We look to you to forbear when necessary, and to dare when the time is right.
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 have ever been in the foremost rank in guarding and defending the rights of the colored people of this country with a sacred jealousy.
I hail with inexpressible joy your manly, bold, and intelligent avowal of their civil and political rights, on the opening of the session of Congress.
I feel assured that they will be opposed, and strongly opposed; but God grant to you, and the other fearless champions of Freedom’s cause, strength and ability to successfully defeat all opposition!
Stick to the noble ground you have taken, and let reason and events put the President in harmony with you and the people.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That no person, in other respects qualified to vote within the District of Columbia, shall be excluded from that right by…
And where the person injured is of African descent, one half the jury impanelled to try the action or indictment shall be of African descent.
Meanwhile, after a debate of several days, the House of Representatives, on the 18th of January, passed a short bill, striking the word “white” from the election laws of the District, and declaring that no person should be disqualified on…
The country expects it; the country will rejoice and be grateful, if you will signalize this first day of your coming together by this beautiful and generous act.
Let us, so far as the Senate can do it, give suffrage to the colored race in the District; let us signalize this first day of actual business by finishing this great act.
Upon any such trial, prejudice against persons of African descent, or against persons not of such descent, shall be ground of challenge, and, being established by proof, to the satisfaction of the judge, shall exclude the juror.
And upon any such trial, inability to read or write shall be ground of challenge, and, the fact being found by the judge, shall exclude the juror.
And this statute, made in pursuance of the Constitution, shall be the supreme law of the land, anything in the Constitution or laws of any such State to the contrary notwithstanding.
Involuntary servitude is forever prohibited, and the freedom of all persons is guarantied in such State.
No debt, State or otherwise, created by or under the sanction of the usurping power, shall be recognized or paid by the State.
There shall be no distinction among the inhabitants of this State founded on race, former condition, or color.
Every such inhabitant shall be entitled to all the privileges before the law enjoyed by the most favored class of such inhabitants.
Be it resolved by the Senate (the House of Representatives concurring), That the Amendment abolishing Slavery has become and is part of the Constitution of the United States.
The complete reëstablishment of loyalty, as shown by honest recognition of the unity of the Republic, and the duty of allegiance to it at all times, without mental reservation or equivocation of any kind.
The complete suppression of all oligarchical pretensions, and the complete enfranchisement of all citizens, so that there shall be no denial of rights on account of race or color, but justice shall be impartial, and all shall be equal…
The rejection of the Rebel debt, and at the same time the adoption, in just proportion, of the national debt and the national obligations to Union soldiers, with solemn pledges never to join in any measure, direct or indirect, for their…
The organization of an educational system for the equal benefit of all, without distinction of race or color.
Call him, then, if you please, the Green Mountain Socrates.
On the great question which for a generation overshadowed all others, and finally wrapped the country in the “living cloud of war,” he was sincerely antislavery, but with certain shortcomings which in this impartial tribute ought not to be…
His lenity toward our monster enemy showed itself unconsciously when he spoke of malignant Rebels as “those Southern gentlemen who had seceded,” and then again, when, at an earlier date, he spoke of “two civilizations”; but he bore kindly…
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