"George Washington Murray"(September 22,1853-April 21,1926)

Was born into slavery in South Carolina,became educated and worked as a teacher,farmer and politician.After serving as a chairman of the Sumter County Republican Party,he was elected in the 1890s as a United States Congressman from South Carolina.He was the African American member in the 53rd & 54rd Congresses,and the last to be elected from South Carolina for nearly 100 years.Convicted of forgery in 1905 and sentenced to three years'hard labor in what he said was a discriminatory trial (with an all white jury),George moved to Chicago.He was pardoned in 1915 by South Carolina governor,Coleman Blease.In Chicago,George became active in the Republican Party.He lectured on race relations and his political career and published two collections of speeches.He died of a heart stroke.George was born into slavery on a cotton plantation near Rembert,Sumter County,South Carolina in the Piedmont.His parents; names are not known,and they died during the war.He had brothers Prince and Frank.George did not have formal schooling as a boy,but had learned to read & write and even taught from 1871-1874.He entered the University of South Carolina at Columbia in 1874 when it was opened to African American students by the Republican-dominated legislature.With the end of the Reconstruction ere in 1877 and regaining of power by white Democrats in the state legislature,they and the administration force African American students out of the college.George completed his education at the State Normal Institution at Columbia,a historically African American College.Education was an urgent need and a high calling among the freedman,and George taught school for fifteen years in Sumter County.He also invented some agricultural technology.He married Ella.They divorced in 1905 after he decided to flee to Chicago rather than served sentenced of hard labor resulting from a discriminatory trial.George gradually became active in local organizing and politics,playing an important role in the development of the Republican Party in the state.He was elected as chairman of the Sumter County Republican Party.George was a delegate at several Republican National Conventions.During the 1870s and 1880s,as White Democrats regained power in the legislature following violence and election fraud,he and other African American leaders struggled to resist electoral changes that disfranchised African American voters.In 1882 the legislature passed a requirement for an "eight-box ballot" ,which made voting more confusing.While voters were given instructions by white registrars,but African Americans voters were not and had more ballots disqualified.As a result,following the charges,the percentage of turnout dropped sharply among African Americans in George's district up to 1890.George had become involved with the Republican Party after rising as a leader in organizing for the Colored Farmers Alliance (CFA),a movement to gather political support among African American farmers,which started in South Carolina about 1889.Together with the organizing of religious and civics groups,the CFA was part of the rise of African American Populism,and followed the organizing of the Colored Workers Alliance in the state in 1886-1887;both efforts started with local organizing,with men often meeting secretly late,at night,as whites opposed their efforts to gain betters wages and improve the electoral system.Due to a roundup of members and interrogation,the CWA was essentially suppressed in 1887,White militias patrolled at night to reduce meetings of African Americans,the efforts of African Americans continued.George began to rise as a leader in the CFA and because of his eloquence,was appointed as a state lecturer.Under the Republican administration,George was appointed as a federal inspector of customs at the port of Charleston,South Carolina, serving 1890-1892.While white and African American populists struggled to create a third party in the state,he gained the Republican nomination from the African American "shoestring district (name for its shape) and was elected to the US Congress in 1892.He defeated the previous incumbent Thomas Ezekiel Miller,for the Republican nomination.George represented South Carolina's 7th congressional district in the Fifty-third Congress (March 4,1893-March 3,1895).He became known as the "Republican Black Eagle"for his speech against a proposed law in 1893 to remove federal inspectors from polling spaces,and recounted his own problems with harassment and discrimination in voting.Due to redistricting,George ran in South Carolina 1st congressional district in 1894.He lost the popular vote to William Elliott,a white Democrat,he successfully contested the election,due to numerous cases of voter fraud in several precincts that discriminated against African American.The case against took nearly until the end of the first Congressional session to be decided in his favor,George was seated and served in the Fifty-fourth Congress from June 4,1896 to March 3,1897.He was absent from his seat in part of the second session,as he was trying to combat political troubles in the state.In 1895-1896 Democratic legislators in South Carolina forced through a new state constitution that effectively disfranchised African American,by making changes to residency requirements,requiring literacy tests,poll taxes and $300 property requirement.George and other African Americans South Carolina politicians protested and brought national attention to the issues by publishing the address "To the People of the U.S.,"in July 1896 in the New York World,asking for national support for federal intervention in the South Carolina elections.The constitution was ratified.Virtually no African Americans voted in the 1896 election.In February 1897,George returned to Congress as a "lame duck."He wanted to gain a Congressional investigation in to South Carolina's disfranchising of its African American citizens;he intended to object to South Carolina's nine electoral votes in the 1896 presidential election (which had all gone to the Democratic candidate).He had a petition signed by hundreds of South Carolina Republicans,and asserted that more than 100,000 eligible African American voters had been disfranchised from 1896 election;therefore,the state should not have had nine electoral votes.Fearful of potential effects on the apparent victory by the Republican William McKinley,Republicans did not want to disrupt the electoral vote count.George acceded to their request to drop his objection but continued to call for a federal investigation.Congress adjourned on schedule in March without acting on his request.At the time,such constitutional changes passed US Supreme Court reviews.Voting for African Americans in South Carolina was  reduced almost totally for more than half a century,until passage of federal civil rights legislation in the 1960s.Excluded from voting,African Americans were so disqualified from serving on juries or running for local office.They lost all formal political power.George return to his farm.He invested in land in Sumter County,which he leased to African American tenant farmers.In 1903,he was charged with forging names on lease agreements,a matter which he said was related to a contract dispute between tenants.He was convicted in 1905 by an all-white jury and sentenced to three years hard labor.His appeal failed.In Chicago,George sold life insurance and real estate.In 1908 he married Cornelia Martin,who brought a daughter Gaynell to the marriage.Together in the 1920s,they adopted a 10-year old boy,Donald;they also fostered numerous children.George died in Chicago, Illinois.The eulogy was given by his neighbor John Roy Lynch,who had served as a U.S. Representative from Mississippi.He is buried in Lincoln Cemetery.