NBC News "presidential historian" Michael Beschloss said Wednesday that <a href="https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2022/11/02/watch_live_president_biden_speech.html">President Biden's speech warning that a Republican midterm victory could be the end of democracy</a> was "absolutely candid and absolutely right." "We could be six days away from losing our rule of law and losing the situation where we have elections we can all rely on," he told MSNBC's Chris Hayes Wednesday night. "There's at least a significant chance that this country could be consumed by violence all over the next week, after this election." <blockquote>MICHAEL BESCHLOSS, NBC NEWS: Six nights from now, we could all be discussing violence all over this country. There are signs that may happen, may God forbid, that losers will be declared winners by fraudulent election officers, or secretary of state candidates, or governors, or state legislatures. We could be six days away from losing our rule of law, and losing a situation where we have elections that we all can rely on. You know, those are the foundation stones of a democracy. So, if Biden had gone on the air tonight and said, the biggest thing we have to worry about is marginal tax rates, or something like that, well, it is important. But what significant presidents do, I think you'll agree, we both write history, you and I. In 1860, Lincoln didn't say the biggest issue was -- colleges, although he felt strongly. He said the country can't survive half slave and half free. 1940, Franklin Roosevelt didn't say, you know, the biggest thing I'm worried about is farm policy. Farm policy was important to him, but it what he did say was, never before, since Jamestown and Plymouth rock has America been in such danger. Joe Biden is saying the same thing tonight, and a historian 50 years from now, if historians are allowed to write in this country, and if there are still free publishing houses and a free press, which I'm not certain of. But if that is true, a historian will say what was next date tonight and this week was the fact whether we will be a democracy in the future, whether our children will be arrested and conceivably killed -- we're on the edge of a brutal authoritarian system, and it could be a week away. CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC: Do you really think it's a week away, possibly? MICHAEL BESCHLOSS: possibly. Because, you know, one of the safeguards that protect our democracy -- being able to have elections where you vote someone out to misbehaves. Instead, what we see -- what you are, for instance, rightly mentioning about the candidate for governor of Wisconsin, saying, elect me governor, you'll never -- Republicans will always be elected to henceforth and our state. Well, Hitler and Mussolini didn't even bother to say that. Yet, in 1934, Mussolini had an election, and how did it go? Well, Miussolini's party got 99% of the vote. In 1936, Hitler's party entered an election, which he called "free and fair," which was a corrupt fraud. It was party one with 98% of the vote. That's what happens in autocracies. And it can happen very fast. CHRIS HAYES: Yeah. If you look to our own history, of course, the Jim Crow South was a one-party state for decades. Within the structure of what we call American democracy, though, it was essentially an authoritarian one-party state within the state. I thought of another moment in history tonight, which was in 1871, when a Northern Republican, Radical Republican from Massachusetts get a speech don't he House floor, and was accused by his democratic opponents of, quote, "waving the bloody shirt." He didn't actually do that, but he talked about planned violence directed at Republican officials and free blacks in the South. And waving the bloody shirt came to mean, "oh, you're going on and on about this democracy stuff again." I thought about that, because it ended up being an effective pitch by Democrats who would go on to find real success and subsequent midterms. And I think you see some of that both from the mainstream press and from the Republican Party, about this democracy concern. Like, you're waving the bloody shirt, are we talking about this again? I wonder what you think the sort of resonance historically of that is. MICHAEL BESCHLOSS: Well, it has the added advantage of being true. I hope it doesn't happen, but there's at least a significant chance that this country could be consumed by violence all over the next week, after this election. After this election. I hope it doesn't happen. The difference between 1871 and now is, groups that wanted to generate violence against black people and others, they didn't have social media, so they couldn't connect with each other, and aggravate each other, and conspire, and plan. Now, you've got social media and all these groups all over the United States can get in touch with each other instantly, and plan something nationally that could be very dangerous and would be the opposite of what you and I think of as a peaceful democracy. Again, I hope this never happens. </blockquote>