CHAPTER I
A Brief Resumé of Reconstruction in Louisiana before 1869
By January 1, 1869, Louisiana had suffered the throes of reconstruction for seven weary years, but the hostile fates had decreed for her more than another seven before she should be able to wrench herself free from the grasp of her colored and carpet-bag despots. The first uncertain attempts at reconstruction were made at the close of 1862 by Governor Shepley with the consent of Lincoln. The President’s policy was based upon the belief that there existed in every Southern State a loyal element which might be made to prove the germ of a civil government owning allegiance to Washington. In the course of that year, as the North gained a foothold, he had appointed General Shepley military governor, whose duty it was to resurrect the loyal element among the people. Thanks to the vigorous grip over New Orleans of Generals Butler and Banks, a considerable body, stronger in numbers than social prestige, became firmly wedded to the Union cause. The old Douglas men sprang into evidence at Butler’s arrival on the scene; members of the Irish Unionists came out strongly; while still others were won by the favors distributed with an eye to political gain. General Shepley ordered an election on December 3 for two Congressmen. The successful candidates proved to be B. F. Flanders and Michael Hahn, both of whom were allowed to take their seats in the National legislature.
There appeared a certain group of men eager to push on the work of reorganization, either for the plums of office, or, on the part of the old slave-holders, for the sake of saving a portion of their slaves, or for the sake of casting off martial law. This group, the Free State Party, working through the Union Clubs, urged on in 1863 a registration and convention to frame a new constitution. But it made such slow progress that Lincoln developed his famous “Ten Per Cent” plan by his proclamation of December 8, 1863, which offered pardon and the restoration of property to all who would take a prescribed oath; and declared that the President would recognize as the true government of any of the seceded States, except Virginia, the organizations set up by loyal citizens, provided that they constituted one-tenth of the voting population of 1860.[1]
General Banks, in accordance with this plan, ordered an election of State officers for February 22, 1864. Hahn, the successful administration candidate, was inaugurated on March 4. About ten days later he was invested with the “powers exercised before by the military governor.” It is of importance to note that as early as this campaign the issue in the radical party was the treatment of the negroes after emancipation. Delegates to a constitutional convention were subsequently chosen and April 6, ninety-four[2] of the men elected met in New Orleans, a fair set of men, but already showing a tendency toward that extravagance which was later to be such a blot upon reconstruction. The convention abolished slavery,[3] but restricted suffrage to white males, although it empowered the legislature to confer it on “such persons, citizens of the United States, as by military service, by taxation to support the government, or by intellectual fitness may be deemed entitled thereto.”[4] A constitution was adopted and submitted to the people, but only 8402 votes were cast in ratification as compared with 11,411[5] in the election of Hahn. The new legislature provided for met October 3, elected two Senators, and adopted the Thirteenth Amendment unanimously. Although this government was duly recognized by the President and its ratification of the Amendment gladly counted to help embody it in the organic law, its authority was restricted to a very narrow limit—that actually within the Union military lines[6]—and neither branch of Congress admitted the members chosen by the new government, while the Presidential vote of 1865 was rejected.
The legislature of 1865, fully representative of the State, and just as fully Democratic, met in extra session to elect two new Senators in case the two elected previously be rejected as not truly representative. With these two Senators, Henry Clay Warmoth presented himself at Washington as territorial delegate of the radical Republicans of the State,[7] his expenses defrayed by his negro constituents, who joyfully deposited their half-dollars with their first ballots to pay the expenses of their impecunious delegate.[8]
Some thirty or more of the members of the convention of 1864 were so angered at seeing the offices of the State passing to the ex-rebels that, with the consent of the governor and a judge of the Supreme Court, they began to meet and plan how they could evict them. Before adjourning, the convention of 1864 had decreed that it might be reconvoked at the call of the President “for any cause, or in case the constitution should not be ratified, for the purpose of taking such measures as may be necessary for the formation of a civil government for the State of Louisiana.” This resolution, however, had not been incorporated in the constitution and had never been passed upon by the people.[9]
The opponents of negro suffrage denied the right of the convention to resume its functions and the controversy over the matter became very fierce. July 30, 1866, the delegates who favored reassembling proceeded to do so, according to call in New Orleans. A street procession of negroes, on their way to the hall, became involved in a serious fight with the police and crowds of white spectators. The number killed and injured amounted to about two hundred and the fact stood out conspicuously that of this number only about a dozen were policemen or their white allies. The North and, more especially, Congress was forced by this episode, together with the rejection of the Fourteenth Amendment[10] and the passage throughout the South of the “Black Codes,” to the conclusion that the colored people were not safe in the hands of their former masters.
Hence, the Congressional plan of reconstruction, long brewing,[11] was forced on the South in the Acts of March 2, 1867, which reëstablished military rule and provided an entire new organization of government through a convention, elected by negro as well as white vote, and a new constitution, which should be acceptable to Congress[12]; in the Supplementary Act of March 23 which placed the initiative in the hands of the military instead of the State[13]; and the additional Act of July 19 which substituted for the liberal interpretation of the earlier acts by civil officials the most rigorous possible and stripped the Executive of the power of determining removals by explicitly conferring certain powers of appointment and removal on the general of the army.[14] Louisiana and Texas constituted one military department, placed first under the direction of General Sheridan, and in August under General Hancock. Under these two commanders registration was pushed on so as to record as many blacks and as few whites as possible. In September a convention of ninety-eight members was elected, consisting by previous agreement of blacks and whites in equal numbers, all but two, Republicans. The body sat in daily session from November 23 to March 9, ostensibly to frame the new constitution, but, because of the lack of a revenue, constituting itself also a legislative body. The constitution framed by it was the most severe in its disfranchising clauses of any in the South.