The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1874-05-22
LAMAR ON SUMNER.
Mississippi MOurns the Death Of the
Great Statesman.

Mr.. LAMAR. Mr.. Speaker, il
rising to second the resolutions
Just offered, desire to add a few
remarks which haye occurred tC
me as appropriate to the occasion
L believe they express a sentiment
which pervades the hearts of al
the people whose Representatives
are here assembled. Strange, as
in looking back upon the past the
assertion may seem, impossible as
it would have been ten wears ago
to make it, it is not the less true
that to-day Mississippi regrets
the death of Charles Sumner and
sincerely unites in paying honors
to his memory. Not because OF
the splendor of his intellect,
though in him was extinguished
enc of the brightest of the lights
which have illustrated the coun-
ellis of the government for nearly
quarter of a century; not be-
cause of the high culture, the ele-
CANT scholarship, and the varied
learning which revealed them
selves so clearly in all his public
efforts as to justify the applica-
ton to him of Johnson's felicitous
expression abe touched nothing
which he did not adorn;" not this,
though these are qualities 10y no
means, it is to be feared, so com
mon in public places as to make
their disappearance, in even a
single instance, a matter of indif-
ference; but because of those
peculiar and strongly marked
moral traits of his character which
gave the coloring to the whole
tenor of his singularly dramatic
public career; traits which made
him for a long period to u large
portion OF his countrymen the
object of as deep and passionate
q hostility as to another he was
one of enthusiastic admiration,
and which are not the less the
cause that now unites all these
parties, ever SO widely differing,
in common sorrow to-day over
his lifeless remains.
1t is of these high moral quail
ties which 1 wish to speak; for
these have been the traits which
in after years, as / have consider
ed the successive acts and utter
ances of this remarkable man,
fastened most strongly my atten-
ton, and impressed themselves
most forcibly upon my magma
ton, my sensibilities, my heart.
L leave to others to speak OF his
intellectual superiority, of those
rare gifts with which nature had
so lavishly endowed him, and of
the power to use them which he
had acquired by education. 1 say
nothing of his vast and varied
stores of historical knowledge, or
of the wide extent of his reading
in the elegant literature of an
cient and modern times, or of his
wonderful power Of retaining
what he had to read, or of his
readiness in drawing upon these
fertile resources to illustrate his
own arguments. say nothing of
his eloquencc as an orator, of his
skill as logician, or of his pow
crs of fascination in the unre-
strained freedom of the social cir
Gle, which last it was my misfor-
tune not to have experienced.
These, indeed, were the qualities
which gave him eminence not only
in our country but throughout the
world; and which have made the
name of Charles Sumner an integ-
raj part Of our nations glory.
They were the qualities which
gave to those moral traits of
which i have spoken the power to
impress themselves upon the his
tory of the age and of civilization
itself; and without which those
traits however intensely develop
ed, would have eXerted no influ-
ence byond the personal circle i'm
mediately surrounding their po-
SCISSOR. More eloquent tongues
than mine will do them justice.
Let me speak of the characters
tics which brought the illustrious
Senator who has just passed away
into direct and bitter antagonism
for years with my own State and
her sister States of the South.
Charles Sumner was born with
an instructive love of freedom,
and was educated from his earli-
est infancy to the belief that free
dom is the natural and indefeasi-
BILE right of every intelligent being
having the outward form of man.
In him in fact this creed seems to
have been something more than a
doctrine imbibed from teachers, or
n result of education. To him it
was grand intuitivc truth in
scribed in blazing letters upon
the tablet of his inner conscious
ness, to deny which would have
been for him to deny that he him
self existed. And along with this
all controlling love of freedom, he
possessed I moral sensibility
keenly intense and vivid, q con
scientiousncss which would never
permit him to swerve by tho
breadth of hair from what he
pictured to himself as the path Of
duty. Thus we've combined in
him the characteristics which have
in all ages given to religion hel
martyrs and to patriotism her self
sacrificing heroes.
To n man thoroughly permeateC
and imbued with such creed
and animated and constantly &c
tuated by such a spirit of devo
ton, to behold q human being o
: n race of human beings restrained
of their natural rights to liberty
t for no crime by him or them com
f mitted, was TO feel all the belliger
emit instincts of his nature rouse
n to combat. The fact was to hiI
5 a wrong which no logic could jus
tify. 1t mattered not how humbl
~ in the scale of rational eXistenc
9 the subject of this restraint Nigh
i be, how dark his skin, or no.
dense his ignorance. Behind a
u that lay for him the great prir
!. ciple that liberty is the birthrigl
= of all humanity, and that ever
q. individual of every race who b;
NJ a soul to save is entitled to I'll
a freedom which may enable him
g. work out his salvation. 1t ma
?" tiers not that the slave might
,g contented with his lot; that h
"a actual condition might be immea
IN urably more desirable than th
from which it had transplant'
ne him; that it gave him physic
o. comfort, mental and moral elev
he ton and religious culture n
ht possessed by his race in any 9th
condition; that his bonds had n
e. been placed upon his hands