Caning of Charles Sumner
05/22/1856 AD attacked
Pro-slavery Democratic Representative Preston Brooks, brutally attacks abolitionist Republican Senator Charles Sumner on the Senate floor with a walking cane, in retaliation for a speech given by Sumner two days earlier in which he fiercely criticized slaveholders, including a relative of Brooks.
The beating nearly killed Sumner and it contributed significantly to the country's polarization over the issue of slavery. It has been considered symbolic of the "breakdown of reasoned discourse" and the use of violence that eventually led to the Civil War.
Washington, D.C.
Lattitude: 38.9072° N
Longitude: 77.0369° W
Region: North America
Modern Day United States
Lattitude: 38.9072° N
Longitude: 77.0369° W
Region: North America
Modern Day United States
Subjects Who or What attacked?
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Preston Brooks American politician and ...
Objects To Whom or What was attacked?
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Charles Sumner United States Senator fr...
Events in 1856 MORE
