Analyzes the discussion of slavery, race, and ideology inspired by the caning of antislavery Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts in the Senate chamber on May 22, 1856, by South Carolinian Congressman Preston Smith Brooks. Reaction of Brooks to Sumner's 'The Crime of Kansas' speech; Fundamental political divide over racial slavery in the U.S. revealed by the reactions to Brooks' assault on Sumner; Emergence of Sumner as one of the foremost voices of emancipation and black rights in the national political arena; Event's revelation of how the concepts of freedom, democracy, and citizenship were not static but constantly contested.