Physical Feistiness in Politics Is Nothing New to Washington

Rep. Richard Hudson (R-N.C.) (L), pulls Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.) back as they talk with Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) and others during the 14th round of voting for Speaker as the House on Jan. 6, 2023. Andrew Harnik/AP Photo

News Analysis

Last week, the American public was treated to the spectacle of members of the U.S. House of Representatives acting in an especially combative mode.

And, of course, the prolonged episode of electing a Speaker was one in which Republicans were more at odds with each other than Republicans and Democrats.

Freedom Caucus members, a particularly stalwart and conservative faction within the GOP, were holding out in delivering the votes needed to hand the gavel to Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) unless he conceded to at least some of their demands.

McCarthy made the concessions and secured the needed votes—but not before a lot of anger and vitriol was spilled, and maybe—one physical altercation narrowly averted.

Harry Truman, the 33rd U.S. President, addresses the media in Washington in 1945. AFP via Getty Images

The pushing and punching, perhaps both, that may have been headed off happened late on Jan. 6 following Matt Gaetz’s (R-Fla.) voting present on the 14th vote, which helped assure McCarthy would not yet become Speaker.

Reacting to Gaetz’s vote, an incensed Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), standing in an aisle of the House chamber and within a few feet of the seated Floridian, lunged at Gaetz and told him he was “finished.”

Rogers’s movement toward Gaetz prompted Richard Hudson (R-N.C.), behind Rogers, to put his hand over his colleague’s mouth and pull him backward.

It is the good fortune of America that—at least in modern times—even as the debates involving our lawmakers often become bitter, highly emotional, angry, and insulting, they almost never get physical or threaten to get physical.

As well—and, again, at least in the modern era—politicians almost never resort to martial means to settle scores with opponents who are not fellow legislators.

But it does happen.

One needs to go back nearly 38 years to the most recent physical exchange on the House floor.

Preceding the event, Rep. Bob Dornan (R-Calif.), who was well-known for provocative comments and stirring things up, referred to Rep. Thomas Downey (D-N.Y.) in a speech as a “draft-dodging wimp.”

An unhappy Downey got in Dornan’s face and brought up the comments, upon which, according to Downey, Dornan grabbed his tie and threatened to harm him bodily.

Such ridiculousness exasperated Speaker of the House Tip O'Neill (D-Mass.), a product of the rough sport of Boston and Massachusetts politics, who told Dornan and Downey they could settle things out “outside in the street” but not in the House chamber.

Legislative Violence

The most famous act of things getting physical in Congress was far more severe than that involving Reps. Dornan and Downey. It was violence that nearly resulted in the death of one participant and was incited by passions and tempers that ripped apart and almost dissolved the Union.

America was inching toward civil war in May of 1856, when Charles Sumner, a Republican from Massachusetts who held and argued a staunch antislavery position, delivered remarks in the debate on one of the fieriest and combustible legislative matters in United States history—whether the nation should admit the Kansas Territory as a free or slave state.

In his “Crime Against Kansas” speech, Sumner inveighed mightily and poignantly against slavery and hurled biting personal insults against his opponents.

Sumner indeed brought forth choice and nasty comments in addressing Democratic senator Andrew Butler of South Carolina, whom he declared to have gained fame in the Senate by promoting the sin of slavery.

Sumner said that Butler had “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.”

Andrew Butler was not in the Senate chamber when Sumner uttered that line, but it was enough that his South Carolina kinsman, House Rep. Preston Brooks, found out what Sumner said.

In the afternoon, a couple of days after the speech, Brooks, armed with a metal-headed walking cane, surprised Sumner in the nearly empty Senate chamber and beat him viciously with the cane, almost killing him before he could be restrained.

Sumner never fully recovered but did resume his seat in the Senate following a three-year recovery and served 18 more years.

Preston Brooks was arrested and received a sentence of a fine. He was censored in the House, but there were not enough votes to expel him.

Brooks resigned from the House in protest of his treatment and successfully ran for reelection but died from the croup at 37 years old before the new term began.

Truman Takes On Critic

Even the president of the United States can consider mixing it up when he objects to criticism of someone he loves.

That was the case in 1950 when President Harry Truman took major exception to a negative review that Washington Post critic Paul Hume wrote of a singing performance of Truman' ’s daughter and only child, Margaret, an aspiring classical soprano.

In response, Truman penned a letter to Hume in which he observed, “It seems to me that you are a frustrated old man who wishes he could have been successful.”

Truman also advised Hume, “Someday I hope to meet you. When that happens you'll need a new nose, a lot of beefsteak for black eyes, and perhaps a supporter below!”

It needs to be noted that Margaret Truman’s performance was in the evening, and on the afternoon of the same day, Charlie Ross, press secretary for the president, and his friend from grade school died from a heart attack.

President Truman was dealing with a lot—and then he picked up the newspaper.