This text is part of the Teaching Hard History Text Library and aligns with Key Concepts 5 and 6 and Essential Knowledge 15 and 20.
Do you know who Barack Obama is? You probably know he is the first black president of the United States. He was elected president in the year 2008.
Now, do you know who Hiram Rhodes Revels is? He was the first black senator in the United States. He was elected senator from Mississippi in the year 1870!
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When Hiram Rhodes Revels was born, in the 1820s, slavery was still legal. All across the South, enslaved people were forced to work for their enslavers. They had no freedom, and they were not paid for their work. Hiram and his parents were not enslaved, but that does not mean their lives were easy.
People who supported slavery said racist things to make slavery seem less bad. They said black people were not as good as white people. They tried to prevent black people from having equality. One way they did this was by stopping black people from going to school.
As a young man, Hiram went to school anyway. His teacher was a woman who had been enslaved. She taught Hiram so well he went to college. Colleges in the South would not teach black people, so Hiram traveled to Illinois and Indiana. He went to college. Then he became a minister. Then he was the principal of a high school for black students. But everything changed when the Civil War started.
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During the Civil War, Hiram was a minister for Union soldiers. He encouraged others to join the army and fight to help enslaved people get freedom. After the Union Army won the war, the United States changed the constitution. It became illegal to enslave people. Hiram and his family moved to New Orleans and then to Mississippi.
Because he was a minister, Hiram got to know a lot of people. Many of them had been enslaved before the war. They told Hiram about their lives. They told Hiram about the help they needed getting houses and schools and jobs after a lifetime of enslavement.
Hiram decided to try to help. He ran for state senate, and he won! He wrote a friend and said, “We are excited and working hard to help Mississippi become a just place for everyone.”
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Hiram was not a state senator for very long before people saw how good he was at his job. His training as a minister made him a good speaker. Before long, it was time to choose someone to go to the U.S. Senate to represent Mississippi. And Hiram was just the man for the job.
On January 20, 1870, Hiram Rhodes Revels was elected to the U.S. Senate. Although many people liked Hiram, others did not. People who had argued for slavery did not want Hiram, a black man, to be their senator. They tried many tricks to make Hiram lose his job. But Hiram did not give up. One month later, he was sworn in as a national senator for Mississippi.
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The first black senator fought for the rights of all people. He fought to be sure everyone freed from slavery had a chance to go to school and have a job and be safe. He spoke out when people in Georgia lost their jobs for being black.
When his term ended in March of 1871, Hiram went back to Mississippi. The people who argued for slavery changed the laws, and they made things much harder for black people in the South. But Hiram kept fighting for equality. Eventually, he became the first president of Alcorn College.
Hiram Rhodes Revels worked hard his entire life for people to get equal access to education and happiness. As a senator, religious leader and educator, he fought for equality—a fight that still continues today.