The Journal of Negro History, Volume 5, 1920. Various

and Stevens advise with Reference to Reconstruction Policy in South Carolina

      The late Honorable Francis L. Cardoza at one time Secretary of State for South Carolina, several years before his death stated to the undersigned the following in substance:

      That a number of colored men met and appointed a committee which was sent to Washington to get the advice of Charles Sumner and Thaddeus Stevens concerning the formation of the political organization for the newly enfranchised Negro citizen shortly after the adoption of the 14th Amendment.

      Pains were taken to keep the plans from both the native whites and the so-called carpet baggers from the North. That both Mr. Sumner and Mr. Stevens advised the committee to tender the leadership to native whites of the former master class of conservative views: but this plan was frustrated because they were not able to secure the consent of desired representatives of the former master class to assume the proffered leadership.

(Signed)   Kelly Miller(Signed)   Whitefield McKinlayWashington, D. C., December 14, 1917.

      Subscribed to and sworn before me, Samuel E. Lacy a Notary Public in and for the District of Columbia, this Fourteenth (14th) Day of December 1917.

(Signed)   Samuel E. Lacy,Notary Public, D. C.Some Negro Members of Reconstruction LegislaturesTexas

      J. H. Stewart who now lives in Austin.

      Edward Patton, San Jacinto County, now living in Washington is in Government service.

      Nathan H. Haller, Brazoria County. House, 1892-94. Reelected and counted out. Contested his seat and won.

      R. L. Smith, Colorado County, 1895-99, now living in Waco. Is president of the Farmers Bank and head of the Farmers Improvement Association. For sketch of, see Negro Year Book, p. 322. For his work in the Legislature, see attached letter.

      Elias May, Brazos County, in the early days of Reconstruction.

      R. J. Moore, Washington County, representative.

      –– Gaines, senator, Lee County.

      Copy.

Cooperative Extension Work in Agriculture and Home EconomicsCollege Station, TexasWaco, Texas, March 26, 1918.

      Prof. Monroe N. Work, Tuskegee Inst. Ala.

      Dear Mr. Work:

      I was elected in Nov. 1894 as representative for Colorado county and was re-elected in 1896.

      My majority in 1894 was 168 and in 1896 at the next election it was 450 as I recollect it.

      I was appointed on the committee on education and on privilege and election and on agriculture.

      I introduced a bill restoring colored trustees which finally passed.

      I fought a bill establishing separate waiting rooms for the races at R. R. Station and killed it for four years.

      I introduced a resolution inviting manufacturing cotton plants to come to Texas. I introduced a resolution granting the use of the Hall of the House of Representatives to the colored citizens of Austin to hold their memorial services for Fred Douglas. When one understands the race feeling in the South this was indeed a triumph. I introduced a bill establishing a college course as a part of our curriculum at Prairie View Normal which passed carrying with it a grant of fifty thousand acres of land.

      I worked hard to help carry a bill through making any peace officer automatically lose his office whenever a lynching took place in his county. This bill passed but was declared unconstitutional by the supreme court. I was appointed by the speaker as a member of the visiting board for Prairie View State Normal. As a member of the committee on privileges and Election I single handed fought for a colored man elected from Brazoria county, N. H. Haller by name who had the nerve to contest the seat of a white man to whom the certificate of election had been awarded. After a long and bitter fight in which three times I carried in and presented a minority report we won and Haller was seated. This isn't the only case of its kind that I know of in this state.

      Haller of course had able legal talent to take care of his case.

      I voted for the purchase of the battle field of San Jacinto which is in Harris country about twenty miles below Houston. It was on this battlefield that Texas won her independence from Mexico in 1836. It is now a beautiful state park. For this action I was publicly thanked by the Daughters of the Republic.

Respectfully(Signed)   R. L. Smith.

      The legislatures which I served in were the 23d and 24th.

      Charles A. Culberson, now U. S. senator was governor and our relations were very cordial.

      In 1902 I was tendered and accepted a position in the U. S. Marshal's office for the Eastern Dist. of Texas by Pres. Roosevelt. Held same until 1909. This was the most honorable and best paid federal position ever held by a Negro in Texas except that held by Hon. N. W. Cuney who was collector of the Post of Galveston. In 1915 I took charge of the Extension Service work for Negroes in Texas which I now hold.

Some Negro Members of the Tennessee Legislature during Reconstruction Period and After175By Honorable J. C. Napier, of Nashville, Tenn., register of United States Treasury, May, 1917

      ³⁰ Contested, not seated.

      Davidson county, Tennessee, sent two colored men to the Legislature. The first colored member of the Legislature was Sampson W. Keeble from 71-73. From 77-79 the colored member was Thomas A. Sykes. Both of these were representatives. Tennessee never had any colored senators. Sampson W. Keeble was a native of Tennessee. Thomas A. Sykes was a native of North Carolina and had been a member of the North Carolina legislature.176

      Captain James H. Sumner, of Davidson County, was elected a door-keeper of the House of Representatives for 1867-69. He was afterwards appointed captain of a Militia Company which rendered the State valuable service in putting down the Ku-Klux. Later by act of the Legislature a committee was authorized for Nashville consisting of three persons to audit claims against the State for destruction of property by soldiers of the Confederates and Federal armies during the war. Governor Brownlow appointed on this commission James H. Sumner, a white man named Lassiter, and J.C. Napier. They examined claims amounting to millions of dollars, some of which were afterwards paid and others rejected. There were other colored men on such commissions in other parts of the state whose names I do not now recall.

      Haywood county first sent Samuel A. McElwee. He served from 79-83. The same county afterwards sent Rev. D.F. Rivers who is now pastor of the Berean Baptist Church in Washington, D.C. Rev. Rivers defeated the father of a very popular white girl and she met him in the street and spat in his face. McElwee made a very active member and was highly respected by all. He was a graduate of Fisk University and the law department of Walden University.

      Weakley County sent John W. Boyd who served two or three terms in the legislature. He ran for the senate but was defeated.

      Perhaps there was one from Hamilton county or Knox county.

      Shelby county sent quite a delegation of colored men from time to time. Among them were T.F. Cassells and I.F. Norris, who is still living in North Dakota. Cassells was a lawyer, educated at Oberlin.

      Mr. Norris was a successful business man of Memphis, Mr. Keeble was a barber in Nashville.

      Mr. Sykes was Internal Revenue Collector in Nashville and came there with high revenue officials from North Carolina. He entered politics and was quite influential and finally died at Nashville.

      Keeble was of a family highly respected and of very high standing in Nashville. The men from Memphis and Haywood counties were more highly educated than the others. They were free men of high class and up to the standard of the whites who were sent to the legislature in those days.

Colored Men in Other Positions

      At one

175

There were no colored members of the Tennessee Senate.

176

1868, 1870, see North Carolina list, Pasquotank County.