CHARLES SUMNER

1811-1874

There have been greater orators than Charles Sumner, and his contemporary, Webster, was infinitely his superior in massive logic, simple language, and contagious enthusiasm. Sumner's style was diffuse and ornate even to excess. He may in some measure be said to resemble Burke. He was too fond of illustrations and quotations. The strength of Sumner lay in his moral character. Theodore Parker, in his "Oration on the Death of Daniel Webster," has well contrasted the two great orators of Massachusetts, and has not spared Webster in the comparison. But Sumner's greatest claim on renown lay in the fact that he raised the question of slavery out of the arena of practical politics into the loftier domain of morals. His treatment of the subject appealed to men's consciences and affections; it struck the deep chord of religious feeling in the country. He abandoned the retirement of the scholar and the student which he loved so well, to go forth and do the work which he seemed to have believed Providence intended him to perform. With his multifarious learning he united a simplicity of mind which was after all the strong support of an invincible purpose, and his life was crowned by the only success he ever seems to have coveted, and that was the success of the cause that gave freedom to the negro slave. His personal character lacked the good fellowship that is the shibboleth of popularity; he was haughty, reserved, and intolerant of opinions differing from his own. But these features of his personality were redeemed, in the eyes of his constituents, by his high and unswerving morality, by his pure patriotism and energy in the cause of right.

Charles Sumner was born at Boston in 1811, graduated at Harvard nineteen years later, and in 1834 was admitted to the bar. He early showed a taste for profound study, and his power of literary expression was exhibited by his many contributions which, in preference to actual legal practice, he made to current law journals and compilations. The three years between 1837 and 1840 he spent in the study of foreign jurisprudence on the Continent of Europe. On his return he pursued his studies, and the earnest and ideal cast of his statesmanship was shown in his fine oration, "The True Grandeur of Nations," delivered in 1845. In this speech, which at once made him famous, he inveighed against the iniquity of war. While averse to politics, he was roused to action by the threatened extension of slavery over new territories. Thus it came about that he was nominated by the Free Soil party for Congress in 1848, but defeated, only to be a successful candidate in 1851 for the national Senate, in which he sat till his death. As the sole member of the Senate who stood out unflinchingly against slavery, he incurred the enmity of the Southern party by his unbridled invective, and in 1856 was assaulted in the Senate chamber by Preston S. Brooks, Member of Congress for South Carolina. The injuries he received in this assault, and from which he never seemed to have completely recovered, were severe enough to incapacitate him for his senatorial duties

for more than three years. On the admission of Kansas as a State, in 1860, he delivered his great speech on "The Barbarism of Slavery." He was elected chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs in 1861, when the secession of the Southern States occurred. During the course of the Civil War he was one of the most prominent figures in the Senate. In the dark days of the conflict, when the dissolution of the Union seemed inevitable, when the victorious Southern troops were marching into Pennsylvania, when organized mobs were resisting the execution of the Draft Act in New York City, Sumner was a pillar of strength for the North. A nature as intense and fiery as his knew neither surrender nor compromise. After the war was ended and its issues had been settled there was hardly place in the new order of things for a gladiator like Sumner. His existence was bound up in conflict-it was in strife alone that he could find an outlet for his aggressive energy. He quarrelled with Grant over the Santo Domingo affair, with his party leaders over the minor questions of politics, and with his friends over trifles. Disagreeing with all bodies of political faith in some point or other, he gradually became alienated from his party, and in 1872 he supported the candidature of Horace Greeley for President. He died at Washington, March 11, 1874, at the age of sixty-three.

The speech entitled "Claims on England" is a statesmanlike deliverance, setting forth in a very clear and lucid form the various counts in the American indictment against England. It has not all the fiery aggressiveness that characterized his speeches against slavery, but, on the other hand, it contains more closely-drawn, logical reasoning. The ponderous statistics of the damage, suffered by reason of English interference in the Civil War, are handled with marvellous skill, so that even the most careless reader must perforce understand and remember the merits of the whole case. This speech was published in all the prominent newspapers in the country, and its effect was to settle beyond cavil the attitude of the country on the subject of the claims on England.

CLAIMS ON ENGLAND

Delievered in the executive session of the Senate, April 13, 1869, the Johnson-Clarendon Treaty being under consideration

MR

R. PRESIDENT: A report recommending that the Senate do not advise and consent to a treaty with a foreign power, duly signed by the plenipotentiary of the nation, is of rare occurrence. Treaties are often reported with amendments, and sometimes without any recommendation; but I do not recall an instance, since I came into the Senate, where such a treaty has been reported with the recommendation which is now under consideration. The character of the treaty seemed to justify the exceptional report. The committee did not hesitate in the conclusion that it ought to be rejected, and they have said so.

I do not disguise the importance of this act; but I believe that in the interest of peace, which everyone should have at heart, the treaty must be rejected. A treaty which, instead of removing an existing grievance, leaves it for heart-burning and rancor, cannot be considered a settlement of pending questions between two nations. It may seem to settle them, but does not. It is nothing but a snare. And such is the character of the treaty now before us. The massive grievance under which our country suffered for years is left untouched; the painful sense of wrong planted in the national heart is allowed to remain. For all this there is not one word of regret, or even of recognition; nor is there any semblance of compensation. It cannot be for the interest of either party that such a treaty should be ratified. It cannot promote the interest of the United States, for we naturally seek justice as the foundation of a good understanding with Great Britain; nor can it promote the interest of Great Britain, which must also seek a real settle

ment of all pending questions. Surely I do not err, when I say that a wise statesmanship, whether on our side or on the other side, must apply itself to find the real root of evil, and then, with courage tempered by candor and moderation, see that it is extirpated. This is for the interest of both parties, and anything short of it is a failure. It is sufficient to say that the present treaty does no such thing, and that, whatever may have been the disposition of the negotiators, the real root of evil remains untouched in all its original strength.

I make these remarks merely to characterize the treaty and prepare the way for its consideration.

If we look at the negotiation which immediately preceded the treaty, we find little to commend. You have it on your table. I think I am not mistaken, when I say that it shows a haste which finds new precedents in diplomacy, but which is explained by the anxiety to reach a conclusion before the advent of a new administration. Mr. Seward and Mr. Reverdy Johnson unite in this unprecedented activity, using the Atlantic cable freely. I should not object to haste, or to the freest use of the cable, if the result were such as could be approved; but, considering the character of the transaction, and how completely the treaty conceals the main cause of offence, it seems as if the honorable negotiators were engaged in huddling something out of sight.

The treaty has for its model the Claims Convention of 1853. To take such a convention as a model was a strange mistake. This convention was for the settlement of outstanding claims of American citizens on Great Britain, and of British subjects on the United States, which had arisen since the Treaty of Ghent in 1814. It concerned individuals only, and not the nation. It was not in any respect political; nor was it to remove any sense of national wrong. To take such a convention as the model for a treaty which was to determine a national grievance of transcendent importance in the relations of two countries marked on the threshold an insensibility to the true nature of the difference to be settled. At once it belittled the work to be done.

An inspection of the treaty shows how, from beginning to end, it is merely for the settlement of individual claims on both sides, putting the two batches on an equality, so that the