Charles Sumner: his complete works, volume 07 (of 20)Sumner, Charles
History
Charles Sumner: his complete works, volume 07 (of 20)
Sumner, Charles
Slavery -- United States; Speeches, addresses, etc., American
On the contrary, the “Editorial Correspondent” of the _New York
Express_, writing on the day of the eulogy on Baker, gave vent
to his sentiments with regard to Mr. Sumner.
“Even in the burial services of the dead he mingles his
sectional hate and personal wrath.
“Such a man will never consent to a peaceful reunion of
the States, nor to an equal representation of all the
States in the Federal Congress. He deeply wounds the
self-sacrificing, loyal Union men of the Border States and
Far South; in every breath he utters, and in every speech
he makes, he sets back upon the clock of advancing time
the hour-hand of Peace. His presence in the Senate Chamber
is a signal of protracted war, renewed sectional hate, and
offensive intermeddling.…
“If Massachusetts were to-day represented in the spirit of
her early Revolutionary men, or in the spirit in which so
many thousands of her sons have rushed to the defence of
the country, Mr. Sumner, as a long standing enemy of the
Constitution and the Union, would be sent back to Boston,
and there sandwiched between Slidell and Mason within the
casemates of Fort Warren. These three men are each old
acquaintances here, and each old enemies of the Government,
the Union, and the Constitution; and the only difference
between the extremes is, that the Senator from Boston
remains in council here to fight the Government, and men
and institutions belonging to it from its foundation, while
the others fled from its service to render more available
aid to those in arms against it.”
Hon. Edward G. Parker, author of “The Golden Age of American
Oratory” and “Reminiscences of Rufus Choate,” wrote from
Boston:--
“I thank you sincerely for a copy of your exquisite
panegyrics on Bingham and Baker. I often heard Baker,
and recognize at once the beautiful fidelity of your
description.
“The touch of Plutarch and of Addison--both, if you will
allow me to say so--are there.
“I had, before receiving this, cut out of the newspaper
your portrait of Baker, and put it in a choice book devoted
to great men and memorable thoughts.
“It is to me like a medallion of that _true_ man, who, in
so shining a manner, and yet so suddenly, ‘passed from the
service of his country to the service of his God.’
“Pardon what you may perhaps consider the superfluous
enthusiasm of this note; but it is written right away
upon reading these oratoric odes, and I feel a little of
the _lava_ struggling even in the attempt to acknowledge
receiving them.”
Hon. John Jay, afterwards Minister at Vienna, wrote from New
York:--
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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