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no partisan of protection, and that on that whole question I am absolutely independent.
And again a week later:—
I do not understand your anxiety about protection in New England.
Wilson and myself are not its partisans, and I am ready to move in any policy which is liberal and just,—especially to the West.1
Sumner was with the other senators present at
Mr. Lincoln's inauguration, March 4.
The Senate, meeting the same day to act on the appointments of the new Administration, remained in session till late in the month.
Sumner was at the time mentioned for the
English mission, and
Governor Andrew and other persons of influence desired his appointment; but he put aside the suggestion peremptorily, preferring his place in the Senate to any other.
The Senate listened to the disunion speeches of
Clingman,
Wigfall,
Mason, and
Breckinridge, and to speeches hardly less mischievous from
Douglas and
Bayard.
Douglas was bitter in the extreme towards
Wilson,
Fessenden, and
Hale; and
Wilson in a brief reply justly called his speech ‘mischievous,’ ‘wicked,’ and ‘unpatriotic.’
This was the last of his career, as he died a few weeks after the session closed.
The Republicans generally kept silent in the debate.
They were now in a majority by the withdrawal of senators from the seceded States, and entitled to the chairmanship of the committees and a majority of members of each committee.
It fell to Bright of
Indiana, who nine years before had explained the exclusion of
Chase,
Hale, and
Sumner by saying that they were ‘outside of any healthy political organization,’ to move the new list on which the two parties had agreed.
Sumner was made chairman of the committee on foreign relations, taking the place of
Mason, who had held the post since 1851.
His associates were
Collamer,
Doolittle,
Harris,
Douglas,
Polk, and
Breckinridge.
He was also placed on the committees on private land claims and patents.
His colleague,
Wilson, became chairman of the committee on military affairs.
Sumner, exercising the customary right of a chairman, designated as clerk of his committee
Mr. Ben Perley Poore, not at the time a personal
