The students of the Radical University: John M. Morris

John Miller Morris (b. abt. 1853)
South Carolina.  Born enslaved.  Black.
Occupation: school teacher.  
Father's occupation: blacksmith, wheelwright, carpenter.

John Miler Morris was born about 1853 in South Carolina to Grace and John B. Morris.  The father worked as a blacksmith and wheelwright.  John's parents are described as free persons of color in the book Men of Mark, but their status was slightly complicated.  John's mother was enslaved but had been purchased by his father.  At the time, manumission was only possible possible through a special act of the state legislature, so legally she was enslaved but largely lived as a free women.

The son John M. grew up in Charleston.  Following his brother Joseph who had left the previous year, he began attending Howard University in Washington D.C. in 1870, following the (College) Preparatory Course.   He graduated from the Preparatory Course on June 12, 1872 and then entered into the Collegiate Course.  However, he left Howard in Spring 1874 (his sophomore year) and returned to South Carolina before completing his degree.

John left Howard at the advice of former Howard Professor Francis L. Cardozo.  In the 1870s, Cardozo was active in South Carolina politics and, in particular, was a member of the University of South Carolina Board of Trustees.  When the university began admitting African American students, Cardozo encouraged Morris's classmate C. C. Scott to bring Howard students back to South Carolina to enroll at the university.  To cover travel expenses, Cardozo lent Cornelius money.  Joined by Paul J. Mishow and William M. Dart, John and Scott followed Cardozo's advice and transferred to the University of South Carolina.  They were later joined by T. McCants Stewart, Alonzo G. Townsend, and John's brother Joseph.

John registered as a student at the University of South Carolina on January 5, 1874.  He enrolled as a college student following the classical studies track, and he graduated with an A.B. degree in June 1876.

After completing his education, John worked as a school teacher in Charleston.   In a 1911 Letter to the Editor of The State newspaper, Cornelius reported that John died shortly after graduation.  The present author has been unable to locate a death record, although Morris appears in the 1880 census.

Sources
1). 1880; Census Place: Charleston, Charleston, South Carolina; Roll: 1222; Page: 488A.

2). 1870; Census Place: Charleston Ward 8, Charleston, South Carolina; Roll: M593_1487; Page: 585A.

3). "When Negroes Attended the State University", May 8, 1911. State (published as The State).  Page 9.

4). Koger, Larry.  Black Slaveowners: Free Black Slave Masters in South Carolina, 1790-1860.  McFarland & Company, Jefferson, North Carolina and London.  1985.  p. 9.

5). Simmons, William J.  Men of Mark: Eminent, Progressive, and Rising.  Geo. M. Rewell & Co. Cleveland, Ohio.  1887.

The students of the Radical University: Thomas A. McLean

Thomas Alston McLean (b. May 20, 1853, d. January 2, 1934)
South Carolina.  Born free.  Mulatto/Black.  
Occupation: teacher, carpenter.  
Father's occupation: carpenter.

Thomas A. McLean was born in 1853 in Charleston, South Carolina to Maria and Stephen McLean.  The father was a free person of color who worked as a carpenter and is recorded as owning 4 slaves in the 1850 U.S. Census.

For his education, he first attended the Saxton School, a freedman's school in Charleston. This was a school set-up by the American Missionary Association. It was later renamed the Avery Insititute. Thomas was a stand-out student. In summer 1867, he was one of two students to receive a second-class medal for boys. The awardee was Joseph O'Hear. Joseph would later attend the University of South Carolina alongside Thomas. Also receiving medals (for Latin) were future USC students T. McCants Stewart and Joseph Morris.

Before completing his studies at the Saxton School, Thomas moved to the northeast and began attending Brown High School (now Newburyport High School) in Newburyport, MA.  He graduated from the Classical Department in 1873. At the graduation ceremony, he delivered an oration on "Models."

After graduating from Brown High School, Thomas attended Amherst College for a year (the 1873-74 academic year).  That year he was one of three African American students at the college.  Reportedly at the urging of his parents, he transferred to the University of South Carolina, registering at the university on October 5, 1874.  Thomas completed the classical studies course and received an A.B. degree in 1877, making him part of the last class of graduates before the university's closure.  Of Thomas, his classmate C. C. Scott wrote in a 1911 newspaper article that he was "perhaps the best prepared scholar in his class."

Thomas returned to Charleston after graduation.  There he worked at a newspaper and taught school.  He also studied under former state Supreme Court justice Jonathan J. Wight at the Claflin College Law Department (located in Charleston), although he did not receive a degree and was not admitted to the bar.

Thomas spent some time in the American West, teaching Native Americans in Oregon and North Dakota. He also spent nine years teaching in Texas. However, most of his life was spent teaching in Charleston. He also worked as an enumerator for the U.S. census in 1890.

In 1933, Thomas applied for a state teaching certification. As part of his application, he submitted the diploma that he had received from the University of South Carolina in 1877. His application attracted an unusual amount of attention and was even featured in an article in The State. It's unclear why Thomas submitted his application. At the time, he was eighty years of age, well past retirement age. 

C. C. Scott said that Thomas spent some time in the American West, holding a government position teaching Native Americans, but most of his life was spent in Charleston, working as a teacher.  In 1890, he worked as an enumerator for the U.S. census.  He died in the Charleston on January 2, 1934.

Sources
1). "When Negroes Attended the State University," May 8, 1911. State (published as The State).  Page 9.

2)  South Carolina Department of Archives and History; Columbia, South Carolina; Year Range: 1925-1949; Death County or Certificate Range: Charleston.

3). Year: 1850; Census Place: St Michael and St Phillip, Charleston, South Carolina; Roll: M432_850; Page: 153B; Image: 147

4). Seventh Census Of The United States, 1850; Record Group: Records of the Bureau of the Census; Record Group Number: 29

5). Year: 1880; Census Place: Charleston, Charleston, South Carolina; Roll: 1221; Page: 85B; Enumeration District: 056

6). Year: 1880; Census Place: Saint Denis and Saint Thomas, Charleston, South Carolina; Roll: 1224; Page: 518A; Enumeration District: 097.

7). Year: 1900; Census Place: Charleston Ward 4, Charleston, South Carolina; Page: 5; Enumeration District: 0083; FHL microfilm: 1241520

8). Year: 1910; Census Place: Charleston Ward 4, Charleston, South Carolina; Roll: T624_1452; Page: 1A; Enumeration District: 0026; FHL microfilm: 1375465

9). Year: 1920; Census Place: Charleston Ward 4, Charleston, South Carolina; Roll: T625_1687; Page: 1A; Enumeration District: 28

10). Year: 1930; Census Place: Charleston, Charleston, South Carolina; Page: 1A; Enumeration District: 0009; FHL microfilm: 2341923

11). July 18, 1873. The Newburyport Daily Herald.  Page 2.

12). Burke, W. Lewis. All for Civil Rights: African American Lawyers in South Carolina, 1868-1968, University of Georgia Press, 2017.

13). "Negro Graduate of Carolina, Now Eighty Years of Age, Asks Teaching Certificate." The State [Columbia, SC] September 13, 1933. p. 12.

14) "Public Examination of Saxton School." Charleston Courier [Charleston, SC]. April 19, 1867. p. `5.

The students of the Radical University: Alonzo G. Townsend

Alonzo G. Townsend
From The Times and Democrat.  July 21, 2011.

Alonzo Gray Townsend (b. August 29, 1853; d. March 13, 1937)
South Carolina.  Black.
Occupation:  clergyman, farmer, minister, preacher, teacher.

Alonzo G. Townsend was born in 1853 in South Carolina to Richard and Julia Johnson Townsend.  His death certificate lists his birthplace as Orangeburg county, but he grew up in Charleston.  Townsend's early life was marked by hardship as his father died when he was two years old and, to help support his mother, he started working when he was nine.  He was able to overcome these challenges and graduated from the first class of the Avery Normal Institute in Charleston (Class of 1872) and then began attending Howard University in Washington DC.

Townsend attended Howard from 1870 to 1874, completing the (College) Preparatory Program and leaving during his sophomore year in the Collegiate Department.  He studied alongside a number of other future University of South Carolina, namely Joseph W. Morris, T. McCants Stewart, William M. Dart, Paul J. Mishow, John M. Morris, Lawrence O. Posey, and Cornelius C. Scott.

When the University of South Carolina began admitting African Americans, Townsend left Howard and returned to South Carolina.  Entering the university in January 1874, he was part of the first class of African American undergraduate students.  He received an A.B. degree from the University of South Carolina in 1876.

After receiving his degree, Townsend began serving the Methodist Church. He was licensed as a minister in the Methodist Church in 1878.  Three years later (in 1881), he became an ordained elder.  Townsend served as a minister in Gaffney (1879), in Society Hill (1880), in Cheraw (1880-81), at Claflin University (1883-90, 1898), in the Florence District (1892-96),  in Kingstree (1891), and Charleston (1899-1900). While in Charleston, he was a pastor at the Centenary Church.

In addition to working as a minister, Townsend taught at Claflin University in Orangeburg for a number of years. Townsend probably was hired in the 1880s. He submitted his resignation from his position in 1890. He offered no public explanation for his resignation. However, he resigned shortly after his colleague and former classmate I. N. Cardozo was assaulted by a white Claflin professor, and his resignation was probably offered as a show of support for Cardozo. The incident involving Cardozo is described in greater detail in his entry. While Townsend's resignation was announced in newspapers, it appears that it ultimately was not accepted. For example, he held the position of Professor of Metaphysics in the 1897-98 academic year. In 1900, Claflin awarded him an honorary D.D. degree.

In addition to his work as a minister and educator, Townsend worked as a bank casher in 1908. He was employed by the Zion Saving Bank, the first Black-owned bank in Orangeburg. 

Townsend was active in politics, although he never held a major political office. In 1883, he participated in a "Colored Convention" in Columbia, SC. Townsend served on the convention's Committee on Address and Resolutions. This six man committee also included two of Townsend's former classmates: E. J. Sawyer and R. L. Smith.

The Committee issued a report that was adopted at the convention to loud applause. The report laid out the grievances of African Americans in South Carolina. The report criticized the national Republican party for having neglected the political needs of African Americans for the past six years. However, most of the report was devoted to criticizing the South Carolina state government which they called the "most damnable form of State Government, to which a free people have ever been subjected."

The complaints about the state government focused on the criminal justice system and the public schools. African American in South Carolina, the report stated, were denied the right to a fair trial. Judges and juries made decisions based on the "condition and color" of the accused. Furthermore, often African Americans accused of crimes were not tried in court and instead were killed in extrajudicial lynchings.

African Americans convicted of crimes in a court  of law faced the prospect of being hired out, or leased, to work for private companies. The state newspapers had recently reported on practice, and their reports documented that convicts often faced horrific working conditions. The report thanked the press for condemning the convict leasing system and called on the Legislature to end the practice. 

Finally, the report criticized the state public school system. The schools, the report said,  were so poorly funded that many schools were open only a few months a year and many teachers were forced to take on additional work. 

On August 10, 1897, Townsend was part of a delegation that presented Governor Ellerbe a letter asking him to prevent extrajudicial lynching of African Americans.  Also part of the delegation was E. J. Sawyer, another former U of SC student.  The letter was published in The State newspaper on the next day.

Townsend was in the national news in 1936.  That year the oldest living alumnus of the University of South Carolina died, and the Alumni Association publicly announced that they had opened a search for his replacement.  After Townsend wrote in response that he believed he was now the oldest alumnus, the association invited him to receive a gold-tipped cane at a public ceremony that was publicized in newspaper.  However, upon learning that Townsend was African American, they rescinded the offer.  The association secretary told one news-reporter, "The members [of the association] . . . are all white and contemplated that the award should go to one of the white alumni, of course."  He further added that the university had repudiated diplomas issued during Reconstruction and "everything connected with it."  The decision was reported in national periodicals such as The Literary Digest and Newsweek magazine.

Townsend died in Sumter on March 13, 1937, a few months after the Alumni Association rescinded their offer.  He is buried in Orangeburg Cemetery in Orangeburg, SC.

Alonzo G. Townsend
From palmettoislandgirl

Sources:
1).  "As To Lynchings Second Delegation of Negroes Waits on Governor." State (published as The State),  August 11, 1897. Page 2.

2). "USC alumni snubbed Townsend despite his many accomplishments".  The Times and Democrat. July 21, 2011.

3). 1900; Census Place: Charleston Ward 6, Charleston, South Carolina; Page: 4;

4). South Carolina Department of Archives and History; Columbia, South Carolina; South Carolina Death Records; Year Range: 1925-1949; Death County or Certificate Range: Sumter.  Certificate Number: 004516.  Volume Number: 10

5). Methodist Episcopal Church. Minutes of the annual conferences of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Volumes 1879, 1880, 1881, 1882, 1883, 1884, 1885, 1886, 1887, 1888, 1889, 1890, 1891, G. Lane & C.B. Tippett for the Methodist Episcopal Church, 1773-1940.

6) "Colored Convention." The watchman and southron, July 24, 1883, p. 2.

7) "As to lynchings." The Newberry herald and news, August 13, 1897, p. 1.

8) "Holds College Diploma Signed by Chamberlain." The Anderson daily intelligencer, April 3, 1915, p. 3.

9) "South Carolina Conference Opens." The watchman and southron, December 9, 1922. p. 4.

10) 1930; Census Place: Blenheim, Marlboro, South Carolina; Page: 3B; Enumeration District: 0025; FHL microfilm: 2341939

11) 1910; Census Place: Sumter, Sumter, South Carolina; Roll: T624_1465; Page: 5B; Enumeration District: 0119; FHL microfilm: 1375478

12) 1880; Census Place: Cheraw, Chesterfield, South Carolina; Roll: 1225; Page: 297D; Enumeration District: 003

The students of the Radical University: Charles J. Babbitt

Charles Jacob Babbitt (b. March 28, 1856; d. April 4, 1913)
Rhode Island.  White.
Occupation: lawyer.  
Father's occupation: clergyman, professor.

Charles Babbitt
From The Babbitt family history

Charles Babbitt was born in 1856 in Providence, RI to Mary Elizabeth Babbitt and Benjamin Bosworth Babbitt. The Babbitts are an old New England family that can trace its history to the Plymouth Colony.  The family served with distinction during the US Civil War. Charles' grandfather Jacob enlisted in the army when the war broke out and was killed in the Battle of Fredericksburg while serving as a major in the 7th Rhode Island Regiment.  His uncle Samuel D. Green served in the US Navy and commanded the USS Monitor at the Battle of Hampton Roads.

Charles' father Benjamin was an ordained Episcopal minister who was educated at Brown University (B.A. 1846) and Trinity College (A.M. 1868).  When Charles was four year old (in 1860), Benjamin moved the family to Andover, MA and became rector at Christ's Church.  The family left Andover in 1868.  The father began working at St. Clement's School for Boys in East Medway, MA.  It seems that Charles, his brother Edward, and his mother Mary did not join him but instead moved to Bristol, RI as they appear living there in the 1870 U.S. Census. There Charles attended Bristol High School.

The entire Babbitt family moved to South Carolina in 1871.  The father Benjamin worked for the Episcopal church and became a professor at the University of South Carolina. 

In Columbia, Charles attended the Columbia Male Academy. However, he appears to only have attended the academy for a short period as he had matriculated in the University of South Carolina by fall 1871. Charles and his brother Edward were among the few students to remain at the university after the October 3, 1873 admission of African American students.  (The others were Charles W. Cummings, Francis A. Cummings, and Olin F. Cummings, all children of Professor Cummings.)

Charles received a Ph.B. from the University of South Carolina in 1875 and a LL.B. in 1876.  The next year (1877) he was admitted to the South Carolina bar.  (At the time, the university offered two different undergraduate degrees: an A.B. for students who completed coursework with a focus on classical studies and a Ph.B. for students who completed coursework with a focus on modern languages.) 

In 1874, Charles began serving as assistant private secretary to Republican Governor H. Chamberlain. He was promoted full private secretary in 1876. That year was a difficult one for Chamberlain. Chamberlain ran for reelection and claimed victory, but his claim was challenged his Democratic opponent Wade Hampton III.  The dispute went on for 6 month and escalated to the point where violence threatened to break out on the Statehouse grounds.  Chamberlain finally withdrew his claim to the governorship on April 10, 1877 after U.S. army troops guarding the Statehouse were withdrawn by order of the President.  The next day (April 11, 1877) Charles turned over the State seal and keys to the Executive chamber to Hampton's secretary, bringing an end to the Reconstruction government in South Carolina.

After Reconstruction, Charles remained in South Carolina and worked a lawyer. He was admitted to the state bar on December 12, 1878. He then began working as attorney at law for the office of Melton & Wingate.  Charles left the state for New York City the next year (in summer 1879). He was admitted to the New York State bar on March 27, 1882. He then resumed his work as a lawyer. Charles was admitted to practice in the U.S. Supreme Court on three years later, on November 9, 1885. Charles moved to Boston in 1908. There he resumed his law work after being admitted to the Massachusetts bar on September 25, 1908.

One of the most interesting legal cases Charles was involved with was that of the inheritance of James H. Paine, known as "Miser" Paine.  Paine was a well-educated New York City music critic from an established Boston family. He was also widely regarded as an eccentric miser.  One newspaper reported that "His uncouth habits and neglect of personal appearance caused him to be shunned by most respectable people" and that "he went about in rags and begged the leavings of the table." 

Upon Paine's death in 1885, it was revealed Paine had almost $400,000 (over $10 million in 2020) in financial assets stored in an old safe.  A piano dealer that was on good terms with Paine claimed that Paine had made a will giving him the assets in recognition of the kindness he had shown him and also because Paine did not want his relatives to have any of the money.  His claim was challenged by the next of kin.

Charles provided legal counsel for the piano dealer.  Legal proceedings dragged out for years.  Ultimately, the piano dealer was unable to produce a will.  In 1888 (after the piano dealer had died), Paine's assets were divided among the next of kin.

Charles did a significant amount of legal scholarship, especially as the law relates to motor vehicles.  In 1909, he published The New Massachusetts Motor Vehicle Law, a book which collected recent state laws concerning motor vehicles. The next year (in 1912), he published The Law Applied to Motor Vehicles which presents a more expansive treatment of motor vehicle law. A year later, he prepared a list of legislative sessions and session laws for the U.S. states as The Hand-List of Legislative Sessions and Session Laws, and published the article "Stumbling Blocks and Pitfalls in Session Laws" discussing his experiences preparing the book.

Charles may have remained in contact with his former classmate Charles Roome Parmelee. The two participated in a 1889 parade in Washington D.C. organized by the Templar Knights of the U.S.

Charles died on April 4, 1913 in his home on Huntington Avenue.  He was buried in the North Burial Ground in Bristol, RI.

Sources:
1). Browne, William Bradford, The Babbitt family history, 1643-1900.  Taunton, Mass. : C. A. Hack, 1912.

2). Columbia City Directories, 1859, 1875-1903. Richland County Public Library, Columbia, South Carolina

3). The Boston Globe; Publication Date: April 5, 1913.

4). The Pickens Sentinel;  Publication Date: April 19, 1877.

5) "Lawyer and Author of Law Books Succumbs at Huntington-av Home." Boston Globe, August 5, 1913. 0. 10. 

6) "A Grand Parade." Boston Globe, October 8, 1889. p. 7. 

7) "Miser Paine's Money." The Fall Daily Herald, January 2, 1888. p. 2. 

8) "Columbia Male Academy Reunion Now Proposed." The State, May 2, 1926. p. 15.

9) "Charles J. Babbitt Died." Boston Evening Transcript [Boston, MA]. April 4, 1913. p. 10.

9) "Charles J. Babbitt Dead." Boston Globe [Boston, MA]. April 5, 1913. p. 10.

8) look up politics

The students of the Radical University: T. McCants Stewart

T. McCants Stewart
From Wikipedia

Thomas McCants Stewart (b. December 28, 1852; d. January 7, 1923)
South Carolina.  Born free.  Mulatto.
Occupation:  Attorney at law, professor, author.  
Father's occupation: blacksmith.

T. McCants Stewart was born in 1852 in Charleston, South Carolina to George Gilchrist and Anna Morris Stewart.  Both were free, literate African Americans, and the father worked as a blacksmith.  Stewart was educated at the Avery Normal Institute in Charleston until 1869 when he moved to Washington DC to attend Howard University.  He was a student at Howard from 1869 to 1874, entering into the college preparatory program and leaving as a junior college student.

Stewart registered as a scholarship student at the University of South Carolina on January 7, 1874.  He received A.B. and LL.B. degrees from the university in 1875.  McCants was one of seven Howard students to transfer to U of SC (the others were William M. Dart, John M. Morris, Joseph M. Morris, Paul J. Mishow, Cornelius C. Scott, Alonzo G. Townsend).

While a student, Stewart likely wrote articles for the New National Era newspaper on South Carolina. The New National Era was a national newspaper for African Americans that was edited by Frederick Douglass and Richard T. Greener.

One of the articles gives a valuable account of South Carolina and the University of South Carolina during Reconstruction.  The description of the university is quoted in Historian Eric Foner's Bancroft Prize-winning book Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution.  The article reads

Time will not permit us to describe the University.  It is sufficient to say that it occupies the most beautiful spot in the "Queen City of the South."  Its grounds, three squares by two, are covered with verdant trees and lawns, reminding one of the groves in which the ancient philosophers are said to have studied and taught.... 

This institute is calculated to do much good for South Carolina and for the negro race.  If the time ever comes when the descendants of the Rutledges and the Marions shall believe in the universal fatherhood of God and the unlimited brotherhood of man, the University of South Carolina will have a dwelling place in the breast of every Africo-American. 

(The  articles were published under the pseudonym "MAC".  In written correspondence, Stewart used this name as a shortened form of "McCants.")

After receiving his degree, Stewart spent 2 years in Orangeburg, teaching mathematics at South Carolina State Agricultural College (a precursor to South Carolina State University) and practicing law at the law firm of Elliot, Stewart, and Straker.  Robert B. Elliot and D. Augustus Straker had both been prominent African American politicians during Reconstruction.  Straker was a student at Howard at the same time as Stewart (1870-72), although he was older and a law student.

In 1878 (one year after African Americans were expelled from the university), Stewart left South Carolina to attend the Princeton Theological Seminary. He attended for 2 years but did not receive a degree.  However, in 1880 he became a pastor at the Bethel AMS Church in New York City.  

In 1883, Stewart migrated to Liberia to work at Liberia College.  Almost immediately he began fighting with the College President Edward Blyden.  In general, his experience was marked by frustration, and he left two years later to return to New York.  Drawing on his experiences in Liberia, he published the book Liberia: The Americo-African Republic a year later (in 1886).

In New York, Stewart returned to working in law.  He was admitted to practice law before the New York Supreme Court in 1886 and then opened a law office.  One of his most significant clients was  Timothy Thomas Fortune, the editor of the influential black newspaper the New York Freeman (later The New York Age).  Fortune brought a lawsuit against Trainor's Hotel in New York.  In 1890, the hotel had refused him service because he was African American. When Fortune refused to leave, a hotel manager physically forced him out of the hotel and then had him arrested.

After 4 years legal proceedings, the Fortune received a positive judgement and was awarded roughly $1,000 in financial damages (a financial amount comparable to $25,000 in 2020).  This outcome was reported in the New York Times.

Stewart knew Fortune well as he contributed articles to his newspaper.  Of particular note is a series of 1885 articles he contributed that reported on a trip he took to South Carolina.  Since Stewart had left the state in 1878, South Carolina had been transformed by the political changes brought about by the end of Reconstruction.  Surprisingly, while many political changes focused on undoing the advances made by African Americans, Stewart's articles were mostly positive.  For example, reflecting at the end of his trip, he wrote:

I do contend that if in thought we should put ourselves in the Southern white man's place we would be astounded at our reflections.  Think it, when a boy, eight years of age, I had to dodge to go to school.  Now, Charleston is full of public schools for colored children, and colored lawyers plead at the bar, physicians ride about the streets and the irrepressible Negro appears everywhere!

During this time, Stewart was an active supporter of the Democratic Party, an unusual decision for an African American.  Starting in 1886, he began corresponding with Democratic President Grover Cleveland.  In 1888, he publicly broke with the Republican Party and endorsed Cleveland's campaign for reelection. Cleveland lost the 1888 election but was returned to office in the 1892 election.  Two years into his second presidency (in 1894) Stewart had a falling out with Cleveland and the Democratic Party.  Stewart was especially critical of Cleveland's decision to remove a number of African Americans from federal offices.

In 1898, after two decades of living in New York City, Stewart made the surprising decision to move to Hawaii.  There he started a new law practice and became active in Republican politics, but he became frustrated by living in the state and more generally by his experience living in America.  In 1905, he wrote to his son,  "I am victim of the white man's unholy color line.  In 1878 I left South Carolina to escape it.  In 1883 I left New York for Africa to escape it.  And now, ah, whither shall I flee?"

Stewart chose to flee to London, but he only stayed there for a year.  He returned to Liberia and, again, opened a law practice and involved himself in politics.  He achieved some of his greatest professional success in the country.  A crowning achievement was being appointed associate justice of the Liberian Supreme Court in 1911.  However, his achievements were short-lived.  He became embroiled in conflict with government officials and was removed from judicial office by a legislative resolution.  The legislature's reasons for taking this action are unclear, but Stewart alleged that it was for challenging corruption by his political opponents.

Stewart's political fights brought his career in Liberia to an end, and he returned to London in 1914.  In London, he worked on finding a new professional direction.  Ultimately he tried to start a new career in the Virgin Islands.

Stewart moved to St Thomas in the Virgin Islands in 1921.  As with many of his earlier moves, he opened a law practice and pursued his interests in politics.  In an unofficial capacity, he joined a 1923 delegation that was sent to the United States to deliver grievances regarding the US administration of the island. (The United States had purchased St Thomas Island from Denmark in 1917.)

Sadly, his trip to the United States was his last.  On the return trip, he fell ill to a sickness that took his life on January 7, 1923, shortly after he landed at St Thomas.  Despite his complicated relation with the nation, Stewart was buried in the Liberian flag at his request.

Thomas McCants Stewart
From Wikipedia

Sources Cited:

1). 1860 U.S. census, population schedule. NARA microfilm publication M653, 1,438 rolls. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.

2). Wynes, Charles E. "T. McCants Stewart: Peripatetic Black South Carolinian." The South Carolina Historical Magazine 80, no. 4 (1979): 311-17.

3). Broussard, Albert S.  African American Odyssey: The Stewarts, 1853-1963.  University Press of Kansas. 1998.


To do: Check Foner quotation

The Radical University of South Carolina

U of SC Professor Richard T. Greener
From Wikipedia

The University of South Carolina during the period from 1873 to 1877 is sometimes referred to as the Radical University because the university was reorganized by the Radical Republican state government.

One of the most revolutionary changes the state government implemented was the admission of African American students to the University of South Carolina.  I have seen this change referred to as the integration or desegregation of the university, but those terms do not capture how profound the change was.  During this period, African Americans not only attended the university, but they formed the majority of the student body, roughly half of the Board of Trustees, and included a faculty member.

During my lifetime, I have never seen this level of African American representation at flagship state university.  While every US university I've worked at has had African American students and faculty, the representation of African Americans is roughly at or below their level in broader society.  For example, African Americans make up roughly one-third of the population of South Carolina but only about one-tenth of the U of SC student body. Only 1 person on the 24-body Board of Trustees is African American.

Despite its revolutionary nature, it is hard to figure out what actually happened at the university during Reconstruction.  The admission of African American students is analyzed in many books on reconstruction including Eric Foner's Bancroft prize-winning book Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution, but the analyzes are so different its hard to know what to make of them.  Foner, for example, describes the event positively and quotes the following newspaper account given by an African American student:

Right here allow me to say that our standard is high.  In Latin we pass, like other colleges, over the ground which lies between Caesar and Cicero on one side, and Terence and Tacitus on the other.  In Greek we pass from Xenophon and Homer to Sophocles and Plato.  In mathematics we attempt to fight our way from Euclid to analytic geometry.  We spend the usual amount of time in studying physics, chemistry and the modern languages.  In the departments of Bella Lettres, metaphysics, international law, sociology and political economist, we hold sweet communion with several of the grand old masters....

The student then goes on to describe the racial composition of the student body and explains

I am sorry that I have felt called upon to make so many references to races.  I do not like to do it; but I want it distinctly understood that the University of South Carolina is not in possession of any one race or any one condition of men.  Its advantages are being enjoyed by young men who want to make their State better by themselves having lived in it.

The finest argument in factor of "equality before the law" is found here in this peculiar place.  The two races study together, visit each other's rooms, play ball together, walk into the city together, without the the blacks feeling themselves honored or the whites disgraced...

Compare that account to the description given in an early (published in 1905) history of Reconstruction in South Carolina written by South Carolinian John S. Reynolds:

The requirements for admission were so lax – the regulations in this manner were so flagrantly disregarded – that the so-called University soon became little more than a high school, whose chief aim was to inculcate and illustrate the social equality of the black race with the white.  The establishment, taken as a whole, was a fraud upon the taxpayers – a fraud deliberately perpetrated in the name of progress and enlightenment!  In this degraded position the institution continued until it was closed by the white Legislature of 1877.

Earlier he described the Board of Trustees as "adventurers who were unknown or known unfavorably."

Certainly Reynolds and Foner have diametrically opposed political beliefs that are reflected in the differences in their descriptions, but a close inspection of accounts shows disagreement over basic facts.  For example, how many African Americans were enrolled?  The student indicates says that "a pretty large proportion of these [students] are of the Caucasian rate", while Reynolds says that African Americans made up "more than nine-tenths" of the student population.

Similarly, who were the African American students?  The image formed by reading Reynold's account is that they were probably fieldhands who had left plantations, but South Carolina was also home to a small (about 2% of the African American population) but significant population of African Americans who had been free before the Civil War, some of whom had achieved significant economic and political security.

What did the students do after the university was closed?  Was the education wasted on them (Reynolds certainly seems to think so) or were they able to complete their education and have successful careers?

The best description of the African American students is given in a May 8, 1911 Letter to the Editor of The State newspaper written by an alumnus, Cornelius Chapman Scott.  Scott describes the (impressive) accomplishments of some of the alumni, but there is no reasonably comprehensive overview of the students.  On this blog, I will try to flesh things out by writing short biographies of as many students as I can.  Roughly 100 students attended the university during this time, so compiling short biographies of everyone is a reasonable task.

University of South Carolina campus
Form the University of South Carolina

Chandler Davis on loyalty oaths

Chandler Davis
From Wikipedia

The first substantive blogpost I made talked about the use of loyalty oaths at US universities in the 1950s with a view towards Abigail Thompson's editorial in the Notices of the AMS.  I tried to use the blogpost as an opportunity to visit loyalty oaths in South Carolina, and I tried to avoid offering personal opinions about Thompson's editorial.  (I wasn't entirely successful: I corrected some errors in a later blogpost.)

While hopefully not expressed in the blogpost, my personal opinion at the time was that Thompson's editorial was badly thought out and offensive.  She compares the current use of diversity statements in hiring to the use of loyalty oaths asserting non-membership in the Communist Party USA during the 1950s Red Scare.  During the Red Scare, professors who were refused to sign loyalty statements were questioned by investigative committee, fired from their jobs, and even, in some cases, sent to jail.  I was tempted to write that Thompson's remarks were really disrespectful to those people.

Whelp, I was wrong.  Totally wrong.  Remember the series of blogposts on Governor Timmerman's attacks on faculty at Benedict and Allen?  Two of the faculty members in question were the parents of  Chandler Davis.  Chandler Davis himself refuse to cooperate with the House Unamerican Activities Committee and ended up losing his position at the University of Michigan and served 6 months in a federal prison.

Why do I mention him?  He signed his name to one of the letters in support of Abigail Thompson!

Chandler Davis's signature to the Letter to the Editor in support of Abigail Thompson

I guess I was totally wrong about Thompson's editorial being disrespectful to victims of the Red Scare since one of the victims is openly supportive of her....

You can read the full letter here on page 9.