ning
system, and the churches. By the spring of 1866, the Negroes were widely
organized under this leadership, and it needed but slight change to
convert the Negro meetings into local councils of the Union League.* As
soon as it seemed likely that Congress would win in its struggle with
the President the guardians of the Negro planned their campaign for the
control of the race. Negro leaders were organized into councils of
the League or into Union Republican Clubs. Over the South went the
organizers, until by 1868 the last Negroes were gathered into the fold.

* Of these teachers of the local blacks, E. L. Godkin,
editor of the New York Nation, who had supported the
reconstruction acts, said: "Worse instructors for men
emerging from slavery and coming for the first time face to
face with the problems of free life than the radical
agitators who have undertaken the political guidance of the
blacks it would be hard to meet with."

The native whites did not all desert the Union League when the Negroes
were brought in. Where the blacks were most numerous the desertion of
whites was general, but in the regions where they were few some of
the whites remained for several years. The elections of 1868 showed a
falling off of the white radical vote from that of 1867, one measure of
the extent of loss of whites. From this time forward the order consisted
mainly of blacks with enough whites for leaders. In the Black Belt the
membership of native whites was discouraged by requiring an oath to the
effect that secession was treason. The carpetbagger had found that he
could control the Negro without the help of the scalawag. The League
organization was soon extended and centralized; in every black district
there was a Council; for the state there was a Grand Council; and for
the United States there was a National Grand Council with headquarters
in New York City.

The influence of the League over the Negro was due in large degree to
the mysterious secrecy of the meetings, the weird initiation ceremony
that made him feel fearfully good from his head to his heels, the
imposing ritual, and the songs. The ritual, it is said, was not used
in the North; it was probably adopted for the particular benefit of the
African. The would-be Leaguer was informed that the emblems of the
order were the altar, the Bible, the Declaration of Independence, the
Constitution of the United States, the flag of the Union, ce