Charles Sumner: his complete works, volume 05 (of 20)Sumner, Charles
History
Charles Sumner: his complete works, volume 05 (of 20)
Sumner, Charles
Slavery -- United States; Speeches, addresses, etc., American
Nor is the experience of our Republic peculiar. Where is the country or
power which does not inscribe the names of foreigners on its historic
scroll? It was Christopher Columbus, of Genoa, who disclosed to Spain
the New World; it was Magellan, of Portugal, sailing in the service of
Spain, who first passed with adventurous keel through those distant
Southern straits which now bear his name, and opened the way to the
vast Pacific Sea; and it was Cabot, the Venetian, who first conducted
English enterprise to this North American continent. As in triumphs
of discovery, so also in other fields have foreigners excelled, while
serving states to which they were bound by no tie of birth. The Dutch
Grotius, author of the great work, “Laws of War and Peace,” an exile
from his own country, became Ambassador of Sweden; and, in our own day,
the Italian Pozzo di Borgo, turning his back upon his own country,
reached the most exalted diplomatic trust in the jealous service of
Russia. In the list of monarchs on the throne of England, not one
has been more truly English than the Dutch William. In Holland no
ruler has equalled in renown the German William, Prince of Orange.
In Russia the German Catharine the Second takes place among the most
commanding sovereigns. And who of Swedish monarchs was a better Swede
than Bernadotte, the Frenchman? and what Frenchman was ever filled with
aspiration for France more than the Italian Napoleon Bonaparte?
* * * * *
I pass from these things, which have occupied me too long. A party,
which, beginning in secrecy, interferes with religious belief, and
founds a discrimination on the accident of birth, is not the party for
us.
* * * * *
“Where Liberty is, there is my country,” was the sentiment of that
great Apostle of Freedom, Benjamin Franklin, uttered during the trials
of the Revolution. In similar strain, I would say, “Where Liberty is,
there is my party.” Such an organization is now happily constituted
here in Massachusetts, and in all the Free States, under the name of
REPUBLICAN PARTY.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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