Bleeding Kansas

In 1856, Preston Brooks attacked Senator Charles Sumner with a cane after Sumner insulted Brooks’s relative in a speech. The violent act intensified sectional tensions, influenced John Brown’s rebellion, and contributed to the rise of the Republican Party. Biographies of Sumner and Brooks later reevaluated their roles in the pre-Civil War era.

Hasan Kwame Jeffries, a history professor and brother of House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, called for citizens to emulate John Brown's violent abolitionist tactics, stating 'by any means necessary' to combat white supremacy. The article criticizes this as a dangerous endorsement of political violence, referencing Brown's 1856 Pottawatomie massacre and other academics like Stacey Patton who have similarly invoked Brown as a model for activism.