Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 13.djvu/682

MISSISSIPPI. settlement by the whites. In 1832 a new Constitution was adopted for the State. Its most notable features were the abolition of property qualifications for office-holding, the requirement that all officers, both State and county, including the judges, should be chosen by the people. It also created a High Court of Errors and Appeals and abolished the office of Lieutenant-Governor. During the ‘flush times’ of this period Mississippi, like many other Southern and Western States, fell a victim to financial extravagance and speculation, one of the results of which was the repudiation by the State of five million dollars in bonds which it had issued for the purpose of acquiring stock in the Union Bank. The Supreme Court of the State decided in favor of the liability of the State for the payment of the bonds, but the people, in an election in which this was the main issue, decided otherwise, and the Legislature refused to make any appropriation for the purpose. A little later two million dollars of the Planters' Bank bonds were repudiated under similar circumstances. Upon the outbreak of the Mexican War Mississippi was called upon to furnish one regiment of volunteers, but more than enough men for two regiments responded. The first regiment was commanded by Col. Jefferson Davis, who won great distinction at the battle of Buena Vista. In 1851 occurred the first important struggle in Mississippi over the slavery question, which had become serious on account of the enactment by Congress of the so-called Compromise Measures of 1850. The Democratic Party in Mississippi adopted a platform favoring secession and nominated Jefferson Davis for Governor, while the Whigs declared their attachment to the Union and nominated United States Senator Foote as their standard-bearer. The Union Party won a substantial victory and the slavery question rested until 1856, when the question of secession was again agitated on account of the fear that Frémont would be elected President. The news of Jonn Brown's raid in 1859 led the legislature to appropriate $150,000 for the purchase of military supplies and for the organization of the militia. It was left, however, for the election of Lincoln to bring the secession movement to a head. An ordinance of secession was passed on January 9, 1861, by a convention, by a vote of 84 to 15, and the State Constitution was amended to bring it into conformity with the Constitution of the Confederate States. During the Civil War the people of Mississippi suffered greatly, and in 1863 and 1864 especially, a large part of the State was devastated by the contending armies. Almost all semblance of government had disappeared. (For the military operations in Mississippi, see ; ; Clarke was removed and a provisional Governor was appointed by President Johnson. On July 21st, slavery was abolished by a State convention, and on the following day the ordinance of secession was repealed. In December the State Government was given over into the hands of the duly elected officers, who proceeded to reorganize the State militia for the public defense, a course in which they were upheld by the President. Limited civil rights were conferred on the freedman, but the Fourteenth Amendment was rejected in January, 1867, and in March the State came under military government.
 * .) In June, 1865, Governor

In January, 1868, a convention framed a new Constitution, conferring the suffrage on negroes. The conservative element vehemently opposed the Constitution because of the severe penalties it imposed on members of the Government and armies of the Confederacy, and brought about its rejection at a popular election. Resubmitted in November, 1869, with the test oath and disfranchisement clauses to be voted on separately, the Constitution was adopted almost unanimously, while the independent clauses were as unanimously rejected. In January, 1870, the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments were ratified, and on February 17, 1870, the State was readmitted into the Union. The period before 1875 was marked by a spirit of bitter hatred between the old Democrats and the newly enfranchised negroes, together with their leaders, the white Republicans. The feeling of animosity was intensified by the unhappy financial condition of the State, and by the dishonesty and incapacity of its officers, very many of whom were ignorant negroes, the tools of scheming politicians. Bloody collisions between whites and negroes were frequent in 1874 and 1875, in one of which, at Vicksburg, 29 negroes and several whites were killed. The desperate attempts of the ‘conservatives’ to restore the supremacy of the white population proved finally successful in 1875, when the Democratic Party captured the Legislature. The Republican Governor and Lieutenant-Governor and the Superintendent of Education were driven from office by impeachment or threats of impeachment, and since then the Democratic Party has retained an overwhelming predominance. The twenty years after 1865 were a period of economic depression, the result of the havoc wrought by the war and of the difficulties encountered in readjusting production to the new conditions of labor, but later the rise of manufactures marked the beginning of a bright era. The racial problem assumed a momentous aspect in 1844, when a vast migration of colored men into the swamp lands of Mississippi seemed to threaten the rise of a negro State within the State of Mississippi. The policy of fortifying the white race in power was continued. By the Constitution of 1890 the suffrage was restricted to those able to read a section of the Constitution, or to interpret any passage, if read aloud, a provision aimed against the negro voter, and sufficiently successful in attaining its aim. In national elections Mississippi has been a Democratic State with the exception of the year 1840, when it voted for the Whig candidate, and of 1872, when its vote was given to Grant. In 1864 and 1868 its vote was not counted. The Governors of Mississippi have been the following: