Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XV.djvu/488

 468 BUMNEB smKU, Charles, an American statesman, born in Boston, Mass., Jan. 6, 1811, died in Washington, D. C., March 11, 1874. His fa- ther, who died in 1839, was a graduate of Har- vard college, a lawyer, and for 14 years high sheriff of the county of Suffolk. The son re- ceived his early education at the Boston Latin school, and graduated at Harvard college in 1830. He was appointed reporter of the cir- cuit court of the United States, in which ca- pacity he published three volumes known as "Sumner's Reports," containing decisions of Judge Story. He also at the same time edited the "American Jurist," a quarterly law jour- nal of high reputation. During the first three winters after his admission to the bar, while Judge Story was absent in Washington, Mr. Sumner was appointed lecturer to the law students, and part of the time he had sole charge of the school. His favorite topics were those relating to constitutional law and the law of nations. He visited Europe in 1837, travelled in Italy, Germany, and France, and resided for nearly a year in England. He car- ried to England a letter of introduction from Judge Story, in which he was described as " a young lawyer giving promise of the most emi- nent distinction in his profession, with truly extraordinary attainments, literary and judi- cial; and a gentleman of the highest purity and propriety of character." He was received with unusual distinction in the highest circles, was introduced by eminent statesmen on the floor of the houses of parliament, and invited by the chief judges to sit with them in West- minster hall. He returned to Boston in 1840, and in 1844-'6 published an elaborate edition with annotations of " Vesey's Reports" in 20 vols. Though voting with the whig party, he took no active part in politics till 1845, when on the 4th of July he pronounced before the municipal authorities of Boston an oration on "The True Grandeur of Nations," in which, prompted by the menacing aspect of affairs between the United States and Mexico, he de- nounced the war system as the ordeal by bat- tle still unwisely continued by international law as the arbiter of justice 'bet ween nations, and insisted that this system ought to give way to peaceful arbitration for the adjudication of international questions. His oration attracted unusual attention, led to much controversy, and was widely circulated both in America and Europe. It was followed by a rapid suc- cession of public addresses on kindred themes, which were also widely circulated. Mr. Sum- ner earnestly engaged in the opposition to the annexation of Texas on the ground of slavery. In 1846 he made an address to the whig state convention of Massachusetts on " The Anti- Slavery Duties of the Whig Party," and short- ly afterward published a letter of rebuke to Mr. Robert 0. Winthrop, who then repre- sented Boston in congress, for his vote in fa- vor of the war with Mexico. These steps led eventually to Mr. Sumner's separation from the whig party and association with the free- soilers, to whose candidates, Van Buren and Adams, he lent efficient support in the presi- dential contest of 1848. After the withdrawal of Mr. Webster from the senate of the United States by his entrance into the cabinet of Mr. Fillmore in 1850, Mr. Sumner was nominated for the vacancy by a coalition of freesoilers .and democrats in the Massachusetts legislature, and was elected on April 24, 1851, after a most earnest and protracted contest. He took his seat on Dec. 1, 1851, and retained it by successive reelections till his death. His first important speech was upon the fugitive slave act, against which he argued that congress had no power under the constitution to legis- late for the rendition of fugitive slaves ; and that if it had, the act in many essential par- ticulars conflicted with the constitution, and was also cruel and tyrannical. In this speech Mr. Sumner laid down as a guide for political action the formula to which he ever after- ward adhered, that " freedom is national and slavery sectional." In the debate on the re- peal of the Missouri compromise and on the contest in Kansas, Mr. Sumner took a very prominent part. His last speech upon this topic, which was printed under the title of "The Crime against Kansas," occupied two days in its delivery, May 19 and 20, 1856. Some passages in it greatly incensed the mem- bers of congress from South Carolina, one of whom, Preston S. Brooks, on May 22 as- saulted Mr. Sumner while he was writing at his desk in the senate chamber, and with a gutta percha cane struck him on the head till he fell to the floor insensible. (See BROOKS, PEESTON S.) The injury thus received proved very serious, and was followed by a severe and long disability, from which his recovery was not complete till three or four years later. His term of office as senator expired March 4, 1857, and in the preceding January the legis- lature of Massachusetts reflected him by a unanimous vote in the senate, while in the house of representatives, consisting of several hundred members, he received all but seven votes. Under the advice of physicians he went to Europe for the benefit of his health in March, 1857, and returned in the autumn to re- sume his seat in the senate. His health being still impaired, he went abroad again in May, 1858, remaining till the autumn of 1859, and submitted to a course of extraordinarily se- vere medical treatment in Paris. His next serious effort was an elaborate speech in the senate, denouncing the influence of slavery on character, society, and civilization, which was printed under the title of " The Bar- barism of Slavery." In the presidential con- test of 1860 he made several speeches in be- half of Abraham Lincoln and Hannibal Ham- lin. In the senate and in popular addresses during the civil war he earnestly opposed all concession to or compromise with slavery, and early proposed emancipation as the speedi-