Chapter V: Injuries and Continued Disability of Mr. Sumner (3)

“The Senator from South Carolina tells us that the speech is to be condemned. It has gone out to the country. It has been printed by the million. It has been scattered broadcast amongst seventeen millions of Northern freemen who can read and write. The Senator condemns it; South Carolina condemns it: but South Carolina is only a part of this Confederacy, and but a part of the Christian and civilized world. South Carolina makes rice and cotton, but South Carolina contributes little to make up the judgment of the Christian and civilized world. I value her rice and cotton more than I do her opinions on questions of scholarship and eloquence, of patriotism or of liberty.

“Mr. President, I have no desire to assail the Senator from South Carolina, or any other Senator in this body; but I wish to say now that we have had quite enough of this asserted superiority, social and political. We were told, some time ago, by the Senator from Alabama [Mr. CLAY], that those of us who entertained certain sentiments fawned upon him and other Southern men, if they permitted us to associate with them. This is strange language to be used in this body. I never fawned upon that Senator. I never sought his acquaintance,--and I do not know that I should feel myself honored, if I had it. I treat him as an equal here,--I wish always to treat him respectfully; but when he tells me or my friends that we fawn upon him or his associates, I say to him that I have never sought, and never shall seek, any other acquaintance than what official intercourse requires with a man who declared, on the floor of the Senate, that he would do what Henry Clay once said ‘no gentleman could do,’--hunt a fugitive slave.

“The Senator from Virginia, not now in his seat [Mr. MASON], when Mr. Sumner closed his speech, saw fit to tell the Senate that his hands would be soiled by contact with ours. The Senator is not here: I wish he were. I have simply to say that I know nothing in that Senator, moral, intellectual, or physical, which entitles him to use such language towards members of the Senate, or any portion of God’s creation. I know nothing in the State from which he comes, rich as it is in the history of the past, that entitles him to speak in such a manner. I am not here to assail Virginia. God knows I have not a feeling in my heart against her, or against her public men; but I do say it is time that these arrogant assumptions ceased here. This is no place for assumed social superiority, as though certain Senators held the keys of cultivated and refined society. Sir, they do not hold the keys, and they shall not hold over me the plantation whip.

“I wish always to speak kindly towards every man in this body. Since I came here, I have never asked an introduction to a Southern member of the Senate,--not because I have any feelings against them, for God knows I have not; but I knew that they believed I held opinions hostile to their interests, and I supposed they would not desire my society. I have never wished to obtrude myself on their society, so that certain Senators could do with me, as they have boasted they did with others,--refuse to receive their advances, or refuse to recognize them on the floor of the Senate. Sir, there is not a Coolie in the Guano Islands of Peru who does not think the Celestial Empire the whole Universe. There are a great many men who have swung the whip over the plantation, who think they not only rule the plantation, but make up the judgment of the world, and hold the keys not only to political power, as they have done in this country, but to social life.

“The Senator from South Carolina assails the resolutions of my State, with his accustomed looseness, as springing from ignorance, passion, prejudice, excitement. Sir, the testimony before the House Committee sustains all that is contained in those resolutions. Massachusetts has spoken her opinions; and although the Senator has quoted the _Boston Courier_ to-day,--and I would not rob him of any consolation he can derive from that source,--I know Massachusetts, and I can tell him, that, of the twelve hundred thousand people of Massachusetts, you cannot find in the State one thousand, Administration office-holders included, who do not look with loathing and execration upon the outrage on the person of their Senator and the honor of their State. The sentiment of Massachusetts, of New England, of the North, approaches unanimity. Massachusetts has spoken her opinions. The Senator is welcome to assail them, if he chooses; but they are on the record. They are made up by the verdict of her people, and they understand the question, and from their verdict there is no appeal.

* * * * *

“Mr. President, I have spoken freely; I shall continue always to speak freely. I seek no controversy with any man; but I shall express my sentiments frankly, and the more frankly because on this floor my colleague has been smitten down for words spoken in debate, and because there are those who, unmindful of the Constitution of their country, claim the right thus to question us.”

IV.

VOICE OF THE NORTH.

Under this head must be put the speech of Hon. Anson Burlingame, afterwards so justly distinguished as the Minister of China, made in the House of Representatives, June 21, 1856. Here is an extract.

“But, Mr. Chairman, all these assaults upon the State of
Massachusetts sink into insignificance, compared with the one I
am about to mention. On the 19th of May it was announced that
Mr. Sumner would address the Senate upon the Kansas question.
The floor of the Senate, the galleries, and avenues leading
thereto were thronged with an expectant audience; and many of
us left our places in this House to hear the Massachusetts
orator. To say that we were delighted with the speech we heard
would but faintly express the deep emotions of our hearts
awakened by it. I need not speak of the classic purity of its
language, nor of the nobility of its sentiments. It was heard
by many; it has been read by millions. There has been no such
speech made in the Senate since the days when those Titans of
American eloquence, the Websters and the Haynes, contended with
each other for mastery.

“It was severe, because it was launched against tyranny. It
was severe as Chatham was severe, when he defended the feeble
colonies against the giant oppression of the mother country.
It was made in the face of a hostile Senate. It continued
through the greater portion of two days; and yet, during that
time, the speaker was not once called to order. This fact is
conclusive as to the personal and parliamentary decorum of the
speech. He had provocation enough. His State had been called
‘hypocritical.’ He himself had been called ‘a puppy,’ ‘a fool,’
‘a fanatic,’ and ‘a dishonest man.’ Yet he was parliamentary
from the beginning to the end of his speech. No man knew better
than he did the proprieties of the place, for he had always
observed them. No man knew better than he did parliamentary
law, because he had made it the study of his life. No man saw
more clearly than he did the flaming sword of the Constitution
turning every way, guarding all the avenues of the Senate. But
he was not thinking of these things; he was not thinking then
of the privileges of the Senate, nor of the guaranties of the
Constitution. He was there to denounce tyranny and crime; and
he did it. He was there to speak for the rights of an empire;
and he did it bravely and grandly.

“So much for the occasion of the speech. A word, and I shall be
pardoned, about the speaker himself. He is my friend; for many
and many a year I have looked to him for guidance and light,
and I never looked in vain. He never had a personal enemy in
his life; his character is as pure as the snow that falls on
his native hills; his heart overflows with kindness for every
being having the upright form of man; he is a ripe scholar, a
chivalric gentleman, and a warm-hearted, true friend. He sat at
the feet of Channing, and drank in the sentiments of that noble
soul. He bathed in the learning and undying love of the great
jurist, Story; and the hand of Jackson, with its honors and its
offices, sought him early in life, but he shrank from them with
instinctive modesty. Sir, he is the pride of Massachusetts.
His mother Commonwealth found him adorning the highest
walks of literature and law, and she bade him go and grace
somewhat the rough character of political life. The people of
Massachusetts--the old, and the young, and the middle-aged--now
pay their full homage to the beauty of his public and private
character. Such is Charles Sumner.

“On the 22d day of May, when the Senate and the House had
clothed themselves in mourning for a brother fallen in the
battle of life in the distant State of Missouri, the Senator
from Massachusetts sat in the silence of the Senate Chamber,
engaged in the employments appertaining to his office, when
a member from this House, who had taken an oath to sustain
the Constitution, stole into the Senate, that place which had
hitherto been held sacred against violence, and smote him as
Cain smote his brother.

[MR. KEITT (in his seat). That is false.

MR. BURLINGAME. I will not bandy epithets with the
gentleman. I am responsible for my own language. Doubtless
he is responsible for his.

MR. KEITT. I am.

MR. BURLINGAME. I shall stand by mine.]

“One blow was enough; but it did not satiate the wrath of
that spirit which had pursued him through two days. Again and
again, quicker and faster, fell the leaden blows, until he was
torn away from his victim, when the Senator from Massachusetts
fell in the arms of his friends, and his blood ran down on
the Senate floor. Sir, the act was brief, and my comments
on it shall be brief also. I denounce it in the name of the
Constitution it violated. I denounce it in the name of the
sovereignty of Massachusetts, which was stricken down by the
blow. I denounce it in the name of civilization, which it
outraged. I denounce it in the name of humanity. I denounce it
in the name of that fair play which bullies and prize-fighters
respect. What! strike a man when he is pinioned,--when he
cannot respond to a blow? Call you that chivalry? In what code
of honor did you get your authority for that? I do not believe
that member has a friend so dear who must not, in his heart of
hearts, condemn the act. Even the member himself, if he has
left a spark of that chivalry and gallantry attributed to him,
must loathe and scorn the act. God knows, I do not wish to
speak unkindly or in a spirit of revenge; but I owe it to my
manhood, and the noble State I in part represent, to express my
deep abhorrence of the act.

“But, much as I reprobate the act, much more do I reprobate the
conduct of those who were by and saw the outrage perpetrated.
Sir, especially do I notice the conduct of that Senator,
recently from the free platform of Massachusetts, with the odor
of her hospitality on him, who stood there, not only silent and
quiet, while it was going on, but, when it was over, approved
the act. And worse,--when he had time to cool, when he had
slept on it, he went into the Senate Chamber of the United
States, and shocked the sensibilities of the world by approving
it. Another Senator did not take part because he feared his
motives might be questioned, exhibiting as extraordinary a
delicacy as that individual who refused to rescue a drowning
mortal because he had not been introduced to him. [_Laughter._]
Another was not on good terms; and yet, if rumor be true, that
Senator has declared that himself and family are more indebted
to Mr. Sumner than to any other man; yet, when he saw him
borne bleeding by, he turned and went on the other side. O
magnanimous Slidell! O prudent Douglas! O audacious Toombs!”

This speech drew from Mr. Brooks a challenge, which was promptly accepted by Mr. Burlingame, who insisted upon these terms: “Weapons, rifles; distance, twenty paces; place, District of Columbia; time of meeting, the next morning.” Hon. L. D. Campbell, who acted as Mr. Burlingame’s friend, substituted the Clifton House, Canada, for the District of Columbia. The friends of Mr. Brooks, assuming that the excitement growing out of the assault made it dangerous for him to traverse the country, prevented the meeting from taking place.

* * * * *

The following resolves were adopted by the Legislature of Massachusetts, and duly presented to both Houses of Congress.

“_Resolves concerning the recent Assault upon the Honorable
Charles Sumner at Washington._

“_Resolved_, By the Senate and House of Representatives of the
Commonwealth of Massachusetts, that we have received with deep
concern information of the recent violent assault committed
in the Senate Chamber at Washington upon the person of the
Honorable Charles Sumner, one of our Senators in Congress, by
Preston S. Brooks, a member of the House of Representatives
from South Carolina,--an assault which no provocation could
justify, brutal and cowardly in itself, a gross breach of
parliamentary privilege, a ruthless attack upon the liberty of
speech, an outrage of the decencies of civilized life, and an
indignity to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

“_Resolved_, That the Legislature of Massachusetts, in the
name of her free and enlightened people, demands for her
representatives in the National Legislature entire _Freedom of
Speech_, and will uphold them in the proper exercise of that
essential right of American citizens.

“_Resolved_, That we approve of Mr. Sumner’s manliness and
courage in his earnest and fearless declaration of free
principles and his defence of human rights and free territory.

“_Resolved_, That the Legislature of Massachusetts is
imperatively called upon by the plainest dictates of duty,
from a decent regard to the rights of her citizens, and
respect for her character as a sovereign State, to demand, and
the Legislature of Massachusetts hereby does demand, of the
National Congress, a prompt and strict investigation into the
recent assault upon Senator Sumner, and the expulsion by the
House of Representatives of Mr. Brooks of South Carolina, and
any other member concerned with him in said assault.

“_Resolved_, That his Excellency the Governor be requested to
transmit a copy of the foregoing resolves to the President
of the Senate and Speaker of the House of Representatives,
and to each of the Senators and Members of the House of
Representatives from this Commonwealth, in the Congress of the
United States.”

The Governor of New York addressed Mr. Sumner directly by letter as follows.

“STATE OF NEW YORK, EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT.
ALBANY, MAY 28, 1856.

“HONORABLE CHARLES SUMNER:--

“MY DEAR SIR,--From the moment the lightning flashed the
intelligence of the barbarous and brutal assault made upon you
by the sneaking, slave-driving scoundrel Brooks, the blood
has tingled in my veins, and I have desired to express to
you, not my abhorrence of the villain, for I could not find
words adequate, but my personal sympathy for you, and, in
their behalf, that of the people of this State (except a few
‘doughfaces,‘--we have still a very few, the breed is not yet
quite extinct here),--assuring you that the hearts of our
people are warmly and strongly with you, and that your noble
and eloquent speech has already been very generally read by
our citizens,--that it is not only entirely approved, but
highly applauded,--and that its doctrines, sentiments, and
expressions, and its author, will be _sustained_ and DEFENDED
by the people of this State.

“Ardently hoping for your recovery and speedy restoration to
health, I have the honor to remain, with the highest regard,

“Your friend and servant,

“MYRON H. CLARK.”

Of the resolutions at public meetings a few only are presented.

The following, from the pen of William Lloyd Garrison, were adopted by the New England Antislavery Society.

“1. _Resolved_, That this Convention fully participates in
the general feeling of indignation and horror which is felt
in view of the recent dastardly and murderous assault made
in the Senate Chamber at Washington upon the person of the
distinguished Senator from Massachusetts, Hon. Charles Sumner,
by a fitting Representative of and from the lawless State of
South Carolina; that, whether regard be had to the place or to
the manner in which it was committed, or to the position and
character of the victim, an assault characterized by greater
cowardice and ruffianism, or more daring in its contempt
for all that is sacred in constitutional liberty, or more
comprehensively malignant against the cause of human freedom,
cannot be found on the page of history; that it indicates a
conspiracy, on the part of the Slave Oligarchy, to ‘crush out’
freedom of speech on the floor of Congress as effectually as
it is done on the slave plantation, by putting in peril the
life of every Northern Senator or Representative who shall
dare to lift up a manly voice against Executive usurpation and
border-ruffianism; and, therefore, that whoever shall attempt
to find any justification, or to frame any apology for it, will
reveal himself to be on a level with the base assailant of as
pure and generous and noble a man as ever yet occupied a seat
in our national legislature.

“2. _Resolved_, That the speech made by Mr. Sumner, which
has subjected him to this most brutal treatment, is a speech
at any time worth dying for,--perfect in its conception,
arrangement, and execution, conclusive in its argument and
evidence, masterly in its exposure of Executive usurpation,
sublime in its moral heroism, invincible in its truthfulness,
just in its personal impeachment, unsurpassed in its eloquence,
and glorious in its object; that, sealed with his blood, it
shall quicken the pulses of millions now living to engage in a
death-grapple with the Slave Power, and go down to posterity as
a rich legacy to the cause of Universal Liberty.”

The following resolution was passed unanimously, at the meeting of Ministers in Boston, immediately after the news of the assault.

“_Resolved_, That the murderous assault upon our honored
Senator, Charles Sumner, is not only a dastardly assault upon
his person, and, through him, upon the right of free speech,
but also a wound which we individually feel, and by which
our very hearts bleed; and whether he shall recover, or sink
into a martyr’s grave,--which may God avert!--we will address
ourselves unto prayer and effort that this sorrowful event may
become the glorious resurrection of national virtue, and the
triumph of Freedom.”

At the Political Radical Abolition Convention, held at Syracuse, N. Y., May 28th and 29th, 1856, on motion of Lewis Tappan, the following was unanimously adopted.

“_Resolved_, That we hold in grateful admiration the character
of the Hon. Charles Sumner; that we honor the splendid services
he has rendered to the cause of Liberty; that we deeply
sympathize with him in his present sufferings in consequence
of the cowardly and brutal attack of the villain who dared to
assault the intrepid advocate of the Slave in the American
Senate Chamber; and that we hope and pray that Mr. Sumner’s
valuable life will be spared until he shall witness the
complete overthrow of the execrable system that now brutalizes
our brethren in bondage, and brutalizes their oppressors, and
disgraces our country.”

At New York there was a meeting immense in numbers and unprecedented in character, of which George Griswold was Chairman. Among the speakers were William C. Bryant, Daniel Lord, the eminent lawyer, Samuel B. Ruggles, Charles King, President of Columbia College, Edwin B. Morgan, John A. Stevens, Joseph Hoxie, and Henry Ward Beecher. The following resolutions were moved by Hon. William M. Evarts, afterwards Attorney-General.

“_Whereas_ it has become certainly known to the citizens of New
York, upon a formal investigation by a Committee of the Senate
of the United States, and otherwise, that on the 22d day of
May, instant, the Honorable Charles Sumner [_long, loud, and
enthusiastic cheers_], Senator from Massachusetts, while in
his seat in the Senate Chamber, was violently assaulted with a
weapon of attack by Preston S. Brooks [_loud hisses and groans
for Brooks_], a member of the House of Representatives from
South Carolina, and beaten to insensibility upon the floor
of the Senate, which was stained with his blood; that the
assailant sought the Senate Chamber to perpetrate this outrage,
provided with his weapon and attended by a follower in its aid,
and, taking his unarmed victim unawares and in a posture which
renders defence impossible, by a heavy blow utterly disabled
him, and with cruel repetition inflicted frequent and bloody
wounds upon his prostrate, helpless form, with which wounds
Senator Sumner now languishes in peril of his life; that the
sole reason alleged for this violent outrage was a speech made
by Senator Sumner in debate upon a public question then pending
in the Senate, no word of which was, during its delivery, made
the subject of objection by the President of the Senate or
any Senator, and which was concluded on the 20th day of May,
instant: Now, at a public meeting of citizens of New York,
convened without distinction of party [_applause_], and solely
in reference to the public event above recited, it is

“_Resolved_, That we sincerely and respectfully tender our
sympathy to Senator Sumner in the personal outrage inflicted
upon him, and the anguish and peril which he has suffered and
still suffers from that outrage, and that we feel and proclaim
that his grievance and his wounds are not of private concern
[_cheers_], but were received in the public service, and every
blow which fell upon his head we recognize and resent as an
insult and injury to our honor and dignity as a people, and a
vital attack upon the Constitution of the Union. [_Loud cheers
and applause._]

“_Resolved_, That we discover no trace or trait, either in
the meditation, the preparation, or the execution of this
outrage by Preston S. Brooks [_loud hisses and groans for
Brooks_], which should qualify the condemnation with which
we now pronounce it _brutal, murderous, and cowardly_.
[_Continued cheers, and cries of ‘Read it again!’ Mr. Evarts
repeated the last clause. Voices,--‘Yes, cowardly! that’s the
word!--cowardly!’ Another voice,--‘Now let him send another
challenge!’_]

…

“_Resolved_, That we have witnessed with unmixed astonishment
and the deepest regret the clear, bold, exulting espousal of
the outrage, and justification and honor of its perpetrator,
exhibited by Senators and Representatives of the Slave States,
without distinction of party, in their public places, and by
the public press, without distinction of party, in the same
portion of our country, and that, _upon the present state
of the evidence_, we are forced most unwillingly to the sad
conclusion that the general community of the Slave States is
in complicity in feeling and principle with the system of
intimidation and violence, for the suppression of freedom
of speech and of the press, of which the assault on Senator
Sumner is the most signal, but not the singular instance.
[_Applause._] That we sincerely hope, that, on fuller and
calmer consideration, the public men and public press and the
general community of the Slave States will give us a distinct
manifestation of their sentiments which will enable us, too, to
reconsider our present judgment. [_Applause._]”

At this meeting the Rev. Henry Ward Beecher spoke as follows.

“Had Mr. Sumner been a man of war, or a man of brawling words,
had he been any other than what he was, the case could not
have been so strong. I know not that there would have been
found throughout all the land one man so fit to be offered up
as a sacrifice for Liberty, a man so worthy to be offered up
on the great altar of our country. [_Applause._] No aspiring
politician has he been. His past career has not been marked by
ambitious clutchings. A lawyer by profession, but a scholar by
instinct,--a man of refined ideas, of social taste,--he was
seized by one of those sudden gusts of popular feeling which
break out occasionally in all our Free States, and elected to
the Senate of the United States. While his election was yet
pending, I had the pleasure of conversation with him in his
office, I being a clergyman, and confessor on that occasion
[_laughter_], and he told me the secrets of his heart. I am
sure, that, although not without honorable and manly ambition,
this man had no desire for that position. Since he has been
in Washington, his course has been that which became a man,
a Christian, a gentleman, a statesman, and a scholar. He has
everywhere not merely observed the rules of decorum, but, with
true chivalry, with the lowliest gentleness, he has maintained
himself void of offence, so that the only complaint which I
have ever heard of Senator Sumner has been this, that he, by
his shrinking and sensitive nature, was not fit for the ‘rough
and tumble’ of politics in our day.…

“Mr. Sumner had no other weapon in his hand than his pen. Ah,
Gentlemen, here we have it! The symbol of the North is the pen;
the symbol of the South is the bludgeon.”

At a public meeting in Canandaigua, of which Hon. Francis Granger, Postmaster-General under President Harrison, was Chairman, the following resolutions were adopted.

“1. _Resolved_, That in this premeditated and brutal attack
upon Senator Sumner, for words spoken by him in legislative
debate, and in the conscientious discharge of his public duty,
we behold not only a malignant outrage upon the person of a
distinguished public servant, but also a wanton violation of
the right of freedom of speech,--a right which is guarantied to
every Representative, and through him to his constituents, by
the express provisions of the Constitution,--a right without
which the office of the legislator would be powerless and the
liberties of the people would become extinct, and which is
therefore ‘inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.’

“2. _Resolved_, That, participating in the righteous
indignation which was recently expressed by thousands of
freemen assembled in the city of New York, ‘we discover no
trace or trait, either in the meditation, the preparation,
or the execution of this outrage, which should qualify the
condemnation with which we now pronounce it _brutal, murderous,
and cowardly_.’

…

“5. _Resolved_, That to the Hon. Charles Sumner, the man of
pure and generous qualities, the accomplished scholar, the
distinguished lawyer, and the able and eloquent Senator, we
respectfully and sincerely offer our sympathies in the pain and
peril which he has suffered and is still suffering from this
despicable assault; and we earnestly hope that his restoration
to health may be speedy and complete, and that he may long be
spared to vindicate the great popular rights at which the blows
inflicted upon him were aimed.”

At Providence, Rhode Island, there was a public meeting, in which the most distinguished citizens took part. Among the able speakers was the Rev. Dr. Hedge, who said, among other things:--

“I have heard of crimes which betoken greater pravity of heart,
but never have I heard or read of an act more flagitious in
its open defiance of sacred rights, in its ruthless disregard
of all humane sentiment and shameless violation of decency and
order. We shall form a more just conception of the outrage by
viewing it abstractedly from any interest we may feel in it as
fellow-citizens of the parties concerned. Suppose we had read,
among the items of recent transatlantic intelligence, that
Count Buol, at the Peace Congress in Paris, offended by some
expression of the Earl of Clarendon, had felled him to the
ground with murderous blows. Imagine what a thrill of horror
would have struck through the heart of Europe, and how the
wrath of the nations would have chased the perpetrator of such
an act from the face of the earth. Or suppose Mr. Hume, of the
British Commons, had entered the House of Lords, and beaten
Lord Brougham with a club until he was borne senseless from the
spot. “With what confidence should we look to be advised by
the next steamer that the culprit had been doomed to expiate
his crime by the direst penalty which the laws of England have
provided!--if, indeed, the English law has made any provision
for such a case, and not rather, as the law of the Roman
Commonwealth did the crime of parricide, left it unprovided
for, as an impossible, unsupposable enormity.

“One supposition more. Conceive the situation of the parties
in the case before us reversed. Suppose Senator Butler, who
has said severer things of Mr. Sumner than Mr. Sumner of him,
to have been the victim, and some member from Massachusetts,
perhaps a far-away cousin of Mr. Sumner, to have been the
aggressor. Does any one here present imagine that the ‘gallant
relative’ in that case would be going about unmolested on a
paltry bail of five hundred dollars? If the trusty bowie-knife
or omnipresent revolver of Southern chivalry did not otherwise
dispose of him, does any one doubt that the summary and prompt
vengeance of Congress and the law would have been demanded by
one side and conceded by the other?”

Here is a brief extract from the speech of Rev. Dr. Wayland.

“The question before us is simply, whether you, here and now,
consent to this change in our form of government, and accept
the position which it assigns to you,--and whether you agree
to transmit to your children this precious inheritance? For
myself, I must decline the arrangement. I was born free, and I
cannot be made a slave. I bow before the universal intelligence
and conscience of my country, and when I think this defective,
I claim the privilege of using my poor endeavors to enlighten
it. But to submit my reason to the bludgeon of a bully or the
pistol of an assassin I cannot; nor can I tamely behold a step
taken which leads inevitably to such a consummation.

“You see that I consider this as a case of unusual solemnity.
It becomes us to deliberate wisely, to resolve in view of the
future as well as the past, and prepare ourselves to carry our
resolutions out to all their legitimate conclusions, and, in
doing this, to pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes,
and our sacred honor.”

At a public meeting in Chapman Hall, Boston, immediately after the assault, Wendell Phillips said:--

“Nobody needs now to read this speech of Charles Sumner to know
whether it is good. We measure the amount of the charge by the
length of the rebound. [_Cheers._] When the spear, driven to
the quick, makes the Devil start up in his own likeness, we
may be sure it is the spear of Ithuriel. [_Great applause._]
That is my way of measuring the speech which has produced this
glorious result. Oh, yes, glorious! for the world will yet
cover every one of those scars with laurels. [_Enthusiastic
cheering._] Sir, he _must_ not die! We need him yet, as the
vanguard leader of the hosts of Liberty. No, he shall yet
come forth from that sick-chamber, and every gallant heart in
the Commonwealth be ready to kiss his very footsteps. [_Loud
cheers._]

…

“Perhaps, Mr. Chairman and fellow-citizens, I am wrong; but I
accept that speech of my loved and honored friend, and with an
unmixed approbation,--read it with envious admiration,--take
it all. [_Cheers._] Yes, what word is there in it that any one
of us would not have been proud to utter? Not one! [_Great
applause._] In utter scorn of the sickly taste, of the
effeminate scholarship, that starts back, in delicate horror,
at a bold illustration, I dare to say there is no animal God
has condescended to make that man may not venture to name.
[_Applause._] And if any ground of complaint is supposable in
regard to this comparison, which shocks the delicacy of some
men and some presses, it is the animal, not Mr. Douglas, that
has reason to complain. [_Thunders of applause, renewed again
and again._]

…

“Mr. Chairman, there are some characters whose worth is so
clear and self-evident, so tried and approved, so much without
flaw, that we lay them on the shelf,--and when we hear of
any act attributed to them, no matter in what doubtful terms
it be related, we judge the single act by the totality of
the character, by our knowledge of the whole man, letting
a lifetime of uprightness explain a doubtful hour. Now,
with regard to our honored Senator, we know that his taste,
intellect, and heart are all of this quality,--a total,
unflawed gem; and I know, when we get the full and complete
report of what he said, the _ipsissima verba_ in which it was
spoken, that the most fastidious taste of the most delicate
scholar will not be able to place finger on a word of Charles
Sumner which the truest gentleman would not gladly indorse.
[_Loud cheers._] I place the foot of my uttermost contempt on
those members of the press of Boston that have anything to say
in criticism of his language, while he lies thus prostrate and
speechless,--our champion beaten to the ground for the noblest
word Massachusetts ever spoke in the Senate. [_Prolonged
applause._]”

A great meeting in Faneuil Hall was remarkable for the speeches, of which a few extracts are given.

His Excellency, Henry J. Gardner, at the time Governor of Massachusetts, said:--

“Were this a party occasion, my feet would not be upon this
platform; were this to stir up sectional animosity or promote
local discord, my voice would never reverberate from these
arches above my head; but when the State of Massachusetts is
attacked in one of her dearest rights, one of her most glorious
privileges, I should be recreant to my duty, I should be false
to my trust, as every one who hears me would be, did I not
protest against this infraction of our common rights. I wish,
my friends, in order to give the greatest moral weight possible
to this meeting, to give its proceedings the most cogent force,
to assume in the outset that this case can in no wise, in no
way, and under no consideration, be considered anything but a
spontaneous expression of the sentiments of gentlemen of every
party in the State of Massachusetts upon this question. The
last time the eloquent and honorable Senator of Massachusetts
addressed his fellow-citizens of Boston, he stood where I now
stand, on the eve of the election in November last; and here,
he being a Senator of Massachusetts in the Congress of the
United States, and I being Governor of the Commonwealth of
Massachusetts, he indulged in what he honestly believed to be
facts and statements in regard to those of my friends who were
striving to place me again in the post I then occupied, using
no unfair, but only honest statements of the views he held;
and he being still a Senator from Massachusetts, and I again
her Governor, and this being the first time since then that
my voice has been heard in Faneuil Hall, while I lament most
deeply the circumstance which has called us together, I rejoice
that it gives me an opportunity to rise superior to party
feelings, to party bias, and to express my sentiments that we
must stand by him who is the representative of Massachusetts,
under all circumstances. [_Loud cheers._] And while he
represents the old Commonwealth in the United States Senate, in
the performance of his constitutional duties as he understands
them, I will, so help me Heaven, do all in my humble ability to
strengthen his arm and encourage his heart. [_Loud applause._]”

Hon. George S. Hillard said:--

“But now, when I read of this event in the Senate, of this
assault upon Sumner, it seemed to me it was a very bad specimen
of a very bad school. [_Laughter._] And all of us were affected
in the same manner, upon reading the account. What was our
first exclamation? Not that it was an inhuman outrage, or
a brutal outrage, but that it was cowardly. I say that the
cowardliness of this attack stands out even more conspicuous,
to my eye, than its brutality or its inhumanity. To approach
a man imprisoned, tied hand and foot, as it were, between an
arm-chair and a desk, and to strike him over the head without
warning or immediate provocation, a stunning, deadly blow
with a bludgeon, is, in my opinion, the act of an assassin.
[_Applause._] And I say, that, compared to such an act, the act
of the man who meets me on the high-road, and horsewhips, or at
least attempts to horsewhip me [_laughter_], soars to something
like manliness and courage. [_Cheers._]”

Hon. Peleg W. Chandler said:--

“For more than twenty years, Mr. President and fellow-citizens,
I have been on terms of the closest intimacy with Charles
Sumner. For more than one half that period I have been his
political opponent. It is precisely because I have been, and
now am, his personal friend, and it is precisely because I have
been, and now am, his political opponent, that I have come
here to-night,--not with the intention of speaking upon this
platform, but to listen to the voices of those who are his
political as well as personal friends, in relation to the great
outrage which has brought a stain upon our country.

“I have heard here, Gentlemen, a great deal of sympathy
expressed for Mr. Sumner. As his personal friend, I beg to say
that that feeling is entirely uncalled for, if not to some
extent misplaced. Have sympathy for the great martyrs of the
past, for those who wear the civic crown, if you will,--but I
tell you that that gentleman in Washington who now lies upon a
bed of pain, whose life it may be is hanging in the balance,
needs no sympathy from us. Every drop of blood shed by him in
this disgraceful affair has raised up ten thousand armed men.
[_Applause._] Every gash upon that forehead will be covered
with a political crown, let it be resisted as much as it may
be resisted, here or elsewhere. [_Loud cheers._] This matter
is raised far above and beyond all personal considerations.
It is a matter of trifling consequence to Mr. Sumner. It
makes those who love him love him more,--and no man is more
loved, or more to be considered, so far as the affections or
friendship are concerned. Yet personal feelings are of little
or no consequence in this outrage. It is a blow not merely at
Massachusetts, a How not merely at the name and fame of our
common country; it is a blow at constitutional liberty all the
world over; it is a stab at the cause of Universal Freedom. It
is aimed at all men, everywhere, who are struggling for what
we now regard as our great birthright, and which we intend to
transmit unimpaired to our latest posterity. [_Loud cheers._]

“Whatever may be done in this matter, however, one thing is
certain, one thing is sure. The blood of this Northern man, who
had dared to stand up in the Senate of the United States under
circumstances that would have discouraged a man of less ardor,
less enthusiasm, and less courage,--that blood now stains the
Senate floor; and let me tell you, that not all the water of
the Potomac can wash it out. They may cry, with the great
tragic queen, ‘Out, damned spot!’ but no water of this world
can ever efface it. Forever, forever and aye, that stain will
plead in silence for liberty, wherever man is enslaved, for
humanity all over the world, for truth and for justice, now and
forever. [_Continued applause._]”

The meeting at Cambridge was distinguished for the character of those who took part in it, many of whom had not sympathized with Mr. Sumner in his public life. The President was Hon. Joel Parker, formerly Chief Justice of New Hampshire; and among the Vice-Presidents were Theophilus Parsons, the eminent law-writer,--C. C. Felton, afterwards President of Harvard University,--Jared Sparks, the historian,--Henry W. Longfellow,--Charles Beck, the Latin scholar,--Joseph E. Worcester, the lexicographer,--Willard Phillips, the law-writer and judge,--Joseph T. Buckingham, the well-known editor.

Professor Felton thus alluded to Mr. Sumner:--

“I know Mr. Sumner well. In former times I had a long, an
intimate, and an affectionate acquaintance with him; and
I feel bound to say that he is a scholar of rich and rare
acquirements, a gentleman of noble qualities and generous
aims, distinguished for the amenities of social life, and a
companion most welcome in the society of the most generous, the
most refined, the most exalted. Sir, I had nothing to do with
sending Mr. Sumner to the Senate of the United States; I had no
vote to cast on that occasion; and if I had had, it would not,
on public grounds, have been cast for him. I shall have none to
cast, when the time for another election comes; but if I had
five hundred votes, every one should be given to send him back
again. [_Great applause._]

“Such is the man for whom ruffians lay in wait, whom they
assaulted, when unarmed and defenceless, in the Senate House.”

Richard H. Dana, Jr., Esq., made an elaborate speech, of which the following is only an extract.

“But I cannot, if I would, altogether withdraw my thoughts from
this personal outrage upon Mr. Sumner. Charles Sumner!

‘He is my friend,--faithful and just to me.’

I cannot allow myself to call up that scene in the Senate
House, lest I should feel more than I shall be able to express
or be willing to betray. Boston, his native town, has spoken.
Next to Boston, there is no place so dear to him as Cambridge.
He is a true son of Harvard. The best years of his early life,
from fifteen to twenty-three, he spent here: the four years
of college,--a fifth year which he wisely, though unusually,
added to his course, for the perfecting of his classical and
general studies,--and the three years of his studies in the
Law School. At the Law School his attainments were not only
great, but wonderful; and for purity of character, kindness,
and frankness, he was respected and beloved by all. He was the
friend, young as he was, the beloved friend, the frequent and
honored guest of Story, of Channing, and of Allston. He was the
companion of your Longfellow and your Felton. No young man was
more honored by Mr. Webster--in I had almost said his better
days. He was the friend of every man and of every cause that
deserved to have a friend. At the bar he distinguished himself,
especially in juridical literature. He was the reporter of
Judge Story’s decisions, and editor of the _Jurist_, where the
young student will find the copious results of his enthusiastic
labors in his then beloved profession. When he went abroad,
he took nothing in his hand that his own merits had not given
him. He had not one claim that did not rest on character,
learning, and talents. Still under the age of thirty, he became
in Europe the honored friend of men whose names have honored
the world. Turning his back upon the attractions of dissipation
and fashion, he devoted himself to the society of the learned,
the wise, the philanthropic, and to all great and good objects.
Thomas Carlyle, in a letter to America, says, “We have had
_popular Sumner_ here,”--so universally was he liked. In Paris,
while the Northeastern Boundary question was agitating England
and America, and attracting much of the attention of Europe,
Sumner shut himself into the libraries and public archives, and
produced a treatise upon the subject, thought then to be almost
exhausted, which, published in the great journals of Europe,
and brought before Parliaments and Councils, changed the
aspect of the question in Europe, and redounded to his great
honor at home.

“After his return, under the influence of Dr. Channing, and
in sympathy with Dr. Howe and others, he devoted much of his
time to the great philanthropic and social problems of the
day,--Slavery, Pauperism, Crime, and Prison Discipline,--and
gradually the overshadowing social, political, and national
importance of the Slave question drew him first before the
people and into public life. When his sentiments on the Slave
question were to be sustained at the risk of his ease, his
interests, his friendships, and his popularity, he put them all
to the hazard. When proposed as candidate for the Senate, the
highest office Massachusetts can give, while his election hung
trembling in the balance week after week, when one or two votes
would secure it, and this or that thing said or done it was
thought would gain them, nothing would induce Charles Sumner
to take one step from his regular course from his house to his
office to speak to any man; he would not make one bow the more,
nor put his hand to a line, however simple or unobjectionable,
to secure the result. I know--I have right to say this--I know
that in this course he resisted temptations and advice and
persuasions which few men would not have yielded to. He was
elected. It was a tribute to character and talent.

“When he went to Washington, to fight almost alone, with only
two or three allies, discountenanced by colleagues and cried
down by the great majority, to fight the fight for Freedom, he
determined not to speak on the subject of Slavery until he had
done all in his power to secure the confidence and good-will
of his opponents. So far did he carry this, that his friends
here feared that he was bending before the idol, as others had
bent. He secured his footing as well as it could be secured.
All but fanatics for Slavery admitted his claims to personal
affection and public respect. On this basis he took his stand
for Freedom. You have seen the result. Few men in America have
ever had, perhaps no one man now has, so many readers as he.
His opponents say that he burns the midnight lamp. He does. And

‘How far that little candle throws his beams!’

His opponents, too, burn the midnight lamp; but, as you
remember, Sir, the great Athenian said, there is a difference
between the objects on which their lamp throws its glare and
his.”

Among the meetings, that of Concord deserves mention. The resolutions, introduced by Hon. E. Rockwood Hoar, were as follows.

“_Resolved_, That we have heard with feelings of the deepest
indignation of the cowardly and brutal assault upon a Senator
of Massachusetts, in the Senate Chamber of the United States,
for words spoken in debate, in his place, upon the floor of the
Senate.

“_Resolved_, That this dastardly outrage has in itself
dishonored no one but the ruffian who committed it,--but
that the Senate and House of Representatives of the United
States will make themselves accomplices of the criminal, and
deliberate partakers of the guilt and infamy of the crime, if
they shall fail to visit upon him speedy and condign punishment.

“_Resolved_, That, if there are those who imagine that the
voice of a Senator of Massachusetts can be silenced, or the
expression of the deliberate opinions of her people upon public
measures and public men can be stifled and suppressed, _by the
terrors of assassination_, we _know_ that in CHARLES SUMNER
they have mistaken _the man_, and we will endeavor to show that
they have mistaken the Commonwealth.

“_Resolved_, That, in this assault upon our distinguished
Senator, the right of free debate in Congress, guarantied by
the Constitution of the United States, has been dangerously
assailed; and all men who are not willing to see it wholly
destroyed are called upon, personally, to rebuke the outrage,
and all its abettors, defenders, and apologists.

“_Resolved_, That we thank Mr. Sumner with our whole hearts
for his heroic defence of the Kansas settlers, and his solemn
arraignment before the country of the perpetrators of the great
_Crime_ against that unhappy and conquered province.

“_Resolved_, That we have a right to look to the House of
Representatives to vindicate the honor of the country in the
eyes of the civilized world, by expelling from their body a
member with whom none but bullies and savages can hereafter
fitly associate.”

These were followed by a speech from Ralph Waldo Emerson, of which this is an extract.

“The outrage is the more shocking from the singularly pure
character of its victim. Mr. Sumner’s position is exceptional
in its honor. He had not taken his degrees in the caucus and
in hack politics. It is notorious, that, in the long time when
his election was pending, he refused to take a single step to
secure it. He would not so much as go up to the State House
to shake hands with this or that person whose good-will was
reckoned important by his friends. He was elected. It was a
homage to character and talent. In Congress he did not rush
into a party position. He sat long silent and studious. His
friends, I remember, were told that they would find Sumner a
man of the world, like the rest: ‘’Tis quite impossible to
be at Washington and not bend; he will bend, as the rest have
done.’ Well, he did not bend. He took his position, and kept
it. He meekly bore the cold shoulder from some of his New
England colleagues, the hatred of his enemies, the pity of the
indifferent, cheered by the love and respect of good men with
whom he acted, and has stood for the North, a little in advance
of all the North, and therefore without adequate support. He
has never faltered in his maintenance of justice and freedom.
He has gone beyond the large expectation of his friends in his
increasing ability and his manlier tone.

“I have heard that some of his political friends tax him with
indolence or negligence in refusing to make electioneering
speeches, or otherwise to bear his part in the labor which
party organization requires. I say it to his honor. But more to
his honor are the faults which his enemies lay to his charge. I
think, Sir, if Mr. Sumner had any vices, we should be likely to
hear of them. They have fastened their eyes like microscopes,
now for five years, on every act, word, manner, and movement,
to find a flaw,--and with what result? His opponents accuse
him neither of drunkenness, nor debauchery, nor job, nor
peculation, nor rapacity, nor personal aims of any kind. No:
but with what? Why, beyond this charge, which it is impossible
was ever sincerely made, that he broke over the proprieties of
debate, I find him accused of publishing his opinion of the
Nebraska conspiracy in a letter to the People of the United
States, with discourtesy. Then, that he is an Abolitionist:
as if every sane human being were not an Abolitionist, or a
believer that all men should be free. And the third crime he
stands charged with is, that his speeches were written before
they were spoken: which of course must be true in Sumner’s
case,--as it was true of Webster, of Adams, of Calhoun, of
Burke, of Chatham, of Demosthenes, of every first-rate speaker
that ever lived. It is the high compliment he pays to the
intelligence of the Senate and of the country. When the same
reproach was cast upon the first orator of ancient times by
some caviller of his day, he said, ‘I should be ashamed to come
with one unconsidered word before such an assembly.’

“Mr. Chairman, when I think of these most small faults as the
worst which party hatred could allege, I think I may borrow the
language which Bishop Burnet applied to Sir Isaac Newton, and
say, that Charles Sumner ‘has the whitest soul I ever knew.’

“Well, Sir, this noble head, so comely and so wise, must be the
target for a pair of bullies to beat with clubs! The murderer’s
brand shall stamp their foreheads, wherever they may wander
in the earth. But I wish, Sir, that the high respects of this
meeting shall be expressed to Mr. Sumner, that a copy of the
resolutions that have been read may be forwarded to him. I
wish that he may know the shudder of terror that ran through
all this community on the first tidings of this brutal attack.
Let him hear that every man of worth in New England loves his
virtues,--that every mother thinks of him as the protector of
families,--that every friend of Freedom thinks him the friend
of Freedom. And if our arms at this distance cannot defend him
from assassins, we confide the defence of a life so precious to
all honorable men and true patriots, and to the Almighty Maker
of men.”