Bibb County GaArchives Photo Tombstone.....Long, Jefferson Franklin ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/gafiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: James W. Allen jallen46@cox.net July 16, 2005, 2:38 pm Cemetery: Linwood Cemetery Name: Jefferson Franklin Long Date Of Photograph: June 25, 2005 Photo can be seen at: http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/bibb/photos/tombstones/linwood/long6618ph.jpg Image file size: 97.8 Kb Jefferson Franklin Long "Commonly knows as Jeff Long" "United States Congressman" "A Member of the House of Representatives 41st Congress 1870-1871 b: 3 March 1836 d: 4 February 1901 Additional Comments: Lynwood Cemetery is the resting ground for many esteemed former black citizens of Macon, Georgia. Within its boundaries there lie a great number of people who filled a variety of different occupations during their lifetime, but one in particular stands out. In the following except, we will follow the life of Jefferson Franklin Long, and what led up to him becoming the first black American congressman from Georgia. Jefferson Franklin Long was born into slavery in Knoxville, Crawford County, Georgia on March 3, 1836. He was the son of a black slave mother and a white father, undoubtedly his mother's owner. Long's earlier years are hazy and personal information on his childhood is scarce. From the information available, it became evident that he was self-educated; whatever free time he found between his chores was spent studying how to read and write. This in itself is impressive and implies that from an early age Long was determined to better his situation. At some point in Long's childhood, his owner decided to move from Knoxville to Macon. Apparently Long's owner was skilled in the trade of tailoring, the making and repairing of custom clothing, and eventually Long picked up on the trade. By the end of the Civil War in 1865, Long had managed to start a thriving tailoring business in the downtown Macon area, somewhere near the Cotton Avenue and Cherry Street intersection. Even more surprising, the business attracted mostly a small array of wealthy white clientele, and mnay of his clients were known to travel from other areas to seek his service. The business specialized in exotic European fabrics, but it offered anything from custom-made suits to simple laborers clothing. The business was so prosperous, in fact, it gave Long the financial freedom he needed to become active in politics. He could not pull off this feat alone, however, and ended up entrusting his tailoring business to his oldest son, Jefferson Long, Jr., while he was out performing his political duties. Long jump-started his career in 1867 after becoming active in an organization known as the Georgia Equal Rights Association, which soon after changed its name to the Georgia Education Association. This organization's primary function was to "protect and advance the interests of freedom", in the State of Georgia. In 1869, Long served on the state Republican central committee for the first time. Then, in October of that year, he served as Chairman of a Macon convention organized to raise solutions that dealt with problems raised before freedmen of the city. Some of the main topics discussed in this meeting were the creation of a public school system for freedmen, and an improvement in the working conditions of black American laborers and tenant farmers. One of the proposals was the fixation of some sort of minimum wage salary-thiry dollars a week for men, fifteen dollars a week for women- for laborers in the area. Ever since Georgia's readmission into the Union in 1868, it had become a trend, just like in the rest of the newly readmitted Southern States, for reconstruction loyalists to nominate black American candidates for both local and statewide positions in office. Several key positions in both the local and state governments had already been filled by black candidates before Long really came into the picture. Given Long's recently-earned prestigious political standing among the black community, it is simple to understand how appealing he might have been to the Reconstruction government of Georgia. In December of 1870, congressional elections were held for two sets of representatives-one set was elected to serve the third and final session of the Forty-First Congress, and another set to servet he full upcoming term of the Forty-Second Congress, which was set to convene in March of 1871. A vacancy opened up in the ballot when a candidate by the name of Samuel F. Gove, representing the Fourth Congressional District of Georgia, was proven ineligible t run for the brief congressional term. Long was soon after nominated to fill the vacant seat. Long won the election by a landslide- he received a whopping 900 votes over his opponent, a Caucasian Democrat from is District. Jefferson Long was sworn into office on January 16, 1871, making him the first black American representative to Congress from Georgia, and the second from the United States in general, Joseph H. Rainey of South Carolina being the first. Even though the term in which he had to work was so short-it lasted from January to March of 1871- Long was determined to at least attempt to raise some of the troubling issues he had to deal with in his home state. On February 1, 1871, Long delivered the first speech ever to be delivered by a black American on the floor of Congress. In his speech, he raised an opposition to a bill that would alter the requirements of former Confederates seeking a restoration of their right to hold public offices. In Long's opinion, all this bill would accomplish would be the strengthening of "secret intimidation societies," as he called them, and would ultimatley promote future acts of violence. He pointed out some of the outrageous conditions in Georgia, such as nighttime murders of Reconstruction supporters, the loss of jobs and poor treatment of Union loyalists, and the beating and harassment of federal officials, as support for his arguments. He closed his speech by asking whether "those responsible for the crimes should be allowed to hold office." Despite his efforts the bill passed in the House 118 to 90 votes, and soon thereafter President Grant allowed it to become law without his signature. Less than a month after his speech, Long's term expired, and he returned to Georgia, where he continued to campaign for the Republican party. He was never re-elected to Congress, and actually did not seek to be re-elected. He did continue to attend state Republican conventions, however, and was actually nominated as a delegate to three national conventions in the following years; he was elected from the Fourth Congressional District in both 1872 and 1876, and was actually nominated statewide in 1880. Long's later years were mostly spent in his home in downtown Macon. He contracted a strand of flu sometime during the final years of his life and never recovered. He passed on February 4, 1901 at the age of 64. Even though it seemed as if Long's term in Congress as well as some of his other political efforts made a significant change in the electorial behavior of the South, it was not until the mid-1970's that black American candidates began to reappear on ballots. Nevertheless, Jefferson Long's life marked an important period of time in the post Civil War America. The above except was taken from the "Climbing the Hill" booklet of Pleasant Hill Neighborhood sons and daughters by the students at Mercer University. This particular excerpt was taken from the article written by Brandon Hall. It is not written in the exact verbage he wrote in certain instances. File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/ga/bibb/photos/tombstones/linwood/long6618ph.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.poppet.org/gafiles/ File size: 8.2 Kb