Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1874-03-23
CIVIL RIGHTS.
Memorial Services in Honor of
Charles sumner by the COIOred
People of Memphis.

Memorial Services i'm Honor of
Charles sumner by the COIOred
People of memphis.
Yesterday several thousand colored
people, headed ~ bands Of music, APP
peared on the streets in procession in
honor Of the late Mr.. Sumner, Of Massa-
chusetts. The procession contained
number Of chief mourners in carriages;
among others were Mayor John League,
Chief of Police Athy, Dr.. Hewett, chair
man Of the Common Council, and Judge
Harry Lee, chairman of the Board Of
Aldermen; Comptroller Newsom, Treas
urer Kelly, Recorder Winters Sergeant.
alarms Droesher, Register William
son, ?. M. Winters, City Recorder; C.
G. Burke, City Engineer; Aldermen
Malatesta, Doyle and Culligan; Council
men Walsh, MORT, Happek, Thomas,
(col), and Clouston, (col) United States
Collector Patterson, United States Mar
shall s. S. Garrett; o. B. Carr, supervi-
son; United States Custom.house officer
L. E. Dyer and Col. Donovan, President
Raleigh railroad. Behind these distin-
guished mourners came the colored sis
ters in hacks. Chief McFadden and
Fire Department failed to accept the
invitation to be present.
Yesterday morning appeared the fol-
lowing Mayoralty proclamation:
MAYORS OFFICE, Cry HALL, /
MEMPHIS, TENN, March 81, 1874.
By request, the members OF the Cen
eral Council and other city officers are
respectfully invited to meet on Sunday,
the I'D inst, at IL o'clock m, in the
Council chamber, for the purpose of
joining the procession in honor to the
memory of the late Hon. Charles Sum-
ner.
M. McFadden, Esq, Chief of the Fire
Department, is requested to have the
members of the fire department join the
procession in uniform.
Very respectfully,
JOHN League, Mayor,
The city officials, with the above ex-
ception, attended to a man, but the
members of the General Council did not
so respond.
The procession passed down Main
street to Beal, out Beal to Second and
up Second to the Pole Bearers hall,
where addresses were delivered on Sum-
ner and the civil rights bill by Rev.
Albert Thomas (col), L. E. Dyer, United
States official, Rev. Edward Thomas
(coD, Wharfmaster Ed Shaw (col) and
others.
The civil rights bill which Mr.. Sumner
desired to be taken care of provides that
the colored man and woman shall be
permitted to attend theaters, churches,
hotels, etc., on the same plane as white
people, to occupy the same seats and eat
OF the same table. As one Of the speak.
ers put it,
l have never seen the day, nor do |
believe that the Hon. Charles Sumner
ever did, VIXEN he didn't believe that the
heart which beat in the bosom of the
black man was as great and as good as
that which beat in the bosom of the
white man. don't believe that Charles
Sumner ever believed that the entrance
to the theater by which the white man
entered was too good for me to enter, or
that the seat which the white man had
in that theater was too good for me to
sit on, [applausel or that the teacher
who taught the white mans child was
ever too good to teach my child, or that
the school to which the white mans
children went was ever too good for my
children.
The celebration passed off quietly,
and the mourners of both Charles Sum-
ner and the civil rights bill returned to
their homes.