Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 10.djvu/88

 SUMNKR

SUMNER

treateil in every respect as a. freeilnian with all projwr remedies in courts of justice; and no power or control shall be exercised with regard to him. except in conformity with law.'' The auKMulinent was adopted, ami uixm Senator Sumner fell the burden of supjtorting the bill at every stage. He introduced the first bill to re- form civil service. April 30. 1864; proposed a national tax on the circulation and capital of national banks; advocated the establisiiment of a branch mint in On-gon; opposed imposts on books and educational appliances: and proposed a bill to incoriwrate a national academy of litera- ture atul art. In the presidential campaign of 1S04 he took an active part in supporting Lincoln and Johnson, speaking in several cities. He moved the admission of a colored man, J. S. Rock, of Boston, to the supreme court bar. and the motion was granted by Chief-Justice Cliase. On June 1, 1.S65, he delivered in Boston a eulogy on Al)raham Lincoln, and urged his views on Negro suffrage as essential to hastening reconstruction. lie strongly opjwsed President Johnson, and his policy of reconstruction, and voted for all the articles of impeachment. He was married in October, 1866, to Alice Mason Hooper of Boston, but in September, 1867, they separated and later were legally divorced. On Dec. 13, 1866, a bill giving suffrage to colored men in the District of Columbia was passed by the senate. On Feb. 15, 1867, Senator Sumner was appointed a member of the committee of seven, to decide on the pending proposition relative to suffrage and moved amend- ment to the effect that all citizens within a pro- per residence should be voters. His amendment was passed by the committee, and the suffrage bill was passed Feb. IG, after an all niglit session. He was opposed to the election of General Grant to the Presidency, and early in the administration lie opf)osed the Johnson-Clarendon treaty with England, and the acquisition of Santo Domingo. This oi)j)osition caused a personal rupture with President Grant and Secretary Fish, and Sumner's removal as chairman of the committee on foreign affairs followed March 10, 1871. On March 24, he introduced resolutions calling for the withdrawal of the naval force from Santo Domingo, and in the face of a vigorous attempt to prevent the adoption of the resolution he gained the floor, and delivered a speech in which he severely cen- sured the President for his course in the matter, and on April 5, the Santo Domingo project was abandoned. With Senators Trumbull, Schurz and Fenton, he bocame known as an anti-administra- tion Republican and he opposed there-election oT Clrant. and su|i|«.rt<-d Horace Greeley, on the groimd that "principles must be preferred to jxirty.*' His health breaking down, in September, 1872. he sailed for Europe. On rericliiiig England

he found that he had been nominated as the Democratic candidate for governor of Massachu- setts, and lie at once cabled his refusal to accept the nomination. On his return to the senate in November, he was so ill that he asked to be ex- cused from service on committees, but on the opening day of the session he offered a bill that not contained in the army register or placed on the regimental colors of the United States." He delivered his last public oration at the New Eng- land dinner in New York, Dec. 22, 1873. and on Jan. 27. 1874, he made his last appeal in the senate for civil rights for colored citizens. The civil rights bill was passed by the senate, Ma)" 22, 1874, but failed in the house. At his death he was the senior U.S. senator in consecutive service, hav- ing been elected four times. The honorary de- gree of LL.D. was conferred on him by Yale in 1856, and by Harvard and Amlierst in 1859. He was a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences; a member of the American Piiilo- sophical society, and of the Massachusetts His- torical society. A bust of Sumner b}- Thomas Crawford, 1839, is the property of the Boston Art Museum; one by Martin IMilmore (1874) is in the state house, Boston; a bronze statue bj' Thomas Ball (1878) was placed in the Public Gardens, Bos- ton, and a statue by Anne Whitney (1877) stands opposite the Harvard Law school. Cambridge. In selecting names for a place in the Hall of Fame for Great Americans, New York university, October, 1900. his name, in class M, "Rulers and Statesmen," received 26 votes, 13 of the 37 mines in the class standing higlier. See his •■ Life and Public Services," by Charles Edwards Lester (April, 1874), and his "Memoirs, Life and Works," by Edward Lillie Pierce, his literary executor, two volumes of vrliich were published in 1877. the last two completing the series of 15 volumes being published in 1893. He died in Washington, D.C., March 11,1874, and was buried in Mount Auburn cemetery. ^Mass.
 * ' the names of battles with fellow-citizens be

SUMNER, Edwin Vose, soldier, was born in Boston, Mass., Jan. 30, 1797; son of Elisha (1760- 1839) and Nancy (Vose) Sumner; grandson of Seth, great-grandson of Col. Seth, greats-grand- son of William, greats-grandson of Roger, and great*-grandson of William and Mary Sumner who came to Dorchester, Massachusetts Bay Colony, from Dorchester, England, in 1636, Will- iam Sumner, the immigrant, serving in the gen- eral court of Massachusetts for tliirteen years. His maternal grandfather. Col. Joseph Vose, was descended from Robert Vose, an early settler of Milton, Mass. Edwin Vose Sumner attended Billerica and Milton academies, and was a mer- chant's clerk in Montreal and Boston. He was commissioned 2d lieutenant, 2d infantrv, March,