Five Years of Equal Representation
In the 1880's in Lynchburg, "the Negro had now reached the stage where he could have a voice in the actual operation of the city’s government."
For our final Wednesday archives post before this year’s bridge crossing, we are sharing the history of the five Lynchburg city councilmen elected to office in the 1880s. The paragraphs quoted below are extracted from “The Participation of the Lynchburg, Virginia Negro in Politics 1865-1900”1 by Harry S. Ferguson, a Black Lynchburg citizen. (Look for a poem by T.J. Anderson III this year, Professor of English and Creative Writing at Hollins University and great grandson of Jefferson Anderson (1853–1921), mentioned in the article below.)
“The…account of the important activities of these Negro councilmen, shows that they were active in educational, religious and economic affairs and had a desire to serve the citizens of Lynchburg who placed them in office.”
During the eventful years from 1885 to 1889, five Negroes were elected to serve on the Lynchburg City Council. Jefferson Anderson and Henry Edwards represented the city’s third ward from 1885 to 1887, while John W. Crawford, John W Wilson, James H. Merchant, and Jefferson Anderson served the city’s first and third wards from 1887 to 1889.
During the election years of this period, the city became a veritable hot bed of campaigning and electioneering by local Negro politicians, who fought to have their fellow citizens represented in the affairs of the local government.
These councilmen faced a racist political discourse not very different from what we experience today in our media, such as:
‘If you are white, stay white, for the Anglo-Saxon who forgets his race, blood, and proud heritage and bands with the Negroes deserves unspeakable score and the whip of scorpions,’ said the Democratic editor of the Lynchburg News. . . . Mixed schools and Negro policeman will not improve our city…’ (Lynchburg News, November 3, 1884)
. . . But their endurance prevailed. Ferguson goes on:
The campaign of 1887 for the election of the city councilman was a stormy and controversial one. . . . The rift between the Negro and the white members was over representation by Negroes in all the wards.
The fact that this sweeping victory for the Negroes was distasteful to his political adversaries was but a reflection of the political potentialities of the Negro of that day, when he lined up in a concerted effort behind a purposeful movement.
Ferguson provides a short biography of each of the councilmen:
Jefferson Anderson “was born January 5, 1853, of slave parents in Amherst County. He acquired a common school education which was sufficient to operate a grocery business at Madison and Twelfth Streets.”
Henry Edwards “was born September 4, 1834 of slave parents at Charlotte Court House, Virginia and came to Lynchburg after the Civil War. He owned two pieces of property…After working as a laborer in a tobacco factory, he was made floor manager. Edwards was also a professional politician, a good orator…After serving on the city council, he operated a grocery store and saloon…until his death.”
John W. Wilson “was born in Appomattox County, Virginia, June 1841...He owned several places of property. He was a first-class carpenter and contractor and built many houses in the city of Lynchburg. His outstanding construction was the old Negro Church, the Court Street Baptist Church. . . . He was active in fraternal and civic organizations and served on the deacon board of the Court Street Baptist Church, …appointed to serve on the Public Building and Sanitary Committees.”
John W. Crawford “was born in 1845 of slave parents in Campbell County and was never married. He owned tow lots located on Daniel’s Hill…Crawford owned and operated an antique and used bookshop on Main Street in the 700 block. He was a member of the Court Street Baptist Church, and was also connected with the leading Negro civic and fraternal organizations of his day . . . [As a councilman, he] served on the Market, Safety, Sanitary and Parks Committees”
James H. Merchant “owned his home at Fourteenth and Taylor Streets. He was born of slave parents in Lynchburg, December 20th, 1842. . . . Merchant was a barber by trade . . .Mr. Merchant [served as a councilman] on the Alms House, Schools, and Claims Commitee . . .”
The service of these five men improved the morale of the Black community and boosted their quality of life:
Record of these men in office showed that the members of their race were capable and willing to serve all the citizens of the city. It further proved to the colored citizens that office holding was as important as voting. The fact that the Negro had now reached the stage where he could have a voice in the actual operation of the city’s government seemed to have inspired a new political zeal in him for in the coming councilman’s election of 1887, he was able to elect three new councilmen and re-elect an incumbent.
The . . . account of the important activities of these Negro councilmen, shows that they were active in educational, religious and economic affairs and had a desire to serve the citizens of Lynchburg who placed them in office.
But after five years, reactionary forces began to emerge, taking the earned power away from the Black community:
In the election for councilmen held May 23, 1889, the Negro Republican candidates were defeated by a narrow margin, due to the split in the Party. . . . This defeat engendered by a split in the Republican camp makes true the old Roman axion, Divisa et empera, divide and rule.
With the going out of the Negro councilman in 1889, the Negro political power also went out to remain until 1898 when a coalition of white and Negro Republicans…came on the scene to represent Daniel Butler for the United States Congress. . . . Daniel Butler was a scholar, orator, poet, politician, and leader of his people . . . but lost the election . . .
Butler’s campaign for congress in 1898 brought a close to the political venture of the Lynchburg Negro at office holding for in the near future came the Virginia Constitution of 1902 with its new acts of voting requirements that meant the disfranchisement to most of the Negro citizens as far as local and state politics were concerned.
Even though their political power was short-lived, due to the innovation of certain reactionary forces, over which they had no control, they did develop a political consciousness which helped them in the future. They did benefit materially by having provided for them schools, and civil liberties . . .
Due to discriminatory laws passed during the decades following his defeat in the 1898 election, Butler was the last African American from Lynchburg to run for city, state, or federal office for nearly half a century.2
“A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate Division of the Virginia State College in Partial Fulfillment for the Degree of Master of Arts 1950”
Daniel Butler - Old City Cemetery (gravegarden.org)