C. Edwards Lester, Life and public services of Charles Sumner: Born Jan. 6, 1811. Died March 11, 1874.

[232] And the venerable Senator from South Carolina, too, [Mr. Butler]— he has betrayed his sensibility. Here let me say that this Senator knows well that I always listen with peculiar pleasure to his racy and exuberant speech, as it gurgles forth—sometimes tinctured by generous ideas —except when, forgetful of history, and in defiance of reason, he undertakes to defend what is obviously indefensible. This Senator was disturbed, when to his inquiry, personally, pointedly and vehemently addressed to me, whether I would join in returning a fellow-man to Slavery, I exclaimed, ‘Is thy servant a dog, that he should do this thing?’ In fitful phrases, which seemed to come from the unconscious excitement so common with the Senator, he shot forth various cries about ‘dogs;’ and, among other things, asked if there was any ‘dog’ in the Constitution? The Senator did not seem to bear in mind, through the heady currents of that moment, that, by the false interpretation he has fastened upon the Constitution, he has helped to nurture there a whole kennel of Carolina bloodhounds, trained, with savage jaws and insatiable scent, for the hunt of flying bondmen. No, sir, I do not believe that there is any ‘kennel of bloodhounds,’ or even any ‘dog,’ in the Constitution of the United States.

But, Mr. President, since the brief response which I made to the inquiry of the Senator, and which leaped unconsciously to my lips, has drawn upon me various attacks, all marked by grossness of language and manner; since I have been charged with openly declaring my purpose to violate the Constitution, and to break the oath which I have taken at that desk, I shall be pardoned for showing simply how a few plain words will put all this down.