Our Domestic Relations; Or, How to Treat the Rebel States, By Charles Sumner, October 1863 Issue

[Celerity]

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1863/10/our-domestic-relations-or-how-to-treat-the-rebel-states/628803/

AT this moment our Domestic Relations all hinge upon one question: How to treat the Rebel States ? No patriot citizen doubts the triumph of our arms in the suppression of the Rebellion. Early or late, this triumph is inevitable. It may be by a sudden collapse of the bloody imposture, or it may be by a slower and more gradual surrender. For ourselves, we are prepared for either alternative, and shall not be disappointed, if we are constrained to wait yet a little longer. But when the day of triumph comes, political duties will take the place of military. The victory won by our soldiers must be assured by wise counsels, so that its hard-earned fruits may not be lost.

The relations of the States to the National Government must be carefully considered, —not too boldly, not too timidly, — in order to see in what way, or by what process, the transition from Rebel forms may be most surely accomplished. If I do not greatly err, it will be found that the powers of Congress, which have thus far been so effective in raising armies and in supplying moneys, will be important, if not essential, in fixing the conditions of perpetual peace. But there is one point on which there can be no question. The dogma and delusion of State Rights, which did so much for the Rebellion, must not be allowed to neutralize all that our arms have gained.

Already, in a remarkable instance, the President has treated the pretension of State Rights with proper indifference. Quietly and without much discussion, he has constituted military governments in the Rebel States, with governors nominated by himself, — all of which testifies against the old pretension. Strange will it be, if this extraordinary power, amply conceded to the President, is denied to Congress. Practically the whole question with which I began is opened here. Therefore to this aspect of it I ask your first attention.

CONGRESSIONAL GOVERNMENT VS. MILITARY GOVERNMENT.

FOUR, military governors have been already appointed: one for Tennessee, one for South Carolina, one for North Carolina, and the other for Louisiana. So far as is known, the appointment of each was by a simple letter from the Secretary of War. But if this can be done in four States, where is the limit? It may be done in every Rebel State, and if not in every other State of the Union, it will be simply because the existence of a valid State government excludes the exercise of this extraordinary power. But assuming, that, as our arms prevail, it will be done in every Rebel State, we shall then have eleven military governors, all deriving their authority from one source, ruling a population amounting to upwards of nine millions. And this imperatorial dominion, indefinite in extent, will also be indefinite in duration; for if, under the Constitution and laws, it be proper to constitute such governors, it is clear that they may be continued without regard to time, — for years, if you please, as well as for weeks, — and the whole region which they are called to sway will be a military empire, with all powers, executive, legislative, and even judicial, derived from one man in Washington. Talk of the “ one-man power.” Here it is with a vengeance. Talk of military rule. Here it is, in the name of a republic.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Sumner

Charles Sumner (January 6, 1811 – March 11, 1874) was an American statesman and United States Senator from Massachusetts. As an academic lawyer and a powerful orator, Sumner was the leader of the anti-slavery forces in the state and a leader of the Radical Republicans in the U.S. Senate during the American Civil War. During Reconstruction, he fought to minimize the power of the ex-Confederates and guarantee equal rights to the freedmen. He fell into a dispute with President Ulysses Grant, a fellow Republican, over the control of Santo Domingo, leading to the stripping of his power in the Senate and his subsequent effort to defeat Grant's re-election.

Sumner changed his political party several times as anti-slavery coalitions rose and fell in the 1830s and 1840s before coalescing in the 1850s as the Republican Party, the affiliation with which he became best known. He devoted his enormous energies to the destruction of what Republicans called the Slave Power, that is, to the ending of the influence over the federal government of Southern slave owners who sought to continue slavery and to expand it into the territories. On May 22, 1856, South Carolina Democratic congressman Preston Brooks beat Sumner nearly to death with a cane on the Senate floor after Sumner delivered an anti-slavery speech, "The Crime Against Kansas." In the speech, Sumner characterized the attacker's first cousin once removed, South Carolina Senator Andrew Butler, as a "Don Quixote" who had chosen "the harlot, slavery" as his mistress. The widely reported episode left Sumner severely injured and both men famous. It was several years before he could return to the Senate; Massachusetts not only did not replace him, it re-elected him, leaving his empty desk in the Senate as a reminder of the incident. The episode contributed significantly to the polarization of the country leading up to the Civil War, with the event symbolizing the increasingly vitriolic and violent socio-political atmosphere of the time.

During the war, he was a leader of the Radical Republican faction that criticized President Lincoln for being too moderate on the South. Sumner specialized in foreign affairs and worked closely with Lincoln to ensure that the British and the French refrained from intervening on the side of the Confederacy during the Civil War. As the chief Radical leader in the Senate during Reconstruction, Sumner fought hard to provide equal civil and voting rights for the freedmen on the grounds that "consent of the governed" was a basic principle of American republicanism, and to block ex-Confederates from power so they would not reverse the gains derived from the Union's victory in the Civil War. Sumner, teaming with House leader Thaddeus Stevens, battled Andrew Johnson's reconstruction plans and sought to impose a Radical Republican program on the South. Although Sumner forcefully advocated the annexation of Alaska in the Senate, he was against the annexation of the Dominican Republic, then known by the name of its capital, Santo Domingo. After leading senators to defeat President Ulysses S. Grant's Santo Domingo Treaty in 1870, Sumner broke with Grant and denounced him in such terms that reconciliation was impossible. In 1871, President Grant and his Secretary of State Hamilton Fish retaliated; through Grant's supporters in the Senate, Sumner was deposed as head of the Foreign Relations Committee. Sumner had become convinced that Grant was a corrupt despot and that the success of Reconstruction policies called for new national leadership. Sumner bitterly opposed Grant's re-election by supporting the Liberal Republican candidate Horace Greeley in 1872 and lost his power inside the Republican Party. Less than two years later, he died in office. Sumner was controversial in his time; even the 1960 Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of Sumner by David Herbert Donald described him as an arrogant egoist. Sumner was known for being an ineffective political leader in contrast to his more pragmatic colleague Henry Wilson. Ultimately, Sumner has been remembered positively, with biographer Donald noting his extensive contributions to anti-racism during the Reconstruction era. Many places are named for him.


Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote of Sumner:

Mr. Sumner's position is exceptional in its honor…. In Congress, he did not rush into party position. He sat long silent and studious. His friends, I remember, were told that they would find Sumner a man of the world like the rest; "it is quite impossible to be at Washington and not bend; he will bend as the rest have done." Well, he did not bend. He took his position and kept it…. I think I may borrow the language which Bishop Burnet applied to Sir Isaac Newton, and say that Charles Sumner "has the whitest soul I ever knew."… Let him hear that every man of worth in New England loves his virtues.

[duckworth969]

1. Thanks for sharing that speech

Striking parallels between then and now.