Kansas Republican Party SOME ANECDOTES AND BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES OF BLACK KANSAS REPUBLICANS Blue silk regimental flag of the 1st Kansas Colored Infantry, the first African American regiment in the Civil War. Recruitment began August 1862 and it was mustered into Federal service January 13, 1863. The Regiment saw its first action at Island Mound, Missouri, October 29, 1862. The flag bears the names of eight battle honors. 1 | P a g e Kansas Republican Party EXODUSTER MOVEMENT The influx of poor (1879-1881) and unskilled blacks caused a backlash The end of Reconstruction in 1876 caused a of resistance to the mass outflow of black refugees from the Old new immigrants. South, fleeing violence and poverty. Many Governor John P. St headed for Kansas which was associated with John (R), a fiery freedom, Bleeding Kansas, and John Brown. Baptist Minister, Benjamin “Pap” Singleton, a former slave from fought back against Tennessee encouraged people to move to those opposing the Kansas where they would be able to purchase exodusters. He land and establish a better life. In 1873, he led ridiculed democrat a group to Cherokee County near Baxter Benjamin “Pap” Singleton allegations that he Springs. He organized another colony to come was trying to import from Kentucky and settle in Graham County. thousands of Republican voters. This settlement of Nicodemus grew and He likewise dismissed objections based on cost prospered for a time until the railroad bypassed and resources arguing that God would find a Nicodemus and built in a neighboring town. way for Kansas and that he would never turn back refugees who had suffered cruelty, outrage, and wrong, who were destitute, hungry and without adequate clothes in the winter. He noted that “the question of the exodus was not one of business, as shallow thinkers and flippant writers would have us believe . A large portion of the American people will ignore the humanitarian side. Kansas cannot afford to do so.” Nicodemus, Graham County, KS On May 8, 1879, Governor St. John formed the Around 30,000 blacks came to Kansas between Freedman’s Relief Association to receive 1879 and 1881. These people were called charitable contributions to care for the Exodusters from the Jewish exodus from Egypt. exodusters. They established colonies one in Most Exodusters arrived by steamboats sick and Wabaunsee to the west of Topeka, one in unprepared to begin a new life. Most came Chautauqua county, and another in Coffey with little if any money. The cities were county. Black communities also formed within overwhelmed with the large number of needy cities like Topeka (Tennessee Town) and Kansas persons. Shelter, food, and rail transport had to City (Quindero). be provided and were not cheap. 2 | P a g e Kansas Republican Party Edward P. McCabe eastern Kansas in support of the Republican (1850-1920) ticket. In 1882, E.P. McCabe of Graham County In 1887, Waller was appointed deputy city became Kansas State Auditor; the first African attorney of Topeka, Kansas. In the 1888 American elected to statewide office (outside presidential election, Waller was the only black reconstruction) in the United States. In 1884, man in the United States to be selected for the he was re-elected to a second two-year term. Electoral College. He cast a vote for Benjamin Harrison. In 1890 He was born in Troy, he unsuccessfully New York, received an ran for Kansas education in law and state auditor. migrated to Kansas in April 1878, just in time The inability of to get caught up in the black Republicans "Exoduster" dream of to move beyond establishing all-black local office left him towns. McCabe was disillusioned with closely identified with Nicodemus, Kansas, near his political which he settled as a farmer and attorney. A chances in Kansas. He remained loyal to the Republican activist, he was elected Clerk in Republican Party and in 1891 was named by Graham County. His connections and his charm Harrison to be U.S. consul to Madagascar. served him well. After serving as state auditor he worked for the state's leading Republicans in The French viewed Waller's activity as a threat the 1888 election. In 1890, he moved to to their colonial ambitions in Madagascar and Oklahoma. had him tried and convicted to 20 years in prison. Only by the intervention of President Cleveland freed him. He returned to the United John L. Waller States and during the Spanish American War he (1850-1907) was an officer with the 23rd Kansas Volunteers. In 1900 he retired from public life and settled in John L. Waller was a career Republican and New York City activist who played a significant role in Kansas politics. He was born on a Missouri plantation. After being freed by the Union Army in 1862, Alfred Fairfax his family moved to Iowa where he attended (1843-1916) school and was admitted to the Iowa Bar in 1877. Elected to the state House of Representatives in 1888, Alfred Fairfax was the first African In 1878 he moved to Leavenworth, Kansas American to serve in the Kansas legislature. A where he opened a law practice. In 1884 farmer and pastor, Fairfax represented the 58th Waller, recognized for his speaking ability, was District. During his single term in office (1889- recruited by Leavenworth Republicans to tour 1890), he served as chairman of the House 3 | P a g e Kansas Republican Party Committee on Immigration and spoke out in Topeka while young. Lutie attended Topeka favor of an end to segregated schools as well as schools, including Topeka High School. She a prohibition of discrimination more generally. then graduated from Central Tennessee law school's graduating class of 1897 before Born a slave in Loudon County, Virginia, he was returning to Topeka. She later moved to New later sold and taken to Louisiana. In 1862, he York, but returned periodically to Topeka where escaped and joined the Union Army. During her brother Charles had a long, successful Reconstruction he career in law-enforcement. actively participated in "I like constitutional law because the anchor of Louisiana politics, my race is grounded on the constitution. It is including earning a the certificate of our liberty and our equality Republican before the law. Our citizenship is based on it, congressional and hence I love it." nomination. In 1880, following Kansas Bans Birth of a Nation the end of Reconstruction, Fairfax joined thousands of Birth of a Nation was a 1915 silent movie epic other African Americans in moving to Kansas that portrayed the KKK as a heroic patriotic seeking social and economic opportunity. Upon movement that put aggressive blacks in their arriving in Kansas, as leader of a group of place. Democrat President Woodrow Wilson, a several hundred families, he settled in renowned racist, showed it at the White House. Chautauqua County near the town of Peru. He managed a farm of several hundred acres, Meanwhile in Kansas, the raising cotton and operating his own gin, the Board of Review of Motion Fairfax Ginning Company. He became pastor of Pictures banned the movie the New Hope Baptist Church in Parsons. for being both historically inaccurate and racist, designed to stir up hate. Lutie Lytle The ban was not dropped (1875-c1950) until 1924. In 1897, Lutie Lytle of Topeka became the first NAACP & Robert Hill African-American woman in Kansas admitted to the The Topeka branch of the NAACP was founded practice of law and one in 1913. It opposed Birth of a Nation, gained of the first three in the entrance for black children to educational nation. movies shown at segregated theaters, and fought school segregation. In 1919, U.S. She was born in Tennessee and moved to 4 | P a g e Kansas Republican Party Senator and former Governor Arthur Capper (R) dedicated to high morals, Christian virtue, and sat on its board. Americanism. It preached a doctrine of hatred for “non-Americans” especially American In January 1920, Robert Hill, a civil rights leader citizens of Jewish, Catholic, Black, Hispanic, or who had fled Arkansas, was arrested in Kansas German ancestry. By 1922, it had about 50,000 on an extradition request from Arkansas. Three members in Kansas. NAACP lawyers took up his case: James Guy. Elisha Scott, Sr., and Nov 22, 1922: Governor Allen (R), after A. M. Thomas. They declaring that there would be “no such had the full support nonsense” in Kansas, ordered Attorney General of Governor Allen Richard Allen (R) to file suit to oust the Klan and Senator Capper. from Kansas as a foreign corporation illegally doing business in Kansas. In a speech Governor Unlike Arkansas, the Allen stated “This is not a partisan issue. It NAACP could act transcends the obligations of partisanship and openly in Kansas and relates itself to the sacred cause of free planned mass public A. M. Thomas government – the cause of individual rights. No pressure. They more grotesque abuse of the word ‘American’ added Shawnee could be used than to call this Klan organization County Prosecutor Hugh Fisher to the team. American.” When the Arkansas officials arrived to extradite Hill, they were met by large crowds of 1923-24: The Klan’s influence grew at the protestors, relentless news articles from grassroots level, reaching over 100,000 Capper’s newspapers on “Arkansas Justice” and members in Kansas. It set itself up as moral requests from Fisher for information on the censor in communities and took over scattered routine torture or prisoners in Arkansas. municipal governments and school boards. On March 22, 1921, the extradition hearing was held in Topeka. The Arkansas Attorney General appeared, provoking hostility from the crowd by referring to all African Americans as “niggahs,” and incapable of dealing with the African American attorneys Guy, Scott, and Thomas as equals, totally bungled his presentation.