Orleans independent standard. [volume] (Irasburgh, Vt.) 1856-1871, 1856-06-13

declarations here, accompanied by his
declaration that he would violate his oath
now recently taken?"
/ Clay of Alabama stopped to a still
lower and grosser state of abuse. After
accusing Mr.. Sumner of falsehood and
perjury, he proceeded as follows:
81 ask you how would such a miscre-
ant be treated? Why, if you could not
reach him with the arm of the municipal
law, if you could not send him to the
penitentiary, you would send him to Gov
entry. You would exclude him from the
pale Of society; you would neither ex-
tend TO him the courtesies that are shown
gentlemen, nor permit him to offer such
to you. You would make him fear that
he was Stunned like leper, and loathed
like filthy reptile. And yeu would
soon render him as impotent for evil as
he was disinclined for good.
1 have suggested our means of rebuk-
ing, if we cannot silence him; of disa-
bling, if we cannot disarm him. If we
cannot check individual abuses, we may
preserve the dignity ofthis body. If we
cannot restrain or prevent this eternal
warfare upon the feelings nr5 ,iyI.- &c
Southern gentlemen, we may rob the SER
pent of his fangs. We can paralyze his
influence by placing him in that nadir of
social degradation which he merits. l
am surprised, 1 repeat, am surprised
that honorable men, utespecially South
ern men, should so far forget their rights
and those of their constituents, and their
duties to them, as we'll as to themselves,
as to lend any countenance to such a
character as l have portrayed"
At a later period, Mason of Virginia
as8ailed him in the following language:
a will say this in the presence of the
Senate, that when the Senator from
Massachusetts dared, in this chamber,
and among thoseswho knew the Senator
from South Carolina to connect his name
with untruth-for he did so-he presen.
ted himself here as the one utterly inca
pable of knowing what truth is-utterly
incapable Of conceiving the perception
of an honorable mind, when directed to
the investigation of truth. He present.
ed himself as the cunning artifcer or
torger, who knows no other use of truth
than to give currency to falsehood who
uses the beaten gold to enable him to pass
off the false coin; who distinguishes be-
tween that which is pure metal and that
which is not so, only to enable him to
deceive those who have trusted him here.
But, Mr.. President, did not intend to
be betrayed into this debate. have said
that the necessity of political position
alone brings me into relations with men
upon this floor who elsewhere 1 cannot
acknowledge as possessing manhood in
any form. l am constrained to hear
here depravity, vice in its most odious
form, uncoiled in this presence, exhibit
ing Its loathsome deformities in accusa-
ton and villifcation against the quarter
of the country from which 1 come; and
must listen to it because it is a necessi-
to of my position, under a common gov
eminent, to recognize as an equal, polit-
ically, one whom to see elsewhere is to
shun and despise."
After enduring in silence for nearly
five years the gross and vulgar abuse, of
which the foregoing is sample in char
acter, but not hundredth part in quaint
ty, MIR. Sumner at length turns upon his
assailants, and with keen, polished, and
gentlemanly, but severe sarcasm, shows
them that his silence has been the silence
of forbearance and not of fear or inabil-
ity. And when, for meeting and foiling
his antagonists with weapons like their
own, he is beaten almost to death in the
seat which is protected by the Constitu-
ton of the United States, men talk of
the proUoeations he has given! The i'm
pudence of this excuse is equalled only
by its absurdity, and both are so great
that We shall not waste our time nor in
suit the common sense of our readers. by
attempting further to ref1te it.
Book Notices.