suffrage in Louisiana,
repeating that he held it better to extend to the more intelligent
colored men the elective franchise, giving the recently emancipated a
prize to work for in obtaining property and education.[106] The
Convention tried in vain to declare what constituted a Negro, giving
it up in disgust. It did abolish slavery in general; granted suffrage
to those whites who were loyal to the government; and to colored men
according to educational and property qualifications. In 1865, the
Thirteenth Amendment was ratified and the body adjourned.

The culmination of the fight between the Democrat and the Radical was
in the struggle over the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment in July,
1866. An attempt was made to re-open the Constitutional Convention of
1864.[107] The delegates, who favored the reopening of the convention,
formed in the streets of New Orleans, and proceeded to march to the
famous Mechanics Hall, the scene of almost every political riot in
the history of the city. The paraders became involved in a brawl with
the white spectators; the police were called in; and the colored
members of the convention and their white sympathizers fled to the
hall where they attempted to barricade themselves. A general fight
ensued, and over two hundred were killed.[108] The effect of this riot
was electrical, not only in Louisiana but in the North, where it was
construed as a deliberate massacre, and an uprising against the United
States Government by the unreconstructed Louisianians.[109]

Efforts were made to bring about changes satisfactory to all. In 1867,
Sheridan, in charge of the department of Louisiana, dismissed the
board of aldermen of New Orleans, on the ground that they impeded the
work of reconstruction and kept the government of the city in a
disorganized condition. He appointed a new board of aldermen, some of
whom were men of color, and in the next month this council appointed
four assistant recorders, three of whom were colored, and two colored
city physicians. In this month, September, 1867, the first legal
voting of the colored man under the United States Government was
recorded, that being their voting for delegates to the Constitutional
Convention of 1868.[110]

This body proved to be an assemblage of ardent fighters for the rights
of the factions they represented. Pinckney Benton Stewart Pinchback
proposed the adoption of the Civil Rights Bill, and the abolition of
separate schools. In the conve