Chapter X: Part 10

“The opinion embodied in the writing which I am about to
analyze, and which is a mixture of sympathetic words and
of severe counsels for France, is not that of one or many
assemblies, of one or many popular meetings, of one group
or of many groups of journals; it is that of one man. But
this man is one of the most distinguished citizens of his
country; he has exercised a supreme influence in the events
of which the great Republic has been the theatre since the
moment when, in 1861, the South declared that it broke the
Union, and at the mouth of the cannon seized Fort Sumter,
situated in the harbor of Charleston. Mr. Charles Sumner
has not figured on the battle-field; he was elsewhere, in
the Senate of the United States, from which place, it can
be said, he was the political director of the conflict.…
But the thought of extirpating Slavery, of obliging the
Slave States to modify their internal system so as to
render impossible the reëstablishment of servitude under
another name, the idea of assimilating by law the black
and mulatto with the white,--assimilation to which until
then their habits were as repugnant as their laws,--these
have belonged to Mr. Charles Sumner more than to any other
person, and were the basis of a plan which has triumphed by
the indomitable will and the ever-ready eloquence of this
statesman. It can therefore be said of Mr. Charles Sumner,
that he is in himself a public opinion.”[201]

CORRESPONDENCE.

As after the speech on the Barbarism of Slavery, so now,
letters came with volunteer testimony. Beyond their interest as
tokens of strong and wide-spread sympathy with Mr. Sumner, they
have historic value as illustrations of the intense Antislavery
sentiment destined so soon to triumph. Sometimes they are
directly responsive to the press, especially in the severity
of its criticism on the speech. Here, as before, Abolitionists
took the lead.

Wendell Phillips thus earnestly placed himself by the side of
his friend:--

“I both thank and congratulate you most heartily on your
great speech, for some reasons the _boldest_ even you ever
made,--the first statesmanlike word worthy of the hour
from any one in a high civil position,--fit response from
Statesmanship to War,--showing the people the reasons and
purpose of Fremont’s proclamation, and giving it more
breadth and a nobler basis.

“All agree it was a most decided success,--taking the
Convention wholly off its feet with enthusiasm; and we
absent ones may measure the strength of the blow from the
rebound,--witness _Post_, _Courier_, _Journal_, and, basest
of all, _Advertiser_, of course.…

“Never fear but that the masses, the hearts, are all with
you,--and you’ll see your enemies at your footstool, as you
so often have already.”

And in another letter:--

“I could not take the hazard of advising you to make it,
though I told you in your circumstances I should; but now
you’ve done it, I can say it was _wise_ and _well_,--your
duty to the country, to the hour, yourself, the slave,--to
your fame as a statesman, and your duty as leader.”

Lewis Tappan, the Abolitionist, wrote from New York:--

“‘Union and Peace,--how they shall be restored.’ You have
shown the way, and the only way. We may have peace on other
terms, but no union _and_ peace. The Free States must
choose between peace, temporary peace, renewed war, and
peace founded upon righteousness, justice, and equity.”

Hon. Amasa Walker, the able writer on Political Economy,
afterwards Representative in Congress, wrote from North
Brookfield:--

“You never made a nobler, braver, or more opportune
utterance than at Worcester on the first instant. But
all Hunkerdom is down upon you for it, as I expected. No
matter,--the people, I trust in God, will sustain you. Your
words meet a most hearty response in the hearts of all
true men, you may rest assured. If your positions are not
sustained by the country, the great contest now going on
will end in failure, and ought to end so.”

David Lee Child, the sincere and lifelong Abolitionist, once a
journalist and lawyer, and always a writer, wrote for himself
and his wife from Wayland, Massachusetts:--

“I was, and my wife was, refreshed and strengthened by your
voice from Worcester. When you gave us the ‘Barbarism of
Slavery,’ the grandest, the most comprehensive, complete,
compact, and conclusive of all your noble utterances
against ‘the sum of all villanies,’ I did not write,
though never before so much moved to do so. We read it
the night that it reached us, and were so exalted by it
that we sat up two hours beyond our time, talking about
it and rejoicing over it. The foes of justice and freedom
accuse you of accelerating the crisis and precipitating
civil war by that speech. I think they are right for once.
The revived victim of frustrate assassins, the calm and
undaunted bearing, the inflexible purpose, the overwhelming
force of facts, argument, and illustration, struck more
terror to the soul of Richard than could the substance of
ten thousand soldiers armed in proof.

“I fully intended to address you as soon as the overflow
of my heart became somewhat proportionate to the capacity
of the pen, and to repeat that quotation from Tully which
Junius aptly uses, though less aptly than it applied then:
‘Quod si quis existimat me aut voluntate esse mutata,
aut debilitata virtute, aut _animo_ fracto, vehementer
errat.’[202] But my dear wife wrote you our joint offering
of admiration and gratitude better than I could do it for
myself.”

Hon. S. E. Sewall, the able lawyer and devoted Abolitionist,
whose sympathy with Mr. Sumner had been constant, wrote from
Boston:--

“As I have not time to call on you just now, I cannot
forbear writing, merely to say how delighted I am with
your speech at Worcester. I see it has roused a good deal
of howling among our wretched editors. But this does not
convince me that your position is wrong, or that it will
not be sustained by the country. Almost every one whom I
see thinks as I do about your speech, and regards it as
eloquent, statesmanlike, and timely. I trust Congress will
think as you do, and act accordingly.”

George Livermore, who so often wrote to Mr. Sumner with entire
sympathy, and soon afterwards contributed an invaluable service
to the African race,[203] expressed his present anxiety.

“I did hope that in this terrible day of our country’s
trial there would be found sufficient patriotism with those
sent to Worcester to cast aside _all party_ considerations
and all disturbing differences, and unite, _before it is
too late_, in trying to save the Government and the Union.…
I trembled when I heard that you had been invited to speak,
and I wept when I read your speech.

“Unless there is a united North, united on the basis of the
Constitution as it is, we are doomed to defeat.”

Hon. Joshua R. Giddings, at the time Consul General at
Montreal, wrote from that city:--

“Thanks for your speech at Worcester. I want you to place
the same question before the Senate.”

Hon. Carl Schurz, at the time Envoy Extraordinary and Minister
Plenipotentiary in Spain, wrote from Madrid:--

“First let me thank you for the glorious speech you have
delivered before the Massachusetts Convention. I agree with
you on every point, and expect shortly to fight by your
side.”

William S. Thayer, a writer of admirable sense, and Consul
General at Alexandria in Egypt, wrote:--

“Well, after all, your Cassandra-like prophecies as to the
course of public affairs have come true to the letter. Time
will show whether your declaration at the Massachusetts
Convention, that without Emancipation our war will be a
vain masquerade of battles, will not also be realized.
At this distance from home I do not feel qualified to
dogmatize; but we do not appear as yet to have struck our
opponents in a vital part.”

Hon. Montgomery Blair, Postmaster General, wrote from
Washington:--

“Your speech is noble, beautiful, classical, sensible. I
would have timed it differently; but I will take it now,
rather than lose it.”

Hon. Hiram Barney, Collector of New York, wrote:--

“I was gratified with it. You indicate the proper course
for the Government to take in this war with Slavery. It is
the real Rebel, and Providence has brought us at length
into direct conflict with it. We can destroy it without
violating any right. Now is our opportunity, and I pray
God we may have the wisdom and the intrepidity to end the
war humanely and economically by the speedy destruction of
the enemy, Slavery. Peace by Emancipation is accomplishing
a good end by good means. How easily will the President
make his administration the most eventful and glorious in
American history!”

Hon. Thomas Dawes Eliot, Representative in Congress, pure in
life, and always against Slavery, wrote from New Bedford:--

“If the party who have the responsible conduct of our war
do not avail themselves of the power which the Law of
Nations gives to them, whereby to strengthen themselves and
defeat the Rebels, we shall find the party opposed to them
will advocate Emancipation as a party issue. And when the
time comes, as it must, that the South shall realize their
own inevitable defeat, and shall see the alternative of
submission or Emancipation, they will themselves initiate
Freedom and secure Europe, unless before them we shall have
acted.”

Hon. E. G. Spaulding, the eminent Representative in Congress,
and a leading member of the Committee of Ways and Means, wrote
from Buffalo:--

“Our people are earnestly discussing the subject of
Immediate Emancipation, and I desire to see the views of
one who has so thoroughly considered this question. Nearly
all our people have come to the conclusion, that, whenever
it is necessary to crush out the Rebellion to abolish
Slavery, then the Government must abolish it.”

Hon. Robert C. Pitman, afterwards of the Superior Court of
Massachusetts, wrote from New Bedford:--

“Permit me to thank you cordially for the service rendered
by you to our cause, on Tuesday, at Worcester. Ideas must
reinforce our arms, or we shall neither deserve nor win a
victory.”

Epes Sargent, journalist, another and early friend, wrote from
Boston:--

“I do not think you can be more than two months in advance
of the public sentiment of the North, in your speech. I
read it with great satisfaction, and it was not till I
got down town among the politicians that I realized what
imprudent things you had been saying.”

Hon. Daniel W. Alvord, who had coöperated with Mr. Sumner
before, wrote from Greenfield, Massachusetts:--

“I thank you for the right word uttered at the right time
in your Worcester speech. I should not deem it necessary
to say this, as you could hardly fail to know that such
a speech would meet my hearty approbation, but for the
attacks made upon you by the _Springfield Republican_. Be
assured that the _Republican_ by no means reflects the
feelings or the opinions of the people of the western
counties. The thorough, hearty Republicans, who in the
northwest, if not in the southwest, constitute a great
majority, cordially indorse the reasoning and positions of
the speech.”

Hon. John D. Baldwin, journalist, afterwards Representative
in Congress, and author of the work entitled “Pre-Historic
Nations,” wrote from Worcester:--

“What a wave of Hunkerism has flooded Massachusetts since
the State Convention, reaching up to the ceiling of nearly
every editorial sanctum! But the ebb-tide must come.”

Hon. James H. Morton, the magistrate, wrote from Springfield,
Massachusetts:--

“I cannot refrain from expressing the satisfaction and
pleasure I derived from the perusal of your Worcester
speech. In my opinion it expressed the sentiment of a very
large majority of the citizens of Massachusetts, and though
in advance of the sentiment of the whole country, still, if
I can read the signs of the times, our Government, if it
has not already reached, is fast approaching, the doctrines
there enunciated by you. It seems to me they must be
adopted in their length and breadth.”

A writer, admired as “Gail Hamilton,” wrote from Hamilton,
Massachusetts:--

“I glory in that speech. It is logic, and sagacity, and
morality. Let them maul it. To that complexion must they
come at last, and perhaps before. Strange that people will
have so much faith in shilly-shally! Strange they will not
see that honesty is the best policy, as well as the best
religion! But never mind. Do you lead the van.”

Rev. John Weiss, the eloquent preacher, and biographer of
Theodore Parker, wrote from Milton:--

“I am surprised and disappointed at the temper shown by
the Republicans. Before the Worcester Convention I was
ready to declare that the people were only waiting to
have the word Emancipation strongly pronounced to repeat
it with the aggrandizement of a hundred thousand votes. I
am deeply pained to see how the newspapers receive your
declarations. They thinly veil a spirit which is ready at
the first opportunity to forget the Past, and to sacrifice
its living representatives,--the men who alone preserve the
glorious Antislavery idea, and whose prophecies can alone
secure the Future.… ‘Cry aloud, and spare not.’ Reiterate
more flatly and unsparingly, that the war must destroy the
evil which engendered it. Give the bullets their billet,
and the bayonets something to think about, and lend them
a manifesto of Freedom to punctuate. What a Congress will
next winter’s be! Compromise will seek to make War its
missionary.”

Orestes A. Brownson, Catholic thinker and writer, wrote from
Elizabeth, New Jersey:--

“I have re-read your speech at Worcester, and I’m even
better pleased with it than I was at the first reading.
You have struck the right chord, as the manner in which my
own article has been received sufficiently indicates. Our
venerable President and his rhetorical adviser, whatever
their timidity, or their reluctance, or attachment to the
‘Rule of Three,’ must come to the policy you recommend.
It is clear to me that it is impossible to save both the
integrity of the Nation and Southern Slavery, and the great
question before us now is, whether we shall sacrifice the
Nation to Slavery, or Slavery to the Nation. This is the
issue before the people, and this issue we must meet.”

Rev. R. S. Storrs, the eminent Congregational divine, wrote
from Braintree, Massachusetts:--

“Your admirable speech before the Worcester Convention
ought to have been sooner acknowledged, with the fervent
gratitude of my heart, to Heaven and you, for its delivery.
The spirit that condemns its argument or author is either
the spirit of blind infatuation, or of treachery as foul as
marks the Southern Confederates themselves. It surprises
and grieves me that _Republicans_ wince and scold at the
_just_ lashing given to the grand conspirator against
Liberty and Religion,--for in this contest they are
identical. The timeserving policy of multitudes who have
hitherto acted with us, and, as it seems to me, of the
Administration itself, is revolting, and puts far away the
day of peace and prosperity.”

Rev. Francis LeBaron, afterwards of Ohio, earnest against
Slavery, wrote from Dighton, Massachusetts:--

“Let me take this opportunity to thank you most heartily
for your Worcester speech, and for your Boston lecture.
Such noble words dwarf other men’s actions, and make me
glad that the feeling of hero-worship is still strong at my
heart. I can see honor and victory and glory and permanence
on no other path than that by which you would lead the
nation. If you will touch men’s hearts so nobly, you must
not be surprised that they leap toward you; and when men
move my deepest respect and admiration, I must tell them
so.”

Rev. Moncure D. Conway, the Reformer, so admirable with his
pen, wrote from Cincinnati:--

“Allow me to thank you for the exquisite presentation of
the law and the truth in your Worcester speech, which I
read in the _Tribune_, to the million of readers guarantied
it there, and the million others by the Boston press. I
shall secure a large circulation in this city’s press. It
is a perfect code for the hour.”

Rev. Rufus P. Stebbins, who sympathized so strongly with the
speech on the Barbarism of Slavery, wrote now from Woburn,
Massachusetts:--

“Accept a ‘thousand thanks’ for your speech at Worcester.
It was a calm, solid, irresistible word. Adoption or no
adoption by that Convention was of little consequence.
Perhaps _delay_ by _such_ bodies is wise; but _the people
are coming_, and the hour is at hand.”

Rev. Elnathan Davis, the friend of Peace, wrote from
Fitchburg:--

“That the position taken in your speech is true I believe
the judgment of Massachusetts and the country bears full
testimony to-day; and that it is taken in due season I
think the very _howl_ of a Hunker political press clearly
testifies. God give you strength for _this_ battle, and,
amidst the shifting experiences of the Government, and
above ‘the confused noise of the warrior,’ make your
word ‘_On to Freedom_’ clearly and widely heard by our
countrymen.”

Rev. Moses Thacher, the venerable clergyman, formerly of
Massachusetts, wrote from Fort Covington, New York:--

“_God bless you!_ Your Worcester speech of the 1st inst.
is invaluable. It states the _cause_, the _issue_, and the
_remedy_ of the war.”

Rev. W. H. Cudworth, chaplain in the army, in a letter from
Hooker’s Brigade, Camp Union, wrote:--

“If I bore you, pardon me,--but, sympathizing most heartily
in your uncompromising hostility to Slavery, and yet placed
by the laws in an embarrassing, if not helpless position,
what can I do, in the way of preventing the rendition of
fugitives? For instance, one was hidden in our regimental
barn. I knew and encouraged it, intending to trot him
off, if a favorable chance offered. The owner came, but
could not accomplish anything. He came next day with a
United States warrant and the Provost Marshal. It wrung my
heart, but what could I do?… Meantime let me thank you, as
a servant of God and in the name of my brother man, for
your Worcester speech, which I have just read, for your
magnificent broadside called the ‘Barbarism of Slavery,’
and for all your efforts to break every yoke and let the
oppressed go free.”

Hon. Charles W. Slack, connected with the press, and always
Antislavery Republican, wrote from Boston:--

“Whether speaking for others or myself individually, I only
express a general acknowledgment among all Liberty-loving
men, when I say that to you preëminently is assigned the
responsible, yet honorable, task of indicating the advance
of public sentiment upon the living, overtopping, gigantic
question of the day. I thank God daily that we have so
earnest, steadfast, and persistent an exponent in the
Senate Chamber. May you, then, be delivered and preserved
from all harm for even greater achievements!”

John P. Jewett, bookseller, original publisher of _Uncle Tom’s
Cabin_, wrote from Boston:--

“I am more than provoked with the unmitigated flunkeyism of
the Boston ---- and ---- in their criticisms of your manly
and excellent speech at Worcester. Posterity will do you
justice, even if the sneaking toadyism of the day refuse
it to you. I cannot refrain from writing you a word of
sympathy, although perhaps you do not feel the need of it.
Rest assured, my noble friend, that God and all truly great
and good men are with you, therefore you have nothing to
fear from the malice of cowardly time-servers.”

William Kenrick, the horticulturist, wrote from Newton,
Massachusetts:--

“I must thank you for your most timely, outspoken speech
at the Convention at Worcester. It exactly meets my
views,--the views I have long entertained. Yes, here are
our natural allies, amongst the slaves.”

Frank B. Sanborn, most earnest where Freedom is in question,
wrote from Concord:--

“I have to-day read for the second time your speech before
the Worcester Convention, and I am renewedly glad that
you made it then and there. I am sure that every passing
day will but strengthen its positions, and that they must
soon be accepted by the whole Northern people. Indeed, I
believe that the people are of that mind now; it is the
politicians, and those most timid of all created things,
the Republican partisan leaders, who shiver at the thought
of raising a _real_ issue to displace their shams.…
Happily, no great principle like this rests on the turn
of a period or the position of a comma; and if Boston
scribblers could show that Marius did not know a slave from
a barrel of salt-fish, they would not weaken the argument
of your speech.”

Hon. Adin Thayer, a strong Republican, wrote from Worcester:--

“I cannot refrain from expressing to you, even at this late
day, my hearty thanks for your brave, earnest speech at the
State Convention. Be assured that neither you nor the great
truths you advocate will be at all harmed by the malignant
attacks of the Hunker press.”

Rev. William Tyler wrote from Pawtucket:--

“Republicans self-styled Conservative do not like your
Worcester speech; and yet I meet with some such who admit
that the liberation of the slaves of the Rebels must yet
be a war policy,--only that the time has not come for its
adoption. Well, some must be pioneers, and others will
follow at a carefully considered distance: editors and
office-seekers will be farthest in the rear. I was not
so much surprised at the dissent in yesterday’s _Boston
Journal_ as at the character of the assault on your speech
and on you.”

Hollis Loring, a good Republican, wrote from Marlborough,
Massachusetts:--

“Some of our public journals seem disposed to criticize
your speech at Worcester on Tuesday, as not reflecting
the sentiments of your State. For one, I will say that I
listened to your speech with much pleasure. I believe you
take the only correct view of the subject; and I know you
reflect the sentiment of a large majority of the people in
this town. Even some of the most Proslavery Democrats of
the past are fully up to your ground to-day.”

James Means, a teacher, always against Slavery, wrote from
Auburndale, Massachusetts:--

“I have read with great interest and pleasure your speech
at the late Convention in Worcester. And as it has called
forth unfriendly criticism, I cannot forbear to express to
you my cordial thanks for it.”

Dr. Luther B. Morse, a physician and Republican, wrote from
Lowell:--

“I thank you for those manly, true, and earnest words,
which it would be well for our country--Government and
people--to consider. They involve principles of political
economy of unequalled importance to our country, especially
in its present condition.”

William W. Thayer, an earnest Republican, wrote from Boston:--

“All honor, then, to the man who _dares_ to risk his
reputation in representing the Emancipation sentiment
of the country! All honor to you, Sir, for taking the
leadership of the Emancipationists, who will sooner or
later be called upon to march to the ballot-box and there
fight Freedom’s battles!… For one, I am glad that you ‘have
dragged the eternal Slavery Question’ into politics again,
and I feel so glad that I had to write and tell you so.”

Josiah H. Carter, a Boston constituent, wrote:--

“Allow me to congratulate you on the position you took in
your speech delivered at Worcester on the first instant.
You have now struck the _key-note_. I honor you for it.
May the time soon come, when our military, judicial, and
executive heads may take their tone from that key! Then,
and not till then, can we begin to subdue Rebellion and put
a stop to this bloodshed and enormous expenditure.”

Dr. Dio Lewis wrote from Boston:--

“I am more gratified than I can express for your wise,
noble, patriotic speech at Worcester.”

Thomas Gaffield, an excellent business man and alderman, wrote
from Boston:--

“As you have had, and will have much more, opposition on
the part of some newspapers and some men, I have felt it my
duty, although only a humble constituent, to give my word
of comfort and good cheer, though I doubt not you foresaw
all which has followed, and find your comfort in the sense
of duty well and fearlessly done. I have no doubt that your
speech is prophetic, and of events and ideas not very far
in the future.”

Dr. Henry A. Hartt wrote from New York:--

“I am greatly pleased with your speech at Worcester, and it
seemed to me a fitting key-note to a general appeal to the
masses.”

J. W. Alden, an early Abolitionist, wrote from New York:--

“Cheered and encouraged by your noble speech at Worcester
yesterday, which causes a thrill of joy to run through
the hearts of the friends of Emancipation in this city,
warned by the action of the President in regard to General
Fremont’s proclamation, and seeing a disposition in various
quarters to put down Rebellion without wiping out its
cause, we have come to the conclusion that there is no time
to be lost in organizing our committees and inaugurating a
movement in the direction indicated above.”

J. P. Lesley, the eminent geologist, wrote from Philadelphia:--

“Why can’t the golden chance be clutched to say to the
whole South, ‘Good!--you rebel,--you are no longer
slaveholders, nor can you ever be again.’ How it would
ring round the world, and transcendently through Heaven!
One would think that Abraham Lincoln would be fired at the
thought of the unrivalled fame that would succeed the act.
Has he not thought of immortality? Or does he wait for
Congress to take away the glory from him, or an accident to
take away the opportunity?”

Lyman S. Hapgood, paymaster in the army, and a good Republican,
wrote from Washington:--

“I have just been reading your speech which was made to
the Massachusetts Republicans, at their State Convention,
on the first instant; and the policy therein so fully
declared, which, in your opinion, it is the duty of the
National Government to pursue, agrees so completely with
my own views of our country’s difficulties, and her only
way of permanent and successful escape, that I could not
refrain from expressing to you my gratitude, as a citizen
of the good old Commonwealth, that she has one son, at
least, who, regardless of all personal misrepresentations
from political enemies or professed friends, has the moral
courage to stand up, upon all occasions and under all
circumstances, and proclaim what he sincerely believes to
be the true and just policy for the Government to adopt.”

A. B. Johnson, of the Treasury Department, wrote from
Washington:--

“I thank you from my heart for that noble speech at
Worcester. That trumpet gave forth no uncertain sound.
Hints have come up from the West, and intimations, vague,
undetermined, from the East, before; but it has been left
for you to define, announce, and defend a logical policy,
and you have accomplished your task.”

H. Catlin, editor of the _True American_, wrote from Erie,
Pennsylvania:--

“How lamentable that we should make Human Slavery the one
sacred thing under the heavens! Everything else must give
way,--every other property may be confiscated, every other
right suspended,--but _Slavery_ cannot be touched! Our
Proslavery education is costing a great deal,--it threatens
to cost us our country! Thanks that Senator Sumner so fully
appreciates the real issue of the hour, and that, _though a
Senator_, he proclaims it manfully and boldly! The masses
of the people are with you.”

A. T. Goodman wrote from Cleveland:--

“Your speech of October 1st is before me, and I have read
and read it through and through again, no less than three
times. There is something about your speeches that has
endeared your name to me, and something in their tone and
in their teachings that tells me they are right in their
meaning, and right in every point, and are very true.”

Thus, from correspondence, as also from the press, it appears
that Mr. Sumner was not alone. Others were glowing in the
same cause, and their number increased daily. But the great
salvation was postponed. Almost a full year was allowed to
elapse before the Proclamation of Emancipation. And what a
year, whether for those in the tented field and Rebel prisons,
or those others waiting, longing, struggling for Union and
Peace through Liberty! Nobody could espouse such a cause, and
feel that its triumph was essential to save the country from
prolonged bloodshed, without effort and anxiety corresponding
in some measure to the transcendent interests involved.

From this time forward Mr. Sumner never missed an opportunity
of urging Emancipation, whether in addresses before the
people and in the Senate, or in direct personal appeal to the
President. In the last he was constant, rarely seeing the
President without in some way presenting the all-absorbing
question. These volumes will show the continuity of his public
efforts.

THE REBELLION: ITS ORIGIN AND MAINSPRING.

ORATION, UNDER THE AUSPICES OF THE YOUNG MEN’S REPUBLICAN UNION OF NEW YORK, AT COOPER INSTITUTE, NOVEMBER 27, 1861. WITH APPENDIX.

_Cassius._ Some to the common pulpits, and cry out,
_Liberty, Freedom, and Enfranchisement!_

SHAKESPEARE, _Julius Cæsar_, Act III. Scene 1.

The natural strength of the country, in point of numbers,
appears to me to consist _much more in the blacks than in
the whites_. Could they be incorporated and employed for
its defence, it would afford you double security. That they
would make good soldiers I have not the least doubt; and I am
persuaded the State has it not in its power to give sufficient
reinforcements, without incorporating them, either to secure
the country, if the enemy mean to act vigorously upon an
offensive plan, or furnish a force sufficient to dispossess
them of Charleston, should it be defensive.--MAJOR-GENERAL
NATHANIEL GREENE, _Letter to Governor Rutledge of South
Carolina_. Life and Correspondence, by William Johnson, Vol.
II. p. 274.

* * * * *

The assemblage before which this oration was delivered was
remarkable in numbers and in character.[204] Long before
the hour for the meeting, the immense hall was crowded; and
notwithstanding the stormy evening, the proportion of ladies
present was larger than ever before seen in New York on such an
occasion.

Upon the platform were seated many distinguished citizens,
among whom may be named Hon. William Pennington, ex-Governor
of New Jersey and ex-Speaker of the House of Representatives,
Hon. Schuyler Colfax of Indiana, Hon. Lot M. Morrill of Maine,
Charles King, LL. D., President of Columbia College, Professor
Francis Lieber, David Dudley Field, Esq., William M. Evarts,
Esq., John Jay, Esq., Rev. Stephen H. Tyng, D. D., Rev. William
Hague, D. D., Rev. George B. Cheever, D. D., Rev. Theodore L.
Cuyler, Rev. Alfred Cookman, John H. Griscom, M. D., Hon. John
W. Edmonds, General Prosper M. Wetmore, Lewis Tappan, Esq.,
Rev. William Goodell, Hon. Charles A. Peabody, Rev. Roswell D.
Hitchcock, D. D., Rev. Henry M. Field, Hon. Thomas B. Stillman,
Hon. Benjamin F. Manierré, R. M. Blatchford, Esq., William
Pitt Palmer, Esq., D. A. Harsha, Esq., George P. Putnam, Esq.,
Elliot C. Cowdin, Esq., Hon. William B. Taylor, Postmaster of
New York, Hon. Rufus F. Andrews, Surveyor of the Port, Hon. H.
B. Stanton, Deputy Collector, Hon. Joseph Hoxie, Major A. A.
Selover, U. S. Army, Oliver Johnson, Esq.

Charles T. Rodgers, Esq., President of the “Union,” introduced
William Curtis Noyes, Esq., as presiding officer of the
meeting, and a list of Vice-Presidents and Secretaries was
unanimously adopted.

Mr. Noyes, upon taking the chair, delivered the following
address.

“LADIES AND GENTLEMEN:--Thanking you, as I do, gratefully,
for the kindness which has called me to preside over this
meeting, let me remind you that within the modest chapel
which impresses with devotional emotions every visitor to
Mount Auburn, that most beautiful of American cemeteries,
stands a marble statue of one of the patriot leaders of the
American Revolution. Its simple dignity arrests attention
and commands admiration and respect. Stern resolve and
unflinching courage are depicted in lineament and attitude.
We see him voluntarily renouncing a high professional
office under the crown to take his place in the forum as
a private citizen, to oppose, without reward, the odious
violations of the liberties of the people by means of
Writs of Assistance. His exordium startles the prejudiced
judges:--

“‘Let the consequences be what they will, I am
determined to proceed. The only principles of public
conduct that are worthy of a gentleman or a man are to
sacrifice estate, ease, health, and applause, and even
life, to the sacred calls of country. These principles,
in private life, make the good citizen,--in public
life, the patriot and the hero.’

“Then, rising with the progress of his great theme, he
continues:--

“‘Every man in a state of Nature is an independent
sovereign, subject to no law but the law written upon
his heart and revealed to him by his Maker. His right
to his life, his liberty, and his property no created
being can rightfully contest; these rights are inherent
and inalienable.’

“We watch the effect of his indignant words. They convince
and awe, and yet the royal tribunal dare not decide. It
prevaricates and postpones; but the victory is won, the
odious measure is abandoned forever, and the orator’s
utterances have lighted up a flame which Independence alone
can ever quench.

“We go with him from this first theatre of triumph, through
many long years of toil and anxiety in shaping the measures
which led to the great conflict with the mother country,
to the General Court guided by his skill and political
sagacity, to the popular assembly alike aroused to
turbulence and hushed to repose by his burning eloquence.
We see him hurling defiance at the minions of power who
with secret malevolence assailed his reputation. We witness
their malignant hatred, and their deadly assault upon his
person, when alone and unarmed. We see him fall, covered
with wounds, and carried bleeding to his home.

“Thenceforward, to the actual opening of the Revolutionary
drama, and during its progress, this act of regal barbarism
obscured, but did not wholly extinguish, the light of the
great intellect which it sought to destroy; but all that
remained was a wreck, reminding only of the glories of the
past. The crime against the person added to its atrocity a
greater crime against the soul, dooming it to pursue its
earthly career in sadness and gloom. Conscious of being
only a monument of decay, well might the gradually expiring
patriot wish, that, when God, in his righteous Providence,
should call him from time into eternity, it might be by
a flash of lightning. We may rejoice that his prayer was
answered, and that, too noble to be permitted to die a
common death, in a manner equally affecting and sublime,
JAMES OTIS [_applause_] was removed to the mansions of
eternal felicity.

“It is the necessary result of barbarism, in all its
phases, to furnish historic parallels by reproducing itself
in viler forms. Not a century elapsed, and a similar
atrocity is enacted in the Senate Chamber of the United
States. The ruffians were actuated by as deadly a hate,
their malice was as foul and murderous, their defiance of
law was as manifest, their victim was also the friend and
advocate of universal freedom, and as much distinguished
and feared, and he also fell beneath the blows of
assassins in heart and conduct.

“But here the parallel ends. This outrage did not impair
the intellect which it sought to destroy; that survived the
trial, enlarged, strengthened, purified, to set forward in
a new and more glorious career in the cause of Freedom and
Humanity. Instead of the lightning’s flash to remove it to
heaven, a divine influence, equal in potency, has emanated
thence, inspiring it with a larger love of freedom, more
zeal in the cause of the oppressed, and a more earnest
conviction that human slavery produces only evil, and that
it should be forever eradicated. [_Enthusiastic applause._]

“Happy, then, for us, and for our country, has been the
suffering of these martyrs in the cause of Freedom. The
name of James Otis has descended to posterity on the
brightest pages of our history, associated with those of
Hancock, and Adams, and Jay, and Jefferson, and Henry, and
Rutledge, and there it will remain forever.

“The name of that other martyr in the cause of Truth and
Justice will find equal distinction, in future ages, on the
roll of philanthropists, with those of Howard and Clarkson
and Wilberforce, and others of that glorious company, ‘of
whom the world was not worthy.’

“But history has also its retributions. The infamous actors
in these tragedies passed away under the scorn and contempt
of mankind, their names only searched for and remembered
among the persecutors and slayers of their race. They who
countenanced and approved the last, by a fitting gradation,
became the betrayers and assassins of their country, and
two of these, the highest in station and basest in conduct,
are now awaiting the punishment due to their crimes in
a prison within the shadow of Bunker Hill Monument,
[_applause_,] which indignantly frowns upon them from base
to summit.

“In the reality of the present behold the promise of the
future, when all traitors like them shall meet a similar
doom. Still devoting himself to the cause of his country
and to the freedom of the oppressed, the advocate and
friend of all, of whatever rank or condition or color, the
scholar, the philanthropist, the martyr, the statesman
has come again among us, and it is with equal pride and
pleasure that I present to you the Hon. Charles Sumner, not
of Massachusetts, but of the United States of America, one
and indivisible.”

Mr. Sumner then came forward, and was received by the vast
audience with tumultuous applause, in which the ladies joined
with every manifestation of delight. The cheers, and waving of
hats and handkerchiefs, lasted several minutes.

SPEECH.

MR. PRESIDENT,--It is my nature to be more touched by the kindness of friends than by the malignity of enemies; and I know something of both. You make me feel that I am among friends. Beyond this satisfaction, I have additional pleasure in being welcomed by the Republican Union: first, as you represent the young men, who are the hope and strength of the country; and, secondly, as you constitute an association which has rendered already signal service in saving the country from the rule of the Slave Oligarchy. I know well how you brought forward and supported Abraham Lincoln for the Presidency, and how you adopted and circulated that masterly speech, made in this very hall, which completed those titles to regard that caused his nomination at Chicago and his triumph with the people.

* * * * *

FELLOW-CITIZENS OF NEW YORK:

In the presence of such an auditory, so genial and almost festive in character,--assembled for no purpose of party, or even of politics, in the ordinary sense of the term,--I incline naturally to some topic of literature, history, science, or art,--to something, at least, which accords with peace. But at this moment, when our whole continent is beginning to shake with the tread of mustering armies, the voice refuses any such theme. The ancient poet, longing to sing of Achilles and the house of Atreus, found that he could sing of love only; and he snatched from his lyre its bloody string. Alas! for me the case is all changed. I can speak to you of war only; but be assured, that, if I speak of war, it is because, unhappily, war has become to us the only way of peace.

* * * * *

The Present is apt to appear trivial and unimportant, while the Past and the Future are grand. Rarely do men know the full significance of the period in which they live, and we are inclined to sigh for something better in the way of opportunity,--such as was given to the hero of the Past, or as imagination allots to the better hero of the Future. But there is no occasion for this repining now. There is nothing in the Past, and it is difficult to imagine anything in the Future, more inspiring than our Present. Even with the curtain yet slightly lifted, it is easy to see that events are gathering, which, in their development, must constitute the third great epoch in the history of this Western Hemisphere,--the first being its discovery by Christopher Columbus, and the second the American Revolution. It remains to be seen if this epoch of ours may not surpass in grandeur either of its two predecessors, so that the fame of the Discoverer and the fame of the Liberator, of Columbus and of Washington, shall be eclipsed by the mild effulgence beaming from an act of godlike justice, creating within its immediate influence a new heaven and a new earth, and extending to other lands a life-giving example, so long as men struggle for rights denied, so long as any human being wears a chain. And this sublime act will be the present substitute for armies. The ancient Spartan, being asked, “Which is the greater virtue, justice or valor?” answered in memorable words, “Where justice is, there can be no need of valor.”

War is always an epoch. Unhappily, history counts by wars. Of these, some are wars of ideas,--like that between Catholics and Huguenots in France, between Catholics and Protestants in Germany, between the arbitrary crown of Charles the First and the Puritanism of Oliver Cromwell, and like that between our fathers and the mother country, when the Declaration of Independence was put in issue. Some originate in questions of form, some in the contentions of families, some in the fickleness of princes, and some in the machinations of politicians. England waged war on Holland, and one of the reasons openly assigned was an offensive picture in the Town-Hall of Amsterdam. France hurled armies across the Rhine, carrying fire and slaughter into the Palatinate, and involving great nations in most bloody conflict,--and all this wickedness is traced to the intrigue of a minister, to divert the attention of his sovereign. But we are now in the midst of a war which, whatever the reasons assigned by the unhappy men who began it, or by those who sympathize with them elsewhere, has an origin and mainspring so clear and definite as to be beyond question. Ideas are sometimes good and sometimes bad; and there may be a war for evil as well as for good. Such was that earliest rebellion waged by fallen spirits against the Almighty Throne; and such is that now waged by fallen slave-masters of our Republic against the National Government. I adopt the language of Milton, in his masterly prose, when I call it “a war fit for Cain to be the leader of,--an abhorred, a cursed, a fraternal war.”[205] Nor can any courage in Rebels give true honor. If victorious, they will be only Satanic saints of Slavery, with place in a most hateful hagiology.

If you will kindly listen, I shall endeavor to unmask this Rebellion in its Origin and Mainspring. Only when these are known can you determine how it is to be treated. Your efforts will be governed by the character of the adverse force,--whether regarded as motive power or as disease. A steam-engine is stopped at once by stopping the steam. A ghastly cancer, which has grappled the very fibres of the human frame, and shot its poison through every vein, will not yield to lip-salve or rosewater.

“Diseases desperate grown
By desperate appliances are relieved,
Or not at all.”

On the sixth of November last, the people of the United States, acting in pursuance of the Constitution and laws, chose Abraham Lincoln President. Of course this choice was in every particular perfectly constitutional and legal. As such, it was entitled to the respect and acquiescence of every good citizen. It is vain to say that the candidate represented opinions obnoxious to a considerable section of the country, or that he was chosen by votes confined to a special section. It is enough that he was duly chosen. You cannot set aside or deny such an election, without assailing not only the whole framework of the Constitution, but also the primal principle of American institutions. You become a traitor at once to the existing government and to the very idea of popular rule. You snatch a principle from the red book of despotism, and openly substitute the cartridge-box for the ballot-box.

And yet scarcely had this intelligence flashed across the country before the mutterings of sedition and treason began to reach us from an opposite quarter. The Union was menaced; and here the first distinct voice came from South Carolina. A Senator from that State, one of the largest slaveholders of the country, and a most strenuous partisan of Slavery, [Mr. HAMMOND,] openly declared, in language not easily forgotten, that before the 18th of December South Carolina would be “out of the Union, high and dry and forever.” These words heralded the outbreak. With the pertinacity of demons its leaders pushed forward. Their avowed object was the dismemberment of the Republic, by detaching State after State, in order to found a Slaveholding Confederacy. And here the clearest utterance came from a late Representative of Georgia [Mr. STEPHENS], now Vice-President of the Rebel States, who did not hesitate to proclaim that “the foundations of the new government are laid upon the great truth, that Slavery, subordination to the superior race, is the negro’s natural and moral condition,”--that “it is the first government in the history of the world based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth,”--and that “the stone which was rejected by the first builders is in the new edifice become _the chief stone of the corner_.”[206] Here is a savage frankness, with insensibility to shame. The object avowed is hideous in every aspect, whether we regard it as treason to our paternal government, as treason to the idea of American institutions, or as treason to those commanding principles of economy, morals, and Christianity, without which civilization is no better than barbarism.

And now we stand front to front in deadly conflict with this double-headed, triple-headed treason. Beginning with those States most peculiarly interested in Slavery, and operating always with intensity proportioned to the prevalence of Slavery, it fastens upon other States less interested,--Tennessee, North Carolina, Virginia,--and with much difficulty is prevented from enveloping every State containing slaves, no matter how few: for such is the malignant poison of Slavery that only a few slaves constitute a Slave State with all the sympathies and animosities of Slavery. This is the Rebellion which I am to unmask. Bad as it is on its face, it becomes aggravated, when we consider its origin, and the agencies by which it is conducted. It is not merely a Rebellion, but it is a Rebellion begun in conspiracy; nor, in all history, ancient or modern, is there any record of conspiracy so vast and so wicked, ranging over such spaces both of time and territory, and forecasting such results. A conspiracy to seize a castle or to assassinate a prince is petty by the side of this enormous, protracted treason, where half a continent is seized, studded with castles, fortresses, and public edifices, where the Government itself is overthrown, and the President, on his way to the national capital, narrowly escapes most cruel assassination.

But no conspiracy could ripen such pernicious fruit, if not rooted in a soil of congenial malignity. To appreciate properly this influence, we must go back to the beginning of the Government.

* * * * *

South Carolina, which takes so forward a part in this treason, hesitated originally, as is well known, with regard to the Declaration of Independence. Once her vote was recorded against this act; and when it finally prevailed, her vote was given for it only formally and for the sake of seeming unanimity.[207] But so little was she inspired by the Declaration, that, in the contest which ensued, her commissioners made a proposition to the British commander which is properly characterized by an able historian as “equivalent to an offer from the State to return to its allegiance to the British crown.”[208] The hesitation with regard to the Declaration of Independence was renewed with regard to the National Constitution; and here it was shared by another State. Notoriously, both South Carolina and Georgia, which, with the States carved from their original territory, Alabama and Mississippi, constitute the chief seat of the conspiracy, hesitated in becoming parties to the Union, and stipulated expressly for recognition of the slave-trade in the National Constitution as an indispensable condition. In the Convention, Mr. Rutledge, of South Carolina, while opposing a tax on the importation of slaves, said: “The true question at present is, _whether the Southern States_ shall or shall not be parties to the Union.” Mr. Pinckney, also of South Carolina, followed with the unblushing declaration: “South Carolina can never receive the plan [of the Constitution], _if it prohibits the slave-trade_.” I quote now from Mr. Madison’s authentic report of these important debates.[209] With shame let it be confessed, that, instead of repelling this disgraceful overture, our fathers submitted to it, and in that submission you find the beginning of present sorrows. The slave-trade, whose annual iniquity no tongue can tell, was placed for twenty years under safeguard of the Constitution, thus giving sanction, support, and increase to Slavery itself. The language is modest, but the intent was complete. South Carolina and Georgia were pacified, and took their places in the Union, to which they were openly bound only by a most hateful tie. Regrets for the past are not entirely useless, if out of them we get wisdom for the future, and learn to be brave. It is easy to see now, that, had the unnatural pretensions of these States been originally encountered by stern resistance worthy of an honest people, the present conspiracy would have been crushed before it saw the light. Its whole success, from its distant beginning down to this hour, has been from our timidity.

There was also another sentiment, of kindred perversity, which prevailed in the same quarter. This is vividly portrayed by John Adams, in a letter to General Gates, dated at Philadelphia, 23d March, 1776:--

“However, my dear friend Gates, all our misfortunes arise from
a single source: _the reluctance of the Southern Colonies to
Republican Government_.”[210]

And he proceeds to declare in strong language that “popular principles and axioms are abhorrent to the inclinations of the barons of the South.” This letter was written in the early days of the Revolution. At a later date John Adams testifies again to the discord between the North and the South, and refers particularly to the period after the National Constitution, saying: “The Northern and the Southern States were immovably fixed in opposition to each other.”[211] This was before any question of Tariff or Free Trade, and before the growing fortunes of the North had awakened Southern jealousy. The whole opposition had its root in Slavery,--as also had the earlier resistance to Republican Government.

In the face of these influences the Union was formed, but the seeds of conspiracy were latent in its bosom. The spirit already revealed was scarcely silenced; it was not destroyed. It still existed, rankling, festering, burning to make itself manifest. At the mention of Slavery it always appeared full-armed with barbarous pretensions. Even in the first Congress under the Constitution, at the presentation of that famous petition where Benjamin Franklin simply called upon Congress to step to the verge of its power to discourage every species of traffic in the persons of our fellow-men, this spirit broke forth in violent threats. With kindred lawlessness it early embraced that extravagant dogma of State Rights which has been ever since the convenient cloak of treason and conspiracy. At the Missouri Question, in 1820, it openly menaced dissolution of the Union. Instead of throttling the monster, we submitted to feed it with new concessions. Meanwhile the conspiracy grew, until, at last, in 1830, under the influence of Mr. Calhoun, it assumed the defiant front of Nullification; nor did it yield to the irresistible logic of Webster or the stern will of Jackson without a compromise. The pretended ground of complaint was the Tariff; but Andrew Jackson, himself a patriot Slaveholder, at that time President, saw the hollowness of the complaint. In a confidential letter, only recently brought to light, dated at Washington, May 1, 1833, and which during the last winter I had the honor of reading and holding up before the Senatorial conspirators in the original autograph, he says:--

“The Tariff was only the _pretext_, and Disunion and a Southern
Confederacy the real object. _The next pretext will be the
Negro or Slavery Question._”[212]

Jackson was undoubtedly right; but the pretext which he denounced in advance was employed so constantly afterwards as to become threadbare. At the earliest presentation of Abolition petitions,--at the Texas Question,--at the Compromises of 1850,--at the Kansas Question,--at the possible election of Fremont,--on all these occasions, the Union was threatened by angry Slave-Masters.

The conspiracy is unblushingly confessed by recent parties to it. Especially was this done in the Rebel Convention of South Carolina, where, one after another, the witnesses testified all the same way.

Mr. Parker said: “Secession is no spasmodic effort that has come suddenly upon us. _It has been gradually culminating for a long period of thirty years._”

Mr. Inglis followed: “Most of us have had this matter under consideration for _the last twenty years_.”

Mr. Keitt, Representative in Congress, gloried in his work, saying: “I have been engaged in this movement _ever since I entered political life_.”