Congressman Brooks' Assault on Senator Sumner.Montpelier, Vermont, Patriot and State Gazette [Democratic](30 May 1856)
The following is the statement of Mr.
Sumner, under oath, in regard to the
assault upon him by Mr. Brooks:
[statement omitted by transcriber]
Mr. Sumner's own account makes the
outrage lighter than did the first dispatches.
Mr. Brooks was the only one who knew of
the attack beforehand, -- contrary to first
reports, which represented that this mode of
punishment was agreed on by southerners
in caucus, -- and he was promptly arrested
by the by-standers, Mr. Toombs, of Georgia,
grasping Brooks round his waist; and the
instrument used on Mr. Sumner was a
limber and hollow gutta percha walking stick.
The remarks made by Mr. Sumner, which
provoked this assault, were malignant and
insulting beyond anything ever uttered in
coolness upon the floor of the Senate. Yet,
had they been ten times more so, they could
have afforded no excuse for this brutal and
dastardly attack. The House owes it to its
own character to expel this cowardly wretch
at once.
We observe the Abolition papers are
disposed to use this incident to promote their
peculiar views. They speak of it as "another
outrage" of slavery against freedom;
whereas it is a personal affair entirely, for
which Mr. Brooks is alone responsible. It
is an incident, we agree, which has resulted
from the angry passions this slavery
controversy has infused throughout the whole
Union; and the lesson it teaches with most
clearness, is the folly and madness of any
word or act which many stimulate this
excitement to a higher degree of frenzy.
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