Charles Sumner: 'The Massive Grievance'

Plate No. 186 in the Statesmen series caricatures Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner (1811–1874), the radical Republican abolitionist and civil-rights champion, here rendered as a corpulent, scowling figure in frock coat and buff waistcoat, pince-nez dangling from one hand, the other thrust defiantly into his hip. Papers on a desk to his left suggest senatorial business. The caption — 'The Massive Grievance' — is a double cut: Sumner's physical bulk and his reputation for relentless, self-righteous complaint, particularly his bitter break with President Grant over Santo Domingo annexation. The caricature exaggerates his heavy jowls and disheveled mane to project pompous grievance rather than moral heroism, reducing a figure who had been caned nearly to death on the Senate floor in 1856 to a sulking heavyweight.