Civil War and Reconstruction in Alabama

by Walter L. Fleming

The Alabama Grand Council of the Union League, the machine of the Radicals in Alabama,[1379] met in April and formulated the principles upon which the campaign was to be conducted. Congress was thanked for putting the reorganization of the state into the hands of “Union” men; the return to the principle that “all men are created equal” and its application to a “faithful and patriotic class of our fellow-men” was hailed with joy; any settlement which denied the ballot to the negro could not stand, they asserted; and “while we believe that rebellion is the highest crime known to the law, and that those guilty of it hold their continued existence solely by the clemency of an outraged but merciful government, we are nevertheless willing to imitate that government in forgiveness of the past, and to reclaim to the Republican Union party all who, forsaking entirely the principles on which the rebellion was founded, will sincerely and earnestly unite with us in establishing and maintaining for the future a government of equal rights and unconditional loyalty;” “we consider willingness to elevate to power the men who preserved unswerving adherence to the government during the war as the best test of sincerity in professions for the future;” and “if the pacification now proposed by Congress be not accepted in good faith by those who staked and forfeited their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor, in rebellion, then it will be the duty of Congress to enforce that forfeiture, by the confiscation of the lands at least of such a stiff-necked and rebellious people;” “the assertion that there are not enough intelligent and loyal men in Alabama to administer the government is false in fact, and mainly promulgated by those who aim to keep treason respectable by retaining power in the hands of its friends and votaries.”[1380] This was a declaration of principles to which self-respecting whites could hardly be expected to subscribe. That was the very reason for its proclamation. The Radical leaders in control of the machinery of the Union League began to discourage the accession of whites to the party. The negro vote was to be their support, and not too many whites were desired at the division of spoils.[1381] Other causes conspired to drive the respectable people from the ranks of the reconstructionists. Prominent politicians were sent into the state to tell the negro that, having received his freedom from the Republican party, to it his vote was due. Senator Henry Wilson of Massachusetts made a bitter speech against the southern whites at the capitol in Montgomery. The negroes were informed that the Republican party was entitled to their votes, and the whites were asked to join them, as subordinates perhaps.[1382] This speech was delivered on May 11, and from this date may be traced the organized opposition to Reconstruction. General James H. Clanton[1383] replied to Wilson, maintaining that the southern white was the real friend of the negro and declaring in favor of full political and educational rights for the negro, while asserting that Wilson’s plan would result in a black man’s party, controlled by aliens.[1384] This speech of Clanton’s had the effect of rousing the people to organized resistance against the plans of the Radicals.

On May 14, Judge “Pig Iron” Kelly of Pennsylvania spoke in Mobile to an audience of one hundred respectable whites and two thousand negroes, the latter armed. His language toward the whites was violent and insulting, an invitation for trouble, which inflamed both races. A riot ensued for which he was almost solely to blame.[1385] Several whites were killed or wounded and one negro. From the guarded report of General Swayne it was evident that the blame lay upon Kelly for exciting the negroes. It was a most unfortunate affair at a critical period, and the people began to understand the kind of control that would be exercised over the blacks by alien politicians.[1386]

In May the Alabama Sentinel, a short-lived reconstructionist newspaper in Montgomery, assisted by a negro mass-meeting, nominated Grant for the presidency and Busteed for vice-president. The platform demanded that the negro have his rights at once or upon his oppressors must fall the consequences. The Republican party was indorsed as the negro party, the only party that had done anything for the negro.[1387]

When the registrars were appointed it was necessary, in order to get competent men, to import both blacks and whites into some districts. The whites were brought from north Alabama or sent out from the Bureau contingents in the towns. They were members of the Union League, and it was a part of their duty to spread that organization among the negroes of the Black Belt, thus carrying out that part of their instructions which directed them to instruct the negroes in their rights and privileges.[1388] The Radical organization steadily progressed, but even thus early two tendencies or lines of policy appeared which were to weaken the Radicals and later to render possible their overthrow. The native white reconstructionists, living mostly in the white counties, wanted a reconstruction in which they (the native “unionists”) should be the controlling element. They were in favor of negro suffrage as a necessary part of the scheme and because it would not directly interfere with them, as the negro was supposed to be content with voting. These white “scalawags” were thus to gather the fruits of reconstruction. But the “carpet-baggers,” or the alien-bureau-missionary element, having worked among the negroes and learned their power over them, intended to use the negroes to secure office and power for themselves. They were less prejudiced against the negroes than were the “scalawags” and were willing to associate with them more intimately and to give them small offices when there were not enough carpet-baggers to take them. It was soon discovered that the native white “unionist” and the black “Unionist,” like oil and water, would not mingle. However, all united temporarily to gain the victory for reconstruction, each faction hoping to be the greater gainer.

On June 4, 1867, a “Union Republican Convention” met in Montgomery, and at the same time the Union League held its convention. The Union League was merely a select portion of the Union Republican Convention and met at night to slate matters for the use of the convention next day. F. W. Sykes of Lawrence County[1389] was chairman pro tem., and William H. Smith of Randolph County was permanent chairman.[1390] The delegates to the convention consisted of a large number of office-seekers, “union” men, deserters, “scalawags,” ex-Union army officers, and employees of the Freedmen’s Bureau, and negroes.[1391] There were one hundred negroes and fifty whites. The negroes sat on one side of the house and the whites on the other, but the committees were divided equally by color. The committee on permanent organization consisted of “three Yankees,” four “palefaces,” and six negroes, who nominated several negroes and Bureau men for officials.[1392] The Mail said that the negroes presented a better appearance than the whites, that they were cleaner and better dressed. General Swayne took a prominent part in the proceedings, and with Smith and the negroes voted out Busteed.[1393] Griffin (of Ohio) from Mobile offered a resolution dictated by Swayne, declaring that the recent opinions of the Attorney-General upon the registration of votes were dangerous to the restoration of the Union according to the plan of Congress.[1394] The proceedings were turbulent, there was much angry discussion, and the meeting ended in a fight after having indorsed the Radical programme and declaring against the United States cotton tax and the state poll tax,[1395] and agreeing to support only “union” or “loyal” men for office.[1396]

Conservative Opposition Aroused

Though the leaders complained of the “appalling apathy of the whites in political matters,”[1397] a change was coming. The teachings of the Radicals were beginning to have effect on the negroes, some of whom were becoming hostile to the whites and were resisting the white officers of the civil government. Their old belief in “forty acres of land and a mule” was revived by the speeches of Thaddeus Stevens, which were widely circulated by the agents of the Union League, who were sent through the country to distribute the speeches and to organize the movement resulting from it. Many of the whites now began to believe that at last confiscation would be enforced and that the negroes and low whites of the Union League would become the landowners.[1398] Clanton had been at work for two months, and on July 23, as chairman of the state committee of the Conservative party, called a convention of that party to meet in Montgomery on September 4.[1399] Meetings of the Conservative party were held in the larger towns. A slight hope was entertained that the whites might be able, by uniting, to obtain some representation in the convention. At a meeting in Montgomery, in August, Joseph Hodgson[1400] urged the people to take action and save the state from “Brownlowism,”[1401] as the worst results were to be feared from inaction; the enemies of the Conservatives were making every effort to control the constitutional convention; the Conservatives were in favor of conceding every legitimate result of the war and were willing to grant suffrage to the negro by state action—the only legitimate way; at the same time the negro must assist in guaranteeing universal amnesty. The negroes were asked by the speaker to reflect and to learn for what purpose the Radical leaders were using them. The best people of the state, he said, and not the worst, ought to reconstruct the state under the Sherman law.[1402]

Although strenuous efforts were made to secure a large attendance at the Conservative convention in September, there were only thirteen of the sixty-two counties represented. General M. J. Bulger was chosen to preside. Resolutions were adopted asserting the old constitutional view of the Federal government and declaring that the present state of affairs was destructive of federal government, in which each state had the absolute right to regulate the suffrage. An appeal was made to the negroes not to follow the counsels of bad men and designing strangers. The convention favored the education of the negro so as to fit him for his moral and political responsibilities.[1403]

About the time of the meeting of the Conservative convention an event occurred which showed the results of the teachings of the Radical leaders. A plan was formed by the more violent blacks to prevent the meeting of the Conservatives. Some of the more sensible negroes used their influence as a “Special Committee on the Situation” to prevent the attempt to break up the convention, and L. J. Williams, a prominent negro politician, was the chairman of the committee. The white Radicals did nothing to prevent violence. Later a negro Conservative speaker was mobbed by the negroes and was rescued only by the aid of General Clanton. Other negroes who sided with the whites were expelled from their churches.[1404]

The registrars continued to instruct “that part of the population which has heretofore been denied the right of suffrage” in the mysteries of citizenship or membership in the Union League. By the time of the election they were so effectively instructed that they were sure to vote as they were told by the League leaders. Nearly all of the respectable white members of the League in the Black Belt had fallen away, and but few remained in the white counties. Governor Patton yielded to Radical pressure, wrote Reconstruction letters, appeared at Reconstruction meetings, and deferred much to Pope and Swayne. He was harshly criticised by the Conservatives for pursuing such a course.