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1866 Tennessee State Convention of Colored People

In August of 1866, a group of African Americans came together in Nashville, TN to form the states second Convention of Colored People, to discuss civil rights during reconstruction.

Origins of the Convention

The states second State Colored Convention was created a year after the end of the Civil War and a month after Tennessee's return to the Union. After the Tennessee General Assembly had passed laws giving African Americans the right to make contracts, acquire property, to sue, and to have equal rights and protection under the law, accept the right to vote, a group of black men gathered together in Nashville to help make change in the state. The convention brought together many black leaders, whose goal was to urge the states legislature to pass laws giving more freedom to African Americans.

Convention Leadership

Illustration showing Samuel Lowery's Supreme Court bar admission.

Tennessee State Capitol in Nashville

There were many black leaders that helped set up the convention this year in Nashville. Some of these men being Sampson Keeble, Nelson G. Merry, Samuel Lowery and his father Peter Lowery, and many others.

Sampson W. Keeble (1833-1887) was an African American barber, businessman, and politician who would go on to become the first black Tennessean to serve in the states council. This being a Representative of Davidson County in the 38th Tennessee General Assembly.

Nelson G. Merry (1824-1884) was an African American minister who was born into slavery and eventually freed after being baptized and employed by the church. He would go on to become Nashville's first ordained African American minister.

Samuel R. Lowery (1830 OR 1832-1900) was an African American preacher and silk industry worker who helped organize churches and spread the gospel around the American South and Ontario, Canada.

Convention Outcomes

One of the highlights of this convention was that there would be organized protests at the state Capitol to urge for the passage of law that allowed black men to vote. This would eventually end up working in March of 1867, when the Tennessee General Assembly granted African American men the right to vote and to have political positions. Though women weren't allowed to vote until many decades later. This lead too many African Americans holding positions in government. Within six months of the General Assembly decision, Nashville had elected an African American to the city council and would have six black councilmen and a city alderman, a year later. Sampson Keeble would also go on to be a representative in the Tennessee General Assembly from 1873-1874.

See Also

Colored Conventions Movement

African Americans in Tennessee

External Links

Colored Conventions Project

Preliminary Bibliography

Chicago Style Cited Sources

“The Colored State Convention at Nashville.” Colored Conventions Project Digital Records.

Thomas, Waud, Alfred R., Stephens, Taylor Henry L., James E., Hoover, Crane, White, and Elizabeth. “The African American Odyssey: A Quest for Full Citizenship Reconstruction and Its Aftermath.” Reconstruction and Its Aftermath - The African American Odyssey: A Quest for Full Citizenship | Exhibitions (Library of Congress), February 9, 1998.

A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation: U.S. Congressional Documents and Debates, 1774 - 1875.

Lovett, Bobby L. "Memphis Riots: White Reaction to Blacks in Memphis, May 1865-July 1866." Tennessee Historical Quarterly 38, no. 1 (1979): 9-33.

Lauder, Kathy. "Chapter 130 and the Black Vote in Tennessee." Middle Tennessee Journal of Genealogy & History 24, no. 2: 1-6.

African American Legislators. Accessed March 5, 2020. https://sharetngov.tnsosfiles.com/tsla/exhibits/blackhistory/keeble.htm.