Preston Brooks
Preston Brooks | |
---|---|
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from South Carolina's 4th district | |
In office August 1, 1856 – January 27, 1857 | |
Preceded by | Himself |
Succeeded by | Milledge Bonham |
In office March 4, 1853 – July 15, 1856 | |
Preceded by | John McQueen |
Succeeded by | Himself |
Member of the South Carolina House of Representatives from the Edgefield County district | |
In office November 25, 1844 – December 15, 1845 | |
Personal details | |
Born | Preston Smith Brooks August 5, 1819 Edgefield County, South Carolina, U.S. |
Died | January 27, 1857 Washington, D.C., U.S. | (aged 37)
Political party | Democratic |
Education | University of South Carolina |
Military service | |
Allegiance | United States |
Branch/service | United States Army |
Years of service | 1846–1848 |
Rank | Colonel |
Commands | Palmetto Regiment |
Battles/wars | |
Preston Smith Brooks (August 5, 1819 – January 27, 1857) was an American politician and member of the U.S. House of Representatives from South Carolina, serving from 1853 until his resignation in July 1856 and again from August 1856 until his death.
A member of the Democratic Party, Brooks was a strong advocate of slavery and states' rights to enforce slavery nationally. He is most remembered for his May 22, 1856 attack upon abolitionist and Republican Senator Charles Sumner, whom he beat nearly to death; Brooks beat Sumner with a cane on the floor of the United States Senate in retaliation for an anti-slavery speech in which Sumner verbally attacked Brooks's first cousin once removed,[1]: 7 [2] South Carolina Senator Andrew Butler.
Sumner was seriously injured by Brooks's beating, and was unable to resume his seat in the Senate for three years, though eventually he recovered and resumed his Senate career.[1]: 104 The Massachusetts Legislature reelected Sumner in 1856, "and let his seat sit vacant during his absence as a reminder of Southern brutality".[3]
An attempt to oust Brooks from the House of Representatives failed, and he received only token punishment in his criminal trial. He resigned his seat in July 1856 to allow his constituents to express their view on his conduct; they reelected him in the August special election to fill the vacancy created by his resignation. He was re-elected to a full term in November 1856, but died in January 1857, five weeks before the new term began in March.[4]
As described by historian Stephen Puleo, "The caning had an enormous impact on the events that followed over the next four years. ... As a result of the caning, the country was pushed, inexorably and unstoppably, to civil war."[5]
Early life
Brooks was born in
He attended South Carolina College (now known as the University of South Carolina), but was expelled just before graduation for threatening local police officers with firearms.[8] After leaving college, he studied law, attained admission to the bar, and practiced in Edgefield.[9]
In addition to practicing law, Brooks owned a plantation located in Cambridge, between Edgefield and
Family
Brooks's first wife was Caroline Harper Means (1820–1843). They had one child, Whitfield D. Brooks, who was born in 1843 and died that same year. Brooks was widowed upon Caroline's death.[12]
His second wife was Martha Caroline Means (1826–1901), his first wife's cousin.[13] They had three children, Caroline Harper Brooks (1849–1924), Rosa Brooks (1849–1933),[14] and Preston Smith Brooks (1854–1928).[15] Martha outlived her husband.
Political career
He was a member of the South Carolina state House of Representatives in 1844. Brooks was elected to the 33rd United States Congress in 1853 as a Democrat. Like his fellow South Carolina Representatives and Senators, Brooks took an extreme pro-slavery position, asserting that the enslavement of black people by whites was right and proper, that any attack or restriction on slavery was an attack on the rights and the social structure of the South.
During Brooks's service as Representative, there was great controversy over slavery in Kansas Territory and whether Kansas would be admitted as a free or slave state. He supported actions by pro-slavery men from Missouri to make Kansas a slave territory. In March 1856, Brooks wrote: "The fate of the South is to be decided with the Kansas issue. If Kansas becomes a hireling [i.e., free] state, slave property will decline to half its present value in Missouri ... [and] abolitionism will become the prevailing sentiment. So with Arkansas; so with upper Texas."[16]
Sumner assault
On May 20, 1856, Senator Charles Sumner made a speech denouncing "The Crime Against Kansas" and the Southern leaders whom he regarded as complicit, including Brooks's first cousin once removed, Senator Andrew Butler.[1]: 7 Sumner compared Butler with Don Quixote for embracing a prostitute (slavery) as his mistress, saying Butler "believes himself a chivalrous knight".
Of course he has chosen a mistress to whom he has made his vows, and who, though ugly to others, is always lovely to him; though polluted in the sight of the world, is chaste in his sight. I mean the harlot Slavery.[17]
Senator
Sumner's language was intentionally inflammatory; Southerners often claimed that abolition would lead to intermarriage and miscegenation, arguing that abolitionists opposed slavery because they wanted to have sex with and marry black women.[19] Abolitionists reversed the argument by accusing Southerners of supporting slavery so they could make sexual use of slave women. As Hoffer (2010) says, "It is also important to note the sexual imagery that recurred throughout the oration, which was neither accidental nor without precedent. Abolitionists routinely accused slaveholders of maintaining slavery so that they could engage in forcible sexual relations with their slaves."[1]: 62
Brooks thought of challenging Sumner to a duel. He consulted with Representative Laurence M. Keitt (also a South Carolina Democrat) on dueling etiquette. Keitt said that dueling was for gentlemen of equal social standing. In his view, Sumner was no gentleman, no better than a drunkard due to his supposedly coarse and insulting language toward Butler.[20][21] Brooks then decided to "punish" Sumner with a public beating.
On May 22, two days after Sumner's speech, Brooks entered the Senate chamber in company with Keitt. Also with him was Representative
Brooks confronted Sumner, who was seated at his desk, writing letters. He said, "Mr. Sumner, I have read your speech twice over carefully. It is a libel on South Carolina, and Mr. Butler, who is a relative of mine." As Sumner began to stand up, Brooks hit Sumner over the head several times with his cane, made of thick
Sumner suffered head trauma that would cause him chronic pain and symptoms consistent with what would now be called traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress disorder, and spent three years convalescing before returning to his Senate seat. He suffered chronic pain and debilitation for the rest of his life.[24]
After the attack
The national reaction to Brooks's attack was sharply divided along regional lines. In Congress, members in both houses armed themselves when they ventured onto the floor.[25] At no time, between the incident and his death, did Brooks apologize for the attack. In his speech to the House of Representatives announcing his resignation on June 14, 1856, Brooks insisted that he had behaved honorably and condemned any efforts to censure or punish him for his behavior.[26]
Brooks was widely cheered across the South, where his attack on Sumner was seen as a legitimate and socially justifiable act. South Carolinians sent Brooks dozens of new canes, with one bearing the phrase, "Good job"; another cane was inscribed "Hit him again." The
In contrast, Northerners, even those previously opposed to Sumner's extreme abolitionist invective, were universally shocked by Brooks's violence.[
Brooks claimed that he "meant no disrespect to the Senate of the United States" by attacking Sumner, and also that he had not intended to kill Sumner, or else he would have used a different weapon. Brooks was tried in a
A motion to expel Brooks from the House failed, but he resigned on July 15 to give his constituents the opportunity to ratify or condemn his conduct. They demonstrated their approval by returning him to office in the special election held on August 1, then elected him to a new term in November 1856.
Death
Brooks died unexpectedly from a violent attack of croup on January 27, 1857, a few weeks before the March 4 start of the new congressional term to which he had been elected.[31] He was buried in Edgefield, South Carolina.[32] The official telegram announcing his death stated "He died a horrid death, and suffered intensely. He endeavored to tear his own throat open to get breath."[33] Despite terrible weather, thousands went to the Capitol to attend memorial services.[34] After his body was transported back to Edgefield, another large crowd took part in funeral ceremonies before he was buried.[35] By stroke of fate, Butler died in May, barely four months later and one year after the caning.
Legacy
The city of
See also
- List of federal political scandals in the United States
- List of United States Congress members who died in office (1790–1899)
Notes
- ^ ISBN 978-0-8018-9469-5.
- JSTOR 27567525.
- ^ "Canefight! Preston Brooks and Charles Sumner". ushistory.org. Retrieved August 6, 2019.
- ^ Foreman, Amanda (2010). A World On Fire: Britain's Crucial Role in the American Civil War. New York: Random House. p. 34.
- ^ Puleo, Stephen (March 29, 2015). "The US Senate's darkest moment". Boston Globe Magazine. Boston, MA.
- ISBN 978-1-5275-3143-7 – via Google Books.
- ^ Kellam, Ida Brooks (1950). Brooks and Kindred Families. p. 14.
- ^ Hollis, Daniel Walker (1951). University of South Carolina: South Carolina College. Vol. 1. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press. p. 139.
- ^ Deitreich, p. 34.
- ^ Deitreich, p. 53.
- ISBN 9781880067352.
- ^ "Caroline Harper Means 1820–1843 – Ancestry®". Ancestory.com. Retrieved February 23, 2023.
- ISBN 9780879210663.
- ^ "Virginia Death Records 1912-2014, Death Certificate for Rosa Brooks McBee". Ancestry.com. Provo, UT: Ancestry.com LLC. September 24, 1933. Retrieved March 11, 2016.
- ^ "Tennessee Death Records 1908–1958, Death Certificate for Preston S. Brooks". Ancestry.com. Provo, UT: Ancestry.com LLC. July 6, 1929. Retrieved March 11, 2016.
- ISBN 978-0-19-503863-7.
- ^ Charles Sumner, Memoir and Letters of Charles Sumner: 1845–1860 edited by Edward Pierce (1893) Page 446 online
- ^ Lockwood, John and Charles. The Siege of Washington (2011) p. 98
- ISBN 9780807824931.
- ^ "The Compromise of 1850, The Kansas/Nebraska Act, Dred Scott, and John Brown's Raid". Academic Outreach. University of Alabama. Archived from the original on September 27, 2011. Retrieved July 16, 2011.
- ^ "Bleeding Congress". History Engine. University of Richmond. Retrieved July 16, 2011..
- ^ Ford, James. History of the United States from the Compromise of 1850: 1850–1854. p. 486
- ISBN 9780809046812.
- ^ Mitchell, Thomas G. Anti-slavery politics in antebellum and Civil War America (2007) p. 95
- ISBN 9780679768821.
- ^ "On his assault on Charles Sumner – Wikisource, the free online library".
- ^ Puleo, 102, 114–115
- ^ a b c Brady, Tim (Winter 1997). "Anson Burlingame: Diplomat, Orator" (PDF). JAAER: The Journal of Aviation/Aerospace Education and Research. Daytona Beach, FL: Embry-Riddke Aeronautical University. p. 17.
- Newspapers.com.
- The Far Eastern Quarterly. Vol. 4, no. 4. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. pp. 274–277.
- ^ "Death of Preston S. Brooks". Washington Evening Star. Washington, DC. January 28, 1857. p. 2.
- ISBN 978-0-8063-4823-0.
- ^ Sumner, Charles (1871). The Works of Charles Sumner. Vol. 4. Boston: Lee and Shepard. p. 271.
- ISBN 978-0-19-503902-3.
- ^ America in 1857: A Nation on the Brink.
- ^ "History of Brooksville". City of Brooksville. Archived from the original on May 8, 2020. Retrieved May 20, 2010.
- ^ "Brooks County Courthouse". GeorgiaInfo. Digital Library of Georgia. Retrieved May 20, 2010.
References
- Hoffer, Williamjames Hull (2010). The Caning of Charles Sumner: Honor, Idealism, and the Origins of the Civil War. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN 978-0-8018-9468-8. (160 pages).
- Puleo, Stephen (2012). The Caning: The Assault That Drove America to Civil War. Yardley, PA: Westholme Publishing LLC. ISBN 978-1-59416-516-0. (374 pages).
External links
- United States Congress. "Preston Brooks (id: B000885)". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.
- "Full text of Sumner's speech". Archived from the original on December 26, 2002. Retrieved December 7, 2004.
- Brooks's response, after the beating
- An account of the incident, the participants and the aftermath
- Preston Smith Brooks at Find a Grave
- Jefferson Society Notes[permanent dead link]