Black Republicans Research Articles

Contrasting Patterns in Black School Politics: Atlanta and Memphis, 1865-1985

Scholars have paid relatively little attention to the participation of African Americans in school politics in the urban South. Some notable incidents have been recounted, and patterns of inequality between Black and White schools have been documented, but the kinds of synthetic historical accounts of growth and change in the educational opportunities available to Black children that have recently been produced for several northern cities are still lacking for most southern cities (Homel, 1990). In an earlier article we presented such an account of Black school politics in Atlanta (GA), in which we identified a pattern of changes in the immediate goals and tactics adopted by African American leaders in their century-long effort to win better schools for their community (Plank & Turner, 1987). In the present article we contrast Black school politics in Atlanta with those in Memphis (TN) and show how the divergent political structures of the two cities produced very different sets of opportunities and constraints for African Americans in the two cities. As in Atlanta, Black leaders in Memphis adapted their goals and tactics to the changing political circumstances of their community; yet, because the political histories of the two cities are very different, the patterns of interaction between Black leaders and the public school system are proven to be dramatically different as well. The crucial difference between Black school politics in Atlanta and in Memphis involves the participation of African Americans in city politics. From the start, White politics in Atlanta were organized around Black exclusion. A Black Republican, William Finch, was elected to the Atlanta city council in 1871, but thereafter no Blacks held public office in that city until the 1960s. Divisions in the White electorate sometimes allowed Blacks to play a role in local elections in the years immediately following the Civil War, but the ensuing competition for Black votes was universally decried among Whites. The institution of a White primary in 1892 brought an effective end to Black political participation in Atlanta, and it was only on the rare occasions when meaningful citywide elections were held (e.g., mayoral recall, bond referenda) that Blacks enjoyed real power (Plank & Turner, 1987; Turner, 1990).

Sweet Cherry, Spotted Tentiform Leafminer Control, 1985

Abstract Experimental sprays were evaluated for control of STLM and possible deleterious effects on STLM parasitoids. The treatments were applied to nonreplicated 1.6-acre plots in The Dalles, OR, on a mixed planting of approximately 50-year old Bing, Black Republican, and Napoleon sweet cherry trees. The materials were applied on 14 Jul using an Orchardmaster sprayer with a 200 gpa output. Diazinon was applied on 23 Aug to 0.5 of the Vendex + Dimilin plot and the check plot to observe possible parasitoid disruption. STLM damage was assessed by counting both the sap-feeding and tissue-feeding mines in leaves removed from current season Napoleon shoots. Mine counts were taken from a proximal, distal and middle leaf from each of 45 shoots/plot. The same sampling procedure was used on 9 Sep but only tissue-feeding mines were counted. Apanteles sp. were trapped on Pherocon AM yellow stickey traps hung 6 ft high on the north side of trees for approximately 1 wk. A ratio of the average no. ol Apanteles sp. trapped, divided by tissue-feeding mines/leaf was calculated to determine parasitoid disruption from the sprays. Average monthly temperatures were: Jul 79.8°F, Aug 70.9°F, Sep 58.0°F. Monthly rainfall in inches was: Jul 0.02, Aug 0.29, Sep 0.43.

Colonel Edward J. C. Kewen; Los Angeles' Fire-Eating Orator of the Civil War Era

On a hot August afternoon in 1859, a bevy of horse-drawn carriages converged on El Monte. Their destination was Willow Grove, a wooded glen alongside the nearly dry wash of the San Gabriel River. warm-hearted denizens of The Monte were hosting a mass Democratic Party barbeque, and good Democrats from all over Los Angeles County were invited. Hundreds came. After stuffing themselves with barbequed beef and washing it down with gallons of wine, the assemblage settled back to enjoy the feature of the day a rousing political address by Colonel Edward J. C. Kewen, the premier orator of the southern counties. Colonel Kewen did not disappoint his listeners. gaunt, thirty-four-year-old Los Angeles attorney, his full black beard and noble head of hair waving with his gyrations, launched into a two-hour tirade against apostate Democrats and Black Republicans. He directed his choicest invectives against J. J. Warner, Los Angeles Democrat who had broken with the regular party. Kewen charged that Warner had stolen mules from the U.S. Army during the Mexican War and was A traitor to his country and a purloiner of his country's property, . . . eminently entitled to the consideration of the hangman. He climaxed his diatribe by shouting, This trifling fellow, Warner, is so notoriously corrupt and villainous as to wholly exclude him from any consideration except that which prompts a man to kick a snarling cur that intercepts his path. reptile's teeth have been extracted, there is now no venom in his bite.1

James T. Rapier and Reconstruction (review)

BOOK REVIEWS363 little special attention to pay to Daniel or any other child." It is difficult to quarrel with such a conclusion, but it is also disappointing to find the author so little inclined to speculate on the possible effects of the situation he describes. With that single observation he drops the subject entirely. But fortunately—though not necessarily for the sake of clarity— Bartlett has insights to offer apart from those of the psychobiographer. He is at his best, perhaps, in discussing the reaction to Webster's famed Seventh of March Speech and his subsequent defense of the Fugitive Slave Law passed as part of the Compromise of 1850. The story has been told before, and Bartlett quotes the familiar stanzas from Whittier's "Ichabod" and the usual lines from Theodore Parker's funeral oration and Emerson's journal to show how thoroughly Webster alienated the conscience of New England with his efforts in behalf of sectional reconciliation. Yet to the traditional picture Bartlett brings—by way of explaining the extraordinary depth of feeling among Webster's detractors—a fresh sense of thedeeply personal qualityof their response to his "betrayal." Had they worshipped him less ardently in the first place, it might have been otherwise, but, as Bartlettobserves, "when the gods fail, the faithful turn upon them with greater scorn and fury than that directed at mortal enemies because they have lost part of their own identity." At such times, of course, Bartlett is talking less about what Webster was than about what he meant to his contemporaries. But that may ultimately be the most revealing—and significant—thing we have to learn from analyzing the phenomenon of his "greatness." Whatever drove him to be and do what he became and did will probably remain elusive, yet somehow in the process, with all his virtues and failings, he managed to grasp the imagination of his contemporaries as few other men did. This in turn tells us a good deal about them, as Bartlett is careful to point out from time to time. Regrettably, however, he does so only in passing and devotes most of his analysis to other—less rewarding— topics. Robert F. Dalzell, Jr. Williams College James T. Rapier and Reconstruction. By Loren Schweninger. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1978. Pp. xx, 248. $22.00.) One aim of this brief biography of James T. Rapier, a black Republican from Alabama, is to illustrate "the inadequacy of conservative stereotypes in recounting the era of reconstruction and the Negro in American history." In this purpose Loren Schweninger succeeds admirably. Rapier came from a remarkable family of former slaves and "free" slaves who were hard working and extraordinarily successful at 364civil war history business enterprise. Schooled in Nashville and Canada, Rapier devoted his energies early on in reconstruction to organizing blacks politically, first in Tennessee and shortly thereafter in his home state of Alabama. He helped establish the Alabama Republican party, served in the state's "Black and Tan" constitutional convention, twice held high positions in the Internal Revenue Service, and represented Alabama in Congress from 1873 to 1875. When he was not running for office (he was defeated once in his bid to be Alabama's Secretary of State and twice in his attempt to return to Congress), Rapier was putting his mind to the problems ofblack poverty and deprivation, helpingto organizeboth the National Negro Labor Union and its Alabama auxiliary, the Alabama Negro Labor Union. His overriding ambition for the freedmen was to help them acquire land and decent educational opportunities, and he even contributed his own funds to projects for the betterment of less fortunate members of his race. (Rapier was a successful and liberal cotton planter.) Neither threats nor bribes could deflect him from his purpose. Yet, Rapier was no fiery radical. As Schweninger observes, he "consistently opposed radical movements—land confiscation, land redistribution, the complete disfranchisement of ex-Confederates . . ." He even opposed integrated schools in practice, but advocated them in principle in order to frighten white conservatives into providing blacks with equal educational opportunities. Only once did Rapier cast moderation aside, and this was after reconstruction, when he urged blacks to abandon hopes for reform in...

Black Republicans: The Politics of Blacks and Tans

Black Republicans: The Politics of Blacks and Tans

Black Republicans: The Politics of the Black and Tans. By Hanes WaltonJr. (Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1975. Pp. 217. $8.00.)

Black Republicans: The Politics of the Black and Tans. By Hanes WaltonJr. (Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1975. Pp. 217. $8.00.)

Black Republicans: The Politics of the Black and Tans.

Black Republicans: The Politics of the Black and Tans.

Black Republicans: The Politics of the Black and Tans

Black Republicans: The Politics of the Black and Tans

Black Republicans in New York

Black Republicans in New York

The Names of Negro Newspapers

A SK ANY literate American if he has ever heard of a Negro newspaper, and one out of ioo might nod his head and say, 'I've never seen one, but I suppose they have them.' One out of 900 more might be able to mention the Chicago Defender or the Pittsburgh Courier, two of the older and more widely circulated papers. Rare indeed are those people who are aware that there have been upward of 3,000 Negro newspapers published in 40 states and the District of Columbia since I827. Yes, 3,000 of them, of which 206 are operating today. One of the striking omissions in the accounts of American newspapers in past years has been the story of these Negro papers, a story that is just gradually being pieced together with any degree of fullness. The appellations the overseers have given their papers is a story in itself and one that is the subject of this article. These papers have been variously named and have not all, chameleon-like, taken on the surrounding hue. There are, to be sure, a number that bear the usual titles one expects of newspapers: Herald, Star, Ledger, News, Tribune, and the like; but many others have been given strikingly individual names. There is, for instance, the Oklahoma Black Dispatch, whose editor told the writer a few years ago that the name was chosen to 'dignify a slur.' In a former day, the expression black dispatch gossip had ignominious overtones; put a good newspaper under that expression, Roscoe Dunjee reasoned, and you raise the latter. So, the Black Dispatch came into being, a weekly at Oklahoma City. The Civil War left in its wake such Negro newspaper titles as Freeman; Free Man's Press; Union Republican; Black Republican; and perhaps one of the longest titles of any newspaper, North Carolina Republican and Civil Rights Advocate. Before 1900 Republican was the title of eight Negro papers in the Southern states.

Press Opposition to Lincoln in New Hampshire

EARLY in March, 186o, Abraham Lincoln visited his son, Robert, at Phillips Exeter Academy and delivered four addresses, at Exeter, Concord, Dover, and Manchester. Before his departure he had spoken before six or seven thousand persons and had won such staunch support that in the Republican convention, New Hampshire was more consistently for him than any other New England state. But, as was perhaps only natural, the Democratic press had little good to say of him. Nashua Gazette of March 8 characterized him as dull, prosy speaker; the Dover Gazette observed that he was not orator, albeit ... a tolerable declaimer and branded him an unscrupulous demagogue; the New Hampshire Patriot charged editorially on March 7, The 'irrepressible conflict' doctrine of the black republicans means disunion or it means nothing. This doctrine, false, dangerous, revolutionary and treasonable, was first proclaimed by Abraham Lincoln.' tone was thus set for the abuse which the same Demo-

Hannibal Hamlin, a "Black Republican."

Journal Article Hannibal Hamlin, a "Black Republican." Get access Richard H. Thornton Richard H. Thornton Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Notes and Queries, Volume s11-VI, Issue 145, 5 October 1912, Page 270, https://doi.org/10.1093/nq/s11-VI.145.270e Published: 05 October 1912