I firmly believe that in the providence of God it has been decreed that one cup more should be put to our lips, and that it should not pass away until we had drained it to the dregs.
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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Thank God, the chains that have bound the people to their old organizations have been snapped asunder, and they have proved in this case but as packthreads upon the arms of an unshorn Samson....
Boston, it is true, has been humbled in the dust, and it is hard, terribly hard, to be compelled to witness the surrender of a panting fugitive into the hands of the Slave-Hunters; but never, since I have been engaged in the Antislavery…
In the first place, allow me to congratulate you upon the glorious position you occupy in the hearts of the people of Boston.
I have read your closing remarks on the Nebraska Bill with the greatest admiration, and most heartily indorse every word and sentiment.
Let the minions of the Administration and of the Slavocracy harm one hair of your head, and they will raise a whirlwind that will sweep them to destruction.
While the person of a Virginia citizen is only safe from rudeness and outrage behind the serried ranks of armed men, Charles Sumner is permitted to walk among the 'slave-catchers' and 'fire-eaters' of the South in peace and security.
Let Sumner and his infamous gang feel that he cannot outrage the fame of his country, counsel treason to its laws, incite the ignorant to bloodshed and murder, and still receive the support and countenance of the society of this city…
But let public opinion condemn these men everywhere,--in the street, in the Capitol, in every place where men meet.
But our Charles Sumner tells us that a new era has been inaugurated, ... that the Constitution shall not be obeyed, and that Slavery shall at all and every hazard be uprooted and destroyed, in spite of all that has been pledged and written…
Men shot down in the faithful discharge of duty to a law based upon a constitutional guaranty, and the word which encourages the assassin given by a man who has sworn on the Holy Evangelists and in the presence of his Maker to support the…
Boston in arms against the Constitution, and an Abolition fanatic, the distant leader, safe from the fire and the fagot he invokes from his seat in the Senate of the United States, giving the command.
But the clergy of New England, when protesting against a wicked measure, which, with singular unanimity, they believe full of peril and shame to our country, are told to stay at home.
If he has correctly stated that it is verbatim copied from the petition presented by his colleague, I say it is a prostitution of their office to the embrace of political party; and the Senate shall not, by my assent, be made the medium of…
Proudly I discern the flag of my country, as it ripples in every breeze, at last in reality, as in name, the Flag of Freedom,--undoubted, pure, and irresistible.
More clearly than ever before, I now penetrate that great Future when Slavery must disappear.
Thus, Sir, standing at the very grave of Freedom in Nebraska and Kansas, I lift myself to the vision of that happy resurrection by which Freedom will be assured, not only in these Territories, but everywhere under the National Government.
Everywhere within the sphere of Congress, the great Northern Hammer will descend to smite the wrong; and the irresistible cry will break forth, "No more Slave States!
Thus it puts Freedom and Slavery face to face, and bids them grapple.
The Tea Tax and Stamp Act, which aroused the patriot rage of our fathers, were virtues by the side of your transgression; nor would it be easy to imagine, at this day, any measure which more openly and wantonly defied every sentiment of…
Among the crimes of history, another is soon to be recorded, which no tears can blot out, and which in better days will be read with universal shame.
In a Christian land, and in an age of civilization, a time-honored statute of Freedom is struck down, opening the way to all the countless woes and wrongs of human bondage.
It is the worst bill, inasmuch as it is a present victory of Slavery.
I struggle against it as against death; but, as in death itself corruption puts on incorruption, and this mortal body puts on immortality, so from the sting of this hour I find assurance of that triumph by which Freedom will be restored to…
From the depths of my soul, as loyal citizen and as Senator, I plead, remonstrate, protest, against the passage of this bill.
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