Charles Sumner: his complete works, volume 18 (of 20)Sumner, Charles
History
Charles Sumner: his complete works, volume 18 (of 20)
Sumner, Charles
Slavery -- United States; Speeches, addresses, etc., American
This outrage by our Navy upon a sister republic is aggravated by the
issue which the President of the United States in his Annual Message
has directly made with the President of Hayti. Of course, Sir, the
President of the United States, when he prepared his Message, was
familiar with a document like that which I now hold in my hands,
entitled “The Monitor, Official Journal of the Republic of Hayti,”
under date of Saturday, the 24th of September, 1870, containing the
message of the President of Hayti addressed to the National Assembly.
This message is divided into sections or chapters, with headings, not
unlike a message or document in our own country. And now, Sir, listen
to what the President of Hayti in this annual message says of the
project of annexion, and then in one moment listen to the issue which
the President of the United States has joined with this President: I
translate it literally:--
“The project of annexion of the Dominican part has been
rejected by the American Senate. The anxieties which this
annexion caused to spring up have been dissipated before the
good sense and the wisdom of the Senate at Washington.”
Of course the President of the United States was intimate with this
document. He could not have undertaken to hurl his bolt against this
feeble republic without knowing at least what its President had said.
I will not do him the wrong to suppose him ignorant. His Secretary of
State must have informed him. He must have known the precise words that
President Saget had employed, when he said that the anxieties caused by
this annexion were dissipated before the good sense and wisdom of the
Senate at Washington. Our President joins issue with President Saget;
he says that the rejection of the treaty was a “folly.” There you have
it. The President of the Black Republic calls the rejection an act of
“good sense” and “wisdom”; the President of the United States calls
it an act of “folly.” Am I wrong? Let me read from the Message of our
President:--
“A large commercial city will spring up, to which we will be
tributary without receiving corresponding benefits, and then
will be seen the folly of our rejecting so great a prize.”
So the two stand, President Saget and President Grant,--President Grant
speaking with the voice of forty millions, and this other President,
who has less than six hundred thousand people, all black.
If the President of the United States had contented himself with thus
joining issue with the President of Hayti, I should have left the two
face to face; but, not content with making this issue, the President
of the United States proceeds to menace the independence of Hayti.
Sir, the case is serious. Acting in the spirit of his commodore, he
nine times over makes this menace. I have the Message here, and now I
substantiate what I say. The part relating to this subject begins,--
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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