CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Restoration of White Supremacy
The state election in 1870 resulted in a victory for the Democratic and Conservative party, but there was a persistent effort to deprive that party of the fruits of victory. There was instituted on behalf of the incumbent governor and treasurer a proceeding in the chancery court to enjoin the presiding officer of the senate from counting the votes for candidates for those two offices. The legislature met November 20, and the law required that the vote be counted, with the two houses assembled jointly, within the first week. In the proceedings instituted, Governor Smith alleged irregularity in the election. The judge of the circuit court refused to grant an injunction, on the ground that the legislature could not be enjoined by a court. It was then filed with a supreme court judge. It prayed that the presiding officer of the senate be restrained from counting the vote until the legislature could provide rules by which the proposed contest should be tried. Judge Saffold, as chancellor, granted the injunction. Lieutenant-Governor Applegate was dead, and Barr, an Ohio man, was presiding. The injunction was served on Barr, and he very cheerfully obeyed it.
There are some interesting facts in relation to this senate. The radical constitution gerrymandered the senatorial districts, in some instances apportioning a senator to a single county; in others, a senator to a group of three or four counties, with nearly threefold greater population.
The constitution provided that representatives in the legislature should be elected for two years, and senators for four years; that one-half of the seats of senators first elected (in 1868) should be declared vacant at the end of two years, thus providing for continuation of a certain number. In accordance with this provision, at the session in November the question whether the senators should draw for the long and short terms was discussed; nobody wished to vacate his seat, and by hocus-pocus they reached the conclusion that all should hold over. Consequently, one-half of them sat four years and the others for six. This procedure contributed much to the complication of affairs. This senate connived at the attempt to prevent the count of returns.
At noon on the last day of the week the two houses assembled and Barr proceeded to count the returns for other officers, declaring that for Lieutenant-governor E. H. Moren had received a majority of the votes cast at the election; that for secretary of state J. J. Parker had defeated J. T. Rapier; that W. A. Sanford had defeated Joshua Morse in the race for attorney-general; that Joseph Hodgson succeeded N. B. Cloud as superintendent of public instruction. These winners were all Democrats. As soon as he had declared these results. Barr and the radical senators withdrew. Lieutenant-Governor Moren then appeared, took the oath of office, assumed the chair of the presiding officer, and directed that the returns for governor and treasurer be brought in. This being done, he proceeded forthwith to count them and declared that Robert B. Lindsay, for governor, and James F. Grant, for treasurer, had received majorities, and to proclaim them duly elected. These officers were sent for and sworn in. Consternation seized the Republican leaders. They were caught in their own trap, for the injunction had been served on Barr and he had qualified his own successor in the person of Dr. Moren, who as lieutenant-governor was unaffected by the injunction. Lindsay lost no time in demanding possession of the office, but Smith refused to yield and had federal soldiers guarding all entrances to the offices of governor and treasurer.
Judge J. Q. Smith went from Selma to Montgomery, and before him Lindsay and Grant instituted proceedings, demanding that the seal and all books and papers and other property pertaining to the offices of governor and treasurer be delivered to them, respectively. The proceedings lasted several days. Meanwhile, Montgomery was fast filling up with young men, strangers in the community, and there were rumors that bodies of men in near-by towns were awaiting summons to the capital, and that locomotives with steam up and cars attached, ready for service, were side-tracked at a number of stations. Judge Smith’s court-room was daily crowded with strange men. Excitement was intense.
Lindsay in his complaint alleged that he was the qualified successor of Governor Smith; that he had made a demand upon him for the books, papers and paraphernalia of the office of governor, and that Smith refused to deliver them. The trial was set for three o’clock in the afternoon, and Governor Smith was ordered to appear in person in court and show cause why he should not be compelled to deliver the property demanded. Governor Smith did not like the appearance which Montgomery had assumed, nor did he relish the necessity of appearing in that court-room and before that audience contesting the right of the people’s representatives to assume the offices to which they had elected them, nor the certainty that as soon as judgment should be given against him an order for commitment to custody would issue. Accordingly, he had a conference with General Pettus, and soon thereafter announced that he “would yield, upon the ground that, although he was satisfied he was fairly and lawfully re-elected, his continuance of the litigation and the contest in the palpable excitement that surrounded the whole matter would tend to disturb the public peace; and the detriment to the material interests of the people of the state would be infinitely greater than the possession of the office itself by any particular man could possibly compensate.”
Thus negro domination in Alabama was overcome.
And the Ku Klux rode no more.