This group of mixed race plantation owners who finally subdued the 'bush' outlaws and whose descendants by the time of the Civil War had become some of the wealthiest and most politically influential figures of Georgia, the Carolinas, Kentucky and Tennesee - were of the same ethnic stock. The matrimonial alliances of one branch of the Gibson clan, for example, were contracted almost exclusively with congressional, senatorial and gubernatorial families of these southern states. Senator Gibson of Louisiana and the founder of Tulane University was a scion of this family.
A subsequent observation Maxwell Brown made caused me almost as much excitement as my discovery of this deep dark secret surrounding the African strain in the genealogy of our Southern aristocracy. For in this episode of Southern history can be heard some of the earliest drumbeats of the oncoming American Revolution. As a part of the campaign the Gibsons mounted demanding the government restore law and order, they further alienated the British colonial office by witholding their taxes. Hardly a dozen years or so earlier than the Revolution, it was they who started the famous chant, "no taxation without representation," which would gather momentum through the rest of the states and finally culminate in this country's great War of Independence.
It is undoubtedly due to local memories of families like the Gibsons and the Pendarvises that when, at the turn of the century, the one drop or "any amount whatsoever ascertainable" definition of "negro" was being adopted by a majority of the Southern states, the South Carolina Legislature in 189S decided not to follow suit. During the discussion on the floor, one of the members pointed out that were such a law enforced, too many descendants of those who had served during the civil war would not be allowed to marry into white families of the same social standing they had long presumed themselves to be. The Legislature finally settled on one eighth or more of African ancestry as their definition of who was Negro. Prior to this decision, South Carolina as well as most other Southern states, had usually ruled in questions of racial identity that if an individual looked white and acted white then he or she was legally white. Virginia, for instance, would not adopt the "one drop" law until the 1920s
Page: Year: 1880; Census Place: Washington, Washington, District of Columbia, District of Columbia; Roll: 122; Family History Film: 1254122; Page: 345B; Enumeration District: 39; Image: 0696.
Text: Birth date: abt 1835Birth place: KenResidence date: 1880Residence place: Washington, Washington, District of Columbia, District of Columbia, United States
Page: Year: 1880; Census Place: Washington, Washington, District of Columbia, District of Columbia; Roll: 122; Family History Film: 1254122; Page: 345B; Enumeration District: 39; Image: 0696.
Text: Birth date: abt 1835Birth place: KenResidence date: 1880Residence place: Washington, Washington, District of Columbia, District of Columbia, United States
Residence
Residence:
Date: 1880
Place: Washington, Washington, District of Columbia, District of Columbia, United States
Page: Year: 1880; Census Place: Washington, Washington, District of Columbia, District of Columbia; Roll: 122; Family History Film: 1254122; Page: 345B; Enumeration District: 39; Image: 0696.
Text: Birth date: abt 1835Birth place: KenResidence date: 1880Residence place: Washington, Washington, District of Columbia, District of Columbia, United States
Burial
Burial:
Place: Lexington Cemetery, Lexington, KY
Note
Note: Randall Lee Gibson graduated from Yale College in 1853 and was
valedictorian of his class. He was a Brigadier General, C.S.A. during
the Civil War and represented Louisiana in Congress and in the United
States Senate after the War. His biography from the [UL:Biographical
Directory of the American Congress:UL] follows:
GIBSON, Randall Lee, 1832-1892
Years of Service: 1883-1892
Party: Democrat
GIBSON, Randall Lee, a Representative and a Senator from Louisiana;
born September 10, 1832, at Spring Hill, near Versailles, Woodford
County, Ky.; was educated by a private tutor at °Live Oak,® his
father®s plantation in Terrebonne Parish, La.; graduated from Yale
College in 1853 and from the law department of the University of
Louisiana (later Tulane University), New Orleans, La., in 1855;
traveled in Europe for several years; engaged in planting until the
outbreak of the Civil War; enlisted in the Confederate Army in 1861
and served until 1864, when he was promoted to brigadier general;
after the war was admitted to the bar and practiced in New Orleans,
La.; resumed agricultural pursuits; served as administrator of the
Howard Memorial Library, trustee of the Peabody Fund, Regent of the
Smithsonian Institution, and as president of the board of
administrators of Tulane University, New Orleans, La.; unsuccessful
candidate for election in 1872 to the Forty-third Congress; elected as
a Democrat to the Forty-fourth and to the three succeeding Congresses
(March 4, 1875-March 3, 1883); elected as a Democrat to the United
States Senate in 1882; reelected in 1889 and served from March 4,
1883, until his death at Hot Springs, Ark., December 15, 1892;
interment Lexington Cemetery, Lexington, Ky.
Bibliography
American National Biography; Dictionary of American Biography;
McBride, Mary. °Senator Randall Lee Gibson and the Establishment of
Tulane University.® Louisiana History 28 (Summer 1987): 245-62; U.S.
Congress. Memorial Addresses for Randall Lee Gibson. 53rd Cong., 2nd
sess. 1893-1894. Washington, D.C: Government Printing Office, 1894.
Sources
↑ Died in office, vacant December 15, 1892 – December 31, 1892 when successor elected.
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DNA Connections
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