Walt Whitman, the quintessential American poet, once wrote of the American spirit in his poem Song of Myself.
I too am not a bit tamed. I too am untranslatable,
I sound my barbaric yamp over the roofs of the world.
The American people are untamed. We have a barbaric yamp. I write about this distressing element of America in The Art of the Compromise, and historian Paul Gilje writes about it in his book Rioting in America, which I heavily reference.
The argument that I make in The Art is that to allow diversity to exist and to thrive, we as a nation have to be prepared to tolerate some level of violence such as the January 6 riot on Capitol Hill or the 1968 Chicago riot at the Democratic Convention.
To be clear, this tolerance does not mean acceptance.
While we should never condone violence and we should punish folks who participate in violence, we should be careful to avoid draconian measures that constrict diversity. A foundation of our American legal system is that “it was better to let the crime of a guilty person go unpunished than to condemn the innocent.”
Similarly, our political system risks some level of violence as a way for the masses to articulate their grievances–though in an inelegant manner–against those who govern them.
This sentiment is not mine alone but Thomas Jefferson’s as well. In response to the violent and bloody riots of 1787, known as Shays’s Rebellion, Jefferson wrote to James Madison.
Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government.
T. Jefferson in a letter to J. Madison, January 30, 1787.
Jefferson felt the common citizen needed to air grievances through riots because he understood that the common man was not as articulate as elites and that the political expressions of the people needed an outlet before they could find their words and become articulate.
While well-educated elites like Jefferson could write letters to express their convictions, Jefferson felt that vocal protests in the streets were necessary for the common man to express their convictions, and he knew that those expressions might become violent.