There are many in England, who, taking counsel of a perverse political bigotry, have spurned them absolutely; and there are others, who, invoking the point of honor, assert that England cannot entertain them without compromising her honor.
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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There are many among us, who, taking counsel of a sense of national wrong, would leave them to rest without settlement, so as to furnish a precedent for retaliation in kind, should England find herself at war.
Shall these claims be liquidated and cancelled promptly, or allowed to slumber until called into activity by some future exigency?
The mass of a mountain cannot be measured at its base; the observer must occupy a certain distance; and this rule of perspective is justly applicable to damages which are vast beyond precedent.
With the lapse of time and with minuter consideration the case against England becomes more grave, not only from the questions of international responsibility which it involves, but from better comprehension of the damages, which are seen…
The attempt to close this great international debate without a complete settlement is little short of puerile.
Life and property were both swallowed up, leaving behind a deep-seated sense of enormous wrong, as yet unatoned and even unacknowledged, which is one of the chief factors in the problem now presented to the statesmen of both countries.
If the case against England is strong, and if our claims are unprecedented in magnitude, it is only because the conduct of this power at a trying period was most unfriendly, and the injurious consequences of this conduct were on a scale…
Thus by an analogy of the Common Law in the case of a Public Nuisance, also by the strict rule of the Roman Law, which enters so largely into International Law, and even by the rule of the Common Law relating to Damages, all losses…
Every British pirate was a public nuisance, involving the British Government, which must respond in damages, not only to the individuals who have suffered, but also to the National Government, acting as paterfamilias for the common good of…
Because the case is without precedent, because no nation ever before received such injury from a friendly power, this can be no reason why the question should not be considered on the evidence.
Impartial history will record the national losses from British intervention, and it is only reasonable that the evidence of these losses should not be excluded from judgment.
Nor can the claim of the nation be questioned simply because it is large, or because the evidence with regard to it is different from that in the case of an individual.
It is easy to see that there may be occasions, where, overtopping all individual damages, are damages suffered by the nation, so that reparation to individuals would be insufficient.
It will be for a wise statesmanship to determine how this fearful accumulation, like Ossa upon Pelion, shall be removed out of sight, so that it shall no longer overshadow the two countries.
This plain statement, without one word of exaggeration or aggravation, is enough to exhibit the magnitude of the national losses, whether from the destruction of our commerce, the prolongation of the war, or the expense of the blockade.
The Rebellion was suppressed at a cost of more than four thousand million dollars, a considerable portion of which has been already paid, leaving twenty-five hundred millions as a national debt to burden the people.
The sacrifice of precious life is beyond human compensation; but there may be an approximate estimate of the national loss in treasure.
It is not easy to say how much of this change, which has become chronic, may be referred to British pirates; but it cannot be doubted that they contributed largely to produce it.
What with the high rate of insurance, what with these captures, and what with the rapid transfer of tonnage to British capitalists, you have virtually made valueless that vast property.
And now, in the interest of peace, it is the duty of both sides to find a remedy, complete, just, and conciliatory, so that the deep sense of wrong and the detriment to the Republic may be forgotten in that proper satisfaction which a…
It was a terrible mistake, which I cannot doubt that good Englishmen must regret.
Besides degrading us and ruining our commerce, its direct and constant influence was to encourage the Rebellion, and to prolong the war waged by Slaveholders at such cost of treasure and blood.
As in the earlier cases where the national sovereignty was insulted, there should be an acknowledgment of wrong, or at least of liability, leaving to the commissioners the assessment of damages only.
Looking at what is due to us on the present occasion, we are brought again to the conclusion that the satisfaction of individuals whose ships have been burnt or sunk is only a small part of what we may justly expect.
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