According to Wikipedia, Mississippi “was readmitted to the Union on January 11, 1870, and its representatives and senators were seated in Congress on February 23, 1870.”[*the dates are questionable] Although both new senators were Republicans and non-native Mississipians, one was black and one was white.
From the February 19, 1870 issue of Harper’s Weekly:
GENERAL AMES.
General ADELBERT AMES, who has just been elected to the United States Senate from the State of Mississippi, and whose portrait is given on this page, is a native of Maine, and entered West Point as a cadet from that State. He graduated with honors in 1856, received a lieutenant’s commission, and has since remained in the army. No officer has a more honorable war-record than General AMES. He served with distinction in the Army of the Potomac, and participated in nearly every battle in which that gallant host was engaged, and was promoted for gallant and meritorious services through the various grades, from lieutenant to the rank of major-general, which he now holds.
General AMES is about thirty-five years of age, a man of pleasant bearing, of frank and yet firm disposition. His administration as Military Governor of Mississippi has been eminently wise and successful. He was chosen Senator by the nearly unanimous vote of the Legislature of that State. Should the question of his eligibility be decided against him, his rejection by the Senate would cause general regret throughout the State, where his impartial conduct has won the respect of all parties.
two new Senators from Mississippi
HON. H.R. REVELS.
On this page will be found the portrait of Hon. H.R. REVELS, Senator elect from Mississippi. Mr. REVELS was born in North Carolina, in 1822, of free colored parents. He was educated at a Quaker Seminary in Indiana, and became a Methodist Minister. At the breaking out of the war he was settled in Baltimore, and from that time took an active part in the management of freedmen’s affairs. In 1864 he went To Vicksburg, in pursuance of this mission, and assisted in the organization of schools and churches among the liberated slaves. He passed the next two years in Kansas and Missouri, preaching and lecturing on moral and religious subjects; returned to Mississippi the following year, and has since resided in Natchez. He is presiding elder of his Church for the southern portion of the State. Since July last he has been a member of the City Council, and has served in that capacity with credit. A short time since he was elected to the State Senate by a handsome majority, and has now been selected by the Legislature as a proper man to represent the State in the Senate of the United States.
Mr. REVELS is a tall, portly man, of light complexion; has benevolent features, a pleasant voice, and cultivated manners. He is thoroughly respected by his own people and by the whites.
dignity in the Senate
The New-York Times February 26, 1870
According to the February 26, 1870 The New-York Times, Mr. Revels was actually sworn in as Senator 150 years ago today. The galleries were packed with intensely interested spectators. The Senate debated whether Mr. Revels should be seated. Senator Vickers from Maryland argued that Mr. Revels wasn’t eligible because he hadn’t been a U.S. citizen for nine years as required by the U.S. Constitution, and Senator Casserly from California “arraigned the entire reconstruction policy, charging that all the Southern Senators were put in their seats by the force of the bayonets of the regular army”. Charles Sumner’s closing speech for the Republican party “was brief, pithy and eloquent.” The majority-Republican Senate voted to admit Mr. Revels along strict party lines. When Vice-President Colfax told the Senator-elect to come forward and take the oath, “a pin might have been heard drop.” “Mr. REVELS showed no embarrassment whatever, and his demeanor was as dignified as could be expected under the circumstances. The abuse which had been poured upon him and on his race during the last two days might well have shaken the nerves of any one. The vast throng in the galleries showed no sign of feeling one way or the other, and left very quietly.”
One of the spectators in the visitors’ gallery was Charles Douglass. As he wrote to his father Frederick, Charles was happy that the Democrat effort to block the seating of Revels failed, but wished the first black Senator could have been his father: “The new senator was ‘dignified, … but I fear … weak. … If it could only have been Fred. Douglass … the door is open and I expect yet to see you passing, not through as a tool as I think this man is, to fill an unexpired term … but from your native State [Maryland].'” [1]
Hon. Fred. never made U.S. Sen.
In his 1913 The Facts of Reconstruction John R. Lynch, who in 1873 became the first African-American to be elected speaker of a state (Mississippi)legislature, wrote that Rev. Dr. Revels opening prayer when the Mississippi state senate convened in January 1870 was so effective that it “made him” a U.S. Senator, albeit for the shortest of the three terms the Mississippi state senate had to fill. From Project Gutenberg:
… When the Legislature convened at Jackson the first Monday in January, 1870, it was suggested to Lieutenant-Governor Powers, presiding officer of the Senate, that he invite the Rev. Dr. Revels to open the Senate with prayer. The suggestion was favorably acted upon. That prayer,—one of the most impressive and eloquent prayers that had ever been delivered in the Senate Chamber,—made Revels a United States Senator. He made a profound impression upon all who heard him. It impressed those who heard it that Revels was not only a man of great natural ability but that he was also a man of superior attainments.
The duty devolved upon that Legislature to fill three vacancies in the United States Senate: one, a fractional term of about one year,—the remainder of the six year term to which Jefferson Davis had been elected before the breaking out of the Rebellion,—another fractional term of about five years, and the third, the full term of six years, beginning with the expiration of the fractional term of one year. The colored members of the Legislature constituted a very small minority not only of the total membership of that body but also of the Republican members. Of the thirty-three members of which the Senate was composed four of them were colored men: H.R. Revels, of Adams; Charles Caldwell, of Hinds; Robert Gleed, of Lowndes, and T.W. Stringer, of Warren. Of the one hundred and seven members of which the House was composed about thirty of them were colored men. It will thus be seen that out of the one hundred forty members of which the two Houses were composed only about thirty-four of them were colored men. But the colored members insisted that one of the three United States Senators to be elected should be a colored man. The white Republicans were willing that the colored men be given the fractional term of one year, since it was understood that Governor Alcorn was to be elected to the full term of six years and that Governor Ames was to be elected to the fractional term of five years.
In this connection it may not be out of place to say that, ever since the organization of the Republican party in Mississippi, the white Republicans of that State, unlike some in a few of the other Southern States, have never attempted to draw the color line against their colored allies. In this they have proved themselves to be genuine and not sham Republicans,—that is to say, Republicans from principle and conviction and not for plunder and spoils. They have never failed to recognize the fact that the fundamental principle of the Republican party,—the one that gave the party its strongest claim upon the confidence and support of the public,—is its advocacy of equal civil and political rights. If that party should ever come to the conclusion that this principle should be abandoned, that moment it will merit, and I am sure it will receive, the condemnation and repudiation of the public.
It was not, therefore, a surprise to any one when the white Republican members of the Mississippi Legislature gave expression to their entire willingness to vote for a suitable colored man to represent the state of Mississippi in the highest and most dignified legislative tribunal in the world. The next step was to find the man. The name of the Rev. James Lynch was first suggested. That he was a suitable and fit man for the position could not be denied. But he had just been elected Secretary of State for a term of four years, and his election to the Senate would have created a vacancy in the former office which would have necessitated the holding of another State election and another election was what all wanted to avoid. For that reason his name was not seriously considered for the Senatorship.
The next name suggested was that of the Rev. H.R. Revels and those who had been so fortunate as to hear the impressive prayer that he had delivered on the opening of the Senate were outspoken in their advocacy of his selection. The white Republicans assured the colored members that if they would unite upon Revels, they were satisfied he would receive the vote of every white Republican member of the Legislature. Governor Alcorn also gave the movement his cordial and active support, thus insuring for Revels the support of the State administration. The colored members then held an informal conference, at which it was unanimously decided to present the name of Rev. H.R. Revels to the Republican Legislative Caucus as a candidate for United States Senator to fill the fractional term of one year. The choice was ratified by the caucus without serious opposition. In the joint Legislative session, every Republican member, white and colored, voted for the three Republican caucus nominees for United States Senators,—Alcorn, Ames and Revels,—with one exception, Senator William M. Hancock, of Lauderdale, who stated in explanation of his vote against Revels that as a lawyer he did not believe that a colored man was eligible to a seat in the United States Senate. But Judge Hancock seems to have been the only lawyer in the Legislature,—or outside of it, as far as could be learned,—who entertained that opinion.
Mr. Lynch’s point that Hiram Revels finished out the U.S. Senate term of Jefferson Davis seems to be debatable. A.J.Langguth wrote that it was the non-Davis seat, but still “the symbolism reverberated throughout the nation.” Thomas Nast expressed the irony in his Shakespearean cartoon. [2]
short term, big step
Jeff’s stomach ache
from his 1913 book
___________________________
Also from February 1870 – enough states had ratified the Fifteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution for it to become law. All American citizens had the right to vote no matter what: “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”
In its March 12, 1870 issue Harper’s Weekly assumed that the formal proclamation of the adoption of the amendment was imminent. It noted that the states that voted against the amendment were all run by Democrats and that New York State tried to rescind it previous ratification after Democrats took control of state government after the 1869 elections. The amendment completed the work of “political purification begun by the war.”
The paper concluded: “Every citizen of the United States who has contributed to this truly American and humane triumph has reason to be proud. His further duty is to help break down the prejudice that must long survive the removal of the ban [I think] under which the colored race has lain in this country. No law, indeed can remove feeling, but manly good sense can.”
bothersome Democrats
* There seems to be a question of when Mississippi was officially brought back into the nation. Heather Thomas explains in an article at the Library of Congress that Mississippi was formally readmitted to the Union on February 23, 1870. Her post also shows an image from Frank Leslie’s of Mr. Revel being sworn in on February 25th.
February 26,2020: I am adding some references and the Harper’s Weekly spread that included the Mississippi Senators’ bios. Edward Jenner’s 1796 smallpox vaccine eventually led to the disease’s eradication.
All the 1870 Harper’s Weekly material can be found at the Internet Archive. From the Library of Congress: heroes – Blanche Kelso Bruce served as U.S. Senator from Mississippi from 1875-1881; Hiram Revels portrait. The thumbnais of Revels and Lynch are from John R. Lynch’s book
__________________________
