Under pressure from the President, on the ground that Sumner was no longer on speaking terms with the secretary of State, he was deposed on March Io, 1871, from the chairmanship of the committee on foreign relations. Whether the chief cause of this humiliation was Grant's vindictiveness at Sumner's opposition to his San Domingo project or a genuine fear that the impossible de mands which lie insisted should be made upon England, would wreck the prospect of an adjustment with that country, cannot be determined. Sumner's last years were further saddened by the misconstruction put upon one of his most magnanimous acts. In 1872 he introduced in the Senate a resolution providing that the names of battles with fellow-citizens should not be placed on the regimental colours of the United States. The Massachusetts legis lature denounced this battle-flag resolution as "an insult to the loyal soldiery of the nation" and as "meeting the unqualified condemnation of the people of the Commonwealth." For more than a year all efforts—headed by the poet Whittier—to rescind that censure were without avail, but early in 1874 it was annulled. On March io against the advice of his physician, Sumner went to the Senate—it was the day on which his colleague was to present the rescinding resolution. That night he was stricken with an
acute attack of angina pectoris, and on the following day he died.
"The slave of principles, I call no party master," was the proud avowal with which Sumner began his service in the Senate. His was the first clear programme proposed in Congress for the re form of the civil service. It was his dauntless courage in de nouncing compromise, in demanding the repeal of the Fugitive Slave Act, and in insisting upon emancipation, that made him a great propelling force in the struggle that put an end to slavery.
See Sumner's Works (Boston, 187o-83), and Edward L. Pierce's Memoir and Letters of Charles Sumner (Boston, Briefer biographies have been written by Anna L. Dawes (New York, 1892) ; Moorfield Storey (Boston, I900) ; and George H. Haynes (Phila delphia, 1909). See also Charles Sumner, His Complete Works with an introduction by G. F. Hoar (Boston, 191o) ; W. G. Slotwell, Life of Charles Sumner (Iwo) ; A. N. Gimke, Charles Sumner Centenary.