PORTLAND, Ore. (KATU) \u2014 Political violence in the United States may feel uniquely alarming right now, but it is not unprecedented, according to Laura Appleman, the Van Winkle Melton Professor of Law and University Research Integrity Officer at Willamette University.<\/p>\n
After a shooter opened fire at the White House Correspondent’s Dinner over the weekend, the third time in less than two years a gunman has gotten close to the president, the debate of perhaps worsening political violence in the country surfaces again. <\/p>\n
SEE ALSO | Third close call in two years puts Secret Service under scrutiny<\/a><\/p>\n Appleman said American history includes repeated periods of intense political violence, beginning with the nation\u2019s founding. <\/p>\n Speaking with KATU, she pointed to the Revolutionary era, including tarring and feathering, which she described as stripping a person, pouring boiling tar on them and covering them with feathers; an act she said often led to death or severe infection and disfigurement. She also described parts of the Revolutionary conflict, particularly in the middle colonies, as brutal guerrilla warfare.<\/p>\n Appleman said the period she considers the most politically violent in U.S. history began around 1850 and stretched through the years before and after the Civil War into the early 1900s. <\/p>\n She cited \u201cBleeding Kansas\u201d and the violent fight over whether Kansas would be a slave or free state, as well as the beating of Sen. Charles Sumner in Congress over his abolitionist views and the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln.<\/p>\n The professor also pointed to violence during Reconstruction, including the rise of the Ku Klux Klan, and described the era\u2019s brutality both before and after slavery, including convict leasing and debt peonage. She also referenced labor unrest, saying the period into the 1900s included \u201call the Union revolts.\u201d<\/p>\n Appleman said another major era of political violence came in the 1960s, citing the killings of John F. Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr., along with violence on college campuses. She said that period is often what people \u201cin living memory\u201d compare to today.<\/p>\n In discussing more recent events, Appleman said social media has added a \u201csomewhat disturbing\u201d new dimension by creating feedback loops in which people consume news from a narrow subset of sources and are repeatedly exposed to the same viewpoints, including violent rhetoric \u201con either side of the spectrum.\u201d She said social media and the internet also mean people know more details about events as they unfold, and have easy access to information about prior attacks and attempts.<\/p>\n Appleman also referenced a series of high-profile incidents, including President Donald Trump’s third time facing an assassination attempt<\/a> over the weekend, the incident in which a person attempted to assassinate Justice Brett Kavanaugh<\/a> in 2022, the attack on Paul Pelos<\/a>i<\/a>, Nancy Pelosi’s husband, that same year, \u201cthe tragic deaths of Melissa Hortman and her husband,” the Minnesota House of Representatives Speaker who was killed in 2025<\/a>, and the arson at Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro<\/a>\u2019s home also in 2025. <\/p>\n She said people are \u201cvery fraught right now\u201d and \u201cvery polarized,\u201d and that polarization is being exacerbated by social media and the internet.<\/p>\n Appleman said conspiracy thinking and distrust are not new in American life. She pointed to the lead-up to the Civil War as an example of extreme polarization, and said conspiracy narratives were also prominent during Reconstruction, including claims used to justify the rise of the Ku Klux Klan. <\/p>\n She also cited the resurgence of the KKK in the 1920s and 1930s, and referenced Father Coughlin\u2019s radio broadcasts promoting conspiracy theories and antisemitic rhetoric, along with anti-Catholic speech and Charles Lindbergh running against President Franklin D. Roosevelt.<\/p>\n A key difference today is the fragmentation of news consumption, she said.<\/p>\n Appleman said that until roughly 10 to 15 years ago, most Americans still got their news from the same sources, such as newspapers, radio, and later a handful of television networks, but that is no longer the case. <\/p>\n She added that local news has a larger audience share than national outlets such as CNN or C-SPAN, and said the fractured media environment has helped drive current polarization. Even so, she said she does not believe today\u2019s polarization is worse than what the country has experienced before.<\/p>\n Oregon’s piece of the puzzle<\/p>\n Appleman also discussed Oregon\u2019s history and how it fits into the broader picture. <\/p>\n She said Oregon\u2019s territorial charter did not allow Black citizens to live in the territory, and described the state as having \u201calways been a very white state.\u201d She said Oregon saw a resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s.<\/p>\n She also referenced the U.S. Supreme Court case Apodaca v. Oregon, describing it as a case that allowed nonunanimous juries and saying it was \u201cfinally overturned by the Supreme Court\u201d two years ago. Appleman said the case involved a Jewish defendant and that Oregon at the time wanted to ensure the defendant was convicted.<\/p>\n In more recent history, she cited the occupation of the National Wildlife Refuge area involving Ammon Bundy, the Jan. 6 Capitol takeover in 2021 in which five people died, and violent clashes in downtown Portland during the Black Lives Matter protests between \u201cso-called Antifa\u201d and the \u201cso-called proud boys.\u201d <\/p>\n She also described a political divide between the Portland area, which she said \u201ctends to be more blue,\u201d and much of the rest of the state, which she said \u201ctends to go a little more red,” referring to the Democratic party’s prevalence in Portland compared to the Republican party in some other parts of the state.<\/p>\n Appleman said Oregon has experienced political violence but has not seen the kind of \u201cstalking and murder\u201d that other states have had involving state legislatures or governors.<\/p>\n