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THE CITY OF BOSTON AND MR. SUMNER.
Letter to the Mayor of Boston, in Acknowledgment of a Resolution of the Board of Aldermen, March 5, 1866.
March 2d, the Board of Aldermen of Boston adopted unanimously the following resolution, which was communicated to Mr. Sumner by the Mayor.
“Resolved, That we deem it fitting time to express our profound sense of the eminent loyalty, patriotism, and statesmanship of our distinguished Senator, Charles Sumner,—to acknowledge the measureless debt of gratitude which the Commonwealth and the nation owe him for his wise counsels and constant and efficient services in this great struggle to establish justice and to secure the prosperity of the Union,—and our indignant conviction of the utter falsehood of any accusation, no matter by whom made, which likens him, either in theory or practice, to the traitor chiefs of the Rebellion, or which charges him with any lack of devotion or loyalty to that great cause of Freedom and Nationality which he has watched with such untiring vigilance and served with such masterly ability.
“Resolved, That a copy of this resolution be forwarded by his Honor the Mayor to Mr. Sumner.”
This resolution was plainly aimed at President Johnson on account of his speech of February 22d.[220]