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At the Institute’s core is the Gilder Lehrman Collection, one of the great archives in American history. More than 85,000 items cover five hundred years of American history, from Columbus’s 1493 letter describing the New World through the end of the twentieth century.

Eliot, William Greenleaf (1811-1887) to Charles Sumner

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Gilder Lehrman Collection #: GLC07202.06 Author/Creator: Eliot, William Greenleaf (1811-1887) Place Written: s.l. Type: Autograph note signed Date: circa 1872 Pagination: 1 p. ; 20.4 x 12.7 cm. Order a Copy

Eliot, a social activist and clergyman, writes to Sumner, a United States Senator from Massachusetts (recipient inferred from collection). Encloses newspaper clippings asserting they prove the necessity of a civil rights bill. The first clipping, attached to the note, relates that Frederick Douglass was recently denied service at the Planters' House, a St. Louis, Missouri inn. The article notes, "This is the first difficulty of the kind he has received on his present lecture trip, and it is a shameful reflection on St. Louis' hospitality..." The other clipping offers a similar version of the story, suggesting that Douglass should have been given a private room, "where he could have taken his meals, if prejudice did not prevent him to enter the public dining room."

Dear Sir.
The inclosed shows the necessity of civil-ization, if not of a Civil-rights bill.
Yr truly
W.G. Eliot

Eliot, William Greenleaf, 1811-1887
Sumner, Charles, 1811-1874
Douglass, Frederick, 1818-1895

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