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VII
CARPET-BAGGERS
IN THE UNITED STATES SENATE
By C. MILDRED THOMPSON
INSTEUCTOR IN HISTOEY, VASSAE COLLEGE

VII
CARPET-BAGGERS IN THE UNITED STATES SENATE
The careers of the carpet-baggers in the South have been told
in many tales — how they fed on the fat of a lean land and gath
ered up all the choice plums of office. The most coveted of all
in their eyes was of course a seat in the United States senate.
The disqualification of the office-holding class in the South
opened up to them hundreds of state and federal offices from
sheriff to United States senator in every Southern state. This
fact, together with the sudden creation of an ignorant and inex
perienced electorate, — both immediate results of the reconstruc
tion policy of Congress, — brought the carpet-baggers in swarms
to the South. They were for the most part young men of the
disbanded federal armies who went south after the war in search
for offices, but they were reenforced by speculators who were
tempted by the allurements of cheap land and high-priced cotton ;
some came also as missionaries to the blacks, many of whom found
in pohtics a more bountiful harvest than in religious activities.
A position as official of the freedmen's bureau, treasury agent, or
military officer was a stepping stone to a seat in the legislature,
the governor's chair, or the United States senate. Cooperating
with Republicans from the North in gathering up the votes of
the negroes were the native white Republicans, locally known
as "scalawags." These two classes together shared the spoils
of office, now and then throwing a sop to the "loyal" horde of
negro voters by allowing them some local offices and seats in the
legislatures. But in the United States senatorship the carpet
bagger obtained a larger prize than his scalawag brother.
During the third session of the 40th Congress twelve senators
chosen by the reconstruction legislatures of North Carolina, South
CaroHna, Florida, Alabama, Arkansas, and Louisiana took their
161

162 STUDIES IN SOUTHERN HISTORY AND POLITICS
seats in the United States senate. Of this delegation all but two,
one from South Carohna and one from North Carohna, were
carpet-baggers. Mississippi, not admitted until the second ses
sion of the 41st Congress (1870), was represented by two carpet
baggers, one of whom was a negro preacher. The height of carpet
bag power in the senate was attained in 1869-1873, during Grant's
administration, when the harvest of federal offices was bountiful
and before dissension among the Republicans of their foster states
weakened the prop on which the carpet-bag senators supported
themselves. After 1871 their ranks began to thin, and no new
carpet-baggers appeared in the senate after 1873. x To present a
brief survey of the part played by these RepubHcan adventurers
in the United States senate before 1873 is the purpose of this
paper.2 In personnel the carpet-baggers who appeared in the senate
were a mixed lot; some few were quite respectable and able
men; several were thoroughly dishonest and corrupt, and the
majority mere non-entities. Most of them were comparatively
young men, under forty-five, and about half were college gradu
ates. Willard Warner of Alabama and Frederick Sawyer of
South CaroHna were the best representatives of the carpet-bag
1 One exception to this is the case of Pease of Mississippi, who served out the
unexpired term of Ames, resigned.
2 The list of carpet-baggers in the senate between 1868 and 1879 is as follows :
North Carolina. — John C. Abbott, 1868-1871.
South Carolina. — Fredk. A. Sawyer, 1868-1873. John J. Patterson, 1873-1879.
Florida. — Thos. W. Osborn, 1868-1873. Simon B. Conover, 1873-1879.
Adonijah S. Welch, 1868-1869. Abijah Gilbert, 1869-1875.
Alabama. — Geo. E. Spencer, 1868-1879.
Willard A. Warner, 1868-1871.
Mississippi. — Adelbert Ames, 1870-1874. H. R. Pease, 1874-1875.
Hiram R. Revels, 1870-1871.
Louisiana. — John S. Harris, 1868-1871. J. R. West, 1871-1877.
Wm. Pitt Kellogg, 1868-1872 ; 1877-1883.
Arkansas. — Alex. McDonald, 1868-1871. Powell Clayton, 1871-1877.
Benj. F. Rice, 1868-1873. S. W. Dorsey, 1873-1879.
The number of carpet-baggers in the senate in each Congress was as follows :
40th Congress — 10 42d Congress — 9 44th Congress — 6
41st Congress — 12 43d Congress — 8 45th Congress — 5

CARPET-BAGGERS IN UNITED STATES SENATE 163
group. Warner of Ohio, a graduate of a small college in that
state, went to Alabama in 1865 after being mustered out of ser
vice in the federal army. He was unhke his carpet-bag colleagues
in two respects — he owned property in Alabama when he became
senator, and he had held office in his native state, — in fact, his
seat in the Ohio legislature was hardly vacant before he presented
himself in Washington with credentials from Alabama.1 In Wash
ington his colleagues recognized him as far superior to the other
representatives from the Southern states. He was placed on the
important committee of finance and in the debates in the senate
conducted himself with dignity and good sense, and did not al
ways vote bhndly with the radicals. It was to his credit that the
successful wing of the RepubHcan party in Alabama, led by Spen
cer, his colleague, turned against him and refused to reelect him
when his term expired in 1871. The Democrats of Alabama were
less hostile to Warner than to any other prominent RepubHcan
in the state. Another sure sign of respectabihty was that he was
not compelled to leave Alabama after the restoration of home
rule, but remained there until 1890, where he was interested in
coal and iron industries.2 Warner and Sawyer of South Carolina
were the only carpet-baggers who gave evidence that they repre
sented the interests of the states which sent them to the senate.
Sawyer was by no means as able as Warner in practical pohtics,
though he was far above the average carpet-bagger in intelligence
and integrity. A Harvard graduate and school teacher in New
England, superintendent of the City Normal School of Charles
ton in 1859, a resident of the North during the war, collector of
internal revenue at Charleston in 1865 — this was his history
before he went to the United States senate. There he was
markedly conservative for a carpet-bagger; among other things
he introduced measures looking towards a more generous amnesty.
1 "Biographical Congressional Directory," p. 867; Report of Joint Select Com
mittee to inquire into the condition of affairs in the late insurrectionary states
[Kuklux Committee], Vol. VIII, pp. 33-34 ; Fleming, "Civil War and Reconstruc
tion in Alabama," p. 737.
2 Rept. Kuklux Committee, Vol. IX, p. 888 ; White, "Biographical Dictionary,"
Vol. X, p. 396.

164 STUDIES IN SOUTHERN HISTORY AND POLITICS
In South CaroHna in the factional fight among the Republicans
in 1872, Sawyer stood with the moderate and less corrupt wing of
the party.1
As Warner and Sawyer represented the better class of carpet
baggers, the most notorious of the other sort was WilHam Pitt
Kellogg, senator and sometime governor of Louisiana. His
chief claims to notoriety, however, rest on his spectacular career
in Louisiana. In 1872 he resigned from the senate to enter into
the fight-to-the-death conflict for the control of Louisiana, as the
candidate for governor of the party led by S. B. Packard, United
States marshal, and the federal office holders, against Governor
Warmouth and the state officials. Kellogg in the senate was a
staunch partisan of President Grant, and in Louisiana he and his
friends profited by Grant's use of United States troops. At the
close of the Reconstruction period in Louisiana, Kellogg, by il
legal measures, was returned to the senate, serving until 1883. In
the senate as a member of the committee on the Pacific Railroad,
Kellogg was in a position to serve his fellow carpet-baggers and his
land-grabbing constituents in Louisiana by pressing multitudinous
railway bills.2 The last of the carpet-baggers to cling to a seat
in the senate, Kellogg appeared as a sort of reHc of the chaos and
anarchy that went under the name of Reconstruction in the South.
George E. Spencer, of Massachusetts, Ohio, Iowa, Nebraska,
and Alabama, was typical of the carpet-baggers who used their
senatorial office for what they could get out of it, for themselves
and their friends. In 1872 he secured a reelection by the most
wanton corruption and daring manipulation of the Alabama legis
lature. With complete control over the patronage in Alabama,
the funds of the Mobile post-office and the internal revenue offices
at Mobile and Montgomery were his to command.3 It was men
of the type of Spencer, shrewd, vulgar, and unprincipled, that
'"Biographical Congressional Directory," p. 784; Reynolds, "Reconstruction
in South Carolina," p. 111.
2 Rhodes, "History of the United States," Vol. VII, pp. 109-112. See Congres
sional Globe, 41st and 42d Congresses, for various bills for land grants to railroads
introduced by Kellogg.
3 Fleming, "Civil War and Reconstruction in Alabama," pp. 737, 755-759.

CARPET-BAGGERS IN UNITED STATES SENATE 165
made the resources of the Southern states during the Reconstruc
tion period one huge jack-pot to be won by the player most expert
at cheating. Aside from voting and work on the outside, Spencer
was an inactive figure in the senate.
When Mississippi after a prolonged process of reconstruction
was allowed to choose representatives to the second session of the
41st Congress, two carpet-baggers appeared to represent her in
the senate, one of whom was a negro, the Rev. Hiram R. Revels,
the first of his race to win a seat in that body. The negrophiles
of the North looked upon the day when a black man should take
the place once occupied by Jefferson Davis as a red letter day in
the calendar of human progress. To make the tragic — or
comic — irony of the situation complete, they insisted that the
particular seat in which Mr. Davis had once sat should be assigned
to Revels, but to their chagrin the senator who held the seat re
fused to yield.1 Senator Wilson of Massachusetts presented the
credentials of Revels, and Senator Sumner, needless to say, did
not neglect the opportunity to pour forth his "flow of turgid
rhetoric." When the question of admitting Revels was before
the senate, the Massachusetts senator said — "All men are
created equal, says the great Declaration, and now a great act
attests its verity. To-day we make the Declaration a reaHty.
For a long time a word only, it now becomes a deed. For a long
time a word only, it now becomes a consummated achievement.
. . . — What we do to-day is not alone for ourselves, not
alone for that African race now fifted up; it is for all every
where who suffer from tyranny and wrong ; it is for all mankind ;
it is for God himself, whose sublime fatherhood we most truly
confess when we recognize the Brotherhood of Man." 2
Revels' colleague, Adelbert Ames, a brevet brigadier-general
in the army, was appointed provisional governor of Mississippi
in 1868. His only claim to citizenship in the state came from
his residence there as a military officer. His credentials as United
States senator were signed by Adelbert Ames, provisional gover-
1 Garner, "Reconstruction in Mississippi," p. 275, footnote.
2 Cong. Globe, 41st Cong., 2d Ses., p. 1567.

166 STUDIES IN SOUTHERN HISTORY AND POLITICS
nor.1 On the judiciary committee, to which the question of accept
ing his credentials was referred, the only member who supported
Ames was Rice, a carpet-bag senator from Arkansas.2 When the
question came to a vote, nine of the eleven carpet-baggers supported
their colleague from Mississippi.3
On the whole, the course of legislation in the senate in the 41st
and 42d Congresses was but sHghtly affected by these nineteen
members, either individually or collectively. None won distinc
tion in debate, some preferred a reputation for wisdom by silence,
and most of them were shelved on unimportant committees.
With few exceptions they took their stand firmly on the side of
the radical RepubHcans, and in 1870 and 1871 when the RepubHcan
ranks were spUt into hostile factions, they were found among the
administration supporters — for there lay patronage, the summum
bonum of their senatorial ambitions.
The first matter of legislation in which the carpet-baggers
played a part was the Fifteenth Amendment. It naturally be
hooved those whose senatorial existence depended on the votes
of their black constituents to raise their voices in behalf of the
rights of the negro. Their support was given almost unanimously
to the various propositions, more stringent than the resolution
finally adopted, which guaranteed to the negro the right to hold
office as well as the right to vote, and also those which safeguarded
the franchise against restriction on account of property, educa
tion, etc.4 The Amendment as finally agreed upon, containing,
as it did, no provision as to office holding, failed to satisfy the
senators from the South, though most of them voted to accept it.
On its final passage, however, three — Abbott of North CaroHna,
Sawyer of South CaroHna, and Spencer of Alabama — followed Sum
ner's example and refrained from voting.6 Willard Warner of
Alabama, the ablest and most experienced of the carpet-bag sena
tors, took an active part in the debate and offered a resolution
1 Cong. Globe, 41st Cong. 2d Ses., p. 2125 ; Garner, "Reconstruction in Missis
sippi," pp. 213-214, 275.
2 Globe, 41st Cong., 2d Ses., p. 2052. 3 Ibid., p. 2349.
4 Globe, 40th Cong., 3d Ses., pp. 1040 ; 1318. & Ibid., p. 1641.

CARPET-BAGGERS IN UNITED STATES SENATE 167
to safeguard from all possible infringement the right of the negro
to hold office and to vote. In support of his resolution he deHvered
an able speech, holding that the nationahzation of the suffrage
was an essential element of true democracy; it was not a mere
question of negro suffrage, but a necessary means of defending
the equahty of all citizens white and black, not excluding women.1
Other senators from the reconstructed states who spoke in favor
of the Fifteenth Amendment made their plea entirely for the down
trodden black man. Mr. Adonijah Welch, in a high-flown speech,
paid tribute to the negro race.2 Abbott of North CaroHna gave
his assent to the Amendment in a plain, unillumined speech, argu
ing that such a measure was both equitable and expedient, and
one fully sanctioned by the constitution.3 Sawyer of South Caro
Hna expressed his mind forcibly against the resolution eHminating
the right to hold office from the sphere of national protection. He
considered it a failure of the Republican party to safeguard the
just rights of the negro.4
On questions deaHng directly with the Southern states, senators
from those states voted steadily with the radicals against the
moderate RepubHcans. On the resolution of Oliver P. Morton
that Virginia, Texas, and Mississippi should be required to ratify
the Fifteenth Amendment as a prerequisite to readmission,
all the carpet-baggers voting, voted affirmatively, with the
exception of Sawyer, who frequently showed signs of conserva
tism.5 In 1870 the fight on the Georgia bill brought out clearly
the demarcation between the radicals and the moderates in regard
to further reconstruction in the South. There were several prop
ositions under consideration — one, the so-called Bingham
Amendment, to admit Georgia immediately, securing to the state
its right according to its constitution to hold an election in Decem
ber, 1870. The purpose was to thwart the scheme of General
B. F. Butler, acting under the beguihng influence of Governor
Bullock and his supporters from Georgia, to prolong the tenure
1 Ibid., pp. 861-862. » Ibid., pp. 980-981.
2 Ibid., pp. 981-982. 4 Ibid., p. 1629.
« Globe, 41st Cong., 1st Ses., p. 656.

168 STUDIES IN SOUTHERN HISTORY AND POLITICS
of the Georgia legislature two years beyond its ordinary term and
to continue the acting administration as provisional. It was a
matter of common knowledge that the Georgia governor and his
supporters were playing fast and loose with Georgia bonds in
Washington to secure support for their prolongation scheme.1
With this in mind it is significant that on every vote of importance
six of the carpet-bag senators, — Revels from Mississippi, Spencer
from Alabama, the two Florida and the two Arkansas senators — ¦
all stood firmly by the prolongation party, and three others, Warner,
Ames, and Abbott, voted for prolongation until it was apparent
that it could not carry. Sawyer and Kellogg were with the
moderates on this question.2
Revels, the negro senator from Mississippi, who was admitted
to his seat on February 25, 1870, took advantage of the opportu
nity offered by the Georgia bill to make his maiden speech on
March 16. The galleries were crowded with members of his race,
for notice had been given in the colored churches of Washington
that Senator Revels would speak. The Nation, in commenting on
this event, said it was "an incident with a good deal of pathos in
it, whatever the quahty of the speech may be, and however one
may wish, for the sake of his race, that he had fairly won his posi
tion, instead of being, as it were, flung into it." 3 Revels was
aware of the mighty significance of the moment when a .negro
should rise to speak in the place once occupied by Davis and
Toombs, and spoke in the consciousness that the ears of all his
race and of the Northern friends of equahty were open to him.
After a long preamble, in which he paid a glowing tribute to the
black race and denied the existence of any racial antipathy against
the whites, he announced his position as favoring the measure to
prolong the tenure of the Georgia legislature.4
The enforcement act of 1870 6 and the Kuklux bill of 1871 6
both brought out the full support of the carpet-bag senators.
1 The Nation, May 26, 1870; White, "Life of Lyman Trumbull," pp. 299-300.
2 Globe, 41st Cong., 2d Ses., pp. 2677, 2820, 2821.
3 Nation, March 17, 1870.
* Globe, 41st Cong., 2d Ses., pp. 1986-1988. « Ibid., p. 3809.
'Ibid., 42d Cong., 1st Ses., p. 831, and N. Y. Tribune, March 16, 1871.

CARPET-BAGGERS IN UNITED STATES SENATE 169
They Hkewise stood by Sumner in his various attempts to secure
the enactment of the supplementary civil rights bill to insure
to the negro equal rights in hotels, theaters, pubHc carriers, public
schools, etc.1
The real center of interest of every carpet-bagger — and in
that respect he was not very different from many of his older
colleagues of the senate — was the spoils of office. Under Lin
coln it had become customary to apportion the great body of
appointments among members of Congress of the party in power,
and under Grant this practice became more thoroughly systema
tized. RepubHcan members of the house controlled local appoint
ments in their respective districts, while to senators fell the allot
ment of offices for the state-at-large and to some extent of those
in the districts represented by Democrats. According to the
practice of "senatorial courtesy," nominations by the President
were referred to the senators of the state in which the office was
located. Thus United States senators became practicaHy the
distributors of all federal offices in their states.2 To the carpet
bagger with no understanding of important national questions,
with no deep-seated interest in the welfare of his adopted state,
and dependent as he was for his position as senator on returning
favors to those who favored him, the distribution of offices be
came the prime necessity of senatorial living. All the carpet-bag
senators from the Southern states showed an immediate interest
in the repeal of the tenure of office act in the first session of the
41st Congress, for with the act still in force Grant's hands were
tied and the Johnson appointees could chng to their offices while
loyal apphcants besought their carpet-bag friends in vain. In
the early part of Grant's administration the carpet-bag senators
showed resentment that they were ignored in the distribution of
offices and complained that patronage even in their own states
was in the hands of more influential senators from the East and
West.3 An opportunity to air their grievances came in April,
1 Ibid., 42d Cong., 2d Ses., p. 3736. Only two carpet-baggers voted in favor of
the amnesty act, passed May 21, 1872. Ibid., p. 3738.
2 Foulke, "Life of Oliver P. Morton," Vol. II, pp. 210-211 and footnote.
3 Nation, April 29, 1869.

170 STUDIES IN SOUTHERN HISTORY AND POLITICS
1869, when Senator Carpenter of Wisconsin introduced a resolu
tion providing that heads of departments should be required to
furnish information regarding offices and clerks in their depart
ments, from what states they were appointed and upon whose
recommendation. Abbott of North CaroHna was aroused immedi
ately to press the interests of the Southern representatives.
Regarding the position of senator as primarily that of office-
monger, he wished to make certain that the offices should be
apportioned among the states on the basis of population instead of
according to the relative importance of their senators to the ad
ministration. Hence he introduced the following amendment to
the resolution before the senate: "That in the opinion of the
senate the distribution of the official patronage of the government
not embraced in local offices in the states should be made as nearly
equal among all the states, according to their representation and
population, as may be practicable ; and that to confine such pat
ronage to particular states or sections, either wholly or partially,
is both unjust and injudicious." 1
That the new senators from the reconstructed states had been
ignored by the administration and by their colleagues, who were
responsible for the regime in the South that sent the carpet-bag
gers to Congress, is evident from the open expression of their
grievances. Senator Sawyer of South CaroHna, in speaking on
the Carpenter resolution, protested against the treatment of
himself and his fellows. The senators from the newly recon
structed states have no patronage, he said, and are told that they
represent nobody.2
The dissatisfaction of the carpet-baggers manifested itself
towards the end of 1869 by hostifity to the attorney-general,
E. Rockwood Hoar, who controlled the appointment of many
district attorneys and marshals in the Southern states. More
over, Judge Hoar had the reputation of being excessively unap
proachable to senatorial advisers. His rigid integrity and old-
fashioned notion that the pubhc service was for the benefit of the
pubHc instead of to reward partisans were constant sources of
1 Globe, 41st Cong., Extra Ses., p. 738. 2 Ibid., pp. 740-741.

CARPET-BAGGERS IN UNITED STATES SENATE 171
irritation to senators, Northern as well as Southern, who had a
throng of hungry office-seekers begging at their heels. The South
ern senators were aggrieved that their states did not get a fair
share of appointments in the department of justice, nor did the
judgments of the attorney-general and theirs always agree as to
the fitness of appHcants. Judge Hoar himself declared that he
had great difficulty in finding persons in the Southern circuit who
combined both abiUty and loyalty. "My situation," he said,
"was somewhat Hke that of the parish committee who went to a
divinity school in search of a minister, and were told by the presi
dent that the students fell readily into three classes, those who
had talents without piety, those who had piety without talents,
and those who had neither." l In December, 1869, when the new""
judiciary act provided for an additional justice of the Supreme
Court, President Grant sent to the senate the name of Judge Hoar.
In the judiciary committee, to which the nomination was referred,
Senator Trumbull alone supported the nomination. Rice of
Arkansas, a member of the committee, opposed the nomination
of Hoar with great vigor. But Rice's vote was natural, as no one,
said the Nation, expected high poHtic'al moraHty from carpet-bag
senators.2 The day after the hostile reception of Hoar's nomina
tion in the senate, Jacob D. Cox, secretary of the interior, wrote
to Judge Hoar from Washington that opposition to him was
evidently organized — a few Northern RepubHcans, all the South
ern senators, except Warner, together with the natural opposition
of the Democrats, made the majority against him.3 President
Grant stood firm in spite of the opposition in the senate, and re
fused to withdraw Judge Hoar's name ; so on February 3, 1870,
the nomination was formally rejected.4 The Southern senators
and others voting against Hoar objected to him ostensibly on the
ground that there was no judge on the bench from the South, and
that the appointee ought to reside in the Southern circuit over
1 Storey and Emerson, "Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar, A Memoir," p. 181.
2 Jan. 6, 1870.
3 Storey and Emerson, "Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar," p. 191.
* The New York Tribune, Feb. 4, 1870, says that Warner and Gilbert were the
only Southern senators in favor of Hoar.

172 STUDIES IN SOUTHERN HISTORY AND POLITICS
which he must preside. This was clearly but an excuse and not
a reason, for they did not reject Bradley, who was named in
Hoar's stead, though he was no more a resident of the Southern
circuit than Hoar was.1 Indeed, the carpet-baggers' insistence
on residence as "a prerequisite to governmental office was naively
comic. "It shows, too," said the Nation, "that the carpet-bag
gers, besides being unscrupulous, are unblushing. Decency re
quired them to try and cover up their treatment of Judge Hoar by
deaHng out the same measure to Mr. Bradley." 2
But the fight on the watch dog of the department of justice
was not ended with their rejection of his nomination to the Supreme
Court. The opportunity of the carpet-baggers came in connec
tion with President Grant's scheme to annex San Domingo. The
President exerted every influence at his command to overcome
the opposition of the senate, especially that of Sumner, chairman
of the committee on foreign relations. The Southern senators,
not particularly interested in national pohcies of any kind, but
always thirsting for patronage, were wilHng instruments in the
hands of the President. To further their interests the carpet
baggers demanded a place in the cabinet for the South. They
desired especially the office of attorney-general, since there in
particular lay the chief obstacle to the control of the offices. So
a bargain was struck — a Georgia man was appointed attorney-
general, which meant a greater share of patronage for Southern
senators, and they in turn were to support Grant's San Domingo
scheme.3 Apparently the terms of the compact were faithfully
observed on both sides.
Another element in the situation, the relation of the carpet-bag
senators to Sumner, is clarified in the account which Hoar's biog
raphers give.4 "It appears that some 'carpet-bag' senators
told the President that, while they would gladly please him, Mr.
Sumner had such controlhng influence over their colored constit-
1 Hoar, "Autobiography of Seventy Years," Vol. I, p. 306.
2 The Nation, March 31, 1870.
3 Storey and Emerson, "Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar," pp. 207, 210. This is
based on an account given by Jacob D. Cox in the Atlantic Monthly for Aug 1895
*Ibid., p. 211.

CARPET-BAGGERS IN UNITED STATES SENATE 173
uents that it was dangerous for them to oppose him on the San
Domingo question. They were disappointed in the help they
expected from the administration in the form of patronage to
smooth over^bpposition. ' Grant demanded to know by whom they ~"
were ignored. They repHed that it was the attorney-general,
and they requested that he be displaced by a Southern man."--'
Among the Southern negroes the name of Charles Sumner was
still one to conjure with. But it did not take the practical senators
from the South long to learn that in the senate of 1869 it was
more profitable to fine up with Morton and Conkfing and Cameron
than with the doctrinaire Sumner, who was frequently more
absorbed in some trifling matter of mere principle than in securing
the rewards of favoritism. So when the break came between
Grant and Sumner over the San Domingo question, which led to
the removal of Sumner from the chairmanship of the committee
on foreign relations by the caucus of RepubHcan senators, the
support of most of the carpet-baggers was given to the anti-
Sumnerites.1 From this time forth, the carpet-bag senators, real
izing that they could not serve two masters, chose Grant, and
with few exceptions they were ready to support the administra
tion. As was to be expected the Southern senators gave no support
to the movement of 1871 to reform the civil service, aneHn'1872
only two of their number voted for the appropriation to continue
the civil service commission.2
Next to the matter of patronage the activity of the Southern
senators was devoted to securing grants of pubhc lands to rail
roads, present and future : 1869 and the years following constituted
the period of railroad mania. With the completion of the Union
Pacific, six or eight other fines were projected to cross the continent
and as many more to traverse the country from North to South.3
1 Globe, 42d Cong., 1st Ses., p. 52. On the test vote in the senate four carpet
baggers refrained from voting against Sumner. In the caucus, on the motion to re
store the name of Sumner to the chairmanship, two carpet-baggers voted in favor,
Gilbert and Spencer. See N.Y. Tribune, March 10, 1871.
2 Globe, 41st Cong., 3d Ses., p. 292 ; 42d Cong., 2d Ses., pp. 1502, 1575.
3 The Nation, March 11, 1869.

174 STUDIES IN SOUTHERN HISTORY AND POLITICS
The project which most engaged the attention of the carpet-bag
gers was the Southern Pacific Railroad. A proposition to grant
lands to a transcontinental railway through Texas to Cafifornia
was fathered by Kellogg of Louisiana, warmly supported by
Spencer, Sawyer, and Warner in debate and by others by their
votes. Spencer tried to find cover under the Southern Pacific
bill for a grant of land to a local Alabama railway, while Kellogg
pushed the claims of a road from New Orleans to the terminus of
the transcontinental fine. Other carpet-baggers tried to secure
subsidies to various local railroad projects, on the ground that
they would be feeders for the Southern Pacific and so would serve
the national as well as local interests.! Senator Morrill of Ver
mont, growing impatient at these attempts of the Southern sena
tors, declared that if it were the pohcy of the senate to incorporate
on the Southern Pacific a hundred branches of local roads, he
would present the following proviso as a short cut to action:
"Provided, that anybody in any state may have power to build
a railroad from one spot to another spot, and shall have all the
lands adjoining, not claimed by any other railroad." 2 In addition^
to the Southern Pacific in which all the Southern senators cooper
ated, almost every carpet-bagger presented a long fist of bills to
secure subsidies to local railway corporations, existing or prospec
tive. Kellogg of Louisiana, occupying a favorable position as
member of the committee on the Pacific railroad, became a special
promoter of railway aid bills. McDonald and Rice of Arkansas
were both active in railway legislation, and so were Osborn of
Florida, Spencer of Alabama, and Abbott of North CaroHna.
These senators Hkewise exhibited an unusual readiness to press
private claims of their constituents. The roll of bills or resolu
tions introduced by the carpet-bag members in the 4lst and 42d
Congresses deal almost entirely with railroad grants and private
claims. The new members from the reconstructed states did not find
as warm a welcome as they expected from their RepubHcan col-
1 Globe, 41st Cong., 2d Ses., pp. 4719-4722, 4638, 4644.
2 Ibid., p. 4720-4721.

CARPET-BAGGERS IN UNITED STATES SENATE 175
leagues, who were so largely responsible for the conditions which
sent them to the senate. They found themselves on the defensive
and were forced more than once to justify their presence in a repre
sentative assembly.1 From the Democratic members they heard
taunts Hke the following flung at them : 2 "But few as we (Demo
crats) are, I thank God to-day that not one of us sits here thrust
into this senate by the bayonets of the standing army of the
United States over the breasts of a downtrodden and helpless
people." But expressions of contempt were not confined to the
other side of the chamber. Some of the older RepubHcan mem
bers occasionally expressed their disgust at the carpet-bag acces
sions from the South.3 So staunch a RepubHcan as Senator Wil
son of Massachusetts said on one occasion: "Mr. President, we
have been told, if I rightly understand the senator from South
CaroHna, that the 'natural leaders' of the South should come back
here. Well, sir, I shall not object to them. On the contrary, I
am growing a Httle stronger in the opinion that it would be well
for us to have some of them here." 4
In conclusion it may be said that the part played by the carpet
baggers in the United States senate was comparatively sfight in
respect to legislation of a truly national interest. Though at one
time they constituted nearly one-seventh of the senate, their domi
nance in number occurred at the time when the large Republican
majority in the senate Would not have been endangered, even had
their seats been filled by Democrats. Moreover, before the Liberal
RepubHcan movement of 1872 the anti-Grant RepubHcan faction
in the senate was so small and impotent that the carpet-baggers
even then did not hold the balance of power on important ques
tions. The general moral tone of Congress during Grant's adminis
tration was excessively low. With the settlement of the great
slavery issue and the achievement of the principle of nationafity,
1 See Ames's defense of the Carpet-bagger, Globe, 42d Cong., 2d Ses., App.,
pp. 393 el seq.
2 Globe, 41st Cong., 2d Ses., p. 1562. Casserly of California.
3 The Nation, Jan. 13. 1870.
* Globe, 41st Cong., 2d Ses., p. 335.

176 STUDIES IN SOUTHERN HISTORY AND POLITICS
the attention of Congress was devoted largely to matters of local
or personal interest, to the consideration of private bills, to land
grants to multitudinous railroad companies, etc. Even questions
of wider import were bound up with the poHtical fortunes of the
administration.1 In the senate of the 41st Congress and later,
men of statesmanship and disinterested pubhc vision, Hke Lyman
Trumbull, counted for Httle under the leadership of straight-out
party pohticians Uke OHver P. Morton and Simon Cameron.
The senate of 1869 was not therefore a suitable training school in
which to disciphne men Uke Spencer and Kellogg, who were un
principled and corrupt to begin with. On the other hand, the en
trance into the senate of such a large body of men, twelve at one
time, did much to encourage the growth of corrupt practices. In
general, the carpet-baggers stood together in support of the worse,
rather than the better, matters of legislation.
1 Merriam, "Life and Times of Samuel Bowles," Vol. II, pp. 87-88; Nation,
March 9, 1871.