Henry McNeal Turner
Excerpt from "I Claim the Rights of a Man"
Speech before the Georgia State Legislature, September 3, 1868
An expelled black senator defends his right to hold office
The North's victory in the Civil War in 1865 settled two important issues. First, it established that states were not allowed to leave, or secede from, the United States. Second, it put an end to slavery throughout the country. But the end of the war also raised a whole new set of issues. For example, federal lawmakers had to decide whether to punish the Confederate leaders for their rebellion. They also had to decide what process to use to readmit the Southern states to the Union, and how much assistance to provide in securing equal rights for the freed slaves. The period in American history immediately after the Civil War—when the country struggled to deal with these important and complicated issues—was called Reconstruction.
Reconstruction was a time of great political and social turmoil. President Andrew Johnson (1808-1875), who took office after Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) was assassinated in 1865, controlled the earliest Reconstruction efforts. Johnson said that the Southern states could form new state governments and be readmitted to the Union once they abolished (put an end to) slavery and admitted that they had been
"God saw fit to vary everything in nature. There are no two men alike—no two voices alike—no two trees alike. God has weaved and tissued variety and versatility throughout the boundless space of His creation. Because God saw fit to make some red, and some white, and some black, and some brown, are we to sit here in judgment upon what God has seen fit to do?"
wrong to secede. He also pardoned (officially forgave) many men who had held important positions in the Confederate government or army.
Within a short time, however, many Northerners came to believe that Johnson's Reconstruction policies were too lenient (easy) on the South. They worried that the same men who had led the Southern states to secede from the Union would return to power. In December 1865, for example, the people of Georgia elected former Confederate vice president Andrew Stephens to represent them in the U.S. Congress. Other Southern states elected former Confederate politicians and military leaders to public office as well.
As state legislatures re-formed across the South, it became clear that the former Confederate states had no intention of giving black people equal rights as citizens. Instead, most Southern states passed laws known as "Black Codes" to regulate the behavior of blacks and make sure that whites maintained control over them. The state of Georgia not only instituted Black Codes but also rejected the Fourteenth Amendment, which made black people citizens of the United States and granted them civil rights.
In response to such actions by the Southern states, the U.S. Congress decided to take over the process of Reconstruction from the president. Beginning in 1866, Congress enacted stricter Reconstruction policies and sent in federal troops to enforce them. Political leaders in Georgia were determined to avoid complying with (following) these policies. They asked the U.S. Supreme Court to issue an injunction (a court order preventing a law from being enforced), but their case was dismissed.
Congress's Reconstruction policies required the Southern states to hold conventions to rewrite their constitutions. Georgia's constitutional convention met in Atlanta in December 1867. Of the 169 delegates (elected representatives) at the convention, 37 were black men. "The convention was interested in suffrage [voting rights], qualifications for office-holding, relief [aid to the poor], and a liberal Constitution," according to W. E. B. DuBois in Black Reconstruction. "In these matters, Negroes took active part in the discussions, and used their political privilege intelligently, and with caution." The delegates created a new state constitu tion that prohibited slavery and granted all adult males— black and white—the right to vote. However, it did not specifically say that all legal voters would be eligible to hold public office.
Once Georgia and the other Southern states had developed new constitutions, they were allowed to elect state governments and rejoin the Union. A majority of Georgia voters approved the new state constitution in April 1868. They also elected new representatives to the state and federal governments. Many black men jumped at the chance to vote and have a say in their government. As a result, the new Georgia State Senate included three black members, while the State House of Representatives included twenty-nine black members.
The U.S. Congress welcomed Georgia back into the Union on July 21, 1868, shortly after the state ratified (approved) the Fourteenth Amendment. Then Congress withdrew the federal troops that had been sent to enforce their Reconstruction policies. But as soon as the federal troops left Georgia, the white majority in the state legislature began trying to expel (kick out) the black members because of their race. "Immediately upon the readmission of their states the Conservatives [people who want to maintain traditional, established views or conditions] . . . began their running attack on the new administrations," John Hope Franklin wrote in Reconstruction after the Civil War. "Overthrow would come soon, they felt, if they worked hard enough at it."
In the Georgia State Senate, white members of the Democratic Party began targeting black members of the Republican Party. They accused the three black senators of "gross insults" and other minor offenses. But even though the charges were ridiculous, the Democrats held a majority in the senate and had enough votes to expel the black members. In September 1868, the white members of the Georgia State House of Representatives passed a resolution (a formal expression of their opinion) stating that black men were not eligible to hold public office. They argued that the state constitution allowed blacks to vote, but did not allow them to hold office. Based upon this resolution, twenty-five of the twenty-nine black state representatives lost their seats in the House. They were replaced by white Democrats. The other four black
Henry McNeal Turner
Henry McNeal Turner was born in Columbia, South Carolina, in 1834, to free black parents. (Not all black people in the United States were slaves in the early 1800s. Some former slaves were set free when their white owners died or no longer needed their services. Other former slaves saved money and purchased their freedom from their owners. When free blacks had children, the children were also free.) Even though Turner was free from birth, he still spent some time working alongside slaves on a cotton-growing plantation as a boy.
In 1855, Turner moved to Macon, Georgia. He joined the African Methodist Episcopal Church and became a preacher. His sermons attracted the attention of white people in Georgia. Many white people resented blacks who knew how to read and write, because they worried that educated blacks would encourage slaves to rebel against their masters. As a result, fearful whites pressured Turner to leave Georgia. He moved north to Washington, D.C., where he became pastor of Israel Bethel Church. Over the next few years, he emerged as a leader of the black community and a fighter for racial justice.
In 1863, President Abraham Lincoln appointed Turner to be chaplain for the first black troops who fought for the United States in the Civil War. When the war ended in 1865, Turner took a job in the Freedmen's Bureau, a federal government agency organized to help former slaves make the transition to freedom. He traveled around Georgia speaking to freed slaves about education and job opportunities. By 1867, when the U.S. Congress took control of Reconstruction, Turner was a prominent figure in Georgia politics.
members remained in office because they had such light skin that it was impossible to prove their race.
Henry McNeal Turner (1834-1915) was one of the black men expelled from the Georgia legislature. He was an educated man and a respected minister, but his status as a leader in the black community made him one of the primary targets of racist white Democrats. Turner refused to accept the ruling of his colleagues. On September 3, 1868, he made a passionate speech before the Georgia House of Representatives defending his right to hold office. The legislature refused to print the text of his speech in its minutes (the official written record of a meeting), so Turner published it himself and distributed it among the people of Georgia.
- Henry McNeal Turner. (Reproduced by permission of Fisk University Library.)
Turner took part in the convention to rewrite the Georgia State Constitution in 1867. He stressed the importance of compromising with whites in order to make lasting changes to Georgia society. The following year, he was elected to serve in the Georgia House of Representatives. But in September 1868, the conservative white members of the Congress voted to expel all of the black representatives. Turner led the protests against this decision and even went to Washington to make a formal complaint to the U.S. Congress. He and the other black representatives finally regained their seats in 1870.
Turner's experiences in Georgia during Reconstruction convinced him that Southern whites would never allow blacks to be equal members of society. He then began supporting the idea that black Americans should migrate to Africa and form their own country. Turner was ordained a bishop in the African Methodist Episcopal Church in 1880. He died in Windsor, Ontario, Canada, in 1915.
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