Charles Sumner

It is a monster to be hunted down by the public and the constituted authorities.

The charity of one man may counteract or remedy the uncharitableness of another; but no individual can counteract or remedy the uncharitableness of an organized injury.

Each individual is limited in influence; but an institution has the influence of numbers organized by law.

You do well, when you rebuke and correct individual offences; but it is a higher office to rebuke and correct a vicious institution.

Railroads, which, imitating the Boston schools, placed colored people apart by themselves, are compelled, under the influence of an awakened public sentiment, to abandon this regulation, and to allow them the privileges of other travellers.

I call upon you now to obliterate the last of its footprints, and to banish the last of the hateful spirits in its train.

Already you have banished Slavery from this Commonwealth.

Massachusetts, through you, will have fresh title to respect, and be once more, as in times past, an example to the whole land.

It is the constant, ever-present, tutelary genius of this Commonwealth, frowning upon every privilege of birth, every distinction of race, every institution of Caste.

Still, which way soever we turn, we are brought back to one single proposition,--the Equality of men before the Law.

Whoso sets up barriers to these thwarts the ways of Providence, crosses the tendencies of human nature, and directly interferes with the laws of God.

They remove antipathies, promote mutual adaptation and conciliation, and establish relations of reciprocal regard.

Society and intercourse are means established by Providence for human improvement.

Nothing is more clear than that the welfare of classes, as well as of individuals, is promoted by mutual acquaintance.

But the colored children, placed apart in separate schools, are deprived of this peculiar advantage.

Happily, our educational system, by the blending of all classes, draws upon the whole school that attention which is too generally accorded only to the favored few, and thus secures to the poor their portion of the fruitful sunshine.

In this way the poor, the humble, and the neglected not only share the companionship of the more favored, but enjoy also the protection of their presence, which draws toward the school a more watchful superintendence.

As the State derives strength from the unity and solidarity of its citizens without distinction of class, so the school derives strength from the unity and solidarity of all classes beneath its roof.

And since, according to our institutions, all classes, without distinction of color, meet in the performance of civil duties, so should they all, without distinction of color, meet in the school, beginning there those relations of Equality…

It is the microcosm preparatory to the macrocosm, and therefore it must cherish and develop the virtues and the sympathies needed in the larger world.

The school is the little world where the child is trained for the larger world of life.

All are to approach the same common fountain together; nor can there be any exclusive source for individual or class.

They are not only to receive equal quantities of knowledge, but all are to receive it in the same way.

The law contemplates not only that all shall be taught, but that all shall be taught together.

It is a narrow perception of their high aim which teaches that they are merely to furnish an equal amount of knowledge to all, and therefore, provided all be taught, it is of little consequence where and in what company.