THREE TROUBLED STATES
In Grant's second term, the divergence between the Republicans on
Southern questions, though never taking permanent form, often found
marked and effective expression. In the Senate, the controlling group,
who were also the special friends and allies of Grant, were radicals,
and generally of a more materialistic class than the earlier leaders.
Fessenden had died in 1869; Sumner was alienated, and died in 1874;
Wilson had passed into the insignificance of the Vice-Presidency;
Trumbull was in opposition. At the front were Chandler, of Michigan;
Oliver P. Morton, War Governor of Illinois, powerful and partisan;
Roscoe Conkling, of New York, showy and arrogant. In the House the
foremost man was James G. Blaine, Speaker until with the Democratic
majority he became leader of the opposition; brilliant in speech,
fascinating and "magnetic" in personal intercourse, always prominent and
popular, but almost never closely identified with any great principle or
constructive measure. Very prominent on the floor was General Butler, a
foremost radical toward the South; always a storm-center; an advocate of
inflation, an ally of most bad causes, an effective mischief-maker;
followed, feared, and hated with equal ardor. The membership of the
House was notable for able men,--the Hoar brothers, Henry L. Pierce,
Eugene Hale, Dawes, Hawley, Poland, Garfield, Kasson, and others of
almost equal mark. The death of Thaddeus Stevens, in 1868, had left the
House without a master. The Greeley campaign, disastrous though it was,
had started a contagious spirit of independence. During Grant's second
administration, 1873-7, there was shown in the House, on important
questions, a degree of independence rare in American politics. It was
the growing Republican opposition to Federal interference in the South
that hastened its end, and prepared the way for the consummation of that
result under President Hayes.
We now return to the individual cases of three Southern States. To South
Carolina fell the bitterest experience of misgovernment. Its black
majority was organized and led by a group of white men of the worst
character, who were resisted for a time without success by a better
element in the party. Under four years' administration of Governor R. K.
Scott, a Northerner, and two of F. J. Moses, Jr., a South
Carolinian--who later disappeared from public view in a
penitentiary,--money was lavished in profligate expenditure; hundreds of
thousands spent for legislative furniture and luxuries; franchises were
corruptly sold; bogus enterprises enriched; debt piled up by millions,
and thrown off by millions. (Repudiation, be it said, always came easily
to the South,--before the war and after; during reconstruction and
after; whether the borrowed money had been spent for railroads or
squandered by thieves; and the ghost of an unpaid $300,000,000 still
scares Southern Senators when a general arbitration treaty is
discussed.) South Carolina went from bad to worse for six years.
When, in 1872, the honest Republicans bolted, under an unimpeachable
candidate, Reuben Tomlinson, a Philadelphia Quaker, and gave him 35,000
votes, the Democrats stood scornfully aloof--"better a native thief than
an honest Yankee!" But in 1874 came a revolution in the Republican
ranks. Honesty triumphed, under the lead of the elected governor, Daniel
H. Chamberlain, of Massachusetts birth and education,--a remarkable
man; shrewd, long-headed, a past master in political management; with
high aims; by no means indifferent to personal success, but generally
succeeding in combining personal and public service. With a Legislature
in which two-thirds were Republicans, and whites and blacks were about
equal in number, he achieved a surprising reversal of the evil
tendencies that had prevailed. In the Legislature the best of the
Democrats backed him, together with the best of the Republicans, and
overmatched the corruptionists. Stealing was stopped; the abuses of the
pardoning power were ended; the tax laws were amended so as to secure
uniformity and equality of assessment; expenditure was reduced and
regulated. These were the statements of the Charleston _News and
Courier_, the leading paper of the State, in July, 1876, when another
election was coming on. Most of the Democratic papers had praised and
supported Governor Chamberlain. It was now very seriously contemplated,
and advocated by the _News and Courier_, to let him be re-elected
without opposition. But the old-time pride of race and party was too
strong, and the Democrats nominated Wade Hampton. They supported him
with little scruple as to means,--with free use of intimidation and
proscription, with frequent threats and often the reality of violence.
There was a shocking massacre at Hamburg. Governor Chamberlain called on
the President for aid, and a thousand troops were sent into the State.
When the election came, there was claimed a majority for Chamberlain and
for the Republican Presidential ticket. The claim was instantly and
fiercely challenged by Hampton's supporters. And here the story pauses,
until it joins the main current of national affairs.
Mississippi was under Republican control until 1875. If one attempts to
judge of the character of that control, he plunges into a sea of
contradictions almost enough to submerge the hope of truth. Whether we
turn to standard historians, to the 1000 pages of sworn testimony before
a Congressional committee, or to individual witnesses, the perplexity is
the same. Thus, we consult Woodrow Wilson's _History of the American
People_,--and this book invites a word of comment. Its author has woven
together the immense material of the national history for three
centuries, in the main with admirable judgment and skill. He has
produced a comprehensive, well-proportioned, graphic narrative, which
closely holds the reader's attention, and gives in general the spirit as
well as the substance of the people's story. But upon the main theme of
the crowning century, he misses some of the vital elements. Of the wrong
and mischief of slavery he has hardly a word, waving the subject aside
as if beyond his province. He gives with admirable sympathy and
intelligence the attitude of the well-meaning Southerner before and
after the war; and this feature has special value for those familiar
only with the Northern standpoint. But he has not the least appreciation
of the anti-slavery spirit in its heroic phase. On the wrongs of the
slave he is silent, while upon the sins of the carpet-bagger he is
eloquent. This one-sidedness robs of its significance what should be the
American epic of the nineteenth century.
Of the misgovernment of Mississippi, Dr. Wilson instances that "before
the work of the carpet-baggers was done, 640,000 acres of land had been
forfeited for taxes, twenty per cent. of the total acreage of the
State." The nearest atlas or gazetteer is enough to check this
statement. The total acreage of the State is 29,640,000,--of which
640,000 is not twenty per cent., but a trifle over two per cent. Dr.
Wilson goes on to say that the State tax levy in 1874 was fourteen times
as great as in 1869. This is apparently taken from the "Taxpayers'
petition" of 1875, but from whatever source, it gives an utterly
exaggerated impression. Before the Congressional committee Judge H. R.
Ware, chairman of the State Republican committee,--a Kentuckian by
birth, and a life-long resident of Mississippi,--gave his testimony; and
it included documents showing that the total State expense during the
last two years of Democratic rule, 1864 and '65, was $1,410,250 and
$1,860,809; for twenty years of Democratic administration, throwing out
the extra expenses of the war period, the average cost was $699,200;
under military government (always the cheapest) in 1869 it was $563,219;
while under the Republicans in 1875 it was $618,259; and the average for
six Republican years had been $992,920. When the Republicans came in,
they had to make payments in warrants worth only sixty-five cents on the
dollar, with proportionate increase of expense; they had to provide for
a free population doubled by the emancipation of the slaves, and for the
last four years they had made an annual reduction.
Yet the "Taxpayers' petition"--addressed to the Legislature early in
1875, and without effect,--must be taken as evidence of at least a
considerable extravagance and waste. A reading of it gives the
impression of a needless multiplication of offices and excessive
salaries. The public printing seems clearly a scandal, running above
$73,000 a year, as against a cost in the sister State of Georgia of only
$10,000. The general charge seems to be of laxness and needlessly high
salaries rather than any wholesale corruption. Some question as to the
justice of the general charge occurs when a point is encountered as to
the payment of teachers in the public schools. The petitioners claim
that this should be reduced to $25 a month for second-class schools, and
$50 a month for first-class schools. In fact, when the Democrats came
into power, they reduced the rate to $40 a month,--which, for a school
year of four months only, seems like penny-wise economy. The petition
makes perhaps the strongest impression in its statement that the boards
of supervisors, controlling local taxation, are, as a general rule,
"wholly unfit to discharge their duties, and without respectability or
even accountability"; that the public works under their care are
recklessly and carelessly managed, and the county taxes are grievous. It
would seem that in these local bodies, especially in the "black
counties," lay the worst of the taxpayers' grievance.
Judge Story makes a vigorous retort, testifying after a year of
Democratic administration, 1875-6, as to the question of comparative
expense. He shows that the State tax had indeed been reduced from 9-1/4
mills to 6-1/2 mills, but this only by cutting off outright the school
tax of two mills. Not to follow further the labyrinth of figures, it is
interesting to note, as to the favorite term "carpet-bagger," that of
the six Republican candidates for Congress in Mississippi, in 1876, only
one was of Northern birth, and he had married and lived in the South
since the war; one had been an old Southern Democrat and a circuit
judge; two had been Confederate officers; and one, John R. Lynch, was a
colored man of high intelligence and excellent character. He, as Speaker
of the House, and B. K. Bruce, United States Senator, were among the
colored men who showed capacity and character worthy of the high
positions they attained. Among the Republican leaders of Northern birth
were some who were honored and trusted in their old homes; such men as
General Eggleston, president of the Constitutional convention; Colonel
Warner, afterward State Treasurer of Connecticut, and Henry W. Warren,
of Massachusetts. The first Republican governor, J. M. Alcorn, was a
Southern man, very able, but apparently not of the highest moral
standards. His successor, Adelbert Ames, was from Massachusetts,
conceded now to have been "honest and brave, but narrow and
puritanical," and with the mysterious trait of "hating the Aryan race of
the South."
These last words are quoted from the story of an old friend of the
reader's,--Thomas Dabney, the "Southern planter," whose noble character
was sketched in chapter XII. He had fought a brave fight with poverty
and hardship since the war, and as we come again into his company for a
moment, it is with a sense of confidence which even official documents
do not inspire. He had no doubt of the oppressiveness of Republican
rule, and the need of shaking it off by vigorous measures. It is related
that the taxes on his plantation for 1873 were over $900, while the
income was less than $800. Yet one letter tells that he is in "a
laughing humor" because he has just paid his taxes for 1875--only
$375,--a reduction of more than half--and this was still under
Republican rule.
One other witness may be heard, the writer's life-long friend, Henry W.
Warren, now of Holden, Mass. To those who know him his name is a synonym
for integrity, efficiency and modesty; he is one of the men who never
seek a public honor and never decline a public service. From his own
words some statements are here condensed. "After graduating at Yale in
1865, I was called to a position as public school teacher at Nashville,
Tenn.; and from there, seeing a promising opportunity, I went with two
friends to work a cotton plantation in one of the 'white' counties of
Mississippi. We bought it from its old owner, who had kept his slaves in
his employ as paid laborers, and they continued to work for us. As
slaves they had not been badly treated, except by the overseer during
the master's absence. Many of the whites of the county, owning no
slaves, had been indifferent to the Confederate cause, and many of them
had served in its army only when hunted by the conscription officer,
sometimes with bloodhounds. More than a few of them were Republicans. I
was asked to serve as registrar of voters for the Constitutional
convention, being one of the few who could take the 'iron-clad oath'
(that is, that he had never aided the Confederacy) and this led to my
going to the convention, and afterward to the Legislature. The Speaker
dying, I was chosen to his place for the rest of the term. Our county
going Democratic, I was not re-elected; but I was chosen chief clerk of
the House, and served for four years, after my two years as a member.
All the Democrats united in signing a paper, asking me to be always
present in the House,--this was after I had induced the Speaker to
change a mistaken ruling. So I was in a position to know pretty well
what was going on. From the first there were plenty of Confederate
generals and colonels in the Legislature." (The excluding clauses were
struck out of the Mississippi constitution at the start.) "The manner of
the blacks to the whites was habitually civil, and something of the
slave's deference to the white man remained. I think the legislation was
generally of reasonably good character. I knew positively of but little
corruption. That there was some corruption and more extravagance, I have
no doubt. But I have served since in the Massachusetts Legislature, and
I think the Southern State was but little worse than the Northern. The
negro members, though with some able and honest leaders of their own,
like Bruce and Lynch, followed largely the prominent white men. Of the
Northerners whom I knew, almost all were men of substance and had come
to stay. Six out of ten owned plantations. A 'carpet-bagger' I hardly
ever met, though no doubt there were some,--but the name was given to
all Northerners. As to expense, you must remember that the State had to
be completely rehabilitated. The war had ruined everything; public
buildings were destroyed or dilapidated; and under military rule things
had simply been kept going. Everything had to be reconstructed. The
slaves had become citizens, and that doubled the number to be provided
for. There had been practically no public schools, and they were set up
throughout the State. Taxes had fallen largely on slave property, now
they came on land. So it was inevitable that there should be an increase
of taxation. About county taxes I have no special knowledge, though in
our locality they certainly were not burdensome. In some of the black
counties it may have been worse. The Republicans, both blacks and
whites, were drilled in the 'Loyal League of America,'--it was a purely
political organization, often meeting in the woods at night. In those
years there was immense progress on the part of the negroes,--political
discussion was educational. I think if the Federal government had
provided better school education, and had protected the voters at the
polls, all might have gone well. That there was more or less of
extravagance on the part of the Legislature is not to be denied. So
there is in Massachusetts. That there was anything to justify the means
resorted to in 1875 and 1876 to get complete control of the State
government, might safely be questioned."
What those means were, there is no serious question. The Democrats
organized a campaign of clubs, processions, enthusiasm,
and--intimidation. The better part would have disclaimed the last
feature, but they did not prevent it. Thomas Dabney was among the
leaders. He relates that the best men were brought out for the
nominations, often against their own desire. He, in his old age, was
made president of the local club, and kept busy with marchings,
meetings, and barbecues. He quotes sympathetically the response of a
friend to his remark that the uprising was wonderful: "Uprising? It is
no uprising. It is an insurrection." He relates that at Clinton the
Republicans got up a riot, that they might have a pretext for asking
President Grant for troops. "They succeeded in getting up their riot,
which was put down by our own people after so sanguinary a fashion as to
strike them with a terror not easily described." There can be no doubt
as to the "sanguinary fashion" and the "terror." Testimony abounds of
the invasion of Republican meetings, enforced demands on the Republican
speakers to "divide the time," with threats and occasional violence.
Sometimes the meetings were prevented, sometimes they were broken up.
There was a great deal of terrorizing and now and then a murder. In some
cases the officers at the polls interposed so many hindrances that many
of the negroes were unable to vote. There was but a handful of Federal
troops in the State, and the President declined to send more at Governor
Ames's request. The reign of terror was effective. Once again we quote
Mr. Warren: "In our part of the country there were constant parades of
the 'red-shirted cavalry,' and the negroes were thoroughly frightened.
Two rough fellows once assailed me with threats and abuse, but drew off
when I stood my ground. When the election came on, to get our ballots
printed I had to go to New Orleans; spies dogged me in going and coming;
and as with a friend I rode toward home, we were beset and besieged in a
planter's house, that they might get possession of the ballots. Finally
we rode away on an unguarded road, pistol in hand, and escaped. But they
afterward captured and destroyed a part of the ballots, and by such
means they carried the local election. By such means and more violent
measures they carried the State."
The Democratic Legislature now proceeded to impeach Governor Ames, on
frivolous charges, but agreed to drop the proceedings if he would
resign, which he did, and left the State, knowing that his trial would
be a farce. In 1876 the campaign was of the same character as in 1875,
and so Mississippi was "redeemed."
The case of Louisiana was widely different. In that State the corruption
of the Republican managers was flagrant; it extended to the manipulation
of election returns; and the Federal Government interfered freely, and
with notable results. A knot of knavish adventurers were in
control,--Henry C. Warmoth, William P. Kellogg, F. F. Casey, and United
States Marshal S. B. Packard. Casey was the President's brother-in-law,
and General Grant was almost as incapable of believing a relative of his
to be a bad man as he was incapable of knowingly supporting a bad man.
Casey was made collector of New Orleans, and was allowed to hold the
Republican convention in the custom-house, with United States soldiers
guarding the doors and regulating the admissions. As he and his crew
were wrecking the finances of the State, there was in 1872 a general
combination against them of the better elements,--they preferred the
name "Conservatives" to "Democrats,"--and they claimed to have elected
their candidate, John McEnery, as governor. Warmouth, who had been
governor for a four years' term, had quarreled with his confederates
over the division of plunder, and gone over to the Conservatives. He
controlled the State returning-board, to which the laws intrusted a very
elastic and dangerous power of throwing out returns from districts where
intimidation was proved, and undertook to declare McEnery elected. But
there was a split in the board; then two rival boards, one awarding the
governorship to Kellogg and the other to McEnery.
The imbroglio was suddenly ended by the intervention of a United States
judge, E. H. Durell, who issued a writ at midnight, directing the United
States marshal, S. B. Packard, to occupy and hold the capitol, and
ordering a detachment of United States troops to support the Kellogg
government. This fixed the character of the State for the next four
years, by perhaps the most lawless act done under the name of law in
this whole troubled period. It was perhaps only the overshadowing
interest of the Presidential campaign that prevented its reversal by
Congress,--that, and the lingering disposition of the North to pin faith
on whatever wore the label "Republican."
McEnery kept up a shadowy claim to the governorship, with the
countenance of the "respectable" element. But Kellogg and his pals had
the actual administration, and used it to such effect that in two years
the State bonds had fallen from seventy or eighty to twenty-five, and
New Orleans city bonds from eighty or ninety to thirty or forty. In 1874
the Conservatives made a determined effort to carry the Legislature.
There was an organization called "The White League,"--a legitimate
political society, said one side;--a revival of the Ku-Klux spirit and
methods in a more guarded form, said the other side. Beyond question,
there was in Louisiana, at all stages of reconstruction, some degree of
terrorism, and occasional acts of cruelty and outrage. There was knavery
among the Radicals, and there was violence among the Conservatives. At
the 1874 election the Conservatives were successful at the polls; but
the State returning-board at once began to juggle with the returns so
palpably that the Conservative member protested and resigned. The
remainder of the board, after a month of diligent work, threw out a
number of districts, on the pretext of intimidation, and as to five
seats referred the question to the House itself. That body met,
organized in a hasty and irregular fashion, and awarded the five seats
to the Democratic claimants. But Governor Kellogg had the United States
troops at his disposal, and by his command General De Trobriand with a
file of soldiers entered the House and ejected the five
Democrats,--whereupon the Republicans organized the House anew.
But now the whole country took alarm. The President sent General
Sheridan in haste to New Orleans, and his first dispatch sustained
Kellogg, and threw the blame on the White League, to which Secretary of
War Belknap telegraphed his full approval. But the affair transcended
ordinary politics in its importance. New York spoke through Cooper
Institute, and Boston by Faneuil Hall. Such citizens as Bryant, Evarts,
and George T. Curtis led the protest. Congress rose above partisanship.
A committee of the House, including such Republicans as George F. Hoar,
William A. Wheeler, Charles Foster, William W. Phelps and William P.
Frye, with Clarkson N. Potter and Samuel S. Marshall for the Democrats,
visited New Orleans, and after full inquiry agreed that the
returning-board had "wrongfully applied an erroneous rule of law"; that
the five Democrats had been defrauded of their seats; and that the
Louisiana House should be advised--the national House having no
compulsory power--to "repair this great injustice." The two Democrats
went further, and declared that Governor Kellogg himself held by no
rightful tenure. But the Republicans backed a compromise offered by
Wheeler, which the Louisianians accepted,--the Democrats took the
Legislature, while the Republicans kept the governorship. The returning
board survived, to put in its deadly work two years later.