America again flirts with its own “Bleeding Kansas”—a cycle of partisan violence and defiance where lawless zealots are hailed as patriots and the rule of law bleeds away.
n the late 1850s, “Bleeding Kansas” was the term used to describe the escalating cycle of violence, when surrogates for the Union and soon-to-be Confederacy fought each other over whether Kansas would be admitted as a free or slave-owning state.
As the assaults and killings increased, radicals set the agenda. The logical next step was the nightmares of Fort Sumter and Bull Run.
