to admit the State of Kansas for the benefit of the negro. It must be for the benefit of the white man.

SENATOR DOUGLAS.-Am I to understand the Senator that he has abandoned the cause of the negro upon the ground that his freedom and equality are inconsistent with the rights of the white man? What has become of his professions of sympathy for the poor negro? What are we to think of the sincerity of his professions upon this subject?

SENATOR SEWARD.-That is another thing.

SENATOR DOUGLAS.-That is the very thing. If all other considerations are to be made to yield to the paramount object of prohibiting slavery in Kansas upon the ground that the inequality which it imposes is unjust to the negro, will that injustice be removed by adopting a constitution which in effect declares that the negro, whether free or slave, shall never tread the soil, nor drink the water, nor breathe the air of Kansas? The Senator from New York admits that the Constitution with which he proposes by his bill to admit Kansas contains such a provision. Under the code of laws enacted by the territorial legislature of Kansas, which the Senator, in common with his party, professes to consider monstrous and barbarous, a negro may go to Kansas and be protected in all his rights so long as he obeys the laws of the land. In order to get rid of those laws the Senator from New York proposes to give effect to a constitutional provision which is designed to prevent the negro forever from entering the State!

I should like to hear from the Senator from New York on this point.

SENATOR SEWARD.-I need scarcely inform the honorable Senator that I do not approve of any such provision in any constitution in the world. I never did, and I never shall, vote to approve or sanction in any constitution, or in any law, a provision which tends to keep any man, any member of the human family to which I belong, in a condition of degradation below the position which I occupy myself, except for his own fault or crime.

SENATOR DOUGLAS.-The Senator does not approve of this provision, and never can, for the reason that it does not put the negro on an equality with himself! Then, will he vote for admitting Kansas in this irregular manner, and without the requisite population, merely because her constitution has a provision which keeps slaves from going into the Territory, while in another clause "which tends to keep a man, any being, a member of the human family to which he belongs, in a condition of

degradation below the position which he occupies himself''? Yet, if he votes for his own bill to admit Kansas with the Topeka constitution, according to his own doctrine he does vote to sanction a provision to keep the negro out altogether; he will not allow a negro to come in a condition either below him or above him!

SENATOR SEWARD.-You can take it either way-above or

below.

SENATOR DOUGLAS.-Yes; he will exclude the negro absolutely if he is below or above him! He will insist upon having the negro upon a footing of entire and perfect equality with himself. Yet, if his bill passes, and Kansas is admitted with the constitution which has been formed and presented here, all negroes, both free and slave, are forever prohibited from entering the State of Kansas by the terms of the instrument. He cannot escape the responsibility of this result on the plea that he does not vote directly to indorse and sanction the constitution in all its parts; for his doctrine, and the doctrine of his party, is that they not only have the right, but that it is their duty, to examine the constitution in all its parts, and vote for it or against it, according as they approve or disapprove of its provisions, and especially those provisions which degrade the negro below the level of the white man. He must abandon all the principles to which his life has been devoted; he must abandon the creed of the party of which he is the acknowledged leader, before he can vote for his own bill. The Black Republican party was organized and founded on the fundamental principle of perfect and entire equality of rights and privileges between the negro and the white man-an equality secured and guaranteed by a law higher than the Constitution of the United States. In your creed, as proclaimed to the world, you stand pledged against "the admission of any more slave States";

To repeal the fugitive slave law;

To abolish the slave trade between the States;

To prohibit slavery in the District of Columbia;

To restore the prohibition on Kansas and Nebraska; and To acquire no more territory unless slavery shall be first prohibited.

This is your creed, authoritatively proclaimed. I trust there is to be no evading or dodging the issues-no lowering of the flag. Let each party stand by its principles and the issues as you have presented them and we have accepted them. Let us have a fair, bold fight before the people, and then let the verdict be pronounced.

SENATOR SEWARD.-You will have it.

I trust the

SENATOR DOUGLAS.—I rejoice in this assurance. Senator will be able to bring his troops up to the line, and to hold them there. I trust there is to be no lowering of the flagno abandonment or change of the issues. There are rumors afloat that you are about to strike your colors; that you propose to surrender each one of these issues, not because you do not profess to be right, but because you cannot succeed in the right; that you propose to throw overboard all the bold men who distinguished themselves in your service in fighting the anti-Nebraska fight, and to take a new man, who, in consequence of not being committed to either side, will be enabled to cheat somebody by getting votes from both sides!

We are prepared to give you a fair fight on the issues you have tendered and we accepted. Let the presidential contest be one of principle alone; let the principles involved be distinctly stated and boldly met, without any attempts at concealment or equivocation; let the result be a verdict of approval or disapproval so emphatic that it cannot be misunderstood. One year ago you promised us a fair fight in open field, upon the principles of the Kansas-Nebraska act. You then unfurled your banner, and bore it aloft in the hands of your own favorite and tried leaders, with your principles emblazoned upon it. Are you now preparing to lower your flag, to throw overboard all your tried men who have rendered service in your cause, and issue a search warrant in hopes of finding a new man who has not antagonized with anybody, and whose principles are unknown, for the purpose of cheating somebody by getting votes from all sorts of men? Let us have an open and a fair fight. [Applause in the galleries.]

A bill to admit Kansas was prepared by the Territorial Committee of the House of Representatives. On June 30 it was rejected by one vote-106 yeas to 107 nays; later it was reconsidered and passed by a vote of 99 to 97. It was rejected by the Senate.

CHAPTER IX

THE ASSAULT ON SENATOR SUMNER

Philippic in the Senate by Charles Sumner Against the Pro-Slavery Conspirators Against Freedom in Kansas-Replies by Stephen A. Douglas [Ill.] and James M. Mason [Va.]-Representative Preston J. Brooks [S. C.] Assails Sumner in Senate Chamber-Sen. Henry Wilson Describes the Assault-A Committee of Investigation Is Appointed by the SenateThe Committee Reports That a Breach of Senatorial Privilege Was Committed, and Recommends that the Matter Be Laid Before the House of Representatives for Action; the Recommendation Is Adopted-Massachusetts Legislature Passes Resolutions Denouncing Brooks-Senator Andrew P. Butler [S. C.] Defends Brooks-House of Representatives Appoints Investigating Committee-Report of a Majority of the Committee States that a "Breach of Privilege" Had Been Committed, and Recommends Expulsion of Brooks from the House and Reprimand of Henry A. Edmunson [Va.] and Lawrence M. Keitt [S. C.], for Their Connection with the Assault-Minority Report Finds No Breach of Privilege Had Been Committed, and Recommends That No Action Be Taken-Anson Burlingame [Mass.] Denounces Brooks-House Refuses to Expel Brooks, Reprimands Keitt, and Refuses to Reprimand Edmunson--Resignation of Brooks: His Defiant Speech-His Subsequent

Career.

ON

N May 19, 1856, Charles Sumner [Mass.], in a carefully prepared speech on the bill for admitting Kansas into the Union, delivered the most notable philippic in the annals of American forensic oratory. Dealing exhaustively with its subject, "The Crime Against Kansas," it necessarily included much of the arguments already presented. This part has therefore been omitted in favor of the special indictment in the speech of the conspirators against the liberty of Kansas-of whom the Senator particularly pilloried Senator Andrew P. Butler of South Carolina and Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois.

"CONSPIRATORS" VS. "SLANDERER'

SENATOR SUMNER

Before entering upon my argument I must say something in response to what has fallen from Senators who have raised themselves to eminence on this floor in championship of human wrongs; I mean the Senator from South Carolina [Mr. Butler], and the Senator from Illinois [Mr. Douglas], who, though unlike as Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, yet, like this couple, sally forth together in the same adventure. I regret much to miss the elder Senator from his seat; but the cause against which he has run a tilt with such activity of animosity demands that the opportunity of exposing him should not be lost; and it is for the cause that I speak. The Senator from South Carolina has read many books of chivalry, and believes himself a chivalrous knight, with sentiments of honor and courage. Of course he has chosen a mistress to whom he has made his vows, and who, though ugly to others, is always lovely to him; though polluted in the sight of the world, is chaste in his sight-I mean the harlot, Slavery. For her his tongue is always profuse in words. Let her be impeached in character, or any proposition made to shut her out from the extension of her wantonness, and no extravagance of manner or hardihood of assertion is then too great for this Senator. The frenzy of Don Quixote, in behalf of his wench, Dulcinea del Toboso, is all surpassed. The asserted rights of slavery, which shock equality of all kinds, are cloaked by a fantastic claim of equality. If the slave States. cannot enjoy what, in mockery of the great Fathers of the Republic, he misnames equality under the Constitution-in other words, the full power in the National Territories to compel fellow-men to unpaid toil, to separate husband and wife, and to sell little children at the auction block-then, sir, the chivalric Senator will conduct the State of South Carolina out of the Union! Heroic knight! Exalted Senator! A second Moses come for a second exodus!

But not content with this poor menace, which we have been twice told was "measured," the Senator, in the unrestrained chivalry of his nature, has undertaken to apply opprobrious words to those who differ from him on this floor. He calls them "sectional and fanatical"; and opposition to the usurpation in Kansas he denounces as "an uncalculating fanaticism." To be sure, these charges lack all grace of originality and all sentiment of truth; but the adventurous Senator does not hesitate.