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قراءة كتاب Charles Sumner; His Complete Works, Volume X (of 20)
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Charles Sumner; His Complete Works, Volume X (of 20)
to Thugs, buccaneers, and cannibals tries to thrust its hideous head among nations, and claims the protection and privileges of International Law,—a power which rose against the freest rule on earth for the avowed motive of propagating the worst form of Slavery ever known, having no legitimate complaint, or, if it had, certainly trying no constitutional means of redress, but plunging at once into arms, and that when the arsenals had been emptied and the fortresses seized by the treason of office-holders,—I hold it to be an offence against law, order, and public morality for a statesman whose words carry weight to speak at all of such a power without declaring abhorrence of it.—Professor Francis W. Newman, Letter to Mr. Gladstone, December 1, 1862.
I blame men who are eager to admit into the Family of Nations a state which offers itself to us, based upon a principle, I will undertake to say, more odious and more blasphemous than was ever heretofore dreamed of in Christian or Pagan, in civilized or in savage times. The leaders of this revolt propose this monstrous thing: that over a territory forty times as large as England the blight and curse of Slavery shall be forever perpetuated.—John Bright, Speech at Birmingham, December 18, 1862.
We are already culpable for a part of this bloody war; for, better informed or less indifferent, less selfish or more adroit, above all, more wise, more sincerely the friends of what is right, we could, from London and Paris, have thrown into the midst of the combatants this declaration, which would have rendered the conflict ephemeral: “Never will either England or France, Christian nations, liberal nations, recognize the existence of a people seeking to found Liberty and Independence on Slavery!” The misfortune of the times, in obscuring our judgment, in dulling our passion for the beautiful ideas of Freedom, has, then, already made us participants, in some respect, in the rebellion of the people of the South, and, in order to mask what was gross and low in our voluntary error, we set up vague reasons of commercial policy and general policy at which our fathers would have blushed.… The truth is, that the revolt of the South is the most impudent and most odious insult that has ever been offered to the ideas of modern Civilization.—Journal des Économistes, Avril, 1864, Tom. XLII. p. 88.
The following speech[1] was delivered at the invitation of the New York Young Men’s Republican Union, at Cooper Institute, on the 10th of September, 1863. The announcement that Mr. Sumner had consented to address the citizens of New York on a subject so momentous attracted an audience numbering not less than three thousand persons, among whom were most of the acknowledged representatives of the intelligence, wealth, and influence of the metropolis. Long before the hour appointed for the delivery of the speech, the entrance-doors were besieged by an impatient and anxious crowd, who, as soon as the gates were opened, filled the seats, aisles, lobbies, and platform of the vast hall, leaving at least an equal number to return home, unable to gain an entrance to the building.
Of the following named gentlemen, who were invited to occupy seats upon the platform, a majority were present, while in the auditorium were hundreds of equally prominent citizens, who preferred to retain seats near the ladies whom they had escorted to the meeting.
Francis Lieber, LL.D., George Bancroft, Major-General Dix, Horace Greeley, George Griswold, John E. Williams, W. W. DeForest, Cornelius Vanderbilt, Abram Wakeman, Rev. Dr. Tyng, Cyrus W. Field, Alexander T. Stewart, Horace Webster, LL.D., Joseph Lawrence, John A. Stevens, Pelatiah Perit, James A. Hamilton, H. B. Claflin, T. L. Thornell, Colonel William Borden, William Goodell, Rev. Dr. Thompson, Rev. Dr. Gillette, William Cullen Bryant, Major-General Fremont, A. A. Low, John Jay, Henry Grinnell, James Gallatin, Cephas Brainerd, William B. Astor, William H. Aspinwall, Oliver Johnson, W. M. Evarts, William Curtis Noyes, Rev. Dr. Hitchcock, Shepherd Knapp, William H. Webb, James W. Gerard, Anson Livingston, Frank W. Ballard, Isaac H. Bailey, George B. Lincoln, General Harvey Brown, Rev. Dr. Shedd, Rev. Dr. Durbin, Peter Cooper, Major-General Doubleday, Charles H. Marshall, Marshall O. Roberts, Judge Bradford, Charles H. Russell, E. Delafield Smith, Hamilton Fish, Robert B. Minturn, Rev. Dr. Cheever, F. B. Cutting, Charles King, LL.D., Rev. Dr. Ferris, Ex-Governor King, George Folsom, Samuel B. Ruggles, S. B. Chittenden, Charles T. Rodgers, Mark Hoyt, Lewis Tappan, Rev. Dr. Storrs, Rev. Dr. Adams, Rev. Dr. Vinton, Daniel Drew, Francis Hall, George William Curtis, Judge Edmonds, Rev. Dr. Asa D. Smith, Truman Smith, William A. Hall, Prosper M. Wetmore, B. F. Manierre, George P. Putnam, E. C. Johnson, Rev. Dr. Osgood, Elliott C. Cowdin, Rev. T. Ralston Smith, J. S. Schultz, M. Armstrong, Jr., D. A. Hawkins, Edgar Ketchum, Joseph Hoxie, Rev. Dr. Bellows, General S. C. Pomeroy, James McKaye, George F. Butman, David Dudley Field.
David Dudley Field, Esq., who had been selected by the Committee as Chairman of the meeting, introduced Mr. Sumner to the audience in the following words.
“Ladies and Gentlemen,—At no former period in the history of the country has the condition of its foreign relations been so important and so critical as it is at this moment. In what agony of mortal struggle this nation has passed the last two years we all know. A rebellion of unparalleled extent, of indescribable enormity, without any justifiable cause, without even a decent pretext, stimulated by the bad passions which a barbarous institution had originated, and encouraged by expected and promised aid from false men among ourselves, has filled the land with desolation and mourning. During this struggle it has been our misfortune to encounter the evil disposition of the two nations of Western Europe with which we are most closely associated by ties of blood, common history, and mutual commerce. Perhaps I ought to have said the evil disposition of the governments, rather than of the nations; for in France the people have no voice, and we know only the imperial will and policy, while in England the masses have no powers, the House of Commons being elected by a fraction of the people, and the aristocratic classes being against us from dislike to the freedom of our institutions, and the mercantile classes from the most sordid motives of private gain. To what extent this evil disposition has been carried, what causes have stimulated it, in what acts it has manifested itself, and what consequences may be expected to follow from it in future, will be explained by the distinguished orator who is to address you this evening. His position as Chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations has given him an acquaintance with the subject equal, if not superior, to that of any other person in the country. He needs no introduction from me. His name is an introduction and a passport in any free community between the Atlantic and the Pacific seas; therefore, without saying more, I will give way for Charles Sumner, of Massachusetts.”
Amid the most marked demonstrations of satisfaction, expressed frequently by long-continued applause and hearty cheers, Mr. Sumner proceeded in the delivery of his discourse. The meeting adjourned about an hour before midnight.
Three New York newspapers and two in Boston printed the entire speech on the day following its delivery.