The experience of North Carolina with fusion government was a reminder of the Reconstruction days. The Republicans had dilated upon "local self-government" and the Populists had swallowed the bait. The Legislature changed the form of county government, by which the board of county commissioners had been named by the justices of the peace, and made the board elective. This turned over to the blacks counties in which several of the largest towns in the State were situated. Negro politicians were chosen to office, and lawlessness and violence followed. In Wilmington there was an uprising of the whites, who took possession of the city government by force. The Legislature was again Democratic in 1898 and began to prepare an amendment which should disfranchise a large proportion of the 125,000 negro voters of the State. There was coöperation between the Republican and Populist organizations again in 1900, but too many Populists had returned to their former allegiance. The restrictive amendment, of which more will be said presently, was carried by an overwhelming majority at the special election in the summer, and at the regular election in November the Democratic ticket was chosen by an overwhelming majority. The fusion of 1896 and the rising prices of agricultural products killed the Populist party in the South, but the influence of the movement remains to this day. It has had some effect in lessening political intolerance, for those of the Populists who returned to the Democratic party came back without apology, while others have since classed themselves as Republicans. The Populist attitude toward public education was on the whole friendly, and more money has since been demanded and expended for public schools. Perhaps the greatest effect of the Populist movement was the overthrow of the old political organizations. In some States a few men had ruled almost by common consent. They had exerted a great influence upon legislation--not by use of the vulgar arts of the lobbyists, but by the plea of party advantage or by the prophecy of party loss. They had given their States clean government and cheap government, but nothing more. A morbid fear of taxation, or rather of the effects of taxation upon the people, was their greatest sin. The agrarian movement took them unawares. They were unable to realize that between the South of 1890 and another, older South, there was a great gap. They could not interpret the half-coherent speech of the small farmer, who had come to feel that he had been wronged and struck out blindly at those whom he had previously trusted. New and unknown men appeared in Washington to take the place of men whose character, ability, and length of service had made them national figures. The governorship of the States went to men whose chief qualifications seemed to be prominence in the affairs of the Alliance or else bitter tongues.