CHAPTER X.CARPETBAG AND NEGRO RULE.
The Southern States reconstructed by Congress were subject for periods of varying length to governments designed by radical Northerners and imposed by elements thrown to the surface in the upheaval of Southern society.

Georgia, Virginia, and North Carolina each had a brief experience with these governments; other States escaped after four or five years, while Louisiana, South Carolina, and Florida were not delivered from this domination until 1876.

The states which contained large numbers of Negroes had, on the whole, the worst experience.

Here the officials were ignorant or corrupt, frauds upon the public were the rule, not the exception, and all of the reconstruction governments were so conducted that they could secure no support from the respectable elements of the electorate.
The fundamental cause of the failure of these governments was the character of the new ruling class.

Every state, except perhaps Virginia, was under the control of a few able leaders from the North generally called carpetbaggers and of a few native white radicals contemptuously designated scalawags.