A hometown newspaper with a local office, local owners & lots of local news
A hometown newspaper with a local office, local owners & lots of local news
According to the U.S. House of Representatives archives, the most infamous floor brawl in the history of the U.S. House of Representatives erupted as members debated Kansas Territory's pro-slavery Lecompton Constitution late into the night of February 5-6, 1858. Minnesota and Kansas were slated to become states in tandem that year, so the debate held up Minnesota's bill for statehood. Shortly before 2 a.m., Pennsylvania Republican Galusha Grow and South Carolina Democrat Laurence Keitt exchanged insults, then blows. "In an instant the House was in the greatest possible confusion," the Congressional Globe reported. More than 30 members joined the melee. Northern Republicans and Free Soilers joined ranks against Southern Democrats. Speaker James Orr, a South Carolina Democrat, gaveled furiously for order and then instructed Sergeant-at-Arms Adam J. Glossbrenner to arrest noncompliant members. Wading into the "combatants," Glossbrenner held the House mace (a symbolic rod) high to restore order. Wisconsin Republicans John "Bowie Knife" Potter and Cadwallader Washburn ripped the hairpiece from the head of William Barksdale, a Democrat from Mississippi. The melee dissolved into a chorus of laughs and jeers, but the sectional nature of the fight powerfully symbolized the nation's divisions. When the House reconvened two days later, a coalition of Northern Republicans and Free Soilers narrowly blocked referral of the Lecompton Constitution to the House Territories Committee. The Minnesota bill went through anyway and statehood was achieved in May. Kansas entered the Union in 1861 as a free state.
Historic Minnesota events with anniversaries this week.
May 8
1910 Governor Adolf O. Eberhart declares Minnesota's first Mother's Day holiday.
1924 Ships idled in ice in Duluth's harbor begin to break free after stranding passengers and cargo for three days.
May 9
1921 Daniel Berrigan is born in Virginia on the Iron Range. His brother Philip was born Oct. 5, 1923, in Two Harbors. The Berrigans, once called "rebel priests" in the early 1970s on the cover of Time magazine, learned protest from their father, Thomas.
Too radical for the North Shore, the Berrigans moved to upstate New York. The brothers became some of the most visible and radical members of the peace movement. Both spent time in prison. Both were once on the FBI's "most wanted" list in the 1960s for destruction of government property in protests against the Vietnam War. By 1980, their focus shifted to the weapons of war, particularly nuclear arsenals, with the group Plowshares. The name comes from a passage from the Bible and the text of the prophet Isaiah, who said weapons shall be beaten into plowshares.
1998 The suit State of Minnesota et al. v. Philip Morris et al. is settled when the defendants - tobacco companies - agree to pay Minnesota and Blue Cross-Blue Shield $6.5 billion in total. The settlement ended the companies' chain of legal victories and turned the tide in anti-tobacco efforts throughout the nation.
May 10
1941 Charles A. Lindbergh is the featured speaker at a large America First rally in Minneapolis. The America First Committee promoted U.S. isolationism during the years leading up to World War II. Lindbergh's anti-war activity reduced his stature in many people's eyes, but after war was declared, he would dedicate himself to the battle for victory, flying 50 missions in the Pacific.
May 11
1858 Minnesota becomes the 32nd state in the United States. The enabling act for statehood had been passed on Feb. 26, 1857 and the state's constitution was written that summer and ratified in October.
The bill in Congress submitted in December for admission encountered obstacles. It was coupled with the bill for the admission of Kansas. It was customary to admit states in pairs to preserve the balance of power in Congress. A state that permitted slavery would be linked with a state that prohibited slavery. Minnesota was to be a free state, Kansas a slave state.
The proposal to admit Kansas was found to be made under the fraudulent Lecompton constitution that led to an infamous floor brawl in the U.S. House of Representatives in February of 1958. Kansas admission was eventually dropped. But the Minnesota bill also met with general opposition from congressmen from southern slave states.
By May, the bill for the admission of Minnesota was passed by Congress and approved by President James Buchanan. Word of its passage did not reach St. Paul until almost two weeks later. Minnesota had no telegraph lines or railroads, so a telegram was sent to Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, and carried up the Mississippi River to St. Paul by steamboat.
Portions of Minnesota had been claimed under four nations - France, Spain, Great Britain and the United States - and fell into nine territories: Northwest, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Louisiana, Missouri, Iowa, and Minnesota.
May 13
1956 A 21-year-old Elvis Presley makes his Minnesota debut and performs at the auditoriums in St. Paul and Minneapolis for matinee and evening shows.
This column is derived from MNopedia.org and developed by the Minnesota Historical Society. and its partners. Additional information provided by Pine Knot News staff.
