Reconstruction in Mississippi

The former crown jewel of the Cotton Kingdom in the Deep South, Mississippi laid in ruins at the end of the War Between the States. One of the premier states of the secession crisis, Mississippi suffered greatly at the behest of the Union Army. The invading force left the Magnolia State as barely even a shadow of its former glory, a legacy which continues to effect the state within contemporary matters. This essay seeks to examine the economic, political, and political history and ramifications of the Reconstruction Era in Mississippi.

Mississippi stood as the apogee of of the prosperity of Antebellum Agrarian Society, Natchez being the epicenter. The state’s population held the highest concentration of the wealthiest members of American society, most of them being agrarian slave lords. The second state to secede from the Union, Mississippi invested heavily in the victory of the Confederate States of America. Unfortunately, all the financial investment the state made in the Confederacy was nullified by the Union’s victory, adding further disparity to an already devastated economy. Most property had been seized and what little remained was further abused by treasury agents. Generally, there remained few means of economic recovery for most Mississippians during the entirety of Reconstruction, save for a few plantation masters who took advantage of the vagrancy laws as well as the sharecropping and tenant farming which developed. All hope of financial recovery within the state vanished during the Panic of 1873. The economy and desire for rebuilding, as well as, a bitterness over having lost the War flowed directly into the politics and the societal reconstruction of the state.

The political leadership during the Presidential Reconstruction of 1865-1867 produced a largely moderate but unrepentant legislative body, being entirely constituted of old-line Whigs and some Democrats. The constitution they drafted during this time acknowledged the end of slavery but refused to ratify both the 13th and 14th amendments and only repealed the ordinance of secession as opposed to nullifying it. In addition to the already controversial state constitution, the body enacted into it the first of the infamous Black Codes which other Southern states soon adopted, infuriating the rabid radicals of the North.

All of these resulted in the passage of the Reconstruction Acts, also called the Military Reconstruction Acts, in 1867. These objectively unconstitutional and abhorrent pieces of legislation instituted harsh military rule in Dixie and divided it into separate military districts. The radicals appointed their own governors and effectively disfranchised what was left of the disillusioned white voters. Many Negro politicians rose into prominence, most astoundingly in Mississippi. 226 Negroes in Mississippi held public office, far more than the other states, and also produced the only two black senators of the time, Hiram Revels and Blanche Bruce. Mississippians, fed up with the absurdity of Radical Reconstruction, carried out mass riots and violent attacks as well as voter fraud known as the Mississippi Plan leading up to the statewide election of 1875, resulting in the Redemption of the state by Democrats being placed in every public office and the Governorship being assumed by John Marshall Stone, once carpetbagging Republican Adelbert Ames had been ousted.

Mississippi, much like Texas, also experienced the waxing and waning of Radical governorships. Benjamin Humphreys, a moderate Democrat, governed from 1865 to 1868; Adelbert Ames, a Radical Republican carpetbagger, served once from 1868 to 1870 and again from 1874 to 1876; James Alcorn, unique among his peers being that he belonged to the Whigs before the War then later shifting to the Republicans after the War, while also having served in the Confederate Army, and maintained a rivalry against Ames as a moderate, governed from 1870 to 1871 and resigning afterward to accept a Senate seat. Ridgley Powers, a carpetbagger Republican, governed from 1871 to 1874 upon replacing Alcorn; and John Stone, the Redeemer Democrat, who served once from 1876 to 1882 then again from 1890 to 1896. Interestingly, Alcorn lacked the effrontery character to subdue his home state further during its occupation, despite Radical rule in Congress, providing the Magnolia state much needed relief during such a abhorrent period.

Mississippians, as with many Southerners, never truly recanted their fight against the Union. Having suffered greatly during the War Between the States, Mississippians developed a far more resentful opinion of Northerners during the events of the War and Reconstruction, only being rivaled by Louisiana and South Carolina. Facing war crimes arguably worse than that seen in Georgia and South Carolina, the state watched as countless towns and cities in its western half were razed, pillaged, and mercilessly subdued by the federal army. The Army burned down Jackson twice, earning it the nickname of “Chimneyville” due to those being the only structures left and leaving little to no antebellum architecture behind, as well as razed Meridian to the ground. Additionally, cases unfolded in which preachers faced penalty under law should they express support for the Confederate cause or fail to pray favorably for President Lincoln and the federal government during sermons.

Following the War, Mississippians were subjected to Negro military rule but only for a short time and were outnumbered by Negroes demographically. Additionally, the state faced enervating poverty with few methods available to regain even a modicum of its former wealth. Additionally, quick re-admittance to the Union under Presidential Reconstruction just to be cast out again and subjected to harsher Republican rule angered many and drove them to the clutches of violent groups such as the Knights of the White Camellia and the Ku Klux Klan. Though much of the violence of the times all but disappeared around 1871, it found a resurgence among the population at the outset of the Panic of 1873, a depression so severe it annihilated all hope many Unreconstructed Southerners had for regaining any economic prosperity.

Having faced enough hardship, the state experienced a resurgence of violence far more extreme and widespread than it had between 1867 and 1871. The Red Shirts were founded in the state, and riots as well as constant murders took place on both sides of the aisle, ultimately culminating in the Mississippi Plan. Widespread mass violence and political intimidation took place during the election of 1875, the most notorious example being Vicksburg, and every Republican was ousted from public office. The Radical governor, Ames, called for federal assistance but received none. The Mississippi Plan proved so successful it saw replication in Louisiana, South Carolina, and Florida in 1876, being the last states to elect Redeemers. The Red Shirts carried the legacy of forming chapters in South Carolina’s Gubernatorial Election of 1876 and then again formed groups in North Carolina during the 1890s. The Red Shirts in Mississippi adopted the infamous red uniform as a means of mocking how Congress continuously “waved the bloody shirt” in order to justify its malignant legislation. Mississippi, under governor John Marshall Stone, enacted numerous Jim Crow and segregation laws which would later be solidified in the ratification of its state constitution in 1896 during Stone’s non-consecutive second term.

Objectively speaking, paltry words lack the encompassing descriptiveness to convey the true essence of the violence which unfolded in the state following the passage of the Reconstruction Acts and the conditions Mississippians faced during and after the War to warrant such extreme and protean violence. The “Original Seven” of the Lower South faced significant hardship at the polls and simply failed to produce enough votes, without the use of force, to turn the tide of Reconstruction. From 1868 to 1871, various paramilitary groups such as the Knights of the White Camellia and the Ku Klux Klan dominated violent resistance in the state, whereas various rifle clubs and the original Red Shirts dominated Southern Democratic political resistance from 1873 to 1875 to much greater success. The violent tendencies only truly grew following the passage of the Reconstruction Acts only to subside by 1871, not seeing a return until the Panic of 1873 and escalating in zealousness until the state’s Redemption in 1875.

Mississippi faced a notably turbulent Reconstruction. Far too eventful to include in one mere essay, the state never truly experienced peace during those years. The economic, political, and social history of the era set in perspective the tumultuous nature Reconstruction carries the reputation for. Mississippi set a trend which followed in the other states that had not yet shed their Radical dictators at the time, a testament to the violence and chaos in the Deep States. Unfortunately, the tribulations of the Deep South no longer permeate the rhetoric of contemporary historiography, leaving Deep Southerners without a justified understanding of their dark history.