Charles Sumner was born on January 6, 1811 in Boston, Massachusetts, to Relief Jacob and Charles Pinckney Sumner. He graduated from Boston Latin School (1826), Harvard University (1830), and Harvard Law School (1833), and joined the abolitionist movement in Boston, centered in his home neighborhood of Beacon Hill. He acted as co-counsel in a case, Roberts v. City of Boston, that challenged the segregation of Boston’s public school system. In 1852, Sumner was elected to the United States Senate. As a senator, Sumner became known for championing liberal causes, including the abolition of slavery, the rights of emancipated Black people, the limitation of imperialistic expansion (notably into the Dominican Republic), comprehensive civil rights, and punishment for the South after the Civil War. In response to Sumner's opposition to the Kansas-Nebraska Act in May 1856, particularly his speech, "The Crimes Against Kansas," which condemned the institution of slavery and some of the senators who participated in it, Preston S. Brooks beat him nearly to death with his cane on the Senate floor. Sumner took almost three years to recover, but was still re-elected during his recuperation period. Sumner was chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee from March 1861 to March 1871. Sumner continued to serve in the Senate until his death in Washington on March 11, 1874. He never married, but had lifelong romantic friendships with Samuel Gridley Howe and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

Sources:

"Charles Sumner," American Experience, accessed May 16, 2025. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/grant-sumner.

"Charles Sumner." In Dictionary of American Biography. New York, NY: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1936.

"Charles Sumner," National Park Service, January 16, 2023. https://www.nps.gov/people/charles-sumner.htm

"Charles Sumner and Romantic Friendships," National Park Service, February 10, 2025. https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/charles-sumner-and-romantic-friendships.htm

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica. "Charles Sumner." Encyclopedia Britannica, March 7, 2025. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Charles-Sumner.