A correspondent of the _Plymouth Memorial_ put this point strongly.
“It is true, the country press spoke out and denounced this attack upon Mr. Sumner, and the attempt which is being made to take him from his place and put in it some weak-backed quietist, who, afraid to look this thing in the face, would palter weak commonplaces, and, while the patient writhed in the paroxysms of pain, would administer soothing drops instead of strong medicine to cure the disease. Mr. Sumner struck at Worcester the key-note of an anthem that will, ay, that is now being taken up by the people, and the sound of which will put the croaking of these penny trumpets far out of hearing.”
The _Norfolk County Journal_, by one of its correspondents, explained the opposition.
“Of course no man with his eyes open needs to be told that this furious onslaught on Mr. Sumner has very little to do with this speech. _It is the opening of the war to defeat his reëlection next fall._ A year ago the same papers made, if possible, more savage attacks upon Mr. Andrew. Before he was nominated every one of them opposed him, and after his nomination not one of them supported him cordially; and most of them predicted, that, though he might be carried through by the Presidential election, yet in another year the reaction would sweep him into oblivion. They will find themselves equally mistaken about Mr. Sumner.”
Wendell Phillips, alluding to the assaults upon the speech, wrote:--
“If it had no other advantage, suffice it that it shows you who your personal enemies are.”
Not content with arraigning the policy proposed by Mr. Sumner, his assailants became critics of another sort. They insisted that he was wrong in his illustrations from history,--misrepresenting the decree of Emancipation at Athens, and misquoting Plutarch.
The decree of Emancipation can be read, and also the record of the excitement which followed. That Hyperides at a desperate moment proposed Emancipation as a measure of defence against a triumphant conqueror is indisputable, and that such a measure was already known in Athens among war powers is attested by the scholiast of Aristophanes,[177] while a candid interpretation of all the circumstances, including the acceptable peace unexpectedly offered by Philip, points to the conclusion that the latter was unwilling to provoke this untried warfare.[178] This incident is described by a French writer, who gives to it the same effect as Mr. Sumner:--