may 22, 1856 - Caning of Charles Sumner

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The Caning of Charles Sumner occurred on May 22, 1856, when Representative Preston Brooks of South Carolina violently attacked Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts with a cane on the floor of the United States Senate. This brutal event was a response to a speech by Sumner, in which he fiercely criticized slaveholders, including a relative of Brooks, highlighting the intensifying hostility and division between the North and South over the issue of slavery.

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