by the
loyal element, had been put in operation, as already mentioned, as
early as 1864. This was effected under encouragement given by
President Lincoln, through the medium of a Constitutional convention,
which met at New Orleans in April, 1864, and adjourned in July. The
constitution then agreed upon was submitted to the people, and in
September, 1864, was ratified by a vote of the few loyal residents of
the State.

The government provided under this constitution being looked upon as
provisional merely, was never recognized by Congress, and in 1865 the
returned Confederates, restored to citizenship by the President's
amnesty proclamation, soon got control of almost all the State. The
Legislature was in their hands, as well as most of the State and
municipal offices; so, when the President, on the 20th of August,
1866, by proclamation, extended his previous instructions regarding
civil affairs in Texas so as to have them apply to all the seceded
States, there at once began in Louisiana a system of discriminative
legislation directed against the freedmen, that led to flagrant
wrongs in the enforcement of labor contracts, and in the remote
parishes to numbers of outrages and murders.

To remedy this deplorable condition of things, it was proposed, by
those who had established the government of 1864, to remodel the
constitution of the State; and they sought to do this by reassembling
the convention, that body before its adjournment having provided for
reconvening under certain conditions, in obedience to the call of its
president. Therefore, early in the summer of 1866, many members of
this convention met in conference at New Orleans, and decided that a
necessity existed for reconvening the delegates, and a proclamation
was issued accordingly by B. K. Howell, President-pro-tempore.

Mayor John T. Monroe and the other officials of New Orleans looked
upon this proposed action as revolutionary, and by the time the
convention assembled (July 30), such bitterness of feeling prevailed
that efforts were made by the mayor and city police to suppress the
meeting. A bloody riot followed, resulting, in the killing and
wounding of about a hundred and sixty persons.

I happened to be absent from the city at the time, returning from
Texas, where I had been called by affairs on the Rio Grande. On my
way up from the mouth of the Mississippi I was met on the night of
July 30 by one of my staff, who reported what had occurred,