Full Bio: The Early Life of Senator Charles Sumner - All Of It with Alison Stewart

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[00:00]
Alison Stewart
All of it is supported by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy to see if you could save when you bundle your home and auto policies. Try it@progressive.com Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states.
[00:27]
Zakir Tammies
This is all of it on wnyc. I'm Alison Stewart. We just talked about ice cream, so it's time to remind you of another summer tradition, the annual all of It Summer Reading Challenge. We're asking you to read at least one book in all of the five following categories. They are a classic you've been meaning to get to, a book about or set in New York City, a memoir or biography, a recent debut novel, or a book published in 2025. Head to wnyc.org summerreading to register and to download the Summer Reading Challenge PDF. Again, that's wnyc.org summerreading once you've completed the challenge, we'll follow up about your selections to receive a prize and happy reading. That is the plan. So let's get this hour started with something that fulfills one of those categories. It's this month's Full Bio Conversation Full Bio Settle Down. Full Bio is our book series where we spend a few days with the author of a deeply researched biography to get a fuller understanding of the subject. Today we'll discuss the book Charles Conscious of a Nation by Zakir tammies. Born in 1811, Senator Charles Sumner was a prominent abolitionist and leader for integration. Now there have been several other bios of Sumner, but this one we're going to talk about has an interesting twist. Its author, to Mes, was recently a graduate from Yale Law School School and He's in his 20s. He's taken a new look at Sumner and what he stood for in this 533 page book. As the New York Times reported, until last year there hadn't been a study of Sumner in four decades, and almost none with his impact on this nation. Charles Sumner was a man who was the grandson of a revolutionary fighter, the first librarian of Harvard Law School, a senator from Massachusetts, and he was at President Lincoln's bedside when he died. And he was a brilliant legal mind, which the book gets into. Sumnu argued that the Constitution is not mean, stingy or pettifogging, but open handed, liberal and just, including always in favor of freedom. He used his position to help the country see that slavery was wrong and would destroy the country. It almost assured him. Sumner, of course, was nearly beaten to death on the Senate floor for his anti slavery views. The book uses 600 of Sumner's personal and professional letters, 400 contemporaneous newspaper articles, and the works of the men who influenced him growing up. Which is where we will start with his family tree, which dates back to the American Revolution. I think before talking about Charles Sumner, it's important to understand his ancestry, which dates back to the Revolutionary War. His paternal grandfather was named Job Sumner. What role did Job play in the American Revolution?
[03:33]
Ira Flatow
Job Sumner was the child of farmers in rural Massachusetts. He descended from one of the first generations of Americans to come to this soil in the 1600s. And he decided to go to Harvard University in his mid teens. And right after he gets there, ironically, the American Revolution begins in the farming town that he had left. And next thing you know, colonists are fighting British redcoats at Lexington and Concord. Job Sumner was itching to get involved in the fight. But the fight came to him when revolutionaries arrived at Harvard University's campus and demanded to take over the college campus to set up a military encampment in Cambridge in order to try to take Boston, which was in British possession at that moment. Harvard asked the student body to leave campus and to continue their studies in the countryside. But Job Sumner said no. Instead, he stayed at Harvard and joined the Revolution. And within just a few years, this farming boy rises the ranks of the Revolutionary Army. And by 1783, he is a leading major who helps to supervise the evacuation of the British from New York City, escorts George Washington into the city to liberate New York and becomes one of the leading revolutionaries.
[05:26]
Zakir Tammies
It's really interesting because one of our listeners, we had a segment on France's Tavern and that he was there. Job was there to help George Washington celebrate the end of the war. But I'm curious, what did he do with himself after the war?
[05:45]
Ira Flatow
That's right. Job Sumner was there with Washington, Fraunce's Tavern, when Washington is kissing goodbye to the officers. And then Job Sumner afterwards gets an appointment to be a commissioner in Georgia. And here is what is really striking. Job Sumner, this revolutionary who fought for freedom, goes to Georgia, hobnobs with southern planters and becomes a slaveholder. And unbeknownst to Washington, or probably to anyone in the Revolutionary Army, Job Sumner had a son which was Charles Sumner's father, Charles Pinckney Sumner. Job Sumner impregnated a farm girl in Massachusetts around the same time of the Battle of Lexington and Concord. He did not marry this woman. And so he has this bastard son in rural Massachusetts who is Literally toiling to survive, who is herding cows late at night, who doesn't have much of an education at first, while Job Sumner is enjoying a prestigious life as a Southern planter.
[06:57]
Zakir Tammies
It's interesting. The girl that he impregnated named him Job Junior. But he didn't take too kindly to that. Gave him the name Charles Pinckney Sumner. Why Charles Pinckney?
[07:10]
Ira Flatow
Charles Pinckney was a founding father from the south who was extremely pro slavery, who was probably one of the most pro slavery founding fathers. And for Job Sumner, it was an honor to name his son after this man. And yet, Charles Pinckney Sumner grows up deeply resentful of his father. Understandably so. When his father ultimately dies, he gets some money and enrolls himself at Harvard College. And while there, he becomes an abolitionist, probably as a way to reject his father's contradictory ideals of being both a revolutionary and being a slaveholder. And Charles Pinckney Sumner would go on, after graduating from Harvard, to become a sailor. A sailor who traveled on a ship that stopped in Haiti during the Haitian Revolution. And while he's there, General Jean Pierre Boyer, one of the leading Haitian revolutionaries, organizes a birthday party to celebrate George Washington's birthday. And this white boy from Massachusetts, son of the American Revolution, joins this celebration in Haiti and actually lifts his glass and gives a toast to liberty, freedom, and equality for all men. General Boyer is so shocked to see this white American celebrating the Haitian cause and invites him to the front where he stays for the rest of the night. And I think this combination of Charles Pinckney Sumner celebrating the Haitian Revolution and his father, Job Sumner, celebrating the American Revolution, probably informed the grandson Charles Sumner's upbringing and ideology.
[09:06]
Zakir Tammies
My guest is author Zakir Tammies. We're discussing his book, Charles Conscience of a Nation. It's our choice for full B. All right. Charles Pinckney Sumner marries a woman named Relief Jacobs. I love that name. And the subject of your bio. Charles Sumner is born. He's a twin of Matilda. He's the eldest of, I believe, eight children. What kind of child was Charles Sumner?
[09:35]
Ira Flatow
Charles Sumner was a fascinating kid. He is very scrawny. He looked sickly. He didn't engage or enjoy physical activity. He didn't go swimming with his siblings. He was not interested in dance class, and he just loved to learn. So while he's young, he decided that he wanted to learn Latin and he wanted to go to the Boston Latin School. Now, the Sumners didn't have much money, and Charles Sumner decides to borrow money from an older classmate to Give him a Latin textbook, and he comes down the stairs one day, confronts his father while his dad is shaving and starts to speak in Latin. And he's like 9 years old at this moment. And that was his way of persuading his parents to give him an opportunity to take the entrance exam to the Boston Latin School. He's accepted, and next thing you know, this scrawny kid is starting to learn the classics, something that he would enjoy for the rest of his life.
[10:48]
Zakir Tammies
He grew up in a neighborhood where black Bostonians lived, sort of the black Beacon Hill area. Tell us a little bit about the people that live there, and how do you think that shaped Sumner's feelings about race early on?
[11:05]
Ira Flatow
So Sumner grows up in a contradiction. On the one hand, he's a third generation Harvard educated man, or he grows up and becomes a Harvard educated man. On the other hand, he is living in this ethnic enclave of Boston that has a large free black community because his family did not have any money to live anywhere else. And that experience gave him a deep sense of empathy and sympathy for his black neighbors. Black Boston at this time is a small community of extremely persecuted and marginalized people. But there are also a number of artists, of writers, musicians. Free Black Boston, around 1,000 people, was in many ways the cultural capital of black America in the early 1800s. Only a few blocks from Charles Sumner's home was the African Meeting House, one of the first black churches in the country, still standing today. There was also a black Masonic lodge, the first of its kind. There was the African Mutual Aid Society, an organization of free blacks that would try to give money to protect their own community. Sumner saw black schoolchildren going to the Smith School, one of the earliest black schools in the country. And there were writers in the community, like David Walker, a famous black abolitionist, who wrote a tract that called out white Americans for their hypocrisy in celebrating the Revolution and the Declaration of Independence, but not granting that freedom and equality to their black neighbors.
[12:56]
Zakir Tammies
How was Sumner viewed by his neighbors, by his black neighbors?
[13:02]
Ira Flatow
Sumner's father was an abolitionist, and not only that, he believed in racial equality. He was known to not use the word Negro, and he preferred calling his neighbors people of color, a term that we think is a modern term, but actually has been around for more than 200 years. In addition, he was known to tip his hat whenever walking past an African American on the street. He once said that he was waiting for the day that there would be black judges in Boston. And so the Sumners were a family, a white Family that was respected and honored and considered a peer by their black family, neighbors. And Sumner had this upbringing that taught him to treat everyone as equal and that also gave him a window into the daily brunt of oppression that this community faced every day.
[14:06]
Zakir Tammies
You're listening to full bio. We're discussing Charles Sumner, conscience of a nation. My guest is Zakir Tammies. What was Charles Sumner's experience while at Harvard and Harvard Law School?
[14:23]
Ira Flatow
When Sumner gets to Harvard, he is so excited and then he discovers how difficult, tedious the curriculum was at the time. He complained about the food, he complained about his peers. Most of all, he complained about his teachers who just wanted him to memorize, memorize and memorize. That changes when he finally gets to Harvard Law School. Now, this quote unquote law school barely existed at the time. It was really just a small group of students and one teacher named Joseph Story. Joseph Story was a titan of American law. He was a justice on the US Supreme Court. He was in many ways a lieutenant to Chief Justice John Marshall. And Story pretty much founds the school, and Sumner is one of his first students. Story comes up with a new curriculum for teaching law. He decides to have his students read before class, and then in class, he would call on them to explain the reading. For anyone who has been to law school, it's called the Cold Call. Story had invented it, and Sumner is one of the first students to ever be cold called in history. And he was good at it. Story very quickly realizes that Sumner is a kind of prodigy. He starts to invite Sumner to his home, where Sumner would just riddle Story with questions about this topic and that topic. Story asked Sumner to be his research assistant and to find cases for him to edit some of his treatises. Story's son William would go on to say that his father treated Sumner like a son, which I'm sure made for an interesting dynamic because Story had a son. But Story's son William goes on to become an artist. Yeah, Sumner becomes the lawyer and the jurist that Story wanted for his own child.
[16:41]
Zakir Tammies
Well, Story believed in equity jurisprudence. First of all, please explain what that means and how did that impact Sumner's opinion of the Constitution? Because this becomes very, very important. As we will discuss later.
[17:00]
Ira Flatow
Historically in English, common law courts were only able to grant remedies in the form of monetary compensation. That changed sometime in, I want to say, the 15, 1600s, when the English kings invented a new system of courts called the courts of equity. Equity courts were able to do all kinds of fashionable remedies. They could issue injunctions which would order a party to do something. So your compensation as an injured party might not be money, but it might be an order from a court. Equity jurisprudence is really important to Sumner's early training in the law because Story was a proponent of equity. And the logic of equity is that sometimes a court needs to be creative about how to right a wrong, that courts need to come up with new ideas and new strategies to address the violation of rights, even if there is no remedy on the books or there's no monetary remedy in law. So Story trains Sumner to have a deep respect for equity jurisprudence, which is something that Sumner takes with him for the rest of his life in trying to think creatively about how law can right wrongs, even when historically there was no right to the wrong.
[18:42]
Zakir Tammies
It's interesting. Initially, though, he didn't do well as an attorney. You write in the book, Sumner's legal career would fail to take off and achieve the high expectations everybody placed on him. First of all, what were the expectations of him, of Sumner?
[19:01]
Ira Flatow
When Sumner graduates from law school, he first becomes the librarian for Harvard Law School, the first librarian ever of the school who actually published his first catalog. Then he practices law briefly, but he tells his mentors that he wants to go to Europe, and his mentors are very nervous about this. One mentor, Josiah Quincy, the president of Harvard, says, you will go and get a cane and a mustache and an additional stock of vanity. Another mentor, Simon Greenleaf, writes to him and says, to see through all the Jacobinism, radicalism, and atheism of modern Europe and all the other isms, and come back to be the good conservative that God made you. So there is enormous pressure from his mentors for him to be a conservative lawyer, for him to be an attorney representing the Boston merchant class, rather than getting involved in any kind of human rights activism, and to please these mentors who trained him, who taught him, who took care of him, he does exactly what they tell him to do. After returning from Europe, he becomes a corporate lawyer in Boston. He represents Boston merchants, but he is not enjoying this at all. While he does well at first, his client lists quickly dwindles down, probably because they recognize he had no enthusiasm for his practice. And next thing you know, he's barely practicing law, even though he is one of the most educated lawyers in the continent. He had a nickname, the briefless barrister, because he was so smart, so talented, but had no cases. And very quickly, his legal career flounders.
[21:14]
Zakir Tammies
One of the things about him traveling to Europe, Charles Sumner traveling to Europe, is, I think, you said it in a really interesting way. It sort of set the intellectual tone for the rest of his life. What's an example of something he saw or an experience he's had that changed his mind about what the United States could be?
[21:39]
Ira Flatow
I'll give you two examples. When Charles Sumner arrives in Europe, he first goes to Paris, and he is just shocked at how terrible his French is. Even though he had studied French in school, he couldn't hold a conversation with the Frenchman. So he decides rather than go see all the sights, go visit the chateaus, go explore the countryside, or do whatever one does in Paris, he is going to go to university lectures and learn French. He told one of his professors, I'm not even sure I believe this, but he said in a letter that he attended more than 150 lectures in French in Paris. And as he's going to these different universities, including the Sorbonne, he sees white and black students sitting side by side, learning philosophy, learning history, learning literature. And he is startled by this sight, because in his own country, even in Boston, where he lives in a black community, it was inconceivable to imagine black and white students learning together. At the same time, he is also meeting a number of French aristocrats. And many of these aristocrats were totally ignorant of the United States. They didn't care for it. He was shocked to meet one aristocrat who was extremely well educated, but who asked him with a serious question, which was, do you Americans speak the same language as Montezuma? In other words, do you speak Aztec? And he is startled by this level of ignorance from an educated man, which I think may resonate with many immigrants to America today who might meet someone educated who asks a really dumb question about where they're from. So Sumner realizes that America is more or less a backwater considered by Europe. And then he realizes that if educated Frenchmen knew anything about America, the thing they knew was slavery. By this time, Europe had abolished slavery in most countries. It still existed in the colonies, but continental Europe had very little slavery, at least in Western Europe. And so Europeans are just disturbed by the existence of chattel slavery in America. They're also disturbed by the racism in America. And Charles Sumner realizes that, my God, my country will never be respected on the world stage until we address the question of slavery and racism. And he also realized that another world was possible, a world in which whites and blacks were equal, were learning together, were governing together, as he was seeing at these university lectures in Paris.
[25:02]
Zakir Tammies
When Charles Sumner returned to Boston, what were some of the earliest causes that he showed interest in.
[25:14]
Ira Flatow
He took an interest in a variety of causes, much of which revolved around education. He became close to Horace Mann, often considered the father of American public education. He ran for school board unsuccessfully. He tried to campaign to create a teachers college that would teach teachers to become better educators for the next generation. In fact, when it wasn't going well, he decided to pledge his own money to building this teacher's school and then to collect money from donors later to compensate himself. And the whole thing fell apart and he realized the donors who were promising money weren't actually going to give it. And that was a hard lesson for him, which is that when you're trying to do good in the world, you will often have people who are saying the right things, who are encouraging you down the road, but they themselves are not willing to reach into their pocketbooks and contribute, or not willing to give their time or to risk anything. And Sumner learns at that time how difficult it is to pursue reform, and yet he has this deep passion for it, and he continues to give it his best.
[26:27]
Zakir Tammies
That was Zakhar Tamiz, author of Charles Conscience of a Nation. Tomorrow we'll learn about what led to his caning on the Senate floor and why the author believes that Charles Sumner was gay.
[26:40]
Alison Stewart
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[27:11]
Ira Flatow
I'm Ira Flato, host of Science Friday. For over 30 years, our team has been reporting high quality news about science, technology and medicine and news you won't get anywhere else. And now that political news is 24 7, our audience is turning to us to know about the really important stuff in their livescancer climate change, genetic engineering, childhood diseases. Our sponsors know the value of science and health news. For more sponsorship information, visit sponsorship.wnyc.org.

Summary5 min read

Podcast Summary: All Of It – Full Bio: The Early Life of Senator Charles Sumner

Podcast Information:

Title: All Of It
Host/Author: WNYC
Description: All Of It is a show about culture and its consumers, aiming to engage thinkers, doers, makers, and creators in discussions about the what and why of their work. The show fosters a community that embraces diverse perspectives, reflecting the vibrant culture of New York City.

Episode Details:

Episode Title: Full Bio: The Early Life of Senator Charles Sumner
Release Date: June 30, 2025
Host: Alison Stewart
Guest: Zakir Tammies, author of Charles Conscience of a Nation

Introduction to the Full Bio Series

[00:27] Alison Stewart:
Alison Stewart introduces the Full Bio segment, highlighting its focus on in-depth, researched biographies that provide a comprehensive understanding of historical figures. This month’s subject is Senator Charles Sumner, a prominent abolitionist and leader for integration, explored through Zakir Tammies' book, Charles Conscience of a Nation.

Exploring Charles Sumner’s Ancestry and Family Legacy

[03:33] Ira Flatow:
Ira Flatow delves into Charles Sumner’s familial background, tracing his lineage back to the American Revolution. Charles Sumner’s paternal grandfather, Job Sumner, plays a pivotal role:

"Job Sumner was itching to get involved in the fight [for independence]."
— Ira Flatow [03:33]

Job Sumner, originally a farmer’s son from rural Massachusetts, attended Harvard University and became a major in the Revolutionary Army. By 1783, he was instrumental in supervising the British evacuation from New York City and escorted George Washington during the liberation of the city.

[05:25] Zakir Tammies:
Tammies highlights the complexities of Job Sumner’s legacy, noting that despite his revolutionary efforts, Job became a slaveholder in Georgia. This contradiction sets the stage for Charles Sumner’s later abolitionist stance.

Charles Sumner’s Early Life and Education

[09:06] Zakir Tammies:
The discussion shifts to Charles Sumner’s childhood. Born as a twin to Matilda and the eldest of eight children, Sumner was intellectually gifted but physically frail.

[10:48] Ira Flatow:
Sumner’s upbringing in a predominantly free Black community in Boston fostered his empathy and commitment to racial equality:

"Sumner saw black schoolchildren going to the Smith School, one of the earliest black schools in the country. And there were writers in the community, like David Walker, a famous black abolitionist..."
— Ira Flatow [11:04]

Sumner's father, an abolitionist, treated Black neighbors with respect and equality, influencing Sumner’s worldview deeply.

Harvard Education and Legal Training

[14:23] Ira Flatow:
Sumner’s academic journey at Harvard College and Harvard Law School is discussed. Under the mentorship of Joseph Story, a Supreme Court Justice, Sumner was introduced to equity jurisprudence—a legal philosophy emphasizing creative remedies beyond monetary compensation.

"Equity jurisprudence is really important to Sumner's early training in the law because Story was a proponent of equity."
— Ira Flatow [17:00]

This training instilled in Sumner a profound respect for using the law to right societal wrongs, a principle that would guide his future abolitionist efforts.

[18:42] Zakir Tammies:
Despite his academic brilliance, Sumner struggled in his early legal career. Expectations were high, but his lack of enthusiasm for corporate law led to a dwindling client base, earning him the nickname "the briefless barrister."

Influences from Europe and Shaping Abolitionist Views

[21:13] Zakir Tammies:
Sumner's travels to Europe profoundly impacted his perspectives. In Paris, he observed racially integrated educational settings, starkly contrasting with the segregation he knew in America.

[25:02] Zakir Tammies:
Sumner realized that America’s global reputation was tarnished by its persistence of slavery and racism. Witnessing progressive racial integration in Europe inspired him to envision and advocate for a more equitable United States.

"He realizes that America is more or less a backwater considered by Europe... my country will never be respected on the world stage until we address the question of slavery and racism."
— Ira Flatow [25:02]

Early Activism and Challenges

[25:13] Ira Flatow:
Upon returning to Boston, Sumner engaged in various educational reforms, aligning with Horace Mann. His efforts to establish a teachers' college faced significant challenges, teaching him the complexities of enacting social reform.

"Sumner learns at that time how difficult it is to pursue reform, and yet he has this deep passion for it, and he continues to give it his best."
— Ira Flatow [26:26]

Conclusion and Teaser for Next Episode

The episode concludes with a preview of future discussions, including the tumultuous event of Sumner’s caning on the Senate floor and intriguing insights into his personal life, including the author's perspective on Sumner's sexuality.

[26:26] Zakir Tammies:

"Tomorrow we'll learn about what led to his caning on the Senate floor and why the author believes that Charles Sumner was gay."
— Zakir Tammies [26:26]

Notable Quotes

Ira Flatow [03:33]:
"Job Sumner was itching to get involved in the fight."
Ira Flatow [11:04]:
"Sumner saw black schoolchildren going to the Smith School... And there were writers in the community, like David Walker, a famous black abolitionist..."
Ira Flatow [17:00]:
"Equity jurisprudence is really important to Sumner's early training in the law because Story was a proponent of equity."
Ira Flatow [25:02]:
"He realizes that America is more or less a backwater considered by Europe... my country will never be respected on the world stage until we address the question of slavery and racism."
Zakir Tammies [26:26]:
"Tomorrow we'll learn about what led to his caning on the Senate floor and why the author believes that Charles Sumner was gay."

Final Thoughts

This episode of All Of It provides a comprehensive look into the early life of Senator Charles Sumner, exploring the intricate web of family legacy, education, and personal experiences that shaped his formidable stance against slavery and for racial equality. Zakir Tammies' detailed biography offers fresh insights into Sumner's motivations and the societal influences that propelled him to become a pivotal figure in American history.

Listeners can look forward to the next episode, where the dramatic events of Sumner’s caning and the exploration of his personal life will be further examined, shedding light on the complexities of his character and legacy.

Loading summary

Transcript26 lines

[00:00]
Alison Stewart
All of it is supported by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy to see if you could save when you bundle your home and auto policies. Try it@progressive.com Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states.
[00:27]
Zakir Tammies
This is all of it on wnyc. I'm Alison Stewart. We just talked about ice cream, so it's time to remind you of another summer tradition, the annual all of It Summer Reading Challenge. We're asking you to read at least one book in all of the five following categories. They are a classic you've been meaning to get to, a book about or set in New York City, a memoir or biography, a recent debut novel, or a book published in 2025. Head to wnyc.org summerreading to register and to download the Summer Reading Challenge PDF. Again, that's wnyc.org summerreading once you've completed the challenge, we'll follow up about your selections to receive a prize and happy reading. That is the plan. So let's get this hour started with something that fulfills one of those categories. It's this month's Full Bio Conversation Full Bio Settle Down. Full Bio is our book series where we spend a few days with the author of a deeply researched biography to get a fuller understanding of the subject. Today we'll discuss the book Charles Conscious of a Nation by Zakir tammies. Born in 1811, Senator Charles Sumner was a prominent abolitionist and leader for integration. Now there have been several other bios of Sumner, but this one we're going to talk about has an interesting twist. Its author, to Mes, was recently a graduate from Yale Law School School and He's in his 20s. He's taken a new look at Sumner and what he stood for in this 533 page book. As the New York Times reported, until last year there hadn't been a study of Sumner in four decades, and almost none with his impact on this nation. Charles Sumner was a man who was the grandson of a revolutionary fighter, the first librarian of Harvard Law School, a senator from Massachusetts, and he was at President Lincoln's bedside when he died. And he was a brilliant legal mind, which the book gets into. Sumnu argued that the Constitution is not mean, stingy or pettifogging, but open handed, liberal and just, including always in favor of freedom. He used his position to help the country see that slavery was wrong and would destroy the country. It almost assured him. Sumner, of course, was nearly beaten to death on the Senate floor for his anti slavery views. The book uses 600 of Sumner's personal and professional letters, 400 contemporaneous newspaper articles, and the works of the men who influenced him growing up. Which is where we will start with his family tree, which dates back to the American Revolution. I think before talking about Charles Sumner, it's important to understand his ancestry, which dates back to the Revolutionary War. His paternal grandfather was named Job Sumner. What role did Job play in the American Revolution?
[03:33]
Ira Flatow
Job Sumner was the child of farmers in rural Massachusetts. He descended from one of the first generations of Americans to come to this soil in the 1600s. And he decided to go to Harvard University in his mid teens. And right after he gets there, ironically, the American Revolution begins in the farming town that he had left. And next thing you know, colonists are fighting British redcoats at Lexington and Concord. Job Sumner was itching to get involved in the fight. But the fight came to him when revolutionaries arrived at Harvard University's campus and demanded to take over the college campus to set up a military encampment in Cambridge in order to try to take Boston, which was in British possession at that moment. Harvard asked the student body to leave campus and to continue their studies in the countryside. But Job Sumner said no. Instead, he stayed at Harvard and joined the Revolution. And within just a few years, this farming boy rises the ranks of the Revolutionary Army. And by 1783, he is a leading major who helps to supervise the evacuation of the British from New York City, escorts George Washington into the city to liberate New York and becomes one of the leading revolutionaries.
[05:26]
Zakir Tammies
It's really interesting because one of our listeners, we had a segment on France's Tavern and that he was there. Job was there to help George Washington celebrate the end of the war. But I'm curious, what did he do with himself after the war?
[05:45]
Ira Flatow
That's right. Job Sumner was there with Washington, Fraunce's Tavern, when Washington is kissing goodbye to the officers. And then Job Sumner afterwards gets an appointment to be a commissioner in Georgia. And here is what is really striking. Job Sumner, this revolutionary who fought for freedom, goes to Georgia, hobnobs with southern planters and becomes a slaveholder. And unbeknownst to Washington, or probably to anyone in the Revolutionary Army, Job Sumner had a son which was Charles Sumner's father, Charles Pinckney Sumner. Job Sumner impregnated a farm girl in Massachusetts around the same time of the Battle of Lexington and Concord. He did not marry this woman. And so he has this bastard son in rural Massachusetts who is Literally toiling to survive, who is herding cows late at night, who doesn't have much of an education at first, while Job Sumner is enjoying a prestigious life as a Southern planter.
[06:57]
Zakir Tammies
It's interesting. The girl that he impregnated named him Job Junior. But he didn't take too kindly to that. Gave him the name Charles Pinckney Sumner. Why Charles Pinckney?
[07:10]
Ira Flatow
Charles Pinckney was a founding father from the south who was extremely pro slavery, who was probably one of the most pro slavery founding fathers. And for Job Sumner, it was an honor to name his son after this man. And yet, Charles Pinckney Sumner grows up deeply resentful of his father. Understandably so. When his father ultimately dies, he gets some money and enrolls himself at Harvard College. And while there, he becomes an abolitionist, probably as a way to reject his father's contradictory ideals of being both a revolutionary and being a slaveholder. And Charles Pinckney Sumner would go on, after graduating from Harvard, to become a sailor. A sailor who traveled on a ship that stopped in Haiti during the Haitian Revolution. And while he's there, General Jean Pierre Boyer, one of the leading Haitian revolutionaries, organizes a birthday party to celebrate George Washington's birthday. And this white boy from Massachusetts, son of the American Revolution, joins this celebration in Haiti and actually lifts his glass and gives a toast to liberty, freedom, and equality for all men. General Boyer is so shocked to see this white American celebrating the Haitian cause and invites him to the front where he stays for the rest of the night. And I think this combination of Charles Pinckney Sumner celebrating the Haitian Revolution and his father, Job Sumner, celebrating the American Revolution, probably informed the grandson Charles Sumner's upbringing and ideology.
[09:06]
Zakir Tammies
My guest is author Zakir Tammies. We're discussing his book, Charles Conscience of a Nation. It's our choice for full B. All right. Charles Pinckney Sumner marries a woman named Relief Jacobs. I love that name. And the subject of your bio. Charles Sumner is born. He's a twin of Matilda. He's the eldest of, I believe, eight children. What kind of child was Charles Sumner?
[09:35]
Ira Flatow
Charles Sumner was a fascinating kid. He is very scrawny. He looked sickly. He didn't engage or enjoy physical activity. He didn't go swimming with his siblings. He was not interested in dance class, and he just loved to learn. So while he's young, he decided that he wanted to learn Latin and he wanted to go to the Boston Latin School. Now, the Sumners didn't have much money, and Charles Sumner decides to borrow money from an older classmate to Give him a Latin textbook, and he comes down the stairs one day, confronts his father while his dad is shaving and starts to speak in Latin. And he's like 9 years old at this moment. And that was his way of persuading his parents to give him an opportunity to take the entrance exam to the Boston Latin School. He's accepted, and next thing you know, this scrawny kid is starting to learn the classics, something that he would enjoy for the rest of his life.
[10:48]
Zakir Tammies
He grew up in a neighborhood where black Bostonians lived, sort of the black Beacon Hill area. Tell us a little bit about the people that live there, and how do you think that shaped Sumner's feelings about race early on?
[11:05]
Ira Flatow
So Sumner grows up in a contradiction. On the one hand, he's a third generation Harvard educated man, or he grows up and becomes a Harvard educated man. On the other hand, he is living in this ethnic enclave of Boston that has a large free black community because his family did not have any money to live anywhere else. And that experience gave him a deep sense of empathy and sympathy for his black neighbors. Black Boston at this time is a small community of extremely persecuted and marginalized people. But there are also a number of artists, of writers, musicians. Free Black Boston, around 1,000 people, was in many ways the cultural capital of black America in the early 1800s. Only a few blocks from Charles Sumner's home was the African Meeting House, one of the first black churches in the country, still standing today. There was also a black Masonic lodge, the first of its kind. There was the African Mutual Aid Society, an organization of free blacks that would try to give money to protect their own community. Sumner saw black schoolchildren going to the Smith School, one of the earliest black schools in the country. And there were writers in the community, like David Walker, a famous black abolitionist, who wrote a tract that called out white Americans for their hypocrisy in celebrating the Revolution and the Declaration of Independence, but not granting that freedom and equality to their black neighbors.
[12:56]
Zakir Tammies
How was Sumner viewed by his neighbors, by his black neighbors?
[13:02]
Ira Flatow
Sumner's father was an abolitionist, and not only that, he believed in racial equality. He was known to not use the word Negro, and he preferred calling his neighbors people of color, a term that we think is a modern term, but actually has been around for more than 200 years. In addition, he was known to tip his hat whenever walking past an African American on the street. He once said that he was waiting for the day that there would be black judges in Boston. And so the Sumners were a family, a white Family that was respected and honored and considered a peer by their black family, neighbors. And Sumner had this upbringing that taught him to treat everyone as equal and that also gave him a window into the daily brunt of oppression that this community faced every day.
[14:06]
Zakir Tammies
You're listening to full bio. We're discussing Charles Sumner, conscience of a nation. My guest is Zakir Tammies. What was Charles Sumner's experience while at Harvard and Harvard Law School?
[14:23]
Ira Flatow
When Sumner gets to Harvard, he is so excited and then he discovers how difficult, tedious the curriculum was at the time. He complained about the food, he complained about his peers. Most of all, he complained about his teachers who just wanted him to memorize, memorize and memorize. That changes when he finally gets to Harvard Law School. Now, this quote unquote law school barely existed at the time. It was really just a small group of students and one teacher named Joseph Story. Joseph Story was a titan of American law. He was a justice on the US Supreme Court. He was in many ways a lieutenant to Chief Justice John Marshall. And Story pretty much founds the school, and Sumner is one of his first students. Story comes up with a new curriculum for teaching law. He decides to have his students read before class, and then in class, he would call on them to explain the reading. For anyone who has been to law school, it's called the Cold Call. Story had invented it, and Sumner is one of the first students to ever be cold called in history. And he was good at it. Story very quickly realizes that Sumner is a kind of prodigy. He starts to invite Sumner to his home, where Sumner would just riddle Story with questions about this topic and that topic. Story asked Sumner to be his research assistant and to find cases for him to edit some of his treatises. Story's son William would go on to say that his father treated Sumner like a son, which I'm sure made for an interesting dynamic because Story had a son. But Story's son William goes on to become an artist. Yeah, Sumner becomes the lawyer and the jurist that Story wanted for his own child.
[16:41]
Zakir Tammies
Well, Story believed in equity jurisprudence. First of all, please explain what that means and how did that impact Sumner's opinion of the Constitution? Because this becomes very, very important. As we will discuss later.
[17:00]
Ira Flatow
Historically in English, common law courts were only able to grant remedies in the form of monetary compensation. That changed sometime in, I want to say, the 15, 1600s, when the English kings invented a new system of courts called the courts of equity. Equity courts were able to do all kinds of fashionable remedies. They could issue injunctions which would order a party to do something. So your compensation as an injured party might not be money, but it might be an order from a court. Equity jurisprudence is really important to Sumner's early training in the law because Story was a proponent of equity. And the logic of equity is that sometimes a court needs to be creative about how to right a wrong, that courts need to come up with new ideas and new strategies to address the violation of rights, even if there is no remedy on the books or there's no monetary remedy in law. So Story trains Sumner to have a deep respect for equity jurisprudence, which is something that Sumner takes with him for the rest of his life in trying to think creatively about how law can right wrongs, even when historically there was no right to the wrong.
[18:42]
Zakir Tammies
It's interesting. Initially, though, he didn't do well as an attorney. You write in the book, Sumner's legal career would fail to take off and achieve the high expectations everybody placed on him. First of all, what were the expectations of him, of Sumner?
[19:01]
Ira Flatow
When Sumner graduates from law school, he first becomes the librarian for Harvard Law School, the first librarian ever of the school who actually published his first catalog. Then he practices law briefly, but he tells his mentors that he wants to go to Europe, and his mentors are very nervous about this. One mentor, Josiah Quincy, the president of Harvard, says, you will go and get a cane and a mustache and an additional stock of vanity. Another mentor, Simon Greenleaf, writes to him and says, to see through all the Jacobinism, radicalism, and atheism of modern Europe and all the other isms, and come back to be the good conservative that God made you. So there is enormous pressure from his mentors for him to be a conservative lawyer, for him to be an attorney representing the Boston merchant class, rather than getting involved in any kind of human rights activism, and to please these mentors who trained him, who taught him, who took care of him, he does exactly what they tell him to do. After returning from Europe, he becomes a corporate lawyer in Boston. He represents Boston merchants, but he is not enjoying this at all. While he does well at first, his client lists quickly dwindles down, probably because they recognize he had no enthusiasm for his practice. And next thing you know, he's barely practicing law, even though he is one of the most educated lawyers in the continent. He had a nickname, the briefless barrister, because he was so smart, so talented, but had no cases. And very quickly, his legal career flounders.
[21:14]
Zakir Tammies
One of the things about him traveling to Europe, Charles Sumner traveling to Europe, is, I think, you said it in a really interesting way. It sort of set the intellectual tone for the rest of his life. What's an example of something he saw or an experience he's had that changed his mind about what the United States could be?
[21:39]
Ira Flatow
I'll give you two examples. When Charles Sumner arrives in Europe, he first goes to Paris, and he is just shocked at how terrible his French is. Even though he had studied French in school, he couldn't hold a conversation with the Frenchman. So he decides rather than go see all the sights, go visit the chateaus, go explore the countryside, or do whatever one does in Paris, he is going to go to university lectures and learn French. He told one of his professors, I'm not even sure I believe this, but he said in a letter that he attended more than 150 lectures in French in Paris. And as he's going to these different universities, including the Sorbonne, he sees white and black students sitting side by side, learning philosophy, learning history, learning literature. And he is startled by this sight, because in his own country, even in Boston, where he lives in a black community, it was inconceivable to imagine black and white students learning together. At the same time, he is also meeting a number of French aristocrats. And many of these aristocrats were totally ignorant of the United States. They didn't care for it. He was shocked to meet one aristocrat who was extremely well educated, but who asked him with a serious question, which was, do you Americans speak the same language as Montezuma? In other words, do you speak Aztec? And he is startled by this level of ignorance from an educated man, which I think may resonate with many immigrants to America today who might meet someone educated who asks a really dumb question about where they're from. So Sumner realizes that America is more or less a backwater considered by Europe. And then he realizes that if educated Frenchmen knew anything about America, the thing they knew was slavery. By this time, Europe had abolished slavery in most countries. It still existed in the colonies, but continental Europe had very little slavery, at least in Western Europe. And so Europeans are just disturbed by the existence of chattel slavery in America. They're also disturbed by the racism in America. And Charles Sumner realizes that, my God, my country will never be respected on the world stage until we address the question of slavery and racism. And he also realized that another world was possible, a world in which whites and blacks were equal, were learning together, were governing together, as he was seeing at these university lectures in Paris.
[25:02]
Zakir Tammies
When Charles Sumner returned to Boston, what were some of the earliest causes that he showed interest in.
[25:14]
Ira Flatow
He took an interest in a variety of causes, much of which revolved around education. He became close to Horace Mann, often considered the father of American public education. He ran for school board unsuccessfully. He tried to campaign to create a teachers college that would teach teachers to become better educators for the next generation. In fact, when it wasn't going well, he decided to pledge his own money to building this teacher's school and then to collect money from donors later to compensate himself. And the whole thing fell apart and he realized the donors who were promising money weren't actually going to give it. And that was a hard lesson for him, which is that when you're trying to do good in the world, you will often have people who are saying the right things, who are encouraging you down the road, but they themselves are not willing to reach into their pocketbooks and contribute, or not willing to give their time or to risk anything. And Sumner learns at that time how difficult it is to pursue reform, and yet he has this deep passion for it, and he continues to give it his best.
[26:27]
Zakir Tammies
That was Zakhar Tamiz, author of Charles Conscience of a Nation. Tomorrow we'll learn about what led to his caning on the Senate floor and why the author believes that Charles Sumner was gay.
[26:40]
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[27:11]
Ira Flatow
I'm Ira Flato, host of Science Friday. For over 30 years, our team has been reporting high quality news about science, technology and medicine and news you won't get anywhere else. And now that political news is 24 7, our audience is turning to us to know about the really important stuff in their livescancer climate change, genetic engineering, childhood diseases. Our sponsors know the value of science and health news. For more sponsorship information, visit sponsorship.wnyc.org.