He was not only the most clearsighted, brave, and uncompromising friend of my race who had ever stood upon the floor of the Senate, but was to me a loved, honored, and precious personal friend; a man possessing the exalted and matured intellect of a statesman, with the pure and artless heart of a child.
Douglass offers a profound eulogy for Charles Sumner, praising his character, intellect, and unwavering support for the rights of African Americans.
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None now denies the ability of the colored race to acquire knowledge of anything which can be communicated to the human understanding by letters.
The vote of the colored man, formerly beaten down and stamped out by intimidation, is now revived, sought, and defended by powerful allies, and this from no transient sentiment of the moment, but from the permanent laws controlling the…
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