0 the majority of votes. that is the economic payoff for the money to leave, that is been funding this racism, as a way to drive their agreed. ultimately, we are at "the rachel maddow show" starts now. good evening, rachel. >> good evening, chris. much appreciated. and thanks for joining us this hour at home. the chief federal judge in court in washington, d.c., made a ruling tonight concerning one of the defendants facing criminal charges for his alleged role in the january 6th attack on the u.s. capitol a year ago today. the judge handed down her ruling tonight in the form of what's called a minute order, which means it's short. and in this case, it's short like poetry is short, it's short like i think i might commit this to memory and sing it to myself in the shower one day. here it is in its entirety. as to defend anthony robert williams, denying defend's motion for permission to travel. defend, while on pretrial release and facing charges including a serious felony offense, stemming from his alleged actions on january 6, 2021, wished to leave the michigan winter to spend 10 days in the warmer climes of jamaica to meet the family of a woman with whom defend has been in a committed relationship for, quote, more than a year. then the footnote in the minute order indicates that that "more than a year" is a quote from what he said about himself in his motion where he asked for permission to travel to jamaica. more than a year. the judge continues, quote, although such a meeting pay be an important step in defend's personal relationship, defendant surrendered his entitlement to unfettered international travel when also more than a year ago, he allegedly announced his intent to storm the swamp, and on january 6th, 2021, he followed through by joining a mob at the capitol that by his words, took that effing building, the event he allegedly viewed as, quote, the proudest day of his life. this court will not commemorate the one-year anniversary of his attack on the capitol by granting defendant's request for nonessential foreign travel while he is awaiting judgment for his actions on that day. in other words, no, you cannot go to jamaica, signed the chief judge of federal district court in washington, d.c. so, no, that particular january 6th defendant who is facing at least one felony charge that could get him 20 years in prison, there he is, for his role in the trump supporters mob attack on the capitol on january 6th, no, the court isn't give him special permission to spend ten days, sunning himself in jamaica, although, i'm sure it is lovely there this time of year. that is the very brief, very memorable order handed down tonight in federal district court in washington dc. you know, i used to have this sort of pat answer i would give, when people asked me about times that were particularly bad, particularly bleak for our country, especially in terms of politics. you know, something unusually bad would happen, some faction in our politics would sink to some new low, and if anybody asked me about just how bad things had become, for a long time -- i regret this now -- but, for a long time, i had this sort of go-to glib response where i would say some version of, you know, hey, listen, we always think it's the worst it has ever been, but members of congress aren't exactly beating one another with canes on the floor of the senate anymore. it's been worse. i used to say that all the time. and the point of that, i believe it still does stand, right, however bad we think things are. we are a country that had a civil war where we americans massed as opposing armies and killed hundreds of thousands of each other. we are a country that spent hundreds of years enslaving people, i mean, here. right? we have been through the bottomlands, absolutely. and, no, as bad as things get in washington and as badly as they degrade, even in congress, we are not seeing these days a member of congress beat a u.s. senator with a cane on the senate floor. that happened on may 22nd, 1856, senator charles sumner was the victim. he was a radical republican, radically opposed to slavery, leader of the abolitionists in the united states senate. senator sumner was sitting at his desk in the senate chamber alone. he was writing. the chamber was almost empty. nobody in the gallery. and three southern pro-slavery congressmen came into the chamber looking for him, two of them keeping any rescuers from helping out or interfering in any way while the other one, without warning, just starting smashing senator sumner over the head over and over again with the heavy metal end of his cane. it was two south carolina congressmen, one virginia congressman, one of the two south carolina congressman who actually wielded the cane against sumner kept up that beating for so long, so relentlessly, again, with his friends keeping anybody from intervening and stopping him, used that weapon against the unarmed senator to the point where he very nearly beat the senator to death. senator sumner did survive but barely. it took three years before he was able to come back to the united states senate. senator sumner was hurt so badly. that was something serious and terrible enough, even more than, you know, 160 years later that it is nothing to be glib about, nothing to be short about, even to make an otherwise valid point. but today, one of the things that happened at the capitol to commemorate the january 6 attack last year is that the house hosted the librarian of congress you see there on your left, and two very famous historians who you see at the center and right of your screen here, to talk about the history of what happened on january 6th, how to make sure that history gets preserved, how to make sure that attack gets told for the purposes of history, how to make sure it gets told accurately in history, and the historian doris kearns goodwin at that event today brought up the caning of sumner there today and brooks who nearly killed the senator on the floor of the senate and brought it up today in a way that surprised me because of the unique resonance of that violence, that famous act of violence having happened inside the capitol. that happened inside congress, the way the violence happened inside congress on january 6th. we have had a lot of violence in this country, a lot of political violence in this country, but inside the congress? inside the capitol? that resonates in a different way in this country. watch what doris kearns goodwin said today. >> i think the chilling thing about the 1850s is when i think of the attack on senator sumner, the antislavery senator by preston brooks, the south carolina congressman, happened in the senate, and because of that touched on the hearts and minds of the american people in a way lots of other anantislave people had been attacked before, but somehow it hit home and there was a sense in which, for a while, more people joined the republican party, abraham lincoln joined it after that, the moderates and conservatives realized they have to leave the party structure behind, the wig party collapsed, and i thought that was going to happen that a line had been drawn after january 6 in the same way because sometimes these events just touch you and there's a fundamental sense on the part of the people that something had to change, and we got abraham lincoln out of that. the sad, scary part of the 1850s is that preston brooks became a hero in the south, that the governor presented him with a silver goblet people running around with canes wanting to get other members of the antislavery movement, get seward next, they said, and part of that part of the 1850s where you had alternative realities, historians said when you saw that event and two narratives you saw there was something happening to the country. and there was a partisan grasp in the 1850s, when lincoln would be in debates with steven douglas and the republican paper reporting on the very same debate the democratic party would be reporting on, when they report on the lincoln part of it say he was so triumphant, carried out on the arms of his supporters, you read the democratic paper and he fell on the floor it was so embarrassing he had to be dragged out by supporters. so we have some of those parallels from the 1850s, and the only hope will be that -- you're right. it ended badly. i mean, obviously, it ended badly with the civil war, but out of that came what had to be done which was to undo that original sin of slavery, and those people fought for that. we had a leader in abraham lincoln who carried us through that and i think when we look at what happened, that's what you have to remember that somehow some of these fights have to be fought, but hopefully doesn't end up that way, we'll know the mistakes we made in the 1850s. >> we'll know the mistakes we made, doris kearns goodwin speaking today at the capitol, she and fellow esteemed historian led this today for members of congress on how to get the history right on what happened on january 6th. talking about that attack on charles sumner back in the 1850s, it happened inside congress, happened on the floor of the senate. talking about how that fact of it grabbed americans by the proverbial throat it. was a galvanizing thing. it was horrifying, the barbarity of that inside the congress, drove americans to take a clearer side against that that had taken, that they were previously ready to take. and in that sense, it is, as doris said, part of the story of how we get the leadership of abraham lincoln and ultimately the path to the emancipation proclamation and end to slavery. that act of violence, that horrific act of violence, in congress, in the capitol, galvanizes the country and starts turning history towards what ultimately ends slavery, because it's so horrifying. and, but, also, on earth too, also here in america, the pro-slavery guy gets treated as such a hero, they literally bought him new canes and sent them to him to replace the one that he shattered on the skull of that senator. the pieces of the broken cane that he used to beat senator sumner was treated like a religious relic. people wore pieces of it as talismans, news papers in the south deified him, only wish senator sumner could have been further hurt, that the job could have been finished. that was also the reaction in america. that was 1856, and, of course, by 1861, america was formally divided into two warring factions and started killing each other in earnest by the hundreds of thousands. tonight, there was a prayer vigil on the steps of the u.s. capitol, prayer vigil for both senators and members of the house. this is what that looked like. dozens of senators and members of the house gave floor speeches today about the attack and the need to preserve our democracy in the face of the movement that was behind the attack and that would undo our democracy by force. right-wing movement that precipitated the attack on january 6th a year ago, of course, holds sway on the republican party, working on the undoing of the next elect and the one after that, an members of congress today invade against that. president biden gave a fierce, intense speech today, in which he said the capitol attack a year ago was a dagger at the throat of democracy. it was also a bit of a collective shudder across the country late today when politico.com was first to report at the time an operable, viable pipe bomb was found just outside democratic headquarters on january 6 last year, vice president-elect kamala harris was inside the building when they found the bomb there. that is something we did not know before today. so in ways good, in ways bad, and uplifting and sombre and prayerful and angry and scared today and all these ways today, there was kind of a unified earth-1 response, boy, what happened a year ago today on january 6 was terrible, how do we make sure we don't do that again? but then also today, there's hillsdale county, michigan, where tonight, the hillsdale county republican party is hosting a fund-raising calling it the insurrection anniversary fund-raiser, explanation point included. said on their announcement about the insurrection anniversary fund raiser tonight, food and drinks will be provide. we actually spoke with the hillsdale county republican commission tonight, told us they have had to change their plans for this event a little bit, they were planning to have one of the january 6 rioters zoom in to participate in their event, have him join, you know, presumably to give everybody a little lift. unfortunately he is facing criminal charges due to his participation in the event, and at the last minute he told us he decided he shouldn't be the guest of honor at his republican party fund-raiser right now, not at least until he's been sentenced, just going to wait until his sentence, but maybe they'll have another insurrection anniversary celebratory fund raiser next year and he'll be available then. does seem prudent to wait now to find out, you know, prison time. that was today too. this was the state capitol, in the great state of missouri today. kind of a big crowd there. this is under the rotunda, you see all the chairs set up in rows, you also can see in another shot here this guy is gesturing at the big projection screen so you can see his powerpoint presentation. as i mentioned, this is at the missouri state capitol under the rotunda. there's a screen you can see where he's got his presentation up there. see, can we zoom in, see what that presentation is about there? see what's on the screen? how the 2020 election was stolen. that was the presentation under the rotunda tonight -- today, excuse me at the missouri state capitol. the"the st. louis-post dispatch reporting tonight that this event at the missouri state capitol under the rotunda attended by multiple republican state legislators, the guy giving information on how the election was stolen. the presentation was formally introduced by republicans in missouri today on both the floor of the house and floor of the senate. that was the commemoration today of the january 6 attack on the u.s. capitol. that's how they commemorated it at the missouri state capitol today, convening on how the election was stolen. after the violence at the capitol just one year ago, it's, depending on where you look, it feels like a unified response, but we're not different than what we were in 1856. like in 1856, we have an earth one where that was a galvanizing and terrible wake-up call against that horror, also an earth two where we're not that horrified about what happened to the senator, happy that preston brooks gave him that beating and frankly, we want more. today, on capitol hill, the only republicans who took part in the house commemoration of the january 6 attack were the two you see spot shadowed here on the front row of the republican side of the aisle. two of them, only one is a member of congress, as republican congresswoman liz cheney and the other republican in the room is her dad who she brought with her, former vice-president dick cheney, those were the only two republicans who showed up today to commemorate the attack in the house. the only house republican event related to the january 6 today was a press conference held by two pro-trump republicans where they tried to propagate the plucked from the youtube comments conspiracy theory that there was no attack on the capitol a year ago, it's all a hoax faked by the fbi, just like 9/11 was an inside job and covid was a hoax too. nbc reporting tonight that according to a top u.s. intelligence official, monitoring efforts by hostile foreign governments to amplify the claims that january 6 was a false flag, that it was secretly the government that did it so they could blame it on trump supporters, hostile foreign powers have been amplifying that, presumably because they would love the run the skin of our democracy over that particular cheese greater, just have to tune into house republican conferences to do it, even on this day of all days. and, you know, it's, it's all happening -- it's never just one thing at a time. i mean, also today, i looked at some of the press coverage and some of the photo journalism we got in today from senator charles sumner home state of massachusetts, this was north hampton massachusetts city hall steps today, a crowd that turned out today on the anniversary of the january 6 attack for democracy against political violence, this woman turned out in worcester, massachusetts, in central massachusetts. she put this sign on the back of her rubbermaid bin put on her parka, 1/6/21, never forget, never again. it's never all just one thing. honestly, that ruling from the d.c. district court tonight, dude, you cannot go to jamaica, not today, sir, that ruling from the chief judge in d.c. district court. that was something to perhaps learn by heart and sing to yourself in the shower. these things all happen at once. but the divide between the two sides of them feels, not just gaping but scary. i mean doris kerns goodwin had something to say today about violence and galvanization and radicalization. she had that to say today about heading off the possibility of a civil war. she meant it as a good news story, i know, right, that history is here to help and we can and should learn from im, i know, but, honestly, looking at how this unfolded over the course of today, i am ready to hear from somebody who understands these things, how this ends well. joining us now is presidential historian, pulitzer prize winner, author doris kearns goodwin, thank you for making the time on this big day. >> i'm very glad to be with you, rachel. >> let me ask if i misconstrued the point that you were making today? i tried to sort of play it without interruption, without internal edits so people could hear it the way you presented it because it knocked me off my chair a little bit. let me ask if i interpreted that wrong or heard it wrong. >> no, absolutely, i think what you saw in the 1850s, and what you're seeing right now are alternative realities, right? on one side in the north seeing it as you said, what happened to sumner as a terrible event, the side in the south seeing it as a glorious event. what we're seeing right now is an election that presumably they're claiming on one side was not won, was stolen, and the truth is, on the other side, it was won by biden. you've got alternative realities now about what the insurrection was, was it an insurrection or simply a bunch of tourists running around, but i think that the most important thing to understand to figure out where we should go from here which is i think what you wanted to talk about is when lincoln gets in in 1861, he says the central idea of the struggle they were fighting, the civil war had already started, was whether or not if a minority -- and by that he meant a minority who lost an election, did not accept that they had lost an election, and they decided that they were going to break from the union as they did, to secede from the union, then democracy is an absurdity, it can't work. and what are we seeing right now but the minority who lost the election is claiming it wasn't loss, having state legislatures now with the possibility to overturn the will of the people, having partisan people counting the votes instead of the nonpartisan volunteers. i think if lincoln were here now, he would say, if that's true, democracy is an absurdity. so we go to voting rights. we have to protect it. the fight, think, is the most important fight in my life. when i was involved as a young girl on the march on washington when i sat and listened to lyndon johnson's speech where he said voting is not a partisan issue, not a northern or southern issue, to get the voting rights of '65, it's not had a moral challenge because it's undeniably wrong to deny your citizens the right to vote. that's the structure we have now.