The First Blacks In Congress Were All Republicans

Facts the media don't want you to know.

The First Blacks In Congress Were All Republicans

Hiram Rhodes Revels of Mississippi was the first black elected as a United States senator, serving from 1870-1871 as a Republican. Revels completed the unfinished term of Jefferson

Davis who was the former president of the confederacy. He was followed in the Senate by Republican Blanche K. Bruce, also of Mississippi.

Republican Joseph Rainey of South Carolina was the first black to enter the House of Representatives.

Below is a list of the black Republicans elected to Congress during the Reconstruction era. Their lifespan is shown in parenthesis.

United States Senate

Hiram Rhodes Revels (1822-1901); Republican – Mississippi; 1870-1871

Blanche Bruce (1841-1898); Republican – Mississippi; 1875-1881

House of Representatives

John Willis Menard (1838-1893); Republican - Louisiana; 1868

Joseph Rainey (1832-1887); Republican - South Carolina; 1870-1879

Jefferson F. Long (1836-1901); Republican – Georgia; 1870-1871

Robert C. De Large (1842-1874); Republican - South Carolina; 1871-1873

Robert B. Elliott (1842-1884); Republican - South Carolina; 1871-1874

Benjamin S. Turner (1825-1894); Republican – Alabama; 1871-1873

Josiah T. Walls (1842-1905); Republican – Florida; 1871-1873, 1873-1875, 1875-1876

Richard H. Cain (1825-1887); Republican - South Carolina; 1873-1875, 1877-1879

John R. Lynch (1847-1939); Republican – Mississippi; 1873-1877, 1882-1883

James T. Rapier (1837-1883); Republican – Alabama; 1873-1875

Alonzo J. Ransier (1834-1882); Republican - South Carolina; 1873-1875

Jeremiah Haralson (1846-1916); Republican - Alabama; 1875-1877

John Adams Hyman (1840-1891); Republican - North Carolina; 1875-1877

Charles E. Nash (1844-1913); Republican – Louisiana; 1875-1877

Robert Smalls (1839-1915); Republican - South Carolina; 1875-1879, 1882-1883, 1884-1887

James E. O'Hara (1844-1905); Republican - North Carolina; 1883-1887

Henry P. Cheatham (1857-1935); Republican - North Carolina; 1889-1893

John Mercer Langston (1829-1897); Republican – Virginia; 1890-1891

Thomas E. Miller(1849-193); Republican - South Carolina; 1890-1891

George W. Murray (1853-1926); Republican - South Carolina; 1893-1895, 1896-1897

George Henry White (1852-1918); Republican - North Carolina; 1897-1901

In "A Covenant With Life: Reclaiming MLK’s Legacy", Dr. Alveda C. King, niece of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., states:

"My grandfather, Dr. Martin Luther King, Sr., or ‘Daddy King’, was a Republican and father of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. who was a Republican."

The Republican Party - From its founding in 1854 as the anti-slavery party until today, the Republican Party has championed freedom and civil rights for blacks.

• The Democratic Party – As author Michael Scheuer stated, the Democratic Party is the party of the four S’s: slavery, secession, segregation and now socialism.

Democrats formed the Confederacy, seceded from the Union and fought a Civil War (1861 to 1865) – a war where over 600,000 citizens were killed, including many thousands of blacks – in order to keep blacks in slavery because the Democrats had built their economic base on the backs of black slaves.

Democrats enacted Fugitive Slave laws to keep blacks from escaping from plantations and instigated the 1856 Dred Scott decision which legally classified blacks as property. Democrats pushed to pass the Missouri Compromise to spread slavery into 50% of the new states. Democrats also pushed to achieve passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act that was designed to spread slavery into all of the new states.

Northern anti-Civil War Democrats, called "copperheads", did not want to be drafted to fight in the Civil War. Starting in 1861, they attacked blacks in virtually every Northern city and pushed for a negotiated peace that would have resulted in an independent Confederacy where blacks were kept in slavery. In New York, anti-Civil War Democrats engaged in "Four Days of Terror" against the city’s black population from July 13-16, 1863.

The anti-Civil War chant of the Democrats, as reported by one Pennsylvania newspaper, was: "Willing to fight for Uncle Sam", but not "for Uncle Sambo." These anti-Civil War Democrats verbally attacked Republican President Abraham Lincoln because he fought to free blacks from slavery and make his Emancipation Proclamation a reality – a Proclamation that became the source of the Juneteenth celebrations that occur in black communities today.

The Party of Lincoln

The Republican Party was started in 1854 as the anti-slavery party by abolitionists opposed to keeping blacks in human bondage, and Republicans, under the leadership of President Abraham Lincoln, fought to free blacks from slavery.

After the Civil War, Republicans amended the US Constitution to grant blacks freedom (13th Amendment), citizenship (14th Amendment) and the right to vote (15th Amendment). Republicans passed the civil rights laws of the 1860's, including the Civil Rights Act of 1866 and the Reconstruction Act of 1867 that was designed to establish a new government system in the Democrat-controlled South, one that was fair to blacks.

Reconstruction – Democrats fought to end Reconstruction started by Republicans.

Democrats started the Ku Klux Klan in 1866 to lynch and terrorize Republicans -black and white and drive Republicans out of the South.

In the book "A Short History of Reconstruction", renowned historian, Dr. Eric Foner, revealed that the Ku Klux Klan was founded in 1866 by Democrats as a Tennessee social club. The Ku Klux Klan became a military force serving the interests of the Democratic Party, the planter class, and all those who desired the restoration of white supremacy. The Klan spread into other Southern states, launching a ‘reign of terror‘ against Republican leaders, black and white.

The Hayes-Tilden Compromise of 1877 was an attempt by Republicans to end the presidential election stalemate, as well as get the Democrats to stop the lynchings and respect the rights of blacks. Contrary to popular belief, President Rutherford Hayes did not remove the last federal troops from the South, but merely ordered federal troops surrounding the South Carolina and Louisiana statehouses to return to their barracks.

Segregation - Democrats enacted the discriminatory Black Codes and Jim Crow laws

Democrats fought to prevent the passage of every piece of civil rights legislation from the 1860’s to the 1960's.

Democrats wanted to keep blacks in virtual slavery and deny blacks the promised "40 acres and a mule".

After they took control of Congress in 1892, Democrats passed the Repeal Act of 1894 that overturned civil rights legislation passed by the Republicans, including the Civil Rights Acts of 1866 and 1875. It took Republicans nearly six decades to finally achieve passage of civil rights legislation in the 1950’s and 1960’s.

It defies logic for Democrats today to claim that the racist Democrats suddenly joined the Republican Party after Republicans finally won the civil rights battle against the racist Democrats. In fact, the racist Democrats declared that they would rather vote for a "yellow dog" than vote for a Republican, because the Republican Party was known as the party for blacks.

The Republicans started the NAACP in 1909 on Abraham Lincoln’s 100th birthday to counter the racist practices of the Democrats. The first black American to head the NAACP was Republican James Weldon Johnson who wrote the lyrics to "Lift Every Voice and Sing", the inspirational song that is considered to be the Black National Anthem.

Few blacks know that Republicans also started the Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

The Modern Civil Rights Era – Democrats fought against civil rights in the 1950’s and 1960’s

Democrat Public Safety Commissioner Eugene "Bull" Connor in Birmingham let loose vicious dogs and turned skin-burning fire hoses on black civil rights demonstrators.

Democrat Georgia Governor Lester Maddox famously brandished ax handles to prevent blacks from patronizing his restaurant. In 1954, Democrat Arkansas Governor Orville Faubus tried to prevent desegregation of a Little Rock public school.

Democrat Alabama Governor George Wallace stood in front of the Alabama schoolhouse in 1963 and thundered, "Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever."

Democrat Senator Robert Byrd was a former "Exalted Cyclops" and "Keagle" (Recruiter) in the Ku Klux Klan

Byrd remained a Democrat until he died in 2010. He was a prominent leader in the Democrat-controlled Congress where he was honored by his fellow Democrats as the "conscience of the Senate." Byrd was a fierce opponent of desegregating the military and complained in one letter: "I would rather die a thousand times and see old glory trampled in the dirt never to rise again than see this beloved land of ours become degraded by race mongrels, a throwback to the blackest specimen of the wilds."

Republican President Dwight Eisenhower pushed to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1957 and sent troops to Arkansas to desegregate schools. Eisenhower also appointed Chief Justice Earl Warren to the U.S. Supreme Court which resulted in the famous 1954 "Brown v. Topeka Board of Education" decision that ended school segregation and the "separate but equal" doctrine created by the 1896 "Plessy v. Ferguson" decision.

Much is made of Democrat President Harry Truman's issuing an Executive Order in 1948 to desegregate the military. Not mentioned is the fact that it was Eisenhower who actually took action to effectively end segregation in the military. In 1958, Eisenhower established a permanent Civil Rights Commission that had been rejected by prior Democrat presidents, including President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Having aligned themselves with the Republican Party since the days of Abraham Lincoln, what made African Americans switch to the Democrats during the Depression Era? Despite the fact that the Democratic Party had traditionally denied them basic civil rights. Using primary sources and a variety of voices from the period, students can discover how the Depression affected African- American workers, and why black voters switched their allegiance during the period. Roosevelt’s problem was that in order to retain his position of leadership, he had to keep the Southern Democrats – who time and again denied African Americans the vote in their states – within the party.
Although Roosevelt made no move to reverse the legal segregation at the time, he did invite several African-American leaders to serve as advisors to the administration. He also ensured that African Americans had access to relief during the worst days of the Depression. Half way through the 1930s decade, an estimated 40 percent of African Americans were in receipt of some federal aid. And by the latter part of the 1930s, 75 percent of blacks voted Democratic

Little known by many today is the fact that it was Republican Senator Everett Dirksen from Illinois, not Democrat President Lyndon Johnson, who pushed through the 1964 Civil Rights Act. In fact, Dirksen was instrumental to the passage of civil rights legislation in 1957, 1960, 1964, 1965 and 1968. Dirksen wrote the language for the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Dirksen also crafted the language for the Civil Rights Act of 1968 which prohibited discrimination in housing.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. hailed Senator Dirksen’s "able and courageous leadership" and "The Chicago Defender," the largest black-owned daily at that time, praised Senator Dirksen "for the grand manner of his generalship behind the passage of the best civil rights measures that have ever been enacted into law since Reconstruction."

Democrats today ignore the pivotal role played by Senator Dirksen in obtaining passage of the landmark 1964 Civil Rights Act, while heralding President Johnson as a civil rights advocate for signing the bill. The chief opponents of the 1964 Civil Rights Act were Democrat Senators Sam Ervin, Albert Gore, Sr. and Robert Byrd who filibustered against the bill for 14 straight hours before the final vote. President Lyndon Johnson could not have achieved passage of the civil rights legislation without the support of Republicans.

President Lyndon Johnson was not a civil rights advocate

In his 4,500-word State of the Union Address delivered on January 4, 1965, Johnson mentioned scores of topics for federal action, but only thirty five words were devoted to civil rights. He did not mention one word about voting rights. Information about Johnson’s anemic civil rights policy positions can be found in the "Public Papers of the President, Lyndon B. Johnson," 1965, vol. 1, p.1-9.

Johnson did not predict a racist exodus to the Republican Party - In their campaign to unfairly paint the Republican Party today as racists, Democrats point to Johnson’s prediction that there would be an exodus from the Democratic Party because of Johnson’s support of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Omitted from the Democrats’ rewritten history is what Johnson actually meant by his prediction. Johnson’s statement was not made out of a concern that racist Democrats would suddenly join the Republican Party that was fighting for the civil rights of blacks. Johnson feared that the racist Democrats would again form a third party, such as the short-lived States Rights Democratic Party. In fact, Alabama’s Democrat Governor George C. Wallace in 1968 started the American Independent Party that attracted other racist candidates, including Democrat Governor Lester Maddox.

Behind closed doors, Johnson said: "These Negroes, they’re getting uppity these days. That’s a problem for us, since they got something now they never had before. The political pull to back up their upityness. Now, we’ve got to do something about this. We’ve got to give them a little something. Just enough to quiet them down, but not enough to make a difference. If we don’t move at all, their allies will line up against us. And there’ll be no way to stop them. It’ll be Reconstruction all over again."

Democrat President John F. Kennedy is lauded as a proponent of civil rights. However, Kennedy voted against the 1957 Civil rights Act while he was a senator, as did Democrat Senator Al Gore, Sr. And after he became president, Kennedy was opposed to the 1963 March on Washington by Dr. King that was organized by A. Phillip Randolph who was a black Republican. President Kennedy, through his brother Attorney General Robert Kennedy, had Dr. King wiretapped and investigated by the FBI on suspicion of being a Communist in order to undermine Dr. King.

Contrary to popular belief, Kennedy never made the call to get Dr. King out of jail. The call was made by Harris Wofford, Kennedy's Civil Rights Advisor, who was a personal friend of the Kings. Wofford said Kennedy was angry about the call because Kennedy thought it would make him lose the Southern vote. However, the call eventually worked in Kennedy's favor.

Nixon started affirmative action implementation

The enforcement of affirmative action began with Richard Nixon‘s 1969 Philadelphia Plan (crafted by black Republican Art Fletcher who became known as "the father of affirmative action") that was merit-based and set the nation‘s first goals and timetables. Nixon was also responsible for the passage of civil rights legislation in the 1970’s.

Notably, Fletcher, as president of the United Negro College Fund, coined the phrase "the mind is a terrible thing to waste." Fletcher was also one of the original nine plaintiffs in the famous "Brown v. Topeka Board of Education". Fletcher briefly pursued a bid for the Republican presidential nomination in 1995.

Although affirmative action now has been turned by the Democrats into an unfair quota system that even most blacks do not support, affirmative action was pushed by Nixon to counter the harm caused to blacks when Democrat President Woodrow Wilson kicked almost all blacks out of federal government jobs after he was elected in 1912. Also, while Wilson was president and Congress was controlled by the Democrats, more discriminatory bills were introduced in Congress than ever before in our nation’s history.

Democrats talk tolerance, but practice intolerance

Democrats claim that they care about diversity, but readily demean black professionals who do not toe the Democratic Party’s liberal line, slandering blacks as "Uncle Toms", "Sellouts" and "House N-word", including Dr. Condoleezza Rice, General Colin Powel, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, and former Maryland and former RNC Chairman Michael Steele. With impunity, a Democrat Senator, the late Ted Kennedy, called black judicial nominees "Neanderthals". Democrat Senator Harry Reid slurred Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas as an incompetent Negro who could not write good English. "Slap at Thomas stinks of racism," was the headline of the New York Daily News’ December 7, 2004 editorial.

Democratic Party operatives depicted Michael Steele on the Internet as a "Simple Sambo" with big, thick red lips and nappy hair, reminiscent of the way Democrats depicted blacks during the days of slavry. Cartoonist Jeff Danziger and Pat Oliphant portrayed Dr. Condoleezza Rice as a "stooge" and a bare foot "Ignorant Mammy", just the way Democrats demeaned blacks during the days of slavery.

Democrat President Bill Clinton – following in the footsteps of his mentor J. William Fulbright, a staunch segregationist – refused to enforce a court-ordered affirmative action plan while president and was himself sued for discriminating against his black employees while he was the Governor of Arkansas. Clinton also had his Attorney General, Janet Reno, file a class action, reverse discrimination lawsuit on behalf of a group of white janitors at Illinois State University to stop the University from hiring blacks. None of Clinton’s inner-circle of advisors were black, and he failed to take action to stop the massacre of over 800,000 Rwandans in 1994. Without congressional or UN approval, Clinton sent 20,000 troops to help the white Europeans in Bosnia, but refused to send troops to help the 800,000 blacks in Africa.

President Barack Obama Practice Racial Politics

President Barack Obama, while he was an Illinois senator, provided funding for slum projects in Chicago that kept blacks trapped in rat and roach infested housing, as reported in a Boston Globe article.

As a US senator, Obama voted against the minimum wage bill and wrote a letter of support for former Klansman Senator Robert Byrd that helped that racist win re-election. After he became president, Obama cut funding for historical black colleges and universities (HBCU’s). He ended school choice scholarships in the District of Columbia and sent poor black children back into the failing DC public school system. Obama’s out-of-control spending killed private-sector jobs and created nearly twenty percent black unemployment. In his book "Dreams from My Father", Obama described what he and other Democrats do to poor blacks as "plantation politics".

The Democratic Party today is anti-black

Democrats have been running black communities for the past 50 years, and the socialist policies of the Democrats have turned black communities into economic and social wastelands. Democrats have the audacity to blame Republicans for the crisis in black neighborhoods created by the Democrats.

Democratic Party operatives trashed black Democrat Juan Williams, calling him a "Happy Negro" for daring to expose the failed socialist policies of the Democrats in his book "Enough: The Phony Leaders, Dead-End Movements, and Culture of Failure That Are Undermining Black America".

Without remorse, Democrats deliberately keep blacks in poverty because Democrats have built their political power base on the backs of poor blacks, just as Democrats built their economic power base on the backs of poor blacks during the days of slavery. The centuries-old election year strategy of the Democrats is to keep blacks poor, angry and voting for Democrats. Every election cycle, Democrats preach hatred against Republicans and incite blacks to cast a protest vote against Republicans, not for Democrats.

Reagan Helped Blacks

Contrary to popular belief, blacks prospered under President Ronald Reagan who also made Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday a holiday. Notably, in an article entitled "Ronald Reagan — More of a Friend to Blacks Than Obama?" the son of Ronald Reagan, Michael Reagan, describes in detail all the good that President Reagan did to help blacks prosper during his administration. Reagan filed more civil rights suits in housing, education and voter discrimination cases than his predecessor, Democrat President Jimmy Carter. He also signed the bill that extended the 1965 Voting Rights Act for 25 years.