Almost immediately after the uprising passed, not just the city of Wilmington, but rather the entire state of North Carolina enacted laws that began the Jim Crow era and rescinded all of the progressive statutes passed under the Reconstruction government. The fact that only one major massacre was required to activate this change demonstrates just how high the tensions were boiling. The election of 1900 passed quickly and ended with an overwhelming Democratic win, mainly because blacks and other Fusion party members were too terrified to vote. The Republican party even severed its ties to black voters, understanding the danger that would arise if they continued to support them. As a result, Democrats now held control over the state on every level from the governor’s office to the city mayor (Umfleet, 224). Now that they had taken a state, they proceeded to burn the vestiges of Reconstruction to the ground and rebuild the state on a foundation of pure white
Almost immediately after the uprising passed, not just the city of Wilmington, but rather the entire state of North Carolina enacted laws that began the Jim Crow era and rescinded all of the progressive statutes passed under the Reconstruction government. The fact that only one major massacre was required to activate this change demonstrates just how high the tensions were boiling. The election of 1900 passed quickly and ended with an overwhelming Democratic win, mainly because blacks and other Fusion party members were too terrified to vote. The Republican party even severed its ties to black voters, understanding the danger that would arise if they continued to support them. As a result, Democrats now held control over the state on every level from the governor’s office to the city mayor (Umfleet, 224). Now that they had taken a state, they proceeded to burn the vestiges of Reconstruction to the ground and rebuild the state on a foundation of pure white