Charles Sumner's America: A Cultural Biography in History and Memory

From the 1850s until his death, Charles Sumner was one of the nation's most important politicians. He provided the platform for the Free-Soil and Republican Parties, was Lincoln's closest political advisor, and spearheaded the Reconstruction Amendments and a Civil Rights bill that became the blueprint for the 1964 Civil Rights Act. But white writers and filmmakers in the twentieth century erased or demonized him. This project represents the first full symapathetic biography of Sumner in over a century, and the lunch program will address the central themes and the dilemmas of the work.