African American Studies Commons^™

"The Africans Have Taken Arkansas": Political Activities Of African-American Members Of The Arkansas Legislature, 1868-73, Christopher Warren Branam

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

African-American lawmakers in the Arkansas General Assembly during Radical Reconstruction became politically active at a time when the legislature was addressing the most basic issues of public life, such as creating the infrastructure of public education and transportation in the state. They were actively engaged in the work of the legislature. Between 1868 and 1873, they introduced bills that eventually became laws. Arkansas passed two civil rights laws at the behest of African-American lawmakers. Education, law and order, and economic development--issues that reflected the southern Republican agenda that dominated the state's politics between 1868 and Democratic Redemption in 1874--also drew …