t effectively prior to 1856, the people of
color were again given power to elect their own trustees.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Laws of the State of Ohio_, vol. liii., p. 118.]

[Footnote 2: _Ibid_., p. 118.]

During the contest for the control of the colored schools certain
Negroes of Cincinnati were endeavoring to make good their claim that
their children had a right to attend any school maintained by the
city. Acting upon this contention a colored patron sent his son to a
public school, which on account of his presence became the center of
unusual excitement.[1] Miss Isabella Newhall, the teacher to whom he
went, immediately complained to the Board of Education, requesting
that he be expelled on account of his race. After "due deliberation"
the Board of Education decided by a vote of fifteen to ten that he
would have to withdraw from that school. Thereupon two members of that
body, residing in the district of the timorous teacher, resigned.[2]

[Footnote 1: New York _Tribune_, Feb. 19, 1855.]

[Footnote 2: New York _Tribune_, Feb. 19, 1855; and Carlier,
_L'Esclavage_, etc., p. 339.]

Thereafter some progress in the development of separate schools in
Cincinnati was noted. By 1855 the Board of Education of that city had
established four public schools for the instruction of Negro youths.
The colored pupils were showing their appreciation by regular
attendance, manly deportment, and rapid progress in the acquisition of
knowledge. Speaking of these Negroes in 1855, John P. Foote said that
they shared with the white citizens that respect for education,
and the diffusion of knowledge, which has ever been one of their
"characteristics," and that they had, therefore, been more generally
intelligent than free persons of color not only in other States but in
all other parts of the world.[1] It was in appreciation of the worth
of this class of progressive Negroes that in 1858 Nicholas Longworth
built a comfortable school-house for them in Cincinnati, leasing it
with the privilege of purchasing it in fourteen years.[2] They met
these requirements within the stipulated time, and in 1859 secured
through other agencies the construction of another building in the
western portion of the city.[3]

[Footnote 1: Foote, _The Schools of Cincinnati_, p. 92.]

[Footnote 2: _Special Report of the U.S. Com. of Ed_., 1871, p. 372.]

[Footnote 3: _Ibid_., p. 372.]

The agitation for the admission of colored children to the public
schools was