A History of Negro Voting in Louisiana, 1877-1906. Allie Bayne Windham Webb Louisiana State University and Agricultural & Mechanical College

Louisiana State University LSU Digital Commons LSU Historical Dissertations and Theses Graduate School 1962 A History of Negro Voting in Louisiana, 1877-1906. Allie Bayne windham Webb Louisiana State University and Agricultural & Mechanical College Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/gradschool_disstheses Recommended Citation Webb, Allie Bayne windham, "A History of Negro Voting in Louisiana, 1877-1906." (1962). LSU Historical Dissertations and Theses. 748. https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/gradschool_disstheses/748 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at LSU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in LSU Historical Dissertations and Theses by an authorized administrator of LSU Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. This dissertation has been 62-3674 microfilmed exactly as received WEBB, Allie Bayne Windham, 1916- A HISTORY OF NEGRO VOTING IN LOUISIANA, 1877-1906. Louisiana State University, Ph.D., 1962 History, modern University Microfilms, Inc., Ann Arbor, Michigan Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Copyright by Allie Bayne Windham Webb 1962 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. A HISTORY OF NEGRO VOTING IN LOUISIANA, 1877-1906 A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of the Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in The Department of History by Allie Bayne Windham Webb B.A*, Louisiana State University, 1938 B.S., Louisiana State University, 1945 M.A,, Louisiana State University, 1948 January, 1962 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The writer wishes to express her sincere appreciation to Professor Burl L, Noggle for his cooperation and direc tion in the writing of this dissertation, to Mr, Vergil L. Bedsole for permission to use archival material and for many helpful suggestions, and to Miss Wyolene Windham for valua ble and generous assistance in the proof-reading of this dissertation. XX Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE TITLE P A G E ............................................ i ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ................. ......... ii ABSTRACT................................................. iv CHAPTER I PRELUDE TO NEGRO VOTING IN LOUISIANA .... 1 II LOUISIANA REDEEMED; THE REVOLUTION OF THE WHITES ......................................... 25 III POLITICS AND THE NEGRO EXODUS FROM LOUISIANA, 1879-1880 94 IV THE DECADE OF DEMOCRATIC DICTATORSHIP, 1880-1890 124 V COLLAPSE OF THE DEMOCRATIC PATTERN OF POLITICS, 1890-1896 176 VI LEGAL DISFRANCHISEMENT OF NEGROES IN LOUISIANA, 1 8 9 8 - 1 9 0 6 ..................................... 227 VII CONCLUSION .............................. 246 ESSAY ON SOURCES..................................... 253 BIBLIOGRAPHY ..... .............................. 260 AUTOBIOGRAPHY . .......... 275 XIX Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ABSTRACT Negro voting was the most revolutionary feature of the Reconstruction of the Southern states. To perpetuate their power Republicans secured the disfranchisement of whites and tried to control Negro votes. The Constitution of 1868 placed the government of Louisiana in the hands of Negroes and Radicals. The major objective of white Louisianians during Reconstruction was to overthrow the Negro-Radical regime and to restore white rule. The "bargain" or "compromise" connected with the disputed presidential election of 1876 resulted in the re moval of the Federal troops which had sustained Negro- Radical rule and in the recognition of Francis T, Nicholls, Democrat, as governor. The Republicans turned their atten tion to issues other than Negro voting, and white Louisi anians gra^>ed control of the state government. The post-Reconstruction era was ushered in by a violent political revolution which redeemed the entire state for the whites. Bloody riots occurred in all areas in which Negro population was concentrated. Federal Justice officials were unsuccessful in their efforts to punish perpetrators of crimes against Negro voters. During the first decade fol lowing Reconstruction, Negro voters were controlled by fraud, purchase, cajolery, statutory devices and like expediencies, iv Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. V The Bourbon Democrats considered it simpler to count the Ne gro’s ballot for the Democratic Party than to prevent him from casting it. The resentment of the white hill farmers at this use of Negro voters to the detriment of themselves led to compe tition between poor white Populists and rich white Bourbons to exploit Negro voters* The gubernatorial election of I896 was a bitter struggle for Negro votes. The rich whites won the contest. Following their defeat, the poor whites ini tiated a demand for legal disfranchisement of Negroes. The Bourbons, weary of the corruption and expense connected with Negro voting, acquiesced in the demands of the Populists. Legal disfranchisement was achieved by the restric tive provisions of the Constitution of I898 and by the statute providing for compulsory white primaries in I906. The Primary Act of I906 empowered the State Central Commit tee of political parties to fix qualifications for voting. The Louisiana Democratic Central Committee prescribed that voters supporting the Democratic Party should be white Demo crats. There were no Republican primaries in Louisiana. The Lily-white movement had left the Republican Party so badly disorganized that it failed to poll the necessary proportion of the total vote of the state to be eligible to hold pri maries. All nominations were made at white primaries. All candidates were white Democrats. The exclusion of Negroes Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Vi from Democratic primaries in I906 meant virtually the end of Negro voting in Louisiana for over two decades. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER T PRELUDE TO NEGRO VOTING IN LOUISIANA The most revolutionary feature of Reconstruction was Negro voting. The attempt of Northern Radicals to use Negro suffrage to destroy the politica] power of the planter aris tocracy united southern whites politically and contributed to racial unrest in the South for generations. The Radi cal leaders of the Republican Party, who were in control of the national government, desired to perpetuate their power and hoped to use Negro voting as one means of continuing and strengthening their control. Since the Radicals were sponsoring Negro suffrage for selfish and mercenary reasons, they felt it necessary to insure Negro voting by an amend ment to the United States constitution. The fifteenth amendment, which forbade the denying or abridging of the right of citizens to vote on account of race, was ratified in 1870 and became an effective partisan tool during Recon struction. In the state of Louisiana, however, Negro voting of a limited nature antedated Reconstruction by many years. Soon after its admission into the union in 1812, Louisiana became an agricultural frontier characterized by white cotton and black slaves. Small isolated groups of "free Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 2 persons of color” also contributed to the Negro population of the state. Although every ante-bellum constitution of Louisiana restricted suffrage to white men,^ local elec tions were so bitter that rival candidates sometimes cal led free Negroes to their aid. These Negroes constituted a potential reserve of voters which unscrupulous politi cians used during closely contested elections. The best authenticated cases of this practice occurred in the central Louisiana parish of Rapides, at "Ten Mile Precinct." Here free Negroes, used as the tools of corrupt officeseekers, voted in certain elections from I838 to 2 i860. These free Negroes had descended from a few North Carolina slaves who had migrated to Louisiana in I804 after their emancipation and had squatted on public lands located deep in the piney wood wilderness along Ten Mile Creek, then located in Rapides Parish. (This creek now is in the northwestern part of Allen Parish.) The free Negroes of this locality miscegenated with the poor whites of the piney woods, and color of their progeny was admitted to be no clue to their race,3 Their children were so closely related that 3-Constitution of Louisiana. 1812, Article II, Constitu tion of Louisiana. ÏF45, Article X, Constitution of Louisi ana. 1?52^ Article X. ^ 2 Roger Wallace Shugg, "Negro Voting in the Ante-bellum South," The Journal of Negro History. XXI (1936), 359. ^New Orleans Crescent. Sept. I4, 1857, cited in Shugg, "Negro Voting," 359-362. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 3 only a dozen answered to different surnames when, during Re construction, some sixty-odd voted at “Ten Mile Precinct." The scandalous use of Negro votes in ante-bellum Lou isiana, first publicized by the Know Nothing Party during

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