Blacks, Carpetbaggers, and Scalawags

The Constitutional Conventions of Radical Reconstruction

Richard L. Hume, Jerry B. Gough

• Publisher: LSU Press
• Year: 2008
• eBook ISBN: 9780807148334
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: American Civil War History
• Index: History

After the Civil War, Congress required ten former Confederate states to rewrite their constitutions before they could be readmitted to the Union. An electorate composed of newly enfranchised former slaves, native southern whites (minus significant numbers of disenfranchised former Confederate officials), and a small contingent of "carpetbaggers, " or outside whites, sent delegates to ten constitutional conventions. Derogatorily labeled "black and tan" by their detractors, these assemblies wrote constitutions and submitted them to Congress and to the voters in their respective states for approval. Blacks, Carpetbaggers, and Scalawags offers a quantitative study of these decisive but little-understood assemblies -- the first elected bodies in the United States to include a significant number of blacks. Richard L. Hume and Jerry B. Gough scoured manuscript census returns to determine the age, occupation, property holdings, literacy, and slaveholdings of 839 of the conventions' 1, 018 delegates. Carefully analyzing convention voting records on certain issues -- including race, suffrage, and government structure -- they correlate delegates' voting patterns with their racial and socioeconomic status. The authors then assign a "Republican support score" to each delegate who voted often enough to count, establishing the degree to which each delegate adhered to the Republican leaders' program at his convention. Using these scores, they divide the delegates into three groups -- radicals, swing voters, and conservatives -- and incorporate their quantitative findings into the narrative histories of each convention, providing, for the first time, a detailed analysis of these long-overlooked assemblies. Hume and Gough's comprehensive study offers an objective look at the accomplishments and shortcomings of the conventions and humanizes the delegates who have until now been understood largely as stereotypes. Blacks, Carpetbaggers, and Scalawags provides an essential reference guide for anyone seeking a better understanding of the Reconstruction era.

Table of contents

• COVER
• TITLE PAGE
• COPYRIGHT PAGE
• DEDICATION
• CONTENTS
• ILLUSTRATIONS
• ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
• 1: A TREMENDOUS AND SEARCHING SOCIAL REVOLUTION
• 2: DELEGATES AND LEADERS
• DATA TABLES ON DELEGATES AND LEADERS
• 3: VIRGINIA AND ARKANSAS
• DATA TABLES FOR THE VIRGINIA AND ARKANSAS CONVENTIONS
• SELECTED ROLL-CALL VOTES OF THE VIRGINIA AND ARKANSAS CONVENTIONS
• 4: ALABAMA AND MISSISSIPPI
• DATA TABLES FOR THE ALABAMA AND MISSISSIPPI CONVENTIONS
• SELECTED ROLL- CALL VOTES OF THE ALABAMA AND MISSISSIPPI CONVENTIONS
• 5: GEORGIA AND NORTH CAROLINA
• DATA TABLES FOR THE GEORGIA AND NORTH CAROLINA CONVENTIONS
• SELECTED ROLL-CALL VOTES OF THE GEORGIA AND NORTH CAROLINA CONVENTIONS
• 6: LOUISIANA AND SOUTH CAROLINA
• DATA TABLES FOR THE LOUISIANA AND SOUTH CAROLINA CONVENTIONS
• SELECTED ROLL-CALL VOTES OF THE LOUISIANA AND SOUTH CAROLINA CONVENTIONS
• 7: FLORIDA AND TEXAS
• DATA TABLES FOR THE FLORIDA AND TEXAS CONVENTIONS
• SELECTED ROLL-CALL VOTES OF THE FLORIDA AND TEXAS CONVENTIONS
• 8: SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
• DATA TABLES FOR SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
• APPENDIX A: METHODOLOGICAL PROCEDURES
• APPENIDX B: DELEGATE REPUBLICAN SUPPORT SCORES BY STATE
• APPENDIX C: DELEGATE BIOGRAPHICAL DATA
• NOTES
• BIBLIOGRAPHY
• INDEX