I've often thought what it might be like to sit in on a debate held back in the 17-1800s. Was it decorum, or drag-down knock outs?
They are fairly civilized now compared with the violent Democrats back in the day:
en.wikipedia.org
The
Caning of Charles Sumner, or the
Brooks–Sumner Affair, occurred on May 22, 1856, in the
United States Senate, when Representative
Preston Brooks (
D-
SC) used a walking cane to attack Senator
Charles Sumner (
R-
MA), an
abolitionist, 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 drew a sharply polarized response from the American public on the subject of the expansion of
slavery in the United States. It has been considered symbolic of the "Breakdown of reasoned discourse"
[1] that eventually led to the
American Civil War.
And our media hasn't changed much, either:
en.wikipedia.org
Yellow journalism and the
yellow press are American terms for
journalism and associated newspapers that present little or no legitimate well-researched news while instead using eye-catching headlines for increased sales.
[1] Techniques may include
exaggerations of news events, scandal-mongering, or
sensationalism. By extension, the term
yellow journalism is used today as a pejorative to decry any journalism that treats news in an unprofessional or unethical fashion.