h comments
as in his judgment the occasion and circumstances warranted.

Was the enfranchisement of the black men at the South by act of Congress
a grave mistake?

Were the reconstructed State Governments that were organized as a result
thereof a disappointment and a failure?

Was the Fifteenth Amendment to the Federal Constitution premature and
unwise?

An affirmative answer to the above questions will be found in nearly
everything that has been written about Reconstruction during the last
quarter of a century. The main purpose of this work is to present the
other side; but, in doing so, the author indulges the hope that those
who may read these chapters will find that no extravagant and
exaggerated statements have been made, and that there has been no
effort to conceal, excuse, or justify any act that was questionable or
wrong. It will be seen that the primary object the author has sought to
accomplish, is to bring to public notice those things that were
commendable and meritorious, to prevent the publication of which seems
to have been the primary purpose of nearly all who have thus far written
upon that important subject.

But again, the question may be asked, if the reconstructed State
Governments that were organized and brought into existence under the
Congressional Plan of Reconstruction were not a disappointment and a
failure, why is it that they could not and did not stand the test of
time? The author hopes and believes that the reader will find in one of
the chapters of this book a complete and satisfactory answer to that
question.

It will be seen that the State of Mississippi is made the pivotal one in
the presentation of the facts and historical points touched upon in this
work; but that is because Mississippi was the field of the author's
political activities. That State, however, was largely typical, hence
what was true of that one was, in the main, true of all the other
reconstructed States.

The author was a member of Congress during the settlement of the
controversy between Hayes and Tilden for the Presidency of the United
States, resulting from the close and doubtful election of 1876,--a
controversy that was finally decided through the medium of the
Electoral Commission. The reader will find in the chapter on that
subject many important facts and incidents not heretofore published.

Why was it that the able and brilliant statesman from Maine, James G.
Blaine, died, as did Henry Clay, withou