Charles Sumner: His Complete Works, Volume 08 (of 20)

This is Volume 8 of Charles Sumner's Complete Works, containing his Senate speeches from 1861-1862. The Civil War is underway, and Sumner uses his voice as a weapon for justice. He argues for the revision of national statutes, for the rights of Black inventors to patent protection, for the humane treatment of fugitive slaves seeking refuge behind Union lines. He confronts what should happen to those who supported secession. These are not abstract philosophizing, this is the raw material of moral argument deployed in a nation tearing itself apart. Sumner's rhetoric is relentless, principled, often infuriating to his opponents. He refuses to yield an inch on slavery's abolition, even as thousands die. This volume captures one of American history's most uncompromising voices at the moment when his convictions became indistinguishable from the national crisis itself. It is essential reading for anyone interested in primary sources from the Civil War era, American political history, oratory, and the moral foundations of American law.