“The Hunkers will make the most strenuous efforts to secure a large representation in this agency, so that, by means of their influence with the people (and in travelling from town to town), they can poison the minds of prominent citizens against you, and accomplish your defeat by securing a Legislature favorable to their purposes.

“Depend upon it, that they are calculating largely upon the Tax Bill as an element in their desperate ‘strategy’ for the fall campaign.”

“Most of our Republican statesmen have a political history antecedent to our existing organizations. Mr. Sumner, nearly alone, is nowhere regarded as having Whig or Democratic predilections, but as purely and wholly Republican.

“Other statesmen, however profoundly Republican, regard collateral questions with an observing interest: the Tariff, the Currency, the Pacific Railroad, &c., largely engross their attention. Mr. Sumner profoundly believes it of paramount, absorbing interest that the nation should be just, even to her humblest, most despised children, and that Righteousness is the essential condition of material and other prosperity. Never inattentive to or neglectful of any public duty, never even accused of sacrificing or opposing the interest of Massachusetts in any matter of legislation, he is yet known to believe that her interests can never be truly promoted by sacrificing those of Humanity. In an age of venality and of uncharitable suspicion, he was never even suspected of giving a mercenary or selfish vote; in an atmosphere where every man is supposed to have his price, and to be scheming and striving for self-aggrandizement, no man ever suggested that Charles Sumner was animated by sinister impulses, or that he would barter or stifle his convictions for the Presidency. The one charge brought against him by his many bitter adversaries imports that he is a fanatic,—not that it was ever imagined that he is the special devotee of any fane or sect, but that he sincerely believes it the end of civil government to hasten the coming of God’s earthly kingdom by causing His justice to pervade every act, every relation, and thus making the earth, so far as human imperfection will permit, a vestibule of heaven.”

“All that the Republicans of other States can and do ask is, that no back-stairs intrigue, no chimney-corner arrangement, shall send to Boston a Legislature secretly pledged to oust him, and elected by constituencies profoundly ignorant of any such manipulation.… All we ask is, that those who vote at the polls to supersede Mr. Sumner in the Senate shall know for what they vote, and not be duped by professions only made to deceive.”

“No emancipation and turning loose upon them hordes of uncivilized and ignorant Africans.… No tyrant in history has ever made his name execrated by measures more despicable than such as those proposed by the Abolitionists for the humiliation and destruction of the South. The Southern people have been deluded by their leaders in the same way as the Northern people, and, in his opinion, the next man who walked up the scaffold after Jefferson Davis should be Charles Sumner. [Loud and long-continued applause, mingled with hooting and groans for Sumner. Some person in the meeting attempted to say a word in his favor, but his voice was quickly drowned in loud shouts of ‘Put him out!’]”

“And if we came to hanging every traitor in this country in the order of their guilt, the next man who marched upon the scaffold after Jefferson Davis would be Charles Sumner. [Loud applause, the greatest of the evening thus far. Groans for Sumner. Great excitement. Cries of ‘Put him out!’ Cries, ‘Where is Horace Greeley?’]”

“There are now two war-cries in New York, and the great Union mastiff is as ready to pounce upon one of the brutes as upon the other. If there are two parties outside of the doomed radicals, they are those, the most violent of them, who would hang Jeff. Davis and Sumner together, and those who would hang Davis first and Sumner afterwards.

“If Sumner is reëlected to the Senate, he may not find it convenient to pass through this city. That his name is odious, infamous, is not all,—it is cursed and abominable. The blood of thousands sacrificed to his ambition and personal revenge cries to Heaven against him, and if a Massachusetts Legislature can still support him by its vote, those who do so will deserve to lose their children at the altar of this Moloch.”

“By the foulest means they have succeeded in clogging the wheels of our progress in the war, and have made another year of battles unavoidable. Had it not been for them and their coadjutors, the war would have been over and the Union restored on the Fourth of July instant. More than any other men they are responsible for the useless sacrifice of blood and treasure in the past, and for the three hundred thousand more men and five hundred millions more dollars which will have to be perilled in the future. Practically, and in the most emphatic sense, they are traitors to the country and enemies of the nation. From them, more than from a thousand Vallandighams, Jeff. Davis has received aid and comfort; for they have strengthened his forces by exasperating the South and by dividing and weakening the North. We hope that the loyal men of Massachusetts and Ohio will raise these questions in the coming elections for State legislators, and vote down every man who is pledged or who intends to vote for the reëlection of these twin traitors, Sumner and Wade. They have only escaped Fort Lafayette and the gallows because the Government has distrusted its own power and misunderstood the sentiments of the loyal people. Let this misunderstanding now end, and let Messrs. Sumner and Wade find, when they return to their homes, that they are held personally and politically responsible for their infamous and treasonable course.”

“Remember, it is our duty not only to sustain the arms of the Generals in the field, but likewise to sustain the President in his seat, the Cabinet in its counsels, the Governor in his chair, and, above all, the fearless legislator in his duty. [Loud applause, and cries of ‘Good!’]”

“Resolved, That the most decisive measures for the complete and permanent suppression of this Rebellion are the most prudent, and that, as the institution of Slavery is a principal support of it, that institution shall be exterminated.”

“Resolved, That we recognize and acknowledge the preëminent merits and services of our Senators in the Congress of the United States, the Hon. Charles Sumner and the Hon. Henry Wilson. In the posts of duty assigned them by the suffrages of their brother Senators, one as Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations, and the other as Chairman of the Committee on Military Affairs, they have cordially and unreservedly, and with masterly ability, supported all governmental measures, and fitly represented the Commonwealth as among the most cheerful and enthusiastic defenders of the Government. And now that the second term of our senior Senator is drawing to a close, we desire to express our warm approbation of his course and appreciation of his services, and to commend him to the suffrages of his fellow-citizens, whom he has served so well, that the Commonwealth may again honor itself by returning to duty at the capital a statesman, a scholar, a patriot, and a man of whom any republic in any age might be proud.”

“And I tell you, Gentlemen,—and every heart here responds to it,—every heart out of this hall would respond to it, if the lips would speak the language of the heart,—I tell you, Gentlemen, we want men in the Halls of Congress, in the House of Representatives, and, above and beyond all, in the Senate Chamber, who will attend to those interests, and not be continually, as they have been, Sir, attending to mere wild speculations and sentimental theories. [Applause.] Do not the people cry out, ’For God’s sake, give us somebody who believes there is something to be attended to in the wants of a million and a quarter of white men, women, and children’? [Great applause.]”

“The partisanship of the People’s Convention all centres in opposition to Charles Sumner. It is as pure an instance of personal hate on the part of its leaders as was ever exhibited. This animosity comes solely from the fact that he was the earliest and has been the most persistent advocate of what is now the policy of the nation. They hate Mr. Sumner, not because he is personally unamiable, not because there is a flaw in his moral character or a doubt as to the purity of his intentions, not because he has not represented the opinion of Massachusetts, and faithfully advocated her best interests on every point affecting her material prosperity. They have commenced this personal crusade solely because he has been the most conspicuous and uncompromising foe to the encroachments of Southern Slavery. And now that the President has ranged himself on Mr. Sumner’s side, in opposing him they oppose the Administration.”

“Let me, then, appeal to you to come here with one heart and with kindly feelings towards all, entertaining respect for the opinions of all, so that, when this Convention shall have adjourned, a voice will go forth throughout this Commonwealth, that the day of John A. Andrew and Charles Sumner is ended. [Prolonged cheers.]”

“I say this much, before turning again to my immediate subject, for our great Senator, who has done justice to the manufacturing interests and the shipping of Massachusetts, as Webster did, and also justice to her conscience and her thought, as Webster did not. [Applause.] I do not wish to take one leaf from the laurel of the great Defender of the Constitution; he rests at Marshfield, beneath the honors he fairly earned. But we have put in his place a man far more practical than he was; we have put in his place the hardest worker that Massachusetts ever sent to the Senate of the United States [applause]; we have put in his place the Stonewall Jackson of the floor of the Senate,—patient of labor, untiring in effort, boundless in resources, terribly in earnest,—the only man who, in civil affairs, is to be compared with the great terror of the Union armies, the General of the Virginia forces: both ideologists, both horsed on an idea, and both men whom a year ago the drudges of State Street denounced, or would have denounced, as unpractical and impracticable; but when the war-bugle sounded through the land, both were found to be the only men to whom Carolina and Massachusetts hasted to give the batons of the opposing hosts.”

“In looking over the speeches and newspapers of his active opponents, it really seems to me, that, if ever a man was hated and condemned for his very virtues, it is this gentleman. Nobody accuses him of making use of his high position for his own personal emolument; no shadow of suspicion rests upon the purity of his private or public character; no man can point to an instance in which he has neglected any duty properly devolving upon him; no interest of his State has been forgotten or overlooked; no citizen has appealed to him in vain for kindly offices and courteous hearing and attention. As Chairman of the Committee of Foreign Affairs, his industry and ability have never been denied by his bitterest enemies. All admit that he has rendered important service to his Government. What, then, is his crime? Simply and solely this, that he stands inflexibly by his principles,—that he is too hearty in his hatred of the monstrous Wrong which initiated and still sustains the present Rebellion,—that in advance of his contemporaries he saw the danger and proclaimed it,—that he heartily sustains the President in his Proclamation,—that he is in favor of destroying the guilty cause of all our national calamities, that red-handed murderer and traitor against whom the sighs and groans of Massachusetts wives and mothers, weeping in every town and hamlet for dear ones who are not, are rising in swift witness to God.

“This is his crime, his real offence, in the eyes of his leading opponents. I know it has been said that he is too much a man of ideas, and not a statesman. That he is not a politician, in the modern sense of the word, I admit; and if indirection, trickery, and the habit of looking upon men, parties, and principles as mere stock in trade and tools of convenience are the qualifications of statecraft, then he is not a statesman. But if a thorough comprehension of the great principles of law and political economy, of all which constitutes the true honor and glory and prosperity of a people,—if the will and ability to master every question as it arises,—if entire familiarity with the history, resources, laws, and policy of other nations, derived not merely from the study of books, but from free personal intercourse with the leading minds of Europe, are essential requisites of statesmanship, then is Charles Sumner a statesman in the noblest and truest sense. Certain it is that he is so regarded by the diplomatic representatives of European nations, and that no man in the country has so entirely the confidence and esteem of all who are really our friends in the Old World.”

“For the first time in our political history, a party has been organized and a State ticket nominated for the sole purpose of defeating the reëlection of one who is not a State officer, and never aspired to be. Governor Andrew is regarded with a hostility intensified by the fewness of those who feel it; but the bitterness with which Mr. Sumner is hated insists on the gratification of a canvass, even though a hopeless one; and, since there was no existing party by which this could be attempted without manifest futility, one was organized for the purpose. And it was best that this should be. Let us have a census of the friends and the enemies of Mr. Sumner in the State which he has so honored.

“I have said, that, while other Senators have shared his convictions, none has seemed so emphatically, so eminently, as he to embody and represent the growing, deepening Antislavery sentiment of the country. None has seemed so invariably to realize that a public wrong is a public danger, that injustice to the humblest and weakest is peril to the well-being of all. Others have seemed to regard the recent developments of disunion and treason with surprise and alarm: he has esteemed them the bitter, but natural, fruit of the deadly tree we have so long been watering and cherishing. The profound, yet simple truth, that ‘Righteousness exalteth a nation,’—that nothing else is so baleful as injustice,—that the country which gains a large accession of territory or of wealth at the cost of violating the least tittle of the canons of eternal rectitude has therein made a ruinous mistake,—that nothing else can be so important or so profitable as stern uprightness: such is the key-note of his lofty and beneficent career. May it be vouchsafed him to announce from his seat in the Senate the final overthrow of the demon he has so faithfully, so nobly resisted, and that from Greenland to Panama, from the St. John to the Pacific, the sun in his daily course looks down on no master and no slave!”

“This is the third time that this gentleman has been thus honored by the Legislature of Massachusetts. Such repeated tokens of confidence would seem sufficiently to indicate, that, whatever dissent from the views of Mr. Sumner may elsewhere exist, he is the favorite, as he is admitted by all to be the able, representative of the opinions entertained by a majority of the people of this great and influential State. And these views now predominate in the conduct of the present Administration, which may be said to have adopted, reluctantly and at a late day, the political and military policy early commended to its favor by Mr. Sumner.

“If we are not able to concur with Mr. Sumner in certain of his opinions on questions of domestic politics, it gives us only the greater pleasure to bear our cheerful and candid testimony to the enlightened judgment and peculiar qualifications he brings to the discharge of the important duties devolved on him as Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations in the Senate. In this capacity he has deservedly won the confidence of the whole country.”

“By a vote of nearly six to one, Massachusetts again declares her confidence in her long-tried Senator, and, on an issue defined with unmistakable clearness, for the third time returns him to his seat.

“The contrast between his present position and that which he held on first entering the Senate is instructive. Then an arrogant Democratic majority with unequalled effrontery declared him outside of any healthy political organization, excluded him from the Committees, denied him parliamentary courtesies, and withheld the common civilities of social intercourse and acquaintance. There were hardly three or four Senators in Congress who were in any degree identified with his opinions. He declared them none the less boldly, and his speeches for the repeal of the Fugitive Slave Act, on the Nebraska Bill, and on the Crime against Kansas finally exasperated the slaveholding oligarchy into personal violence, and for words spoken in orderly debate he was brutally assaulted on the floor of the Senate and seriously injured. This outrage, and the enthusiastic approval with which it was received throughout the South, were largely instrumental in rousing the North to a right estimate of the system and the political power which sought such means of defence.”

“Thus has Massachusetts nobly vindicated her name and fame as the foremost State of all the world in the cause of free institutions, and trampled beneath her feet the malignant aspersions cast upon the political reputation of her gifted Senator by the minions of a traitorous Slave Oligarchy. The vote is an overwhelming one, notwithstanding the desperate efforts of Mr. Sumner’s enemies to make his defeat a sure event. Such enemies only serve to prove his personal worth and public usefulness, and their factious and profligate character.

“Mr. Sumner’s friends in Washington proposed, last week, to give him a serenade in honor of his reëlection to the Senate; but, hearing of their intention, he declared that the compliment was not in accordance with the present condition of public affairs, and intimated that he preferred that the funds subscribed for the music should be donated to the Massachusetts Soldiers’ Relief Association, which was done.”

“To which department of farming the Senator will direct his remarks I know not; but, whatever his topic, I submit without fear his words of instruction and of eloquence to the ordeal of your verdict.

“I have the honor to introduce to you the Hon. Charles Sumner.”