WATCH: Congress holds moment of silence, discussion with historians on Jan. 6 insurrection anniversary

Warning: This footage may contain graphic images of violence

Democratic leaders welcomed historians for a moderated discussion Thursday to mark of the first anniversary of the Capitol attack.

Watch the historian discussion in the live player above. 

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer spoke before historians Doris Kearns Goodwin and Jon Meacham spoke about their perspective on the attack and how it compared to other U.S. events in the past.

“A democracy is the manifestation of all of us,” said Meacham.

“So our habits of heart and mind matter enormously. And what you saw a year ago today was the worst instincts of both human nature and American politics, which was the will to power over the idea of equality and the rule of law taking precedent.”

The Senate also marked the day with a moment of silence and planned speeches. The president and congressional Democrats started the day in Statuary Hall, one of several spots where rioters swarmed a year ago and interrupted the electoral count.

The violence erupted after thousands of Trump supporters, fresh from the angry rhetoric of a speech from the man himself in the shadow of the Washington Monument, flooded the Capitol grounds on the very day Congress was to certify the election results.

Factions of them pushed past a meagre and overmatched security perimeter and stormed the Capitol building.

Trump flags and Confederate symbols were on full display as they attacked Capitol Police officers, smashed windows and hammered on barricaded doors, some with terrified staffers cowering on the other side.

Outdoors, hordes of angry protesters, some using flagpoles still adorned with American flags as clubs and spears, turned their rage on the police officers trying to hold them back.

READ MORE:‘Democracy was attacked’ during Jan. 6 insurrection, Biden says on anniversary

Inside, chants of “Hang Mike Pence” could be heard as rioters, believing the vice president to have betrayed their leader, sought out the man whose responsibility that day was to certify Biden’s victory.

“We know the revolution was won. We know George Washington, who became a president, not a military leader. We know that the Civil War ended with emancipation secured and the union restored. We know that the allies won World War Two, but the people living through that time did not know that,” said Kearns Goodwin.

“So they’re living with the same anxiety we’re living through today. How will this fragile democracy, which is under attack today, resolve itself? And I guess the hope that that brings is that we’ve come through these really tough times before, and the hope is also that we’re going to get to write the chapter of our story, just like our ancestors wrote the chapters of those stories. And they did pretty well. ”

MORE JAN. 6 COVERAGE:

• Jan. 6, one year later
• 3 lawmakers on surviving the Jan. 6 attack and what the Capitol is like for them now
• What we saw the day the Capitol was attacked
• WATCH: Biden, Harris speak on anniversary of Jan. 6 attack