Late in the evening of Friday, March 29, 1867, Mr. Sumner, on reaching home, found this note from Mr. Seward awaiting him: “Can you come to my house this evening? I have a matter of public business in regard to which it is desirable that I should confer with you at once.” Without delay he hurried to the house of the Secretary of State, only to find that the latter had left for the Department. His son, the Assistant Secretary, was at home, and he was soon joined by Mr. de Stoeckl, the Russian Minister. From the two Mr. Sumner learned for the first time that a treaty was about to be signed for the cession of Russian America to the United States. With a map in his hand, the Minister, who had just returned from St. Petersburg, explained the proposed boundary, according to verbal instructions from the Archduke Constantine. After a brief conversation, when Mr. Sumner inquired and listened without expressing any opinion, they left together, the Minister on his way to the Department, where the treaty was copying. The clock was striking midnight as they parted, the Minister saying with interest, “You will not fail us.” The treaty was signed about four o’clock in the morning of March 30th, being the last day of the current session of Congress, and on the same day transmitted to the Senate, and referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations.

April 1st, the Senate was convened in Executive session by the proclamation of the President of the United States, and the Committee proceeded to the consideration of the treaty. The Committee at the time was Messrs. Sumner (Chairman), Fessenden, of Maine, Cameron, of Pennsylvania, Harlan, of Iowa, Morton, of Indiana, Patterson, of New Hampshire, and Reverdy Johnson, of Maryland. Carefully and anxiously they considered the question, and meanwhile it was discussed outside. Among friendly influences was a strong pressure from Hon. Thaddeus Stevens, the acknowledged leader of the other House, who, though without constitutional voice on the ratification of a treaty, could not restrain his earnest testimony. Mr. Sumner was controlled less by desire for more territory than by a sense of the amity of Russia, manifested especially during our recent troubles, and by an unwillingness to miss the opportunity of dismissing another European sovereign from our continent, predestined, as he believed, to become the broad, undivided home of the American people; and these he developed in his remarks before the Senate.

April 8th, the treaty was reported by Mr. Sumner without amendment, and with the recommendation that the Senate advise and consent thereto. The next day it was considered, when Mr. Sumner spoke on the negotiation, its origin, and the character of the ceded possessions. A motion by Mr. Fessenden to postpone its further consideration was voted down,—Yeas 12, Nays 29. After further debate, the final question of ratification was put and carried on the same day by a vote of Yeas 37, Nays 2,—the Nays being Mr. Fessenden, and Mr. Morrill, of Vermont. The ratifications were exchanged June 20th, and the same day the treaty was proclaimed.

The debate was in Executive session, and no reporters were present. Senators interested in the question invited Mr. Sumner to write out his remarks and give them to the public. For some time he hesitated, but, taking advantage of the vacation, he applied himself to the work, following precisely in order and subdivision the notes of a single page from which he spoke.

The speech was noticed at home and abroad. At home, the Boston Journal, which published it at length, remarked:—

A Russian translation, by Mr. Buynitzky, appeared at St. Petersburg, with an introduction, whose complimentary character is manifest in its opening:—

A French writer, M. Cochin, whose work on Slavery is an important contribution to the literature of Emancipation, in a later work thus characterizes this speech:—

On the appearance of the speech,