Today, we tend to think our disagreements are uncivil. But two centuries ago, citizens could be pummeled just for expressing their opinions and exercising their First Amendment rights. This is exactly what happened to a member of the founding generation.
Henry Lee III, who fought with valor in the Revolution and delivered George Washington’s eulogy, came to Baltimore in the summer of 1812 to aid Alexander Hanson, a federalist newspaper publisher critical of President James Madison and the freshly ignited war with Great Britain. After a night-time standoff with a furious crowd of Democrat-Republicans (supporters of the president), the local militia escorted Lee and Hanson’s party to one of the city’s jails, and supposedly to security. But the city’s officials, with little interest in protecting the prisoners, dismissed the guard.
