Keitt was not attempting to kill anyone, just to assure that Brooks was permitted to have satisfaction in the matter at hand.
By implying he might shoot you if you tried to step in and stop a man from being beaten by a thug. That’s called aiding and abetting nowadays and it’s a felony. Actually under current law you might be able to charge him with assault as well, they charge accomplices with murder even when they didn’t pull the trigger.
“Dueling was a sport for gentlemen.”
Aaron Burr wasn’t a gentleman. Some slave-loving thug who assaults people isn’t a gentleman either and shouldn’t be compared to the President.
Assault is a crime. Anyone can claim “oh he’s an a-hole I’m gonna kick his butt”. You can’t have that on the floor of the damn Congress. Duels had rules, that was the point, to settle the dispute in a civilized way (as civilized as any fight) rather than through criminal assault. One’s opinion (and it’s always an opinion, I gave mine) on whether one’s foe is a gentleman or not is irrelevant.
I 100% believe Brooks should have been expelled, not cool. I can understand why you might think Sumter was a jerk though I don’t agree, but I can’t believe how far you are going excusing Brooks. He could have friggin killed him. Head trauma is real *ss stuff, Sumter wasn’t being a big baby. You can’t have dudes caning fellow members of Congress no matter what they say. I might love it if Ted Cruz took a baseball bat to Al Franken and put him in traction but that’s not cool man.