1856: The Caning of Charles Sumner
The conflict over slavery reached its zenith during a Senate debate in May 1856.
During a Senate debate over whether to allow Kansas into the Union as a free or slave state, Senator Charles Sumner described two fellow Senators individually as: “noise-some, squat, and nameless animal. . . not a proper model for an American senator” (Senate.gov). A senator from Massachusetts and a staunch anti-slavery advocate, Sumner’s rhetoric represented the tensions existing in Congress as a result of slavery.
“A sympathetic northern cartoonist portrayed Senator Charles Sumner's May 1856 beating by South Carolina Representative Preston Brooks.
credit: New York Public Library.”
Source: United States Senate
Three days later, a representative related to one of the senators Sumner had verbally attacked came into the Senate chamber and beat him ruthlessly. What has become known as the “Caning of Charles Sumner” stands as a vivid demonstration of the dramatic crises the country was facing over slavery’s role in the American system. (Senate.gov)