List of African-American officeholders during Reconstruction
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Eric Foner identifies over 1500 African-American officeholders during the Reconstruction period (1865-1876). All were Republicans. However, Canter Brown, Jr. makes the salient point that, in some states (such as Florida) most African-American officeholders held office after 1876, after Reconstruction. The following is a partial list some of the most notable of the officeholders pre-1900.
- Blanche K. Bruce, U.S. Senator from Mississippi.
- Tunis Campbell, State Senator from Georgia.
- Robert B. Elliott, State House lawmaker, and U.S. Representative from South Carolina.
- Jonathan Clarkson Gibbs, Secretary of State and Secretary of Public Instruction of Florida.
- Mifflin Wistar Gibbs, Arkansas, judge, younger brother of Jonathan Clarkson Gibbs.
- Thomas Van Renssalaer Gibbs, Florida House of Representatives, son of Jonathan Clarkson Gibbs.
- John R. Lynch, Mississippi House of Representatives, elected to U.S. House of Representatives.
- James D. Lynch, Secretary of State of Mississippi
- Robert Meacham, Florida Senator
- John Willis Menard, first African-American elected to the U.S. Congress (denied his seat)
- Charles H. Pearce, Florida Senate
- P.B.S. Pinchback, governor of Louisiana
- Joseph Hayne Rainey, U.S. Representative from South Carolina, member of the South Carolina State Senate. First African-American elected to the U.S. House of Representatives.
- James T. Rapier, United States House of Representatives.
- Hiram Revels, U.S. Senator from Mississippi. First African-American elected to the either house of Congress.
- Robert Smalls, South Carolina Representative, South Carolina Senator, U.S. Representative
- Josiah T. Walls, U.S. Representative
[edit] References and External Links
- Bailey, Richard. Black Officeholders During the Reconstruction of Alabama, 1867-1878 (Pyramid Publishing) Available from author.
- Bailey, Richard. Neither Carpetbaggers Nor Scalawags: Black Officeholders During the Reconstruction of Alabama, 1867-1878. Montgomery: Richard Bailey Publishers, 1995.
- Canter Brown, Jr. Florida's Black Public Officials, 1867-1924. Tuscaloosa and London: The University of Alabama Press, 1998.
- Eric Foner ed., Freedom's Lawmakers: A Directory of Black Officeholders During Reconstruction Revised Edition. (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1996). ISBN 0-8071-2082-0. Between 1865 and 1876, about two thousand blacks held elective and appointive offices in the South. A few are relatively well-known, but most have languished in obscurity, omitted from official state histories. Foner profiles more than 1,500 black legislators, state officials, sheriffs, justices of the peace, and constables in this volume.
- John Hope Franklin "John Roy Lynch: Republican Stalwart from Mississippi" in Howard Rabinowitz (ed) Southern Black Leaders of the Reconstruction Era (Urbana, 1982) and reprinted in John Hope Franklin, Race and History: Selected Essays, 1938-1988 (Louisiana State University Press, 1989)
- Mifflin Wistar Gibbs Shadow and Light: An Autobiography Autobiography with Reminiscences of the Last and Present Century. Lincoln and London: University of Nebraska Press, 1995.
- Rabinowitz, Howard N. Southern Black Leaders of the Reconstruction Era (University of Illinois Press: 1982)List of 32 books that cite this book, including Freeedom's Lawmakers. Section on "Congressmen" includes profiles of "John R. Lynch: Republican Stalwart from Mississippi" by John Hope Franklin, "James T. Rapier of Alabama and the Noble Cause of Reconstruction" by Loren Schweninger, and "James O'Hara of North Carolina: Black Leadership and Local Government" by Eric Anderson.
