High School Home :: Art & History > This Week in House History
This Week in House History
The historical highlights featured in This Week in House History are written by the historians, archivists, and curators who preserve the history of the U.S House of Representatives. New highlights are added weekly. The collection, searchable by date or subject, includes more than 400 historical House events.
Members of Congress Brawl on the House Floor
February 06, 1858
On this date, the most infamous Floor brawl in the history of the U.S. House of Representatives erupted as Members debated the Kansas Territory's pro-slavery Lecompton Constitution. Shortly before 2 a.m., Pennsylvania Republican Galusha Grow and South Carolina Democrat Laurence Keitt exchanged insults and physical blows. 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.
House Tables a Motion to Censure President John Quincy Adams
February 07, 1842
On this date, the House voted 106 to 93 to table a motion censuring Representative John Quincy Adams for antislavery agitation. Weeks earlier Adams had masterfully manipulated the public debate over slavery by baiting proslavery Representatives into a prolonged dialogue. Because the House had instituted the "Gag Rule" in 1836 preventing Floor discussion of abolition petitions, Adams manufactured a debate by submitting a petition, allegedly drafted by a group of Georgians, to have Adams removed as Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman.
.jpg?n=4046)
House Passes a Bill to Establish the First Bank of the United States
February 08, 1791
On this date, the House passed a bill establishing the first Bank of the United States. In both the House and the Senate, Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton lobbied support for the bank legislation. Nevertheless, the bank bill passed the House easily, by a vote of 39 to 20, and President George Washington signed it into law on February 25, 1791.
House Elects John Quincy Adams as President of the United States
February 09, 1825
On this date, the House elected Secretary of State John Quincy Adams as President. Following an inconclusive Electoral College result, the House performed the constitutionally prescribed role of deciding the 1825 presidential election. Andrew Jackson had won the popular vote and commanded 99 electoral votes. He was followed in the electoral tally by Adams (84), Treasury Secretary William Crawford (41), and Speaker of the House Henry Clay (37). Speaker Clay was excluded from the House vote because he did not finish in the top three.