THE AMERICAN CIVIL WAR 245 



The practical unanimity of this vote was even 

 less significant than certain incidents that ac 

 companied the Senate s action. Though the 

 session in which the treaty was considered was, 

 as usual in such cases, secret, the Senate made 

 public the speech of Senator Charles Sumner, 

 chairman of the Committee on Foreign Rela 

 tions, whose views thus were impressed with a 

 quasi-official character. In this speech Sumner 

 rehearsed the tale of British unfriendliness to 

 the United States during the war, much as it 

 had been told often in the despatches of Seward 

 and Adams. A shifting of emphasis by the 

 senator, however, impressed a new character 

 upon the discussion. He put in the foreground 

 of his complaint the charge that the course of 

 the British Government had been a wrong to 

 the American nation, bringing upon it suffering 

 and humiliation in addition to vast expense; 

 yet for this public and notorious wrong to a 

 friendly and kindred people no intimation or 

 expression of regret had come from Great 

 Britain. The injuries sustained by the United 

 States could not be measured, Sumner argued, 

 by the losses of individuals, nor be compensated 

 by payments to individuals. British respon 

 sibility was to the American nation, and was 



