Southern Congressman Preston Brooks savagely beats Northern Senator Charles Sumner in the halls of Congress as tensions rise over the expansion of slavery.
When the controversial Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 was passed, popular sovereignty was applied within the two new territories and people were given the right to decide the slave issue by vote. Because the act nullified the Missouri Compromise of 1820, the debate over slavery intensified. Northerners were incensed that slavery could again resurface in an area where it had been banned for over 30 years.
When violence broke out in Kansas Territory, the issue became central in Congress. On May 19, Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner, an ardent abolitionist, began a two-day speech on the Senate floor in which he decried the “crime against Kansas” and blasted three of his colleagues by name, one of whom—South Carolina Senator Andrew P. Butler—was elderly, sick and absent from the proceedings.
Butler’s cousin, Representative Preston Brooks of South Carolina, who had a history of violence, took it upon himself to defend the honor of his kin. Wielding the cane he used for injuries he incurred in a duel over a political debate in 1840, Brooks entered the Senate chamber and attacked Sumner at his desk, which was bolted to the floor. Sumner’s legs were pinned by the desk so he could not escape the savage beating. It was not until other congressmen subdued Brooks that Sumner finally escaped.
Brooks became an instant hero in the South, and supporters sent him many replacement canes. He was vilified in the North and became a symbol of the stereotypically inflexible, uncompromising representative of the slave power. The incident exemplified the growing hostility between the two camps in the prewar years.
Sumner did not return to the Senate for three years while he recovered.
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Yankee takes an ass-whuppin’ and they make it all about slavery/race. Has nothing to do with totalitarian encroachment of the “urban” yankees.
As a Southerner, let me give our side of the story. While beating the shit out of somebody in the halls of Congress is always to be discouraged, if anybody ever deserved it, it was Charles Sumner. Sumner was an incredibly arrogant, self-righteous asshole. The speech he gave attacking the elderly relative of Brooks was not merely offensive, it was obscene and shocking, especially by the standards of the day. As far as the caning is concerned, Sumner was fortunate that Brooks considered him his social inferior and therefore did not merit a bullet in the face – had a more respectable man made the speech Brooks would have simply shot him down like a dog. In the social code of that day in the South, an inferior would merely get a good thrashing. Sumner’s injuries were more psychological than physical. He was not seriously hurt, though he limped around for three years, milking the incident for every ounce of sympathy from credulous supporters. I daresay that quite a few members of our current Congress could benefit from the Brooks treatment. To be fair, Sumner mellowed somewhat in later years (perhaps the caning taught him something). He would do some good work trying to heal the wounds of the dreadful civil war he and his friends did so much to provoke.
On the subject of corporal punishment, though it has gone out of style, intelligent observers in the past had no doubt at all that it had a positive effect on criminals and other anti-social elements, much more than a spell in jail. They observed that a good number of lashes, well laid on, added a large dose of humility and humiliation to any other punishment meted out. I suspect that many of the young punks who make our cities so unsafe and unpleasant would benefit from a good public whipping.
By the way, save your howls of outrage. I don’t care what you think! Cheers!
The Propertarians solve the problem by forcing all public speech to be truthful, but IMO we’d be better off just bringing back the duel and/or legal public ass whippings for slanderous speech. Talk shit, get beat. It would damn sure make CSPAN entertaining if nothing else.
C-SPAN and UFC should combine forces. Now I’d pay a dollar to watch that.
We need far more violence and far less “civility” in the Congress. When I see real violence in the legislatures of other nations it makes me feel like at least someone in the chambers truly cares about their position. The “civility” in ours just sends the message that all the “disagreements” are just bullshit for the cameras.