treated in J.A.C. Chandler's _Representation in Virginia_, and _The
History of Suffrage in Virginia_; J.P. McConnell's _Negroes and their
Treatment in Virginia from 1865-1867_; H.J. Eckenrode's _The Political
History of Virginia during Reconstruction_; and C.C. Pearson's _The
Readjuster Movement in Virginia_.

The author makes a survey of the situation prior to the Civil War,
explaining why the aristocratic Virginians long since accustomed to
rule even by excluding the poor whites from the electorate could not
tolerate the enfranchisement of the Negroes. An effort is made also to
show that inasmuch as most of the Northern States prior to the Civil
War had not accepted Negro suffrage, it was natural for the southern
people to be opposed to such a policy. To strengthen this point he
refers to such authorities as Oliver P. Morton, Governor Andrew and
Abraham Lincoln.

The author considers the Negro a failure in politics and supports his
contention by a quotation from George W. Murray, who felt that it was
the mistake of the nineteenth century to attempt to make the ex-slave
a governor before he had learned to be governed and of Booker T.
Washington who said, "There is no doubt but that we made a mistake at
the beginning of our freedom of putting the emphasis on the wrong end.
Politics and the holding of office were too largely emphasized almost
to the exclusion of every interest."

Since the Negro has been eliminated, the author seems to rejoice that
the races in Virginia now work together in harmony and are friends. He
believes that this relationship will continue only so long as no
exterior factor disturbs the equilibrium and concludes with a
quotation from John Sharp Williams who feels that "It will be well
that wise men think more, that good men pray more and that all men
talk less and curse less." If the author really intends to set forth
the views of such radicals as John Sharp Williams as those upon which
the races may expect to cooeperate in the South, he might have added
his recent pronunciamento that "when it comes to maintaining the honor
of a white woman the South respects no law human or divine."

These observations are sufficient to establish the idea of the book.
The Negro during the Reconstruction period was a failure. The white
man who has been restored to absolute power so as to establish social
ostracism, segregation and lynching is a success. In other words, the
whole study is from the white man's