Congress thereupon took upon itself the work of Southern reconstruction. The extreme gravity of the situation as it affected the Negro lay in the political solidity of that section with its one-party governments in which he was denied a voice. His freedom could not long survive such a combination of Southern race prejudice and passion and political power as constituted at that time the solid South and its one-party governments. They were then and they continue to be the greatest obstacle to the freedom and advancement of the Negro as an American citizen. They signalized their first entrance upon the stage of national affairs by an attempt to create a serf class out of their former slaves. When I say that they constitute the greatest obstacle to the freedom and advancement of the Negro, I mean, of course, the greatest obstacle outside of the Negro himself. For I take it that no race that possesses intelligence, industry and character, coupled with unity of purpose and action can be kept forever out of its rights and in a backward state even by the American white people, accomplished as they are in this species of national wickedness, unless they intend to reverse the wheel of their progress and to retrograde in free institutions and civilization. Against Southern political solidity and its one-party governments Congress directed its reconstruction measures. With the dissolution of this solidity and the introduction of bi-party in place of one-party governments the Republican leaders looked for the passing of the danger to Northern sectional supremacy and the freedom of the Negro. The freedmen were utilized at this juncture to effect the necessary changes in the Southern situation which the exigency demanded. He was first raised to citizenship, and when that proved inadequate to meet the emergency, he was invested with the right to vote on equal terms with the whites. This great constitutional revolution in the status of the Negro laid the basis for a political revolution in the old slave states also. The solid South was dissolved for the nonce and two-party governments made their re-entrance upon the stage of Southern affairs. There followed prompt repeal of the reactionary legislation hostile to the Negro, which had signalized the rise to power of the solid South and its one-party governments. The North received its share likewise of the gains incident to this revolution in the increase of its partisan strength in both branches of the National Legislature, and which in turn confirmed its political domination in the Union.