“Especially will they point to the sweeping resolutions of the great apostle of Abolition, the Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. SUMNER], which by one dash of the pen deprive every Southern man of his slaves.” Then came the familiar parallel between Mr. Sumner and Jefferson Davis. “Sir, a few weeks ago we expelled a Senator, because, on the 1st of March last, he wrote a letter to Jefferson Davis, commending to his regard a friend who had a valuable fire-arm to sell, and who visited the South mainly for the purpose of selling it. This was deemed evidence of disloyalty sufficient to warrant his ejection from the Senate. But what do we now see? What, for instance, is the proposition of the distinguished Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. SUMNER]? It is, by one fell swoop of his pen, to blot ten or twelve States out of the Union forever to remit them back to a Territorial condition, and thus to involve our muniments of right, the titles to our estates, our franchises and municipal privileges, in a kind of hotch-pot, begetting and superinducing an inevitable confusion as inexplicable and dark as original Chaos.”[145] Mr. Fessenden, in reply to Mr. Willey, emphatically disowned Mr. Sumner. “Why, Sir, I do not hesitate to say here most distinctly, for myself, that I dissent entirely from the conclusions of the honorable Senator from Massachusetts, as stated in his resolutions. I do not look upon the States of this Union as gone and destroyed.… It is enough to say, in this connection, that upon this particular point the opinions of the honorable Senator from Massachusetts are his own, for which he alone is responsible, and which he is undoubtedly well able to defend.”[146] On the next day Mr. Sherman followed in the same vein,--vindicating the Republican party, and especially disowning Mr. Sumner, which in the course of his speech he did twice. The first time he said:-- “The Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. SUMNER], as he has a perfect right to do, introduced a series of resolutions giving his idea about the effect of the war upon the political status of the States, and at once those resolutions are seized upon as the dogmas of the Republican party, and we are denounced for them, although candid men must know that they are but the emanation of a single individual, who has decided convictions on this subject, and who is far in advance of any political organization in this country.” Then, at the close of his speech, after saying that “we ought to oppose all useless and unconstitutional measures of legislation,” he proceeded:--