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Guaranteed Human.

Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production of IHeart Radio.

Hello and welcome to the podcast. I'm Tracy V. Wilson. And I'm Holly Fry.

This is part two of three on Charles Sumner.

I think the earlier one, important to listen to before this one. Where we left off, Charles Sumner,

had just made a very controversial anti-war speech at an Independence Day event in Boston.

He also had not gotten a position as a professor at Harvard Law, which a lot of people had been expecting him to get. He was moving a lot more into just doing things that were related to

abolition and racial justice. And the next major milestone in his life and career

was arguing a school integration case before the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court.

We said in part one that Charles Sumner was an abolitionist. He was also opposed to racial segregation.

And this was not just an abstract idea to him.

It was something that affected how he lived his life and conducted himself.

For example, in 1845, the same year as that controversial Independence Day speech,

he was invited to speak at the New Bedford Lyceum.

He turned down that invitation because the Lyceum was

racially segregated, saying, quote, in the sight of God and of all just institutions, the white

man can claim no precedence or exclusive privilege from his color. In 1849, Attorney Robert Morris Jr. approached Sumner for help with a case.

Morris was the first black lawyer to be admitted to the Massachusetts bar, and his clients were

Benjamin Roberts and his daughter, Sarah. They were black, and Sarah had to walk past five schools

for white children before she got to one that she was allowed to attend.

So they wanted Sarah to be able to attend

...