On this day in 1879, Louisiana voters ratified a new state Constitution. The document closed the door on the Reconstruction era, when radical Republicans held political sway throughout much of the South. It also reorganized Louisiana’s judiciary and moved the state capital from New Orleans to Baton Rouge.
In 1898, the white Democratic Legislature enacted yet another Constitution, aimed at further disenfranchising blacks through provisions such as poll taxes, stiff residency requirements and literacy tests. Between 1812 and 1921, Louisianans revised and passed new constitutions 10 times.
In 1896, there were 130,334 black voters on the rolls, about the same number as white voters. By 1900, when the state’s population was 47 percent African-American, there were only 5,230 registered black voters. White Democrats established one-party rule, which they maintained well into the 20th century.
In 1812, nine years after the ratification of the Louisiana Purchase, Louisiana became the nation’s 18th state. Three years later, Andrew Jackson, a future two-term president, successfully defended Louisiana’s chief port in the Battle of New Orleans. Over the next 30 years, the rise of steamboats and King Cotton made New Orleans the fourth busiest port in the world.
Louisiana, situated at the mouth of the Mississippi-Missouri river system, was home to Native Americans for 16,000 years prior to European settlement. Spanish explorers were the first Europeans to enter Louisiana, but the French were the first to colonize it. In 1682, Robert Cavelier de La Salle, a French explorer, claimed the region for France.
During the 1750s and ’60s, French Canadians from Acadia, who had settled in what are now the Maritime Provinces, sought refuge in Louisiana after being ousted by the British. Their descendants, known as “Cajuns,” remain a major cultural influence in southern Louisiana.
SOURCE: U.S. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS