Post Reply - Dear Conservatives, I Apologize part 1

There are other aspects of the Jan 6 breach that seemed anomalous to me from the start. I study the relationship in history of buildings such as The White House and the Capitol, to the US public; I follow the way in which the public is either welcomed into or barred from these structures.

In the media furore around Jan 6, it was erased from memory that the White House itself and the Capitol too have always been open to US citizens and foreign visitors. The interior of the Capitol is open to the public. These are public buildings.

The US government website, Visitthecapital.gov, explains that anyone can watch Congress in session; tickets to the gallery are available from one’s Representative. [https://www.visitthecapitol.gov/visit/know-before-you-go/watching-congress-in-session] You can also enter the Capitol, show ID, and visit the Exhibition Hall. Passes to the gallery are issued to foreign visitors right when they walk in: [https://www.senate.gov/visiting/common/generic/visiting_galleries.htm].

Massing peacefully at the Capitol and other public buildings, and indeed entering the Capitol to observe the legislators at work, is part of our rights and inheritance as citizens, and this use of our First Amendment right to assemble has a long history.

The Gallery -the upper balcony that surrounds the legislative action — was constructed in 1857 in order to allow the public to watch their legislators and to listen to debates. Even before the had a vote, women had recourse to a “Ladies’ Gallery”; and African Americans also joined observers in the gallery, after Reconstruction.

Newly enfranchised African American citizens, thronging the interior of the Capitol building after Reconstruction, were depicted in Frank Leslie’s periodical:

[https://history.house.gov/Exhibitions-and-Publications/Capitol/1857-1950/Gallery-Level/]

In 1876 and 1877, massive, raucus public crowds thronged the Gallery to observe the outcome of a contested Election — between Rutherford B Hayes and Samuel J Tilden.