Political Violence in the United States, 1819-1968

The data contained in this study deal with incidents of political and social violence in the United States from 1819 to 1968. Three indices of political violence used are the number of violent events, the number of deaths resulting from the events, and the number of injuries resulting from the events. Data are provided on the date of the violent event, nature of the target, number of attackers, level of violence by individual attacker and by a group of attackers, respectively, motivation or reason for the attack, numbers of deaths and injuries to targeted individuals and to attackers, type of attacker, property damage, and number of pages in newspaper issue devoted to the event. The data were originally collected in connection with the National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence (established in 1968).