ADMISSION OF MISSISSIPPI TO REPRESENTATION IN CONGRESS.
Speech in the Senate, February 17, 1870.
February 8, 1870, Mr. Trumbull, from the Committee on the Judiciary, to whom had been referred a bill from the House for the admission of Mississippi to representation in Congress, with conditions the same as in the case of Virginia, reported it back with an amendment striking out all these, and admitting the State unconditionally.
In a speech, February 17th, in reference to the proposed amendment, Mr. Sumner said:—
MR. PRESIDENT,—Throughout the long struggle anterior to the Rebellion, and then throughout the Rebellion itself, Slavery had two voices by which it was heard in this Chamber and in the country. The first was that by which its continued existence was vindicated, or, if you please, the right of Slavery; the other was that of State Rights. By these two voices was Slavery heard. Happily, the first is silenced; but the other is still sounding among us, crying out against those generous efforts by which Human Rights are assured.
I am not wrong in this statement. From the beginning it has been the same. How often in times past have we heard the cry of State Rights! At every proposition concerning Slavery, at the presentation of every petition against this tyrannical wrong, at every allusion to it, the cry was heard. And when the Rebellion broke forth, the same cry was raised against those great measures of self-defence by which Slavery, our real enemy, was assailed; and then at each stage of Reconstruction it was the same. Not a measure of Reconstruction which has not encountered this pretension of State Rights. It broke forth in the Virginia debate. It breaks forth on the present occasion. Again we hear the voice of Slavery.
This pretension, which is so constantly manifest, finds partisans naturally on the other side of the Chamber. It is easy for Senators who have upheld Slavery to uphold that interpretation of the Constitution which was the constant ally of Slavery; but it is incomprehensible how Senators fresh from the great battle with Slavery should continue in dalliance with the constant ally.
The argument for State Rights proceeds on a misapprehension. Nobody doubts the right of a State to local self-government, through which are supplied the opportunities of political education, and also of local administration adapted precisely to local wants. This is the peculiarity of our national system, wherein it differs especially from the centralized imperialism of France. But while recognizing the State as the agency for all matters properly local, it must not be allowed to interfere with those other matters, being rights and duties, which are not local, but universal.
Now, Sir, nothing can be clearer than that the Equal Rights of All must be placed under the safeguard of one uniform law which shall be the same in all parts of the nation,—the same in Charleston and New Orleans as in Boston and Chicago. It is absurd to suppose that the rights of the citizen can differ in different States. They must be the same in all the States; but this can be consummated only by the national authority. Therefore, on grounds of reason, I repel that pretension of State Rights which would take this just prerogative from the nation. Understand me, Sir, I do not seek to centralize, but to nationalize. The partisans of State Rights, in their efforts to decentralize, would denationalize. In the name of local self-government they would overthrow the nation.