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c h a p t e r s e v e n THE REDEEMER’S CARNIVAL 1874–1877 BBB You have I suppose heard of our short but decisive little fight on Monday evening last. . . . Ask Ruff what he thinks of the blood thirsty braves now. —J. C. Murphy to Flora Murphy, 1874 T The long series of failures that had dogged white conservative political efforts since 1872 had, by the start of 1874, finally convinced New Orleans moderates to once and for all abandon notions of their independence from the Democratic Party. Nowhere was this state of affairs more evident than among the commercial men of Rex. “Xariffa,” Rex’s poet laureate, kept his majesty’s subjects apprised of their sovereign’s travels when he was not parading down St. Charles Avenue. She noted that he had pared down on luggage, after observing sarcastically that “a carpet-bag was enough to take to New Orleans.” Through Xariffa, the men of Rex bitterly recounted the electoral struggle that had enveloped Mardi Gras of 1873: And others, whose united plans, Were laid the King to overthrow, Seize the throne and scepter at one blow, Tear off the crown from Rex’s head, And plant it on Grant’s brow instead. “Well well,” said Rex, “This thing is racy,” “We see it all, Collector Casey,” “Bribed these, my lords, last Mardi Gras,” “To make a king of his brother-in-law.”1 William Pitt Kellogg’s greatest political accomplishment may have been that he finally provided the Redeemers with an enemy that they almost universally T h e R e d e e m e r’s C a r n i va l 161 despised. Outrage over his ascendancy spilled outside of Louisiana’s borders, touching off congressional investigations and nationwide editorial condemnation . President Grant’s indecisive meddling on behalf of his brother-in-law’s political cronies in the Custom House also undermined Kellogg’s legitimacy and fanned the flames of discontent both at home and in the nation at large. Even as 1874 began, some conservatives, including E. John Ellis, still looked toward these outside forces to reverse the election’s outcome—however unlikely that might be. At the same time, few could ignore the growing mayhem that swept over many of Louisiana’s rural parishes in the spring of 1874. Such chaos had made possible the flowering of the White League, a political movement with wide-reaching implications. During a late-April 1874 meeting at the Opelousas courthouse in St. Landry Parish, those present drafted resolutions that led to the formation of the first White League. When the white men of St. Landry published their racially charged manifesto in the Opelousas Courier, it was clear that their goal was white supremacy in its most strident form. The League quickly spread across the state, traveling through networks of commerce and kinship. When the Committee White League of Opelousas brought the movement to neighboring St. Martin Parish, for instance, it asked a leading St. Martinville resident, Alexandre DeClouet , to speak at the inaugural rally. There, DeClouet described a sinister Republican plot to turn the black man against the white. In familiar rhetoric, he claimed, “The credulity and the ignorance of the colored man has been made an instrument of ambitious, intriguing men.” Further, he asserted that “a trashy list of little tyrants,” including Warmoth, Kellogg, Longstreet, and Badger, had actively helped blacks plot against white Louisianans. The militaristic White League was going to serve as a first line of defense against this imagined threat.2 What constituted a local chapter of the White League varied considerably from parish to parish, both in organizational structure and in ideological stance. Some groups merely renamed their old conservative political clubs White League, while others underwent a more thoroughgoing reorganization, taking on a strongly militaristic character. Although many White League chapters railed against the black franchise, others took a paternalistic stance on race. Many accepted resolutions of an entirely local character and reflected partisan divisions that rarely extended beyond the parish lines. In most instances, however, the White League harnessed the social authority of the parish’s emergent conservative white elite, men who had blood ties to both the Confederate cause and the more prominent families of the region. The most common themes echoed by the various White Leagues were the belief that conservative whites had for too long been their own [18.191.132.194] Project MUSE (2024-04-20 16:54 GMT...

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