Biographical Sidebar:
James L. Alcorn

Elected governor in 1869, Alcorn appointed many white Democrats to office and opposed civil rights legislation.

Black leaders and "carpetbaggers" became disaffected from his administration.

Alcorn resigned in 1871 to take a seat in the U. S. Senate.

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Two years later, alarmed by blacks' increasing political assertiveness, he ran again for governor, this time with Democratic support. He was defeated by Adelbert Ames.

After Blanche K. Bruce, who had served as sergeant of arms of the Mississippi State Senate and a county sheriff and tax collector, was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1874, Alcorn, then the state’s senior senator, refused to escort Bruce to his swearing-in. Roscoe Conkling, a New York senator, took Bruce to the ceremony.