An Overview Of Every Assassination Attempt On US Presidents

Four were successful, many others were not

Painting of Lincoln’s assassination (Public domain)

Recently, there has been a lot of concerning talk about political violence sweeping the world. Unfortunately, assassination attempts have been a part of the fabric of politics since the very beginning. Despite being a stable country with a long line of peacefully elected leaders, the United States (US) has not been immune to the effects of political violence and assassinations.

Here is a complete overview of every assassination attempt lodged against a United States president.

Note: For the sake of keeping this article from turning into a book I have only included live assassination attempts in which the president was in actual acute danger or if the assassination plot resulted in a death. Foiled plots that never came to fruition, empty guns, wayward shooting “in the direction of the White House,” and similar events have been excluded.

Andrew Jackson (1835)

Portrait of Jackson (Public domain)

On a humid dreary day in January of 1835, a man by the name of Richard Lawrence approached Andrew Jackson with the intent to kill him…