hile some Negroes were marching to a political
convention in New Orleans, they became engaged in brawls with the
white spectators. Shots were exchanged; the police, assisted by the
spectators, undertook to arrest the Negroes; the Negroes took refuge in
the convention hall; and their pursuers stormed the building and shot
down without mercy the Negroes and their white supporters. Altogether
not less than forty were killed and not less than one hundred wounded;
but not more than a dozen men were killed on the side of the police and
the white citizens. General Sheridan, who was in command at New Orleans,
characterized the affair as "an absolute massacre ... a murder which
the mayor and police of the city perpetrated without the shadow of a
necessity."

In the face of such events and tendencies, and influenced to some extent
by a careful and illuminating but much criticized report of Carl Schurz,
Congress, led by Charles Sumner and Thaddeus Stevens, proceeded to pass
legislation designed to protect the freedmen and to guarantee to
the country the fruits of the war. The Thirteenth Amendment to the
Constitution formally abolishing slavery was passed December 18, 1865.
In the following March Congress passed over the President's veto the
first Civil Rights Bill, guaranteeing to the freedmen all the ordinary
rights of citizenship, and it was about the same time that it enlarged
the powers of the Freedmen's Bureau. The Fourteenth Amendment (July
28, 1868) denied to the states the power to abridge the privileges or
immunities of citizens of the United States; and the Fifteenth Amendment
(March 30, 1870) sought to protect the Negro by giving to him the right
of suffrage instead of military protection. In 1875 was passed the
second Civil Rights act, designed to give Negroes equality of treatment
in theaters, railway cars, hotels, etc.; but this the Supreme Court
declared unconstitutional in 1883.

As a result of this legislation the Negro was placed in positions of
responsibility; within the next few years the race sent two senators
and thirteen representatives to Congress, and in some of the state
legislatures, as in South Carolina, Negroes were decidedly in the
majority. The attainments of some of these men were undoubtedly
remarkable; the two United States senators, Hiram R. Revels and Blanche
K. Bruce, both from Mississippi, were of unquestioned intelligence and
ability, and Robert B. Elliott, one of the representatives from So