Charles Sumner is the Republican platform incarnate.”

Other papers show how it was received in States lately in rebellion.

The MemphisArgus, of Tennessee, said:—

“Yesterday we received, under the frank of ‘C. Sumner,’ his recent infamous speech at Worcester, Massachusetts. We use the wordinfamousadvisedly, temperately; for viler or more wilful and malicious slanders of a great, suffering, and submissive people, vanquished in war by overwhelming odds, but honestly accepting all the legitimate results of their defeat, and patriotically anxious to resume their old places in a full, restored Union, were never published to the world by the filthiest political scavenger that ever plied his trade in the foul services of party.”

The AugustaTranscript, of Georgia, said:—

“To show the infamous slanders to which the fanatical leaders are obliged to resort, in order to goad on their followers to the new crusade against the South, we republish an extract from Mr. Sumner’s last speech in Massachusetts.”

In England, Colonel T. Perronet Thompson, the Freetrader, and former Member of Parliament, in his series of articles in the BradfordAdvertiser, after enumerating the topics, said:—

“The man who has no curiosity to know what the first statesman in America says on all these heads would go to bed without asking whether the fire in the next street was put out, or if the house next his own began to smoke. The very jobbers in Rebel bonds, or builders of the Shenandoah, might feel a desire to know which way the thing was going.”

TheScotsman, a foremost journal at Edinburgh, commenced a leader on this speech as follows:—

“It would be at least difficult to name a man in the United States, or rather the States now under process of being reunited, who is better entitled to a respectful hearing, all the world over, than Mr. Charles Sumner. He has had but one object,—a noble object, worthy any calculable amount of struggle and sacrifice; and he has pursued it ardently, bravely, disregarding both party and personal consequences, and letting no other object stand in the way or turn him aside for a moment from the straight path. He has sought only the Abolition of Slavery, and has deemed nothing else worth fighting for.”

The response by correspondence was prompt and earnest from various parts of the country. The letters from which extracts are taken, with the exception of that from Great Salt Lake City, were received immediately after the delivery of the speech.

Charles Stearns, ardently against Slavery, and familiar with the Rebel States, wrote from Springfield:—

“After an absence from good old Massachusetts of eleven years, my heart was made glad, the other day, by seeing a notice in the papers that you were to speak at the Republican Convention at Worcester. I immediately hastened thither, and felt happy beyond measure, as I listened to the deafening applause with which your appearance upon the platform was greeted.”

Rev. John T. Sargent, the Liberal clergyman, wrote from Boston:—

“That noble speech of yours at the Worcester Convention, so complete in its analysis of our national condition, dangers, and duties, ought to be printed in letters of gold, and emblazoned henceforth as the established moral code of every one of our States.”

David A. Wasson, the honest thinker and student of philosophy, wrote from Boston:—

“God bless you, and make you strong for the arduous and immense work that is immediately before you! The coming session of Congress will, I think, be preëminently the critical and cardinal day in all American legislation. I look forward to it with unspeakable anxiety. If only your counsels had been accepted, how clear, how easy, all would be! Now the situation is fearfully complicated.”

Rev. George C. Beckwith, Secretary of the American Peace Society, wrote from Boston:—

“Let me express the earnest hope that you will economize your strength for the great conflict soon to come during the approaching Congress. I never doubted the final success of our arms; but when the sword should be sheathed, I have always expected to see our worst crisis in our last grapple with slaveholders. We shall quite need all your prudence, forecast, energy, courage, and decision, to meet the dangers ahead from returning Rebels.”

Rev. Charles Brooks, eminent for his services to education, wrote from Medford:—

“I thank you, I thank you a thousand times, for your sound, comprehensive, and patriotic speech at Worcester. Shakespeare says, ‘Things by season seasoned are.’ Never was a word more fitly spoken. It is the best speech I have read for years, and will become historic.”

William I. Bowditch, the able conveyancer and Abolitionist, wrote from Boston:—

“I read your speech yesterday morning with great satisfaction, and yet with considerable misgiving as to whether its truths will be acted on. I doubt if the North has been punished enough to induce it to forego the attempt of trying again to circumvent God.”

P. R. Guiney, on the day the speech was delivered, wrote from Boston:—

“I am under an overwhelming conviction, that, unless the views which you express are substantially adhered to, Despotism will have gained all that Liberty won in our recent war. The Battle of Gettysburg was not more of a crisis than this. May God prosper you!”

Professor George W. Greene, scholar and author, wrote from East Greenwich, R. I.:—

“I received your Worcester speech this morning. I must write a line to say I have read it carefully and thoughtfully, and say ‘Amen’ to it all. God grant it may go into every house and every heart! I look with deep anxiety for the opening of Congress. You have yet your hardest fight to win; but it is the fight of God and Humanity, and you will win it.”

Professor Charles D. Cleveland, an ardent Abolitionist and successful teacher, recently Consul at Cardiff in Wales, wrote from Philadelphia:—

“Many, many thanks to you for your noble speech at the Worcester Convention. Oh that your words might unite with the heart of the President and bring forth appropriate fruits! For the last two or three months I have been quite desponding as to his course.”

John Penington, the scholarly bookseller, wrote from Philadelphia:—

“With its matter I fully sympathize; but I was particularly struck with the aptitude and felicity of your illustrations of the various points of your argument.”

William Goodell, the early and constant Abolitionist, author of “Slavery and Anti-Slavery,” a history also of the “American Slave Code,” wrote from Bozrahville, Connecticut, where he was then residing:—

“In my rural retreat, where I am for the present recruiting my health, a copy of theCommonwealthcontaining your great speech at Worcester, September 14th, providentially falls into my hands, and I cannot forbear trespassing upon your time one moment to congratulate and to thank you, which I do most heartily, upon your great achievement, and for your signal service to your country, in the hour of its greatest peril,—greatestI say, because, as I fear, so little perceived and so little understood.… If you had spent the whole summer in preparing that speech, I see not how you could have improved it, nor how your time and talents could have been more worthily or more usefully employed.… You well say, ‘We must look confidently to Congress’; to which permit me to add, that for the leadership of Congress the country must look toyou, whose ‘course is fixed,’ who ‘will not hesitate,’ who ‘will not surrender.’”

Hon. Wayne MacVeagh, Chairman of the Republican State Committee of Pennsylvania, afterwards Minister at Constantinople, wrote from West Chester, Pennsylvania:—

“I have just finished reading your superb speech at Worcester, in the complete form in which you sent it to me, and cannot go to bed without thanking you for it. The right word, in the right time, by the right man,—what more should we ask?”

William Hickey, Chief Clerk of the Senate, where he had been a life-long officer, and author of a well-known edition of the Constitution with accompanying documents, wrote from Washington:—

“Your speech ably maintains the consistency, ability, and patriotism which have uniformly distinguished your course, from your first essay in the sacred cause of Liberty, which has elicited so much of disinterested zeal and indomitable courage and perseverance on your part as to call forth, in my hearing, from the most honorable and intelligent of your political opponents from the South, declarations attributing those qualities to you in an eminent degree, giving you credit for consistency and unmistakable integrity of purpose. Your exertions have in a very great degree contributed towards the defeat of the Rebellion and the victory of the Government over its enemies, and you have now the satisfaction of enjoying the fruits of your labors and the exercise of your literary superiority and transcendent talents.”

Hon. John C. Underwood, who had written shortly before on Reconstruction,[252]wrote from Alexandria, Virginia:—

“I thank you for your Convention speech. Its positions and arguments are so overwhelming that I feel almost certain that your efforts will succeed with our people, and that you will be acknowledged the wise statesman and enlightened Christian patriot that I know you are.”

General Saxton, an Antislavery army officer, commanding in South Carolina, wrote from Charleston:—

“I most fully sympathize with and cordially indorse every word and line. In the future, the wisdom of your position will be fully established and vindicated.”

Hon. Charles D. Drake, an eminent lawyer and law-writer, afterwards United States Senator from Missouri, and Chief Justice of the Court of Claims, wrote:—

“Being detained at home by indisposition, I was glad of the privilege of at once reading your latest views on the great questions of the day in connection with Reconstruction. For them, and for the heroic spirit with which you take your stand, and determine ‘to fight it out on that line,’ I offer you my most sincere and fervent thanks. May God preserve your life and health, and enable you to fight it out to a complete victory!”

Hon. Charles Durkee, formerly Senator of the United States from Wisconsin, and then Governor of Utah, wrote from Salt Lake City to Governor Farwell, of Wisconsin:—

“I have just finished reading Mr. Sumner’s great speech delivered at the Massachusetts State Convention. What a masterly argument! It embodies the condensation of Calhoun, the strength of Webster, and more than the eloquence of Clay. In logic, in illustration, in simplicity of truth, I have never read a state-paper that equals it. Its timely utterance how fortunate for the country! He inspires some of the most vital parts of the Constitution (which heretofore have been a dead letter) with new life and activity. Washington and Lincoln led in the first and second revolutions, but it was left for Charles Sumner to lead in the third,—a revolution inConstitutional and Republican ideas. Be so kind as to thank him, in my name, for this timely effort in behalf of his country and in the cause of the oppressed.”

Such words from distant places were an encouragement to the speaker. Evidently he was not alone, nor had he spoken in vain.

Letter to the New York Evening Post, September 28, 1865.

To the Editor of the New York Evening Post.As a faithful reader of the “Evening Post” for many years, I have perused your article insisting that all present effort for guaranties of national security and national faith must be postponed, in order to obtain the ratification of the Constitutional Amendment by which slavery is abolished throughout the United States. If the Constitutional Amendment were not already ratified by the requisite number of States, I should doubt if even this most desirable object could be a sufficient excuse for leaving the national freedman and the national creditor exposed to peril, when exertions now can save them. But allow me to inquire if you do not forget, that, according to usage of the National Government in analogous cases, this Amendment has been already ratified by the requisite number of States, so that at this moment it is valid, to all intents and purposes, as part of the Constitution? There was a butcher once who looked everywhere for his knife, forgetting that he held it between his teeth; there also was the good Dr. Dove, who was in love without knowing it; and youhave laughed, I am sure, at the story told by Southey to illustrate this condition, where the traveller, asking how far it was to a place called “The Pan,” was answered directly, “You be in the Pan now.” It seems to me, that, like the traveller, the doctor, and the butcher, you already have what you desire; so that, even according to your programme, the way is clear for insisting upon those other things embraced under “Security for the Future.”The Constitution of the United States decides that “the Congress, whenevertwo thirds of both Housesshall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, … which shall be valid, to all intents and purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified bythe Legislatures of three fourths of the several States.” On these words the simple question arises, What constitutes the quorum?But the usage of the National Government in analogous cases has determined that the quorum is founded on the Statesactually participating in the Government. This has been decided in both Houses of Congress. The House of Representatives led the way in fixing its quorumaccording to actual representation, or, in other words, at “a majority of the members chosen.”[253]The Senate, after careful consideration and protracted debate, followed in establishing a similar rule.[254]The Constitutional Amendment was adopted by both housesorganized according to this rule. The national debt has been sanctioned by both housesthus organized. Treatiesalso with foreign powers have been sanctioned in the Senatethus organized.Applying this rule, the quorum of States requisite for the ratification of the Constitutional Amendment is plainly three fourths of the Statesactually participating in the Government, or, in other words, three fourths of the States having “Legislatures.” Where a State has no Legislature, it may be still a State, but it cannot be practically counted in the organization of Congress; and I submit that the same rule must prevail in the ratification of the Constitutional Amendment. The reason of the rule is the same in each case. If you insist upon counting a rebel State, having no Legislature, you make a concession to rebellion. You concede to a mutinous State the power to arrest, it may be, the organization of Congress, or, it may be, amendments to the Constitution important to the general welfare. This is not reasonable. Therefore, on grounds of reason as well as usage, I prefer the accepted rule.If this conclusion needed the support of authority, it would find it in the declared opinion of one of our best law-writers, who is cited with respect in all the courts of the country. I refer to Mr. Bishop, who, in the third edition of his “Commentaries on the Criminal Law,” published within a few days, discusses this question at length. In the course of his remarks he uses the following language:“If the matter were one relating to any other subject than Slavery, no legal person would ever doubt, that, when there are States with Legislatures and States without Legislatures, and the Constitution submits a question to the determination of ‘the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States,’ the meaning is, three fourths of the States which have Legislatures. In fact, it does not require either legal wisdom or legal acumen to see this, provided we look at the point disconnected from the peculiar subject of Slavery.”[255]The learned author then proceeds to illustrate this statement in a manner to which I can see no answer.To my mind all this seems so plain that I am disposed to ask pardon for arguing it. Of course there is no question whether a State isinthe Union orout ofthe Union. It is enough that it is without a Legislature, and on this point there can be no question. Being without a Legislature, it cannot be counted in determining the quorum.Therefore, beyond all dispute, the Constitutional Amendment has been already ratified by the requisite number of States; so that Slavery is now constitutionally abolished twice,—first, by the Proclamation of President Lincoln, under the war powers of the National Constitution; and, secondly, by Constitutional Amendment. It remains that we should provide supplementary safeguards, and complete the good work that has been begun, by taking care that Slavery is abolished in spirit as well as letter, and that the freedmen are protected by further needed guaranties. Without this additional provision, I see small prospect of that peace and reconciliation which are the object so near our hearts.I am, Sir, your obedient servant,Charles Sumner.Boston, 28th September, 1865.

To the Editor of the New York Evening Post.

As a faithful reader of the “Evening Post” for many years, I have perused your article insisting that all present effort for guaranties of national security and national faith must be postponed, in order to obtain the ratification of the Constitutional Amendment by which slavery is abolished throughout the United States. If the Constitutional Amendment were not already ratified by the requisite number of States, I should doubt if even this most desirable object could be a sufficient excuse for leaving the national freedman and the national creditor exposed to peril, when exertions now can save them. But allow me to inquire if you do not forget, that, according to usage of the National Government in analogous cases, this Amendment has been already ratified by the requisite number of States, so that at this moment it is valid, to all intents and purposes, as part of the Constitution? There was a butcher once who looked everywhere for his knife, forgetting that he held it between his teeth; there also was the good Dr. Dove, who was in love without knowing it; and youhave laughed, I am sure, at the story told by Southey to illustrate this condition, where the traveller, asking how far it was to a place called “The Pan,” was answered directly, “You be in the Pan now.” It seems to me, that, like the traveller, the doctor, and the butcher, you already have what you desire; so that, even according to your programme, the way is clear for insisting upon those other things embraced under “Security for the Future.”

The Constitution of the United States decides that “the Congress, whenevertwo thirds of both Housesshall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, … which shall be valid, to all intents and purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified bythe Legislatures of three fourths of the several States.” On these words the simple question arises, What constitutes the quorum?

But the usage of the National Government in analogous cases has determined that the quorum is founded on the Statesactually participating in the Government. This has been decided in both Houses of Congress. The House of Representatives led the way in fixing its quorumaccording to actual representation, or, in other words, at “a majority of the members chosen.”[253]The Senate, after careful consideration and protracted debate, followed in establishing a similar rule.[254]The Constitutional Amendment was adopted by both housesorganized according to this rule. The national debt has been sanctioned by both housesthus organized. Treatiesalso with foreign powers have been sanctioned in the Senatethus organized.

Applying this rule, the quorum of States requisite for the ratification of the Constitutional Amendment is plainly three fourths of the Statesactually participating in the Government, or, in other words, three fourths of the States having “Legislatures.” Where a State has no Legislature, it may be still a State, but it cannot be practically counted in the organization of Congress; and I submit that the same rule must prevail in the ratification of the Constitutional Amendment. The reason of the rule is the same in each case. If you insist upon counting a rebel State, having no Legislature, you make a concession to rebellion. You concede to a mutinous State the power to arrest, it may be, the organization of Congress, or, it may be, amendments to the Constitution important to the general welfare. This is not reasonable. Therefore, on grounds of reason as well as usage, I prefer the accepted rule.

If this conclusion needed the support of authority, it would find it in the declared opinion of one of our best law-writers, who is cited with respect in all the courts of the country. I refer to Mr. Bishop, who, in the third edition of his “Commentaries on the Criminal Law,” published within a few days, discusses this question at length. In the course of his remarks he uses the following language:“If the matter were one relating to any other subject than Slavery, no legal person would ever doubt, that, when there are States with Legislatures and States without Legislatures, and the Constitution submits a question to the determination of ‘the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States,’ the meaning is, three fourths of the States which have Legislatures. In fact, it does not require either legal wisdom or legal acumen to see this, provided we look at the point disconnected from the peculiar subject of Slavery.”[255]The learned author then proceeds to illustrate this statement in a manner to which I can see no answer.

To my mind all this seems so plain that I am disposed to ask pardon for arguing it. Of course there is no question whether a State isinthe Union orout ofthe Union. It is enough that it is without a Legislature, and on this point there can be no question. Being without a Legislature, it cannot be counted in determining the quorum.

Therefore, beyond all dispute, the Constitutional Amendment has been already ratified by the requisite number of States; so that Slavery is now constitutionally abolished twice,—first, by the Proclamation of President Lincoln, under the war powers of the National Constitution; and, secondly, by Constitutional Amendment. It remains that we should provide supplementary safeguards, and complete the good work that has been begun, by taking care that Slavery is abolished in spirit as well as letter, and that the freedmen are protected by further needed guaranties. Without this additional provision, I see small prospect of that peace and reconciliation which are the object so near our hearts.

I am, Sir, your obedient servant,

Charles Sumner.

Boston, 28th September, 1865.

Article in the Boston Daily Advertiser, October 2, 1865.

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