There are these good ones:

Despite these episodes, there is a persuasive argument to be made that, when seen in historical context, recent decades have seen advances in matters of decorum and civility on the House floor. Instances of far more severe violence among Members of Congress were common in the 18th and 19th centuries. For example, in 1789, two Members brawled on the House floor using a cane and fire tong. In 1793, a House Member responded to a lingering dispute with a former Member by challenging him to a duel outside of the Capitol and killing him. In 1832, Rep. Sam Houston was formally reprimanded by the House for attacking Rep. William Stanbery with his cane. Stanbery's response was to shoot at Houston, but his pistol misfired. A duel between two freshmen Congressmen in 1838 ended in the death of one. In 1838, Rep. Abram Maury and Rep. William Campbell came to blows behind the Speaker's chair on the House floor. Campbell beat Maury bloody. In separate incidents in 1840, Rep. Jesse Bynum attacked Rep. Rice Garland with a cane, while Representatives Kenneth Rayner and William Montgomery broke canes over each other's heads.

And then, there was the infamous beating of Sen. Charles Sumner by Representative Preston Brooks with a cane on the Senate floor.

Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts was an avowed Abolitionist and leader of the Republican Party. After the sack of Lawrence, on May 21, 1856, he gave a bitter speech in the Senate called "The Crime Against Kansas." He blasted the "murderous robbers from Missouri," calling them "hirelings, picked from the drunken spew and vomit of an uneasy civilization." Part of this oratory was a bitter, personal tirade against South Carolina's Senator Andrew Butler. Sumner declared Butler an imbecile and said, "Senator Butler has chosen a mistress. I mean the harlot, slavery." During the speech, Stephen Douglas leaned over to a colleague and said, "that damn fool will get himself killed by some other damn fool." The speech went on for two days.

Representative Preston Brooks of South Carolina thought Sumner went too far. Southerners in the nineteenth century were raised to live by an unwritten code of honor. Defending the reputation of one's family was at the top of the list. A distant cousin of Senator Butler, Brooks decided to teach Charles Sumner a lesson he would not soon forget. Two days after the end of Sumner's speech, Brooks entered the Senate chamber where Sumner was working at his desk. He flatly told Sumner, "You've libeled my state and slandered my white-haired old relative, Senator Butler, and I've come to punish you for it." Brooks proceeded to strike Sumner over the head repeatedly with a gold-tipped cane. The cane shattered as Brooks rained blow after blow on the hapless Sumner, but Brooks could not be stopped. Only after being physically restrained by others did Brooks end the pummeling.

Today, they are just spewing hateful and stupid words at each other.

Marshall Ephon makes sardine rarebit.