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by the border ruffians at Lawrence, and several unoffending citizens murdered.
“Crush them out!”
said Gen. Stringfellow: “let them vote at the point of the bowie-knife and revolver.”
The whole country was aroused.
“Down with the Black Republicans!”
and “Disunion!”
were the Southern, “No more slave territory!”
“No slave-hunting!”
were the Northern watchwords.
To quell the outrages in Kansas, the advocates of freedom demanded of the administration immediate and decisive action; but, subservient to the slave oligarchy, it steadily fanned the flame of the aggressive party.
The contest deepened in the halls of Congress.
Front to front the defenders of the two opposing systems stood, with crimination and recrimination, taunt, invective, and defiance, on their tongues.
Intrenched in principle, calm and unterrified as a Roman gladiator, Mr. Sumner met the shafts of hatred, and dealt with stalwart arm his deadly blows against the servile institution.
He was then the best representative of freedom living.
During the winter he said to Mr. Waldo Higginson, “The session will not pass without the Senate-chamber's becoming the scene of some unparalleled outrage;” but he had no fears except that he might not fulfil his duty to his country.
B. B. Russell, 1874.
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