Question

What did Southern Senator Preston Brooks do to the abolitionist senator Charles Sumner in 1857? How did people in the South react to this?

Answer 1

Reaction to Senator Charles Sumner in 1857:

This event happened on May 22, 1856. Two days before which Charles Sumner had given a speech against slaveholders and criticizing then heavily publicly, which also included a relative of Brooks.

So, taking this as an insult, Preston Brooks in retaliation beat Sumner with a Walking cane, and this incident significantly contributed to the country’s polarization toward the issue of slavery. There was a lot violence that followed the event and was eventually one of the reasons for the American Civil War.