Final answer:
Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina brutally attacked Massachusetts senator Charles Sumner with a cane in May 1856, in response to Sumner's anti-slavery speech. Southerners hailed Brooks as a hero while northerners saw it as emblematic of the brutality of slavery and free speech suppression, intensifying sectional disputes on the eve of the Civil War.
Step-by-step explanation:
The Caning of Senator Charles Sumner
The congressman from South Carolina who carried out a brutal act on a Massachusetts senator was Preston Brooks. The violent incident occurred after Senator Charles Sumner delivered his impassioned anti-slavery speech. Brooks felt compelled to defend the honor of his relative and state, and on May 22, 1856, he assaulted Sumner with a cane on the Senate floor, leaving him bleeding and unconscious.
While the Southerners celebrated Brooks as a hero, sending him gifts of canes inscribed with messages such as "Hit Him Again" and "Use Knock Down Arguments," the North was appalled and used the incident to highlight the barbarity of the slave system and the suppression of free speech. The event further inflamed sectional tensions and solidified Charles Sumner as a martyr for the antislavery cause. The assault by Brooks became symbolic of the South's unwavering defense of slavery and overall contempt for anti-slavery expression, exacerbating the already stark division between the North and South.
The repercussions of this event were significant, with Northern opinion coalescing around the need to curb slave power, leading toward the Civil War. Brooks's subsequent resignation and re-election by South Carolinians underscored the sectional divide and the South's endorsement of his actions. The polarized views about the caning reflected the deep divisions that had taken hold in the U.S. over the issue of slavery.