CHARLOTTE, N.C. — While political leaders debate the importance, danger and meaning behind the January 6th attack on the US Capitol, two local historians are clear-eyed.
"The history books are going to see it as an attack on democracy," Dr. Scott Huffmon, a professor at Winthrop University, said. "These people were domestic terrorists. They attempted insurrection to overthrow the government."
Put another way, Catawba College professor Dr. Michael Bitzer compares January 6 to the darkest days of American history.
"In the leagues of 9/11s and the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor," he said. "I think it was that monumental of a day that America nearly lost its grand experiment."
As historians, the professors are looking forward to upcoming testimony in front of the House committee investigating the attacks. They're hoping it will give future historians a firm, factual account of what happened that day.
"I think we'll learn a great deal more of what happened behind the scenes, and the American people need to know what happened on that very dark day," Bitzer said.
"We the people need to understand the seriousness of it," he added.
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