University of Virginia Library

CHAPTER XIII

POLITICS, 1885-1901

In 1888, the deadlock which had existed between the Democratic
and Republican parties in national politics since 1876
was broken. In the elections of that year the Republicans won
the presidency and a majority in both houses of Congress. In
Virginia they elected two representatives, and successfully
contested the elections in the Third and Fourth Districts.
There were three candidates in the Fourth District,[1] Edward
C. Venable, Democrat; A. W. Arnold, Republican; and John W.
Langston, independent Republican, nominated by a negro mass
meeting. The returns of the election gave Venable 13,298
votes; Langston, 12,657 votes; and Arnold, 3,267.

Langston was a Virginia mulatto, who had been educated
at the North, where he had lived until he came to Petersburg,
Virginia, as a teacher. He was not overscrupulous, although
intelligent and fluent. Shortly after his arrival in the State,
he entered politics with the determination to defeat Mahone
in his own district. For several months before the election
he canvassed the district, bitterly denouncing Mahone
and the whites of both political parties, and drawing the color
line with the greatest severity. The colored leaders who were
in the legislature, or had been there, remained true to their
party and Mahone. They condemned Langston and the methods
that he used to win the colored votes as tending to produce
friction between the races and to alienate the white Republicans,

and the other whites in the State, who were paying the
greater part of the taxes to provide for the colored schools
and to support the regular functions of government.[2] But
they were insulted and persecuted by other members of their
race who followed Langston. Langston's chief appeal to the
people was that there were enough negroes in the district to
elect a negro to Congress; and that it was time for them to
have a representative there. By his oratory, he worked his
ignorant and excitable hearers into a kind of frenzy. The
whites were denounced and the fires of race animosities were
constantly stirred. The bitterness engendered by this campaign,[3] and the revival of the race question in the national

Philip W. McKinney

Governor, 1890-1894

elections of 1888 were doubtless largely responsible for the
great increase of crime and lynching during the next few
years.

The elections in Virginia of 1889 marked the end of
Mahone's political career. Having lost his seat in the United
States Senate, he sought to become governor of the Commonwealth.
The campaign for governor and for members of the
Legislature, which were to be chosen at the same time, was
conducted with the usual vigor by the two opposing party
leaders, Barbour and Mahone. Mahone's party was weakened
by the revolt of John S. Wise, William E. Cameron, Frank G.
Ruffin, W. C. Pendleton, and their friends, the most brilliant
and worthy of his followers. This faction held a convention
in October at which about two hundred delegates were present.
Resolutions were adopted containing fifteen articles condemning
Mahone's actions, and declaring, "That the defeat of
William Mahone is essential to the salvation of the Republican
party." Pressure was brought to bear on the colored voters
from all sides and notwithstanding Mahone's boast that "the
colored man is by instinct a Republican,"[4] not a few colored
voters were bought for one dollar or for two dollars each by
the Democrats. The usual method of bribing them, however,
was to buy their preachers or other leaders. But the great
mass of the negroes remained true to their old leaders, who
followed Mahone.[5]

The defection of the Wise-Cameron wing left Mahone's
party, which had already been deserted in 1883 by the best of
the Readjusters, still less reputable, both at home and abroad.
Philip W. McKinney, the Democratic nominee, was elected
governor by a majority of 42,000 votes out of a total of
283,000. In the legislature, the Democrats won the greatest
majority that any conservative party had won in the State

since the enfranchisement of the negroes.[6] Only about twenty-four
Republicans were left in the General Assembly. Among
them were five negroes.[7]

The victory of the Republicans in the national elections of
1888 resulted in their attempt to give tangible expression to
the desire of regaining their former power, which had been
menaced for several years by the creation of the solid Democratic
South, at the expense of their colored allies. This desire
found expression in a bill introduced in 1890 by Representative
Henry Cabot Lodge of Massachusetts. This "Force
Bill," as it was called, was designed to place Federal elections
in the Southern States under the control of Federal officers
and Federal troops. President Harrison had advised such a
measure in his first message to Congress in December, 1889.
The bill passed the House, but died in the Senate. Around
this bill there was centered a bitter debate in Congress and
throughout the nation, which served only to stir up past memories
and to increase the solidarity of the South against the
aggressiveness of Northern Republicans.[8]

The conservative people of the North, however, who had
contrasted the ten years of bayonet-negro rule in the South
with the decade of home rule there, were willing to let that
section manage its own affairs.[9] The many Northerners who
had gone South to invest their money and to live were not

slow in appreciating the situation from the Southern point of
view. By voting for the Force Bill, the Republican representatives
from Virginia did not increase their popularity with
the majority of the people of the State, nor did their conduct
aid their party in the state elections that followed.[10]

The political contests in 1888, especially in the Fourth
Congressional District, and the agitation over the Force
Bill, caused the speedy end of the Republican office-holders
in Virginia, at least for a time. In 1890, Democratic representatives
were elected in every district of the State. There
was opposition in only four districts by regular Republican
candidates. Inaction was advised by Republican leaders on
the ground that they were being cheated by the Democrats at
the polls. In 1891, there were only three Republicans in the
General Assembly, and for the first time since 1867 there were
no negroes in the State Senate. In 1893 the Republicans made
no nomination for governor or for members of the legislature.
Some of the Republicans supported independent candidates,
and others, candidates of the People's party.

The People's party, aided by the Southern Republicans,
succeeded in 1890 and in 1892 in dividing the whites in several
of the Southern States, thereby capturing the legislature in
South Carolina, Alabama, Missouri, and Georgia; in electing
several Congressmen in that section—one of them colored—
and in electing governors in Georgia, South Carolina, and
Tennessee.[11] But memories of the Force Bill and the danger
of giving the negroes the balance of power through division
of the whites held the South in line for Cleveland in the
fall of 1892.

The Virginia Populists had their first convention in 1892,
and in the election of that year gave their presidential candidates
12,191 votes. In 1893, they elected thirteen members
to the General Assembly. This movement received the support

of the Republican element in the State and of the more
illiterate Democrats. As a result of the fusion of the Republican
and People's parties, the Republicans elected about
thirty-six members to the General Assembly, and further
strengthened that party in the Southwest.

The success of the Democratic party in the national elections
of 1892 placed both houses of Congress and the Presidency
in the hands of Southerners and their sympathizers,
and demonstrated the futility of the bloody-shirt-negro-agitation
methods of previous campaigns. In 1894, Congress
repealed all the existing statutes providing for Federal supervision
of elections. Time, and a more hopeful outlook in the
South, and a better understanding of conditions by the North,
were bringing the sections of the country closer together. The
war with Spain at this time had a nationalizing influence; and
the problems of suffrage, confronting the Republican party in
the insular possessions, which were similar to those with
which the South had been struggling, forced them to see the
suffrage question from a new angle. Consequently, the Southern
States were left to deal with the suffrage of the ignorant
masses within their borders without interference.

This new era in national life was reflected in the political
affairs in Virginia. The state government and the bondholders
had, in the winter of 1891-1892, reached a settlement
which was satisfactory to both sides. Mahoneism had been
defeated. New interest was taken in national affairs, in education,
economic development, and social reforms. But the
old elements of danger remained in politics and were prevented
from showing themselves by the use of political methods
which were evil in themselves and tolerated only because
they prevented greater evils. The governor of the State
frankly admitted in his message of December 4, 1895, that
prior to 1894 "there had been much confusion and disorder at
the voting places; and that large sums of money had been used
in every election to corrupt voters by all political parties, and
men's ballots had been purchased like stocks in the market;"

and added, "that this condition of affairs should cease, in the
interest of our institutions, had long been apparent to every
honest and right-thinking citizen." This state of affairs
caused grave concern to the people of Virginia, who had begun
to realize that the whole body politic was threatened with the
infection.

It was in order to secure decent and honest elections and
to eliminate the most objectionable of the voters that there
was enacted in March, 1894, the Walton Act, which introduced
a modified form of the Australian ballot system, the main
features of which exist today. Official ballots were required.
Booths placed forty feet from outside observers were to be
provided to enable the voters to prepare their ballots secretly
and without interference. Upon entering the booth, the voter
must be given by one of the judges a ballot, which he was
forbidden to take outside of the polls. He was allowed two
and a half minutes in which to prepare his ballot, and could
secure the aid of one of the judges of election in marking it
if "physically or educationally" unable to do it himself.[12]

This system of elections was a great improvement over
the former one. In the words of the Governor, "The excitement,
confusion, and disorder, and the badgering, pulling, and
hauling of voters that prevailed to such a disgusting extent,"
under the old system were eliminated.[13] Bribing was made
much more difficult, since there was no way for the voter, who
had to be alone in the booth, to show his ballot after marking
it. Bogus ballots, which had played an important part in
former elections, could no longer be used. Many illiterate
voters were practically disfranchised by the Walton law in
spite of the fact that they could receive official assistance if
necessary. Negroes often hesitated in getting a Democratic

election judge to assist them in marking their ballots; others
were timid or ashamed to acknowledge their ignorance; and
many who attempted to vote could not correctly mark their
ballots in the allotted time. In some voting precincts, from a

Charles T. O'Ferrall

Governor, 1894-1898

third to a half of the ballots had to be thrown out because
they were incorrectly prepared. The governor of the State
actually proposed in 1898 that emblems be used on the ballots
to distinguish the candidates of the two parties in order to
enable illiterate voters to vote as they desired. Fortunately,
the General Assembly did not consider his proposition.

Upon losing their votes through legal and illegal methods,
and lacking aggressive leadership, the colored people grew
apathetic, and many did not go to the polls in the elections of
1896 and 1897. In 1896, the Democrats had their own way in
all the black counties; and the white counties of the Southwest
and the Valley, now relieved from the fear of negro
domination in the Eastern counties, became more independent
in politics and gave more support to the Republican party. In
1897, a Democratic governor, Charles T. O'Ferrall, was
elected.

In spite of the fact that the white people of Virginia had
practically taken the vote from the negroes by the middle of
the '90s, they were greatly dissatisfied with political conditions
as they existed. The system of fraud that had been built
up to defeat Mahoneism by disfranchising the negroes had a
demoralizing effect upon the whole electoral system, and was
finally used where whites alone were concerned. And the
political unity of the whites, made necessary by the solidarity
of the colored voters against them, prevented independent voting
and thereby virtually disfranchised the whites in national,
and sometimes even in state elections. These evils were
forcibly brought before the people by the presidential election
in 1896. There was in Virginia a strong gold-standard
faction in the Democratic party which had the enthusiastic
support of the Richmond Times, a paper that had been
founded to support the "Debt-payers" in their fight against
Readjusterism. In the Southwest and the Valley, where the
whites had a free hand, and where there was less reason for
prejudice against the Republican party, the Republicans either
won or ran up large minorities. In the Eastern counties,
however, which had been the Republican stronghold in the
State on account of the colored vote, Bryan won with large
majorities, thereby gaining the State by over 19,000 majority.[14]

The men who had opposed the regular Democratic organization
were warmly assailed by former political associates

for forsaking the party, and the "gold Democrats" felt that
they did not get a square deal at the polls. After this, there
was an increased demand for the elimination of fraud in elections
and the causes back of it, by the revision of the suffrage
article in the State Constitution. The Richmond Times led
the way in this demand. This desire for cleaner and more
independent politics resulted in the new Constitution of 1902.

The changes made by this constitution in the suffrage can
be rightly understood and appreciated only by a knowledge
of the race conditions and relations—within and without the
borders of the Commonwealth—that insured and hastened the
calling of the Constitutional Convention of 1901.

The history of race relations in the South shows that most
of the friction that has existed between the races since the
War of Secession can be traced directly to political agitation.
The leaders of the negroes endeavored to keep them united
by vilifying the whites and by stirring up race prejudices and
passions. Their propaganda was more easily spread on account
of the advent of the younger generation of negroes, who
were reared in the years of turmoil during and after Reconstruction,
and who lacked both the friendship of the whites,
and the training and discipline that were given their fathers
before the War of Secession. The percentage of older freedmen
on the prison records was comparatively low. The records
of the Virginia penitentiary for the years 1871 to 1888,
inclusive, reveal that an average of 67 whites and 247 negroes
were received into that institution yearly. The census figures
of 1880 show that the percentage of negroes received yearly
into the penitentiary was seven times as great as that of the
whites.[15] Even after making allowance for possible discrimination
against the negroes by the courts, the contrast is very
striking. However, such statistics do not show that the more
unfortunate race was proportionately inferior, because crime

is the ally of poverty and ignorance the world over. But such
statistics were naturally used in those days against the negro
as such.

The general lawlessness that followed the war, the lack of
any system of police in the rural districts, which contained
most of the population of the State, and the consequent inability
of the state and local governments to afford proper protection,
compelled the people to take the law into their own hands
to a great extent. Under these conditions, mob violence could
not be readily checked. In those days, lynchings for the crime
of rape, which is the most unspeakably hideous of all crimes
to a Southerner, especially when the offender is of another
race, was deemed the only quick and certain method of punishment
and a wholesome lesson to would-be offenders. It
was considered necessary for the protection of women scattered
on lonely plantations throughout the country districts.[16]

Records show that lynchings were the result of the nature
of the crime rather than of mere race prejudice, as was generally
believed outside of the State. But there was only a
short step between lynchings for rape and lynchings for murder—and
for even lesser crimes. From 1880 to 1888, inclusive,
there were eight white and eighteen colored people
lynched, or an average of one white to two colored victims a
year in Virginia. Of these twenty-six, nine were accused of
rape, or attempted rape, and twelve of murder. The lynchings
for murder were often caused by the brutal manner in
which the crime had been committed.

In the decade of the '90s, contemporary evidence of all
kinds shows that the number of rapings by negro men were
increasing at an alarming rate. This marked increase began
to be evident about the end of the year 1888. The increase
was without doubt due to a lack of the proper restraint in
the younger generation and to the excitement arising out of
the state and national elections of 1888 and 1889. There occurred
in 1888 the election to Congress of John M. Langston,

an illegitimate mulatto, who openly advocated the amalgamation
of the races and other things repugnant to the whites.
The character of the campaign which he conducted has been
described above. It did much to increase the strained relations
already existing between the two races. Then in 1889
came another election, in which negroes were led in masses
to the polls to aid Mahone, who met his last great defeat in
that campaign. There were the usual strained race relations
that followed such campaigns.

After 1888 the number of cases of rape was increasing at
an alarming rate throughout the South.[17]

Bishop Atticus G. Haygood, than whom, according to
James Bryce, the negro had no better friend, quotes Dr. E. E.
Hoss, editor of the Christian Advocate (the chief organ of
the Methodist Episcopal Church, South) as saying that
"300 white women had been raped by negroes within the
preceding three months." "I believe," added Bishop Haygood,
"Doctor Hoss's statement to be under rather than
above the facts in the case. Not a few such crimes are never
published." Bishop Haygood remembered only one such
crime that occurred before the War of Secession. He said
that Reconstruction has taught the negro his rights, not his
responsibilities; license rather than liberty. The younger
negroes were taught that it was their business to keep the
white Southern man down and to hate him, rather than to be
guided by him. A certain class of Northern newspapers
dilated on the horrors of lynching, and reported all violations
done negroes, while barely commenting on the nature of the
crime, or the horrors of rape and murder. Public records
show that the negro criminals were for the most part those
who grew up under the loose regime of Reconstruction.

Virginia offered no exception to the rule. The most brutal
as well as the most frequent criminals in these cases were
negroes. When whites were guilty of such brutality as was
shown by the blacks, they met with the same punishment.
From 1880 to 1897, inclusive, sixty-four lynchings occurred in
Virginia. Twenty-six were for rape, or attempted rape, and
twenty-seven were for murder. Fifty-one victims were colored,
and thirteen, white. The greatest number of lynchings
occurred during the five years that followed 1888 (1889 to
1893, inclusive). There were thirty-five during this brief
period. The victims in all but five cases were colored. The
crime charged against fifteen of these was rape or attempted
rape and that against fourteen was murder.[18]

Twelve negroes were lynched in one year—1893. On September
20 of that year, a climax was reached in mob violence
when a riot occurred in Roanoke, a peaceful and thriving town
outside of the black belt. A negro man assaulted an old lady
in a lonely house, robbed her, and beat her almost beyond
recognition. She revived and informed the authorities, who
found the criminal and lodged him in jail. Upon hearing of
the crime, a crowd gathered and demanded the negro. The
mayor of the town ordered it to disperse and finally called
out the militia. But the mob attacked the jail and the militia
in spite of the entreaties of the mayor and the warning from
the commanding officer of the militia, that they would be fired
upon if necessary. The militia was overcome and the negro
lynched. But this was accomplished only after eighteen people
had been killed and twenty-seven, wounded.[19]

This affair emphasized the dangers and the disgrace of
mob rule and aided in crystallizing public sentiment against
such occurrences. In his message to the legislature of December
6, 1893, Governor McKinney gave an account of the
riot and bitterly condemned the lynching. He said that the
government of the State was now firmly established and in
the hands of the people of Virginia, and that an excuse for
mob rule no longer existed. "The law in the State of Virginia,"
he said, "will be enforced * * * The military
when ordered out will carry loaded rifles, and will use them
when ordered to do so by the officers in command, and the
consequences must rest upon the heads of those who make it
necessary."

The State was fortunate in the election as governor, in the
fall of 1893, of Charles T. O'Ferrall, who also vigorously opposed
mob violence and who promised in his inaugural
address to enforce the law rigidly and to prevent lynchings
to the best of his ability. He was fearless in his effort to redeem
his promise. No lynchings occurred during the first
two years of his administration, 1894 and 1895. The militia

was employed, however, in several counties to prevent mob
violence.[20] In 1896, only one lynching took place in the State;
and in 1897 one white man and one negro were lynched. Governor
Tyler was able to make a similar report during the next
administration. During 1898 and 1899, there occurred two
or three lynchings, "which," according to the Governor,
"could not have been prevented, though the local officers did
all in their power." For the next two years of his administration,
he said, "The order of our state has been good, and
it is a gratifying fact that the prevalence of that menace to
civilization—mob law—has been notably less. With the exception
of one or two counties, the people of the State have
been law-abiding and peaceful."[21] During the next seventeen
years Virginia was free from lynchings, and the attempted
lynchings were much fewer.[22]

The provocations for lynchings had not ceased, however,
and continued to strengthen the demand for the removal of
the negroes from politics.[23]

According to Governor O'Ferrall's report in December,
1897, "The rapidity with which the number of criminal
assaults has grown in the Southern States, and in fact in the
country at large recently, should stimulate the legislature
of every state to take the most vigorous steps to stamp out
the horrible crime." Prof. R. H. Dabney of the University

of Virginia, wrote in 1901, "Race hatred has not yet been
violent except in wreaking vengeance for the crime of rape.
But the steadily growing frequency of this crime is fearfully
increasing the bitterness * * *"[24]

As an outcome of the friction between the races, an act
was passed by the Virginia legislature requiring railroad
companies to provide separate coaches for white and colored
passengers.[25] This, like most legislation of its kind, resulted
from a demand for it extending over a number of years[26] because
of numerous instances of strife between members of
the two races when thrown together on cars. These instances
became more numerous; and the proverbial straw which
brought matters to a climax came early in January, 1900. It
was a relatively small affair, and would not have attracted
state-wide attention had it not been one of several such happenings
that had occurred within a few weeks of each other.
A half drunken negro made himself very disagreeable to a
white woman by whom he was sitting in a car. When asked
to take another seat, he refused and was ejected by a white
man. There were other drunken negroes on the car with
guns, and a fight, which would have proven a serious affair,
was narrowly averted. This event was the occasion of much
discussion of race relations throughout the commonwealth,
which resulted in the enactment of the law, on May 12, 1900,
which prevented the recurrence of such troubles.

The political situation in Virginia was strongly influenced
by the political and race relations that existed in other
Southern states at this time, especially by those of the adjoining
state of North Carolina. It will not be a digression from
the subject under discussion to pause here to note briefly the
situation in that commonwealth during the '90s.

According to the census of 1890, there were 1,055,382

whites and 561,018 negroes in that state, the percentage of
negroes in the total being, therefore, 34.7.[27] In fifteen
counties the negroes were in the majority. But the whites,
who controlled the state government, had made laws which
kept in their hands the government in these counties during
the twenty-three years prior to 1894. In 1894, Republicans,
Populists and negroes fused and gained partial control of
the state and local offices. Two years later they got complete
control of these offices. A Republican governor was elected,
and the legislature came into the possession of the fusionists.
The legislature immediately decentralized the state government
in such a way as to make the negroes supreme in those
counties and towns in which they were in the majority. The
offices were filled with incapable whites and negroes. Two
years of riot and corruption, like those which prevailed in the
days of Reconstruction, followed. One thousand negroes became
office-holders in the State. There were 300 negro magistrates,
and 27 negro postmasters. The collector at the port
of Wilmington was colored. The offices in the Eastern
counties were almost all filled with negroes and their white
leaders. Thus the counties in a large part of the State were
ruled by the mass of ignorant and shiftless negroes and
worthless whites, who paid only a negligible part of the taxes,
and who were most inefficient and corrupt in administering
the affairs of government. Conditions became intolerable.
Neither the property nor the persons of the whites in the
black belt were safe. Crime increased and went unpunished.
The negroes who had been peaceful under the former government
had their heads completely turned by the sight of their
fellows in office, and by the speeches of their leaders. They
became unbearably insolent.

In Wilmington, where three-fifths of the population was
colored, white women were even slapped in the face or pushed
from the sidewalks without provocation by negro women.

James Hoge Tyler

Governor, 1898-1902

When the whites began to arm and to make plans to defend
themselves from insult and injury, there was talk among the
negroes of poisoning the whites and of burning their homes
at night. In November, the white men organized to insure
order on election day. On the day after election, they destroyed
the press of a negro newspaper that had published an
article, which, not only insulted white women, but also tended
to encourage the crime of rape, a brutal instance of which had
just been committed by a negro in an adjoining county. No
other property was destroyed by the whites and no physical
harm was done anyone. About a mile from the scene of this
occurrence, however, a negro mob fired at a group of white
men on the street, injuring one seriously. A fight ensued.
There were two or three other affrays during the day, and by
night thousands of negroes were hiding in the swamps. During
this riot, seven negroes were killed and thirteen wounded.
There was no wanton killing or vandalism. Three whites
were wounded. In the midst of the tumult, the incapable
town authorities resigned and the leaders of the whites were
put in charge of town affairs. The new officials immediately
issued an order that business would be resumed as usual on
the following day, and that all should appear at their tasks
without firearms. The order was obeyed. Peace was restored.
Parties were organized to go in search of the fugitive
negroes, and to assure them that they could safely return to
their homes; and vigilance committees saw to it that those
who had not fled were not molested in their work. The whites
had accomplished their purpose. They were in control of the
town and had given the negroes a warning that insolence and
lawlessness must cease. There were other riots in the State.

In 1896, the white Democrats effected a revolution in North
Carolina, and came once more into control of the legislature.
In 1900, Charles B. Aycock, in opening his successful campaign
for governor, said that the state constitution must be
amended to disfranchise the negro, and that order and development

demanded a change in the system of government.[28]

North Carolina passed her law for separate coaches for
the races in 1899, and made a new constitution, which disfranchised
most of the negroes in 1900.

The revolution across the state line in North Carolina was
watched with interest and sympathy by Virginians, who had
similar elements of danger to guard against.

Of the many methods used to win the votes or the neutrality
of the negroes during the '80s, and especially during the
'90s, bribery was the one most generally resorted to. The
usual sum for an individual vote was one or two dollars. The
most ordinary way of bribing was to pay negro preachers.
With not a few worthy exceptions, the negro preachers in
the South, especially in the rural districts, were chosen, not
on account of any very superior moral fitness, but because
of their fluency and aggressive personality. They were,
therefore, the natural leaders of their race. The church was,
at that time, a kind of political organization. Those of its
members who voted with the whites against the will of the
preachers were ostracized, and were sometimes turned out
of the church. These preachers appealed to the emotions
rather than to the head; and they kept the negro voters under
their control.[29]

An interesting example of the influence of these men in
politics is furnished by the election in Richmond in 1875.
There were to be elected two state senators from Richmond.

Gen. Bradley T. Johnson and William E. Tanner were the
Democratic nominees. The Republicans had no regular nominees;
but two independent candidates, Knight and Starke,
entered the field, with the expectation of being elected by aid
of the negro vote. Johnson, "at very considerable expense,"
had organized Johnson clubs among the negroes, and had a
large number of colored voters pledged to him. There were
eighty-five pledged to him in one precinct. Up to the Sunday
preceding the election (which took place the next day), Johnson
had no opposition among the negroes. On Sunday night,
however, when all the negroes attended church, their preachers
announced from their pulpits throughout the city that all
were expected to vote for Knight and Starke. Tanner and
Johnson were elected but did not receive a single negro vote.

Besides the preachers, other persons of influence among
the colored people were paid $15, $20 and sometimes $50 or
more, for their aid in a certain district, or for a certain number
of votes. As a traveler in the South expressed it, "The
negro vote, like the cotton crop is always on the market, to be
sold to the highest bidder * * * The negro is for sale
today as much as ever."[30]

Other methods were used to defeat the colored vote. Ballot
boxes were stuffed with tissue ballots and otherwise tampered
with. In some counties, the negroes' love of running
for office proved their undoing. Several colored candidates
for office would enter the field. The whites would studiously
avoid the appearance of uniting on one candidate, and at the
same time agree among themselves to vote in a body for only
one man. In some instances, the whites went so far as to put
forward colored candidates to divide the negro vote. Intimidation
was seldom resorted to. In Charlotte County a colored
candidate for the legislature, while making a political speech,
was shot by a white man. The victim, a mulatto shoemaker
named Joseph R. Holmes, had represented Charlotte and
Halifax counties in the Underwood Convention. There were

no more negro candidates for office in Charlotte County. However,
this was a very extreme example of intimidation.

The Walton law of 1894 prevented much confusion at the
polls, but it was not sufficiently effective in weeding out objectionable
votes and in preventing fraud.[31] It was generally
admitted in 1900 by men of all parties in the State that the
negroes were being defrauded at the polls, and that those
who had charge of the party machinery in local elections
often treated the whites who differed with them, in the same
fashion. Men of the younger generation were losing their
respect for the sanctity of the ballot and for politics in general.
A delegate from the Southwest made the following
statement on the floor of the Constitutional Convention of
1901 without having its truthfulness challenged: "I do not
deny, and I am ready to show, if it were necessary, that they
[elections] have not been fair in the black belt; but it is of
no use to show that, because it is admitted all over this floor
by every member on it."[32] The need for an amended constitution
to remedy this state of affairs was very urgent.