ed people from
the benefits of the new system, and returned them the amount accruing
from the school tax on their property.[2] Thereafter benevolent
societies and private associations maintained colored schools in
Cincinnati, Columbus, Cleveland, and the southern counties of Ohio.[3]
But no help came from the cities and the State before 1849 when the
legislature passed a law authorizing the establishment of schools for
children of color at public expense.[4]

[Footnote 1: _Laws of Ohio_, vol. xxiii., pp. 37 _et seq_.]

[Footnote 2: Hickok, _The Negro in Ohio_, p. 85.]

[Footnote 3: Simmons, _Men of Mark_, p. 374.]

[Footnote 4: _Laws of Ohio_, vol. liii., pp. 117-118.]

The Negroes of Cincinnati soon discovered that they had not won a
great victory. They proceeded at once to elect trustees, organized a
system, and employed teachers, relying on the money allotted them
by the law on the basis of a per capita division of the school fund
received by the Board of Education of Cincinnati. So great was the
prejudice that the school officials refused to turn over the required
funds on the grounds that the colored trustees were not electors,
and therefore could not be office holders qualified to receive and
disburse public funds.[1] Under the leadership of John I. Gaines the
trustees called indignation meetings, and raised sufficient money to
employ Flamen Ball, an attorney, to secure a writ of mandamus. The
case was contested by the city officials even in the Supreme Court of
the State which decided against the officious whites.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Special Report of the U.S. Com. of Ed_., 1871, pp. 371,
372.]

[Footnote 2: _Ibid_., 1871, p. 372.]

Unfortunately it turned out that this decision did not mean very much
to the Negroes. There were not many of them in certain settlements and
the per capita division of the fund did not secure to them sufficient
means to support schools. Even if the funds had been adequate to pay
teachers, they had no schoolhouses. Lawyers of that day contended that
the Act of 1849 had nothing to do with the construction of buildings.
After a short period of accomplishing practically nothing material,
the law was amended so as to transfer the control of such colored
schools to the managers of the white system.[1] This was taken as a
reflection on the standing of the blacks of the city and tended to
make them refuse to cooeperate with the white board. On account of the
failure of this body to ac