DID AN INSURRECTION ALMOST HAPPEN BEFORE JANUARY 6?

From "Team of Rivals,"
"The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln" by Doris Kearns Goodwin

Special to El Rrun-Rrun

Many people have believed that the insurrection by a violent and heavily armed mob of supporters of outgoing President Donald Trump who stormed the U.S. Capitol as Congress was meeting to certify the results of the 2020 presidential election was a spontaneous event.

Since then we have learned that while lawmakers and staff were shepherded to secure locations or barricaded behind doors, the rioters pushed past severely outnumbered Capitol Police officers, breaking windows and vandalizing offices, many with disturbingly violent intentions toward members of Congress and Vice President Mike Pence for their having refused to succumb to Trump’s attempts to overturn the election in his favor. Five people were killed, including one Capitol Police officer who was beaten by rioters.

The attempted coup was not the spontaneous work of a moment.

“The invasion of the U.S. Capitol … was stoked in plain sight,” ProPublica reported, with Trump supporters having for weeks discussed openly their plans for a violent overthrow. However, this was not the first time that such an attempt has been recorded. It almost happened February 13, 1861 as Congress met to count the vote that made Lincoln president.

Quoting from Goodwin's book, it states:

"The following day, as Lincoln was feted in the state Capitol at Columbus, Ohio, he received a telegram that the electors had met in Washington to count the vote and make his election official. 

For weeks, (William H.) Seward and Edwin M. (Stanton) had worried that the (southern states) secessionists would choose this day to besiege the capital and prevent the electors from meeting. That day, Lincoln learned, had passed peacefully. 

'The votes have been counted,'" Seward's son Fred reported to his wife Anna," and the Capitol not attacked. General (Winfield) Scott had his troops all under arms, out of sight but ready, with guns loaded, horses harnessed and matches lighted so that they could take to the field at a moment's notice. But there was no enemy.'

Seward himself was immensely relieved to have 'passed the 13th safely' believing, he wrote home, that 'each day brings the people apparently neared to the tone and temper, and even to the policy I have indicated..." 

In contrast to the preparations by Seward, Stanton, and Scott, in 2020 the Capitol Police and the national guard were overwhelmed by a mob of 2,000–2,500 supporters of U.S. President Donald Trump who attacked the Capitol Building in Washington, D.C. seeking to overturn the election results. Just 1,400 Capitol Police officers were on duty at the time, and National Guardsmen didn’t arrive until hours after the invasion began.

We could have taken a page from the past and prevented the January 6 attack if only we had remembered the lessons of history.