Unprecedented Attacks on Capitol Hill

[TheDeamon]

https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/minute/bomb_explodes_in_capitol.htm

The Senate had planned to work late into the evening of Monday, November 7, 1983.  Deliberations proceeded more smoothly than expected, however, so the body adjourned at 7:02 p.m.  A crowded reception, held near the Senate Chamber, broke up two hours later.  Consequently, at 10:58 p.m., when a thunderous explosion tore through the second floor of the Capitol’s north wing, the adjacent halls were virtually deserted.  Many lives had been spared.

Minutes before the blast, a caller claiming to represent the “Armed Resistance Unit” had warned the Capitol switchboard that a bomb had been placed near the chamber in retaliation for recent U.S. military involvement in Grenada and Lebanon.

The force of the device, hidden under a bench at the eastern end of the corridor outside the chamber, blew off the door to the office of Democratic Leader Robert C. Byrd.  The blast also punched a potentially lethal hole in a wall partition sending a shower of pulverized brick, plaster, and glass into the Republican cloakroom.  Although the explosion caused no structural damage to the Capitol, it shattered mirrors, chandeliers, and furniture.  Officials calculated damages of $250,000.

A stately portrait of Daniel Webster, located across from the concealed bomb, received the explosion’s full force.  The blast tore away Webster’s face and left it scattered across the Minton tiles in one-inch canvas shards.  Quick thinking Senate curators rescued the fragments from debris-filled trash bins.  Over the coming months, a capable conservator painstakingly restored the painting to a credible, if somewhat diminished, version of the original. 

Following a five-year investigation, federal agents arrested six members of the so-called Resistance Conspiracy in May 1988 and charged them with bombings of the Capitol, Ft. McNair, and the Washington Navy Yard.  In 1990, a federal judge sentenced Marilyn Buck, Laura Whitehorn, and Linda Evans to lengthy prison terms for conspiracy and malicious destruction of government property.  The court dropped charges against three co-defendants, already serving extended prison sentences for related crimes. 

The 1983 bombing marked the beginning of tightened security measures throughout the Capitol.  The area outside the Senate Chamber, previously open to the public, was permanently closed.  Congressional officials instituted a system of staff identification cards and added metal detectors to building entrances to supplement those placed at chamber gallery doors following a 1971 Capitol bombing.

[DonaldD]

Hmmm... if past is prolog, are the Capitol attackers from January 6 also looking at between 20 and 50 year sentences?

[Fenring]

Ugh, at first I scanned the quote and didn't see the number 1983...

[TheDeamon]

Hmmm... if past is prolog, are the Capitol attackers from January 6 also looking at between 20 and 50 year sentences?

Depends on demonstrable intent, the bombers couldn't claim they had no intent to kill given what they used.

It's going to be hard to prove intent to kill with rope and zip ties, even if someone was found packing a noose, it still might be hard to "prove beyond a reasonable doubt" absent an admission of guilt if their defense is halfway competent.

[TheDeamon]

Ugh, at first I scanned the quote and didn't see the number 1983...

But remember, Capitol Hill hasn't been attacked or vandalized since the war of 1812. Evidently detonated pipe bombs in the building don't qualify as "an attack" and the resulting damage wasn't vandalism, at least when a leftist group is doing it.

[DJQuag]

Americans. Entertaining the rest of the world since 1776.

Gotta refer to your hated enemy as "The Honorable Gentleman from such and such," in chambers, otherwise they're planting bombs.

[TheDeamon]

Americans. Entertaining the rest of the world since 1776.

Gotta refer to your hated enemy as "The Honorable Gentleman from such and such," in chambers, otherwise they're planting bombs.

Or just beating you senseless.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caning_of_Charles_Sumner

The Caning of Charles Sumner, or the Brooks–Sumner Affair, occurred on May 22, 1856, in the United States Senate chamber, when Representative Preston Brooks, a pro-slavery Democrat from South Carolina, used a walking cane to attack Senator Charles Sumner, an abolitionist Republican from Massachusetts, in retaliation for a speech given by Sumner two days earlier in which he fiercely criticized slaveholders, including a relative of Brooks. The beating nearly killed Sumner and it contributed significantly to the country's polarization over the issue of slavery. It has been considered symbolic of the "breakdown of reasoned discourse" and the use of violence that eventually led to the Civil War.

[TheDeamon]

Oh, here is another one:

https://history.house.gov/Oral-History/Events/1954-Shooting/

On March 1, 1954, while Members gathered on the House Floor for an upcoming vote, three men and one woman entered the visitor’s gallery above the chamber and quietly took their seats. All four belonged to the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party and only hours earlier had traveled from New York City to Washington, DC.

The United States had annexed Puerto Rico in 1898, and the island’s relationship with the federal government had long been a point of contention. Some Puerto Ricans sought to maintain their relationship with the mainland, and others, like the four visitors in the House that day, argued for an independent Puerto Rico.

The Capitol had few security protocols at the time, and the four Puerto Rican nationalists entered the gallery armed with handguns. Around 2:30 p.m. they indiscriminately opened fire onto the House Floor and unfurled a Puerto Rican flag in a violent act of protest meant to draw attention to their demand for Puerto Rico’s immediate independence.

Five Congressmen were wounded in the shooting.

Members, House Pages, and police officers quickly helped detain three of the assailants outside the gallery, while the fourth escaped the Capitol and was apprehended later that afternoon.

[Wayward Son]

So are you saying, Deamon, that because of a pipe bomb 38 years ago, because of a shooting in the Capitol from 67 years ago, and because of a caning incident from before the Civil War, we should not take the overrunning of the Capitol by hundreds of protesters which left 2 people killed (including one police officer), 3 others dead from lack of medical assistance, and at least 56 police officers injured (two who were hospitalized), as a "big deal?"  That it really isn't that unusual?

You realize that around half of Americans alive today weren't born when the pipe bomb went off; that most Americans weren't born when the shooting occurred; and that NO Americans alive today were born when the caning incident occurred. 

We've had dark times before.  But no comparison with the darker times we had before makes this any lighter.  Nor does it make the attempted overthrow of the government less significant.

[Grant]

So are you saying, Deamon, that because of a pipe bomb 38 years ago, because of a shooting in the Capitol from 67 years ago, and because of a caning incident from before the Civil War, we should not take the overrunning of the Capitol by hundreds of protesters which left 2 people killed (including one police officer), 3 others dead from lack of medical assistance, and at least 56 police officers injured (two who were hospitalized), as a "big deal?"  That it really isn't that unusual?

I have to agree that somebody is trying to compare apples to oranges and say "but look, fruit!".  The Capitol was overrun by a mob bent on overturning Constitutional process and the actions of the rightly elected representatives of the American people.  It was seized, for however limited a time.  Congress had to flee.  It's a totally different animal than shootings or bombs or canings.  Sorry.  There is no point to make here except make yourself look bad.  Truly upset that none of these people are being charged with treason so they can get the federal death penalty. 

[DJQuag]

Americans. Entertaining the rest of the world since 1776.

Gotta refer to your hated enemy as "The Honorable Gentleman from such and such," in chambers, otherwise they're planting bombs.

Or just beating you senseless.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caning_of_Charles_Sumner

The Caning of Charles Sumner, or the Brooks–Sumner Affair, occurred on May 22, 1856, in the United States Senate chamber, when Representative Preston Brooks, a pro-slavery Democrat from South Carolina, used a walking cane to attack Senator Charles Sumner, an abolitionist Republican from Massachusetts, in retaliation for a speech given by Sumner two days earlier in which he fiercely criticized slaveholders, including a relative of Brooks. The beating nearly killed Sumner and it contributed significantly to the country's polarization over the issue of slavery. It has been considered symbolic of the "breakdown of reasoned discourse" and the use of violence that eventually led to the Civil War.

Nah my friend one of the reasons I end up respecting the American system.

I mean, in that case we needed better security but if you're going to run your mouth watch your back. Basic gangland procedure.