Will a regard to State Rights justify the sacrifice of the rights of men?
Charles Sumner
The Public Record
Charles Sumner was an American lawyer and statesman who represented Massachusetts in the United States Senate from 1851 until his death in 1874. Before and during the American Civil War, he was a leading American advocate for the abolition of slavery, and after the war he was a key figure in the Reconstruction era, during which he and other Radical Republicans successfully fought to end slavery and ensure basic rights for Black Americans. He continued advocating for racial equality until his death, lobbying in his final days for a civil rights bill that served as a model for the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Historians credit Sumner with coining the phrase "equality before the law," which he first used as part of an early attempt to integrate Boston's public school system.
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You cannot elevate the sovereignty of the States over the Constitution of the United States.
But the Constitution is our Magna Charta, which can bear no sovereign but itself, as you will see at once, if you consider its character.
For instance: “No State shall enter into any treaty, alliance, or confederation; coin money; emit bills of credit; make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts.” Or, if the States may exercise certain powers, it is…
Before the Constitution such sovereignty may have existed; it was declared in the Articles of Confederation; but since then it has ceased.
It has disappeared and been lost in the supremacy of the National Government, so that it can no longer be recognized.
Perverse men, insisting that it still existed, and weak men, mistaking the shadow of former power for the reality, have made arrogant claims in its behalf.
When the Constitution was proclaimed, and George Washington took his oath to support it as President, our career as a nation began, with all the unity of a nation.
The States remained as living parts of the body, important to the national strength, and essential to those currents which maintain national life, but plainly subordinate to the United States, which then and there stood forth a nation, one…
The new Government had hardly been inaugurated before it was disturbed by the pestilent pretension of State Rights, which has never ceased to disturb it since.
The original claim, in the name of State Rights, has swollen to all the proportions of an unparalleled war, which, in the name of State Rights, now menaces the national life.
Buchanan, who was then President, declined to interfere, on the ground that what had been done was by States, and that it was contrary to the theory of our Government “to coerce a State,” thus making the pretension of State Rights the…
Had the President then interfered promptly and loyally, it cannot be doubted that this whole intolerable crime might have been trampled out forever.
And now, when it is proposed that Congress shall organize governments in these States, which are absolutely without loyal governments, we are met by the objection founded on State Rights.
The same disastrous voice which from the beginning of our history has sounded in our ears still makes itself heard; but, alas! it is now on the lips of friends.
Just in proportion as it prevails, it is impossible to establish the Constitution again throughout the Rebel States.
State Rights are fully triumphant, if, first, in their name Rebel governments can be organized, and then again in their name Congressional governments to replace the Rebel governments can be resisted.
If they can be employed, first to sever the States from the Union, and then to prevent the Union from extending its power over them, State Rights are at once sword and buckler to the Rebellion.
But State Rights are as much disturbed by a military government as by a Congressional government.
Indeed, the power belongs to Congress by a higher title than it belongs to President: first, because a civil government is more in harmony with our institutions, and, wherever possible, is required; and, secondly, because there are…
Independent in fact, and with a civil government in successful operation, these two Republics are entitled to hospitable recognition in the Family of Nations, according to the rule already established by our Government.
It is argued, that the Acts of Secession are all inoperative and void, and therefore the States continue precisely as before, with their local constitutions, laws, and institutions in the hands of traitors, but totally unchanged, and ready…
Such, I believe, is a candid statement of the pretension for State Rights against Congressional governments, which, it is argued, cannot be substituted for the State governments.
To prove that the Rebel States continue precisely as before, we are reminded that Andrew Johnson continued to occupy his seat in the Senate after Tennessee had adopted its Act of Secession and embarked in rebellion, and that his presence…
Let us at all hazards prevent the extension of Slavery and the increase of the Slave Power.
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