REMARKS IN THE SENATE, ON A RESOLUTION DIRECTING THE ERECTION OF SUCH
MONUMENTS, FEBRUARY 27, 1867.
Mr. Poland, of Vermont, introduced a resolution directing
the Sergeant-at-Arms of the Senate to see that monuments
were placed in the Congressional burial-ground, in memory of
Senators who had died at Washington since July 4, 1861. On the
question of taking up this resolution for consideration, Mr.
Sumner remarked:--
Originally there was a reason for these monuments. Senators and
Representatives dying here found their last home in the Congressional
burial-ground, and these monuments covered their remains. At a later
day, with increasing facilities of transportation, the custom of
burial here has ceased; but the monuments, being only cenotaphs, were
continued until 1861, when this custom was suspended. Meantime Death
has not been less busy here, and the question is, whether the former
custom shall be revived, and cenotaphs be placed in an unvisited
burial-ground, to mark the spot where the remains of a Senator might
have been placed, had they not been transported to repose among his
family, kindred, and neighbors.
I cannot but think that the suspension of this custom of monuments,
which occurred at the beginning of the war, was notice or indication
that the occasion for them had passed; and I doubt sincerely the
expediency of reviving the custom, unless where an associate is
actually buried here. If those dying here, but buried elsewhere,
are to be commemorated by Congress in any monumental form, it seems
to me better that it should be a simple tablet of stone or brass in
the Capitol, where it would be seen by the visitors thronging here,
and perhaps arrest the attention of their successors in public duty,
teaching how Death enters these Halls. But why place an unsightly
cenotaph in a forlorn burial-ground,--I may add, at considerable cost?
I cannot doubt that the time has come for this expense to cease.
The resolution was referred to the Committee on the Contingent
Expenses of the Senate.