Excerpt from National Affairs at Home and Abroad: Speech of Hon. Charles Sumner at the Annual Convention of the Republican Party of Massachusetts, Held at Worcester, September 22, 1869 Return thee, therefore, with a flood of tears, And wash away thy country's stained spots. Such a mood would have been the beginning of peace. How easy to see that these men should have been admonished frankly and kindly to return home, there to plant, plough, sow, reap, buy, sell and be prosperous, but not to expect any place in the copartnership of government until there was completest security for all. Instead of this, they were sent back plotting how to obtain ascendency at home as the stepping stone to ascendency in the nation. Such was the condi tion of things in the autumn of 1865, when, sounding the alarm from this very platform, I insisted Upon irreversible guarantees against the Rebellion, and espe cially for security to the, national freedman and the national creditor. It was for security that I then insisted, believing that, though the war of armies was ended, this was a just object of national care, all contained in the famous time honored postulate of war, Security for the Future, without which peace is no better than armistice. To that security one thing is needed, -simply this: all men must be safe in their rights, so that affairs, whether of government or business, shall have a free and natural course. But there are two special classes still in jeopardy, as in the autumn of 1865 - the national freedman and the national creditor, - each a creditor of the nation and entitled to protection; each under the guardianship of the Public Faith, - and behind these are faithful unionists, now suffering terribly from the growing reaction. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.