View source for P. B. S. Pinchback

{{Short description|American politician (1837–1921)}}
{{redirect-distinguish|Pinchback|Pinchbeck (disambiguation){{!}}Pinchbeck}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| name         = P. B. S. Pinchback
| image        = P. B. S. Pinchback - Brady-Handy.jpg
| office       = 24th [[List of Governors of Louisiana|Governor of Louisiana]]
| term_start   = December 9, 1872
| term_end     = January 13, 1873
| predecessor  = [[Henry C. Warmoth]]
| successor    = [[John McEnery (Louisiana politician)|John McEnery]]
| office1      = 12th [[Lieutenant Governor of Louisiana]]
| governor1    = Henry C. Warmoth
| term_start1  = December 6, 1871<ref>Uncivil War: Five New Orleans Street Battles and the Rise and Fall of Radical Reconstruction by James K. Hogue</ref>
| term_end1    = January 13, 1873
| predecessor1 = [[Oscar Dunn]]
| successor1   = [[Davidson Penn]]
| birth_name   = Pinckney Benton Stewart
| birth_date   = {{birth date|1837|5|10}}
| birth_place  = [[Macon, Georgia]], U.S.
| death_date   = {{nowrap|{{death date and age|1921|12|21|1837|5|10}}}}
| death_place  = [[Washington, D.C.]], U.S.
| party        = [[Republican Party (United States)|Republican]]
| spouse       = Emily Hawthorne
| children     = 6
| education    = [[Straight University]] ([[Bachelor of Laws|LLB]])
| allegiance   = United States
| branch       = [[United States Army]] ([[Union Army]])
| serviceyears = 1862–63
| battles      = [[American Civil War]]
| rank         = [[Captain (United States O-3)|Captain]]
}}
'''Pinckney Benton Stewart Pinchback''' (May 10, 1837&nbsp;– December 21, 1921) was an American publisher, politician, and [[Union Army]] officer who served as the 24th [[governor of Louisiana]] from December 9, 1872, to January 13, 1873. Pinchback is commonly referred to as the first [[African Americans|African-American]] governor and the second lieutenant governor (after [[Oscar Dunn]]) in the United States. His recognition as the first African-American governor is disputed.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Brockell |first1=Gillian |title=The five Black governors who came before Maryland's Wes Moore |url=https://www.phillytrib.com/news/across_america/the-five-black-governors-who-came-before-marylands-wes-moore/article_d489973c-7b18-51a0-9d0b-b64fc3c9c529.html |website=The Philadelphia Tribune |date=19 January 2023 |access-date=6 March 2025}}</ref> Dunn served as acting governor for 39 days in 1871, more than a year before Pinchback served as acting governor, both temporarily replacing governor [[Henry C. Warmoth]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Mitchell |first1=Brian K. |title=Monumental |date=2021 |publisher=The Historic New Orleans Collection |isbn=978-0-917860-83-6 |pages=232–233 |edition=first |url=https://www.hnoc.org/publications/books/monumental}}</ref> A [[Republican Party (United States)|Republican]], Pinchback served as acting governor of [[Louisiana]] for 35 days, during which ten acts of [[Louisiana State Legislature|Legislature]] became law. He was one of the most prominent [[African American officeholders from the end of the Civil War until before 1900|African-American officeholder]]s during and following the [[Reconstruction Era]].

Pinchback was born [[Free Negro|free]] in [[Macon, Georgia]], to Eliza Stewart and her master, William Pinchback, a [[white people|white]] [[Plantations in the American South|planter]]. His father raised the younger Pinchback and his siblings as his own children on his large plantation in [[Mississippi]]. After the death of his father in 1848, his mother took Pinchback and siblings to the [[Slave states and free states|free state]] of [[Ohio]] to ensure their continued freedom. After the start of the [[American Civil War]], Pinchback traveled to [[Capture of New Orleans|Union-occupied]] [[New Orleans]]. There he raised several companies for the [[1st Louisiana Native Guard (Union)|1st Louisiana Native Guard]], and became one of the few African-Americans commissioned as officers in the Union Army.

Pinchback remained in New Orleans after the Civil War, becoming active in Republican politics. He won election to the [[Louisiana State Senate]] in 1868 and became the [[president pro tempore]] of the state senate. He became the acting [[Lieutenant Governor of Louisiana]] following the death of Oscar Dunn in 1871 and briefly served as acting governor of Louisiana after [[Henry C. Warmoth]] was [[Impeachment in the United States|impeached]]. After the contested [[1872 Louisiana gubernatorial election]], Republican legislators elected Pinchback to the [[United States Senate]]. Due to the controversy over the 1872 elections in the state, which were challenged by white Democrats, Pinchback was never seated in Congress.

Pinchback served as a delegate to the 1879 Louisiana constitutional convention, where he helped gain support for the founding of [[Southern University]]. In a Republican federal appointment, he served as the surveyor of U.S. customs of New Orleans from 1882 to 1885. Later, he worked with other leading African-American men to challenge the segregation of Louisiana's public transportation system, leading to the [[Supreme Court of the United States|Supreme Court]] case of ''[[Plessy v. Ferguson]].''{{Citation needed|date=January 2024}} To escape increasing racial oppression, he moved with his family to [[Washington, D.C.]], in 1892, where they were among the elite African-Americans. He died there in 1921.

==Early life==
Pinckney Benton Stewart was born free in May 1837 in [[Macon, Georgia|Macon]], [[Bibb County, Georgia|Bibb County]], [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]. His parents were Eliza Stewart, a former [[History of slavery in Georgia|slave]], and Major William Pinchback, a white planter and his mother's former master. William Pinchback, who also had a legal white family, [[Manumission|freed]] Eliza and her two surviving children in 1836; she had borne six children by that point and two had survived.<ref name="kerman15-18">[https://books.google.com/books?id=PD3jxWlrGpQC&q=Marjorie+Content Cynthia Earl Kerman, ''The Lives of Jean Toomer: A Hunger for Wholeness''], LSU Press, 1989, pp. 15–18</ref> She had four more children with Pinchback, all born into freedom under Georgia law because she was free.{{citation needed|date=December 2020}}

Pinckney Stewart's parents were of diverse ethnic origins. Eliza Stewart was classified as [[mulatto]] and had [[Ethnic groups of Africa|African]], [[Cherokee people|Cherokee]], Welsh and German ancestry. William Pinchback was ethnic European-American, of [[Scotch-Irish American|Scots-Irish]], [[Welsh American|Welsh]] and [[German American]] ancestry.<ref>Toomer, Turner (1980), p. 22</ref> Shortly after Pinckney's birth, his father William purchased a much larger [[Plantations in the American South|plantation]] in [[Mississippi]], and he moved there with both his white and mixed-race families.{{citation needed|date=December 2020}}

Pinckney Benton Stewart and his siblings were considered the "natural" (or illegitimate) children of their father, but they were brought up in relatively affluent surroundings. He treated them as his own, with privileges similar to the [[White people|white]] children on his plantation. In 1846, Pinchback sent the nine-year-old Pinckney and his older brother Napoleon north for education at a private academy,<ref name="kerman15-18"/> [[Gilmore High School]] in [[Cincinnati]], [[Ohio]].<ref name="Brough p. 453">{{Cite book |url=https://archive.org/details/ahistoryschools02shotgoog |title=A history of the schools of Cincinnati |last=Shotwell |first=John Brough |date=1902 |publisher=The School life company |pages=[https://archive.org/details/ahistoryschools02shotgoog/page/n491 453]–455 |language=en}}</ref> In 1848, when Pinckney was eleven, his father died.<ref name="kerman15-18"/>

Fearful that the other Pinchback relatives might try to claim her children as slaves, Eliza Stewart fled with the children to Cincinnati in the [[slave and free states|free state]] of Ohio. Napoleon, at 18, helped to keep the family together, but he broke down under the responsibility.<ref name="kerman15-18"/> At 12, Pinckney left school and began to work as a cabin boy on river and canal boats to help his family. For a while, he lived in [[Terre Haute, Indiana]], where he worked as a hotel porter. During that time, he still identified as Pinckney B. Stewart. He did not take his father's surname of Pinchback until after the end of the [[American Civil War|Civil War]].{{citation needed|date=December 2020}}

==Marriage and family==
In 1860, at the age of 23, Pinckney married Emily Hawthorne, a [[free people of color|free woman of color]].<ref name="kerman15-18"/> Like Stewart, she was "practically white" in appearance, meaning that she had a high proportion of European ancestors.<ref name="kerman15-18" /> They had six children: Pinckney Napoleon in 1863, Bismarck in 1864, Nina in 1866, and Walter Alexander in 1868. Two others died young. Pinckney named one son Bismarck because of his admiration for statesman [[Otto von Bismarck]] of Germany, whom he considered to be one of the world's greatest men. Pinckney's mother, Eliza Stewart, lived with Pinckney and his family from 1867 until her death in 1884.<ref name="Kerman 1989 p. 23">Kerman (1989), ''The Lives of Jean Toomer'', p. 23</ref>

They had a fine house in New Orleans. Usually, in the summer, the whole family traveled to [[Saratoga Springs, New York]], a resort town in upstate, where they would stay for several weeks. Pinchback liked to gamble on the [[horse racing]] held there during the summer season.<ref name="Kerman 1989 p. 23"/>

==Military service and Civil War==
The Civil War began the following year, and Pinckney Stewart decided to fight on the side of the Union. In 1862, he made his way to [[New Orleans]], which had just been captured by the Union Army. He raised several companies for the Union's all-black [[1st Louisiana Native Guards Regiment]], which was garrisoned in the city. A minority of the men were Louisiana [[free people of color|free men of color]], part of the educated class before the war who had participated in the state militia. Most of the Guards were former slaves, who had escaped to join the Union forces and gain freedom.<ref>Terry L. Jones (2012-10-19) [http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/19/the-free-men-of-color-go-to-war/ "The Free Men of Color Go to War"&nbsp;– NYTimes.com]. Opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com. Retrieved 2012-12-18.</ref>

Commissioned a [[captain (U.S. Army)|captain]], Stewart was one of the Union Army's few commissioned officers of African-American ancestry. Like Stewart, the officers were mostly of [[Multiracial|mixed]] race. Most of them were drawn from the class of free people of color in New Orleans established before the war; unlike him, they were usually of colonial French and African descent. He became Company Commander of Company A, [[2nd Louisiana Regiment Native Guard Infantry]], made up mostly of refugee slaves. (It was later reformed as the 74th U.S. Colored Infantry Regiment, of the [[United States Colored Troops]].)<ref>Hollandsworth 1995, p. 122.</ref>

Passed over twice for promotion and tired of the prejudice he encountered from white officers, Stewart resigned his commission in 1863. In a letter of April 30, 1863, his married sister Adeline B. Saffold wrote to him from [[Sidney, Ohio]], urging him to follow her example and enter the white world:<blockquote>If I were you, Pink, I would not let my ambition die. I would seek to rise and not in that class either but I would take my position in the world as a white man as you are and let the other go for be assured of this as the other you will never get your rights. ...<ref name="kerman15-18"/> </blockquote>

After the war, Stewart and his wife moved to [[Alabama]].{{citation needed|date=December 2020}}

P.B.S. Pinchback graduated in 1885 from [[Straight University]] (later renamed Straight College), which merged with New Orleans University to form Dillard University.

==Political career==
{{More citations needed section|date=April 2021}}
After the war in New Orleans, Stewart took his father's surname of Pinchback. He became active in the [[Republican Party (United States)|Republican Party]]. The exact moment Pinchback decided to enter politics is described by George Devol in his book ''Forty Years a Gambler on the Mississippi.''<ref>[https://archive.org/stream/fortyyearsgamble00devo#page/216/mode/2up George Devol, ''Forty Years a Gambler on the Mississippi''], p. 216.</ref> In 1867, Pinchback organized the Fourth Ward Republican Club in New Orleans soon after Congress passed the [[Reconstruction Acts]]. That year, he was elected as a delegate to the constitutional convention.{{citation needed|date=December 2020}}

In 1868 Pinchback was elected as a [[Louisiana State Senate|State Senator]]. He was elected as senate president ''[[pro tempore]]''; seven of 36 seats in the Senate were held by men of color. The House had 42 representatives of African-American descent, comprising half the seats. (At the time, the populations of African Americans, including former free people of color, and whites in the state were nearly equal.){{citation needed|date=December 2020}}<ref>{{Cite web |title=1870 Census Volume 1 |url=https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/decennial/1870/population/1870a-04.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241122000000/https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/decennial/1870/population/1870a-04.pdf |archive-date=November 22, 2024 |access-date=November 22, 2024 |website=census.gov}} [https://archive.org/details/1870-census-volume-1.-the-statistics-of-the-population-of-the-united-states Alt URL]</ref>

As Senate president pro tempore, in 1871, Pinchback succeeded to the position of acting [[Lieutenant Governor of Louisiana|lieutenant governor]] upon the death of [[Oscar Dunn]],<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.pbs.org/wnet/african-americans-many-rivers-to-cross/history/the-black-governor-who-was-almost-a-senator/|title=P.B.S. Pinchback. The Black Governor Who Almost Was a Senator|first1=Henry Louis|last1=Gates|date=November 7, 2013|publisher=PBS}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.wbrz.com/news/louisiana-creates-award-in-honor-of-former-la-governor-p-b-s-pinchback/|title=Louisiana creates award in honor of former La. governor, P.B.S Pinchback|website=WBRZ.org|date=June 6, 2021}}</ref> the first elected [[African-American]] lieutenant governor of a US state.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/03/us/history-refocused-oscar-james-dunn-reconstruction/index.html|title=The Capitol riot is an eerie repeat of this tense era in American history|first=Channon |last=Hodge|publisher=CNN|date=March 3, 2021}}</ref>

Pinchback contributed further to the political discussion with the founding of the bi-weekly newspaper, the ''[[Louisianian]]'' in 1870. He worked as an editor there until 1872. Later, in 1874, he returned to be editor and in 1878 he became editor-in-chief, though he allowed students from Straight University (later part of [[Dillard University]]). The paper's motto was "Republican at all times, and under all circumstances." Publication of the paper ended in 1882.<ref>{{cite web |title=The Louisianian, Semi-weekly Louisianian and The Weekly Louisianian |url=https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/essays/547/ |website=Library of Congress |publisher=Louisiana State University |access-date=22 April 2021 |ref=18}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=About The weekly Louisianian. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1872–1882 |url=https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83016632/ |website=Library of Congress |publisher=National Endowment for the Humanities |access-date=22 April 2021 |ref=19}}</ref>

He was appointed as director of the New Orleans public schools. Statewide public schools were established for the first time by the new state legislature during [[Reconstruction Era|Reconstruction]].<ref>Kerman (1989), ''The Lives of Jean Toomer'', pp. 19–20</ref> Pinchback had a long-standing interest in education of blacks and was appointed to the [[Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education|Louisiana State Board of Education]], where he served from March 18, 1871, until March, 1877.<ref name="Simmons1887">Simmons, William J., and Henry McNeal Turner. ''Men of Mark: Eminent, Progressive and Rising.'' GM Rewell & Company, 1887. pp. 759–781</ref>

===Ascension to Governorship===
In 1872, the legislature filed [[Impeachment in the United States|impeachment]] charges against the incumbent Republican governor, [[Henry Clay Warmoth]], over disputes over certifying returns of the disputed gubernatorial election, in which both Democrat [[John McEnery (Louisiana politician)|John McEnery]] and Republican [[William Pitt Kellogg|William Kellogg]] claimed victory. Trying to support a centrist fusion government at a time of divisions among Republicans, Warmoth had supported his appointed return board, which certified McEnery as winner. Republicans opposed this outcome and appointed their own returns board, which certified Kellogg. The election had been marked by violence and fraud.
Pinchback rose to acting governor in Warmoth's stead by way of article 53 of the Louisiana Constitution of 1868, which held that the lieutenant governor would assume the duties of the governor "in case of impeachment of the Governor, his removal from office, death . . . resignation or absence from the state."<ref>[https://hdl.handle.net/2027/loc.ark:/13960/t9w10bd3n Louisiana Constitution of 1868].</ref> Pinchback was the [[List of African-American U.S. state firsts|first governor of African descent]] to be sworn into office in the history of the United States, though [[Oscar Dunn]] served as acting governor of Louisiana more than a year before Pinchback.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Mitchell |first1=Brian |title=Monumental: Oscar Dunn and His Radical Fight in Reconstruction Louisiana |date=2021 |publisher=The Historic New Orleans Collection |location=New Orleans |isbn=978-0-917860-83-6 |pages=232–233 |url=https://hnoc.org/publishing/books/monumental}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/january-13th-1990-first-elected-black-governor-in-u-s-takes-office/|title=Jan. 13th, 1990: First elected black governor in U.S. takes office|publisher=CBS News|date=13 January 2016 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.nga.org/governor/pinckney-benton-stewart-pinchback/|title=Pinckney Benton Stewart Pinchback|date=14 January 2008 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.pbs.org/wnet/african-americans-many-rivers-to-cross/history/the-black-governor-who-was-almost-a-senator/|title=P.B.S. Pinchback. The Black Governor Who Almost Was a Senator|first1=Henry Louis|last1=Gates|first2=Jr &#124; Originally posted on The|last2=Root|publisher=[[PBS]] |date=November 7, 2013}}</ref> He took the oath as acting governor on December 9, 1872, and served for about six weeks, until the end of Warmoth's term.<ref name=Cowan>{{cite book|pages=107–108|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Y-0-kmu4vk0C&pg=PA107|title=Louisiana Governors: Rulers, Rascals, and Reformers|isbn=9781934110904|last1=Cowan|first1=Walter Greaves|last2=McGuire|first2=Jack B|date=2008-08-01| publisher=Univ. Press of Mississippi }}</ref> No trial was held, and after his term ended all charges were expunged.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2020-01-13 |title=Henry Clay Warmoth |url=https://www.nga.org/governor/henry-clay-warmoth/ |access-date=2024-11-23 |website=National Governors Association}}</ref>

At a national convention of African-American politicians in 1872, Pinchback had a public disagreement with [[Jeremiah Haralson]] of Alabama. [[James T. Rapier]], also of Alabama, submitted a motion that the convention condemn all Republicans who had opposed President [[Ulysses S. Grant]] in that year's election.<ref>See [[1872 United States presidential election]] for more information about that election</ref> Haralson supported the motion, but Pinchback opposed it because Senator [[Charles Sumner]] of Massachusetts would have been condemned for opposing Grant. Pinchback admired Sumner as a lifelong anti-slavery fighter.{{citation needed|date=December 2020}}

===1870s congressional elections===
After his brief period in executive office, Pinchback remained active in politics and public service in Louisiana. From 1868, campaigns and elections in Louisiana were increasingly marked by Democratic violence. Historian George C. Rable described the [[White League]], a [[paramilitary]] group started in 1874, as the "military arm of the Democratic Party."<ref>George C. Rable, ''But There Was No Peace: The Role of Violence in the Politics of Reconstruction'', Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1984, p. 132</ref> The paramilitary group used intimidation and violence to suppress black voting and run Republicans out of office.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Foner |first=Eric |title=Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution |publisher=[[HarperCollins]] |year=2014 |isbn=978-0-06-235451-8 |edition=Updated |pages=550–551 |language=en}}</ref>

As an outcome of the controversial 1872 election, four U.S. seats from Louisiana were also contested, including Pinchback's seat in the [[at-large]] position. In early 1873, both the Republican William Kellogg-allied state legislators, who had a minor majority, and the Democrat John McEnery-allied legislators elected U.S. Senators. Pinchback was elected by the Republicans and presented the Senate with his credentials. The Democratic candidate also presented credentials. As the 1872 gubernatorial contest had involved the national government, Congress was initially reluctant to assess these issues. The contested claim was not settled for years, at a time when Democrats controlled Congress.{{citation needed|date=December 2020}}

Holding out for the Senate seat, Pinchback decided not to take the House seat even though Congress was inclined to seat him while the contest of the election was decided. The 45th Congress (1877–1879), which finally decided the issue, had a Democratic majority and voted against Pinchback. The Senate awarded him compensation of $16,000 for his salary and mileage after his protracted struggle to take his seat.<ref name="leslie">[https://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/40582942?uid=3739744&uid=2129&uid=2134&uid=20405288&uid=2&uid=70&uid=3&uid=20405280&uid=3739256&uid=60&sid=21103743117767 Kent Anderson Leslie and Willard B. Gatewood Jr. "'This Father of Mine ... a Sort of Mystery': Jean Toomer's Georgia Heritage"], ''Georgia Historical Quarterly'' 77 (winter 1993)</ref> The House also ruled against him, but not until the last day of Congress.<ref>{{cite web |title=Two House Members Served for Only One Day |url=https://history.house.gov/Historical-Highlights/1851-1900/hh_1875_03_03_served_congress_one_day/ |access-date=4 January 2023}}</ref>

In his memoir of Reconstruction, former Louisiana governor [[Henry Clay Warmoth]] wrote that the federal government was reluctant to seat people representing the Kellogg-Pinchback faction. He had a personal interest, as he had been forced out of Louisiana after allying with white conservatives in the 1872 election certification.<ref name="intro">[https://books.google.com/books?id=8-fSEhsUmCwC Henry Clay Warmoth, ''War, Politics, and Reconstruction: Stormy Days in Louisiana'', "Introduction" by John C. Rodrigue], Univ of South Carolina Press, 1930/2006</ref> Historian John C. Rodrigue notes that the Committee on Elections was dealing with its own internal issues. It had accepted Pinchback's claim to the House seat, but he was holding out for the Senate seat. Complications arose after the Democrats took control of the next Congress and upheld election of his opponent.<ref name="intro"/>

Overall, the mid-to-late 1870s marked an acceleration of the reversal of the political gains that African Americans in Louisiana had achieved since the end of the Civil War. In 1877, Democrats fully regained control of the state legislature after the withdrawal of federal troops, as a result of a national Democratic compromise marking the end of Reconstruction. Republican blacks continued to be elected to state and local offices, but elections were accompanied by violence and fraud. Most blacks were totally [[disfranchisement after Reconstruction era (United States)|disfranchised]] by a new state constitution in 1898 and were effectively excluded from politics for decades.{{citation needed|date=December 2020}}

Pinchback served as a delegate to the 1879 state constitutional convention; he and two other Republican African-American delegates, [[Theophile T. Allain]], and [[Henry Demas]], were credited with gaining support to establish [[Southern University]], a [[Historically black colleges and universities|historically black college]] in [[New Orleans]], which was chartered in 1880. Pinchback was appointed as a member of Southern University's board of trustees (later redesignated the board of supervisors). The college relocated to the capital, [[Baton Rouge]], in 1914.<ref>[[Southern University at New Orleans]], now under the same Board of Supervisors as [[Southern University]] and part of its statewide system, was developed later.</ref> At the [[1876 Republican National Convention]] in Cincinnati, Pinchback gave a speech seconding the nomination of [[Oliver P. Morton]] for the presidency.<ref>[[David Saville Muzzey]], [https://archive.org/details/jamesgblainepoli0000muzz/page/106/mode/1up?view=theater ''James G. Blaine: A Political Idol of Other Days'', p.106], Dodd, Mead & Co., 1934. Muzzey described Pinchback, without explanation, as "disreputable." ''Ibid.''</ref> Pinchback was a delegate to the [[1880 Republican National Convention]].<ref name="Simmons1887"/>

In 1882, the national Republican administration appointed Pinchback as surveyor of [[United States Customs Service|customs]] in New Orleans, a politically significant position in which he served until 1885.<ref name=Ingham>{{cite book|pages=560–562|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TTha3NavN-sC&pg=PA562|title=African-American Business Leaders: A Biographical Dictionary|isbn=9780313272530|last1=Ingham|first1=John N|last2=Feldman|first2=Lynne B|year=1994| publisher=Greenwood Publishing }}</ref> It was his last political position.

==Later life==
In 1885, Pinchback studied law in New Orleans at [[Straight University]], a [[historically black college]] later known as [[Dillard University]]. He was admitted to the Louisiana [[bar (law)|bar]] in 1886, but he never practiced.<ref name=Ingham/>

Pinchback moved with his family to [[Washington, D.C.]], in 1892. Wealthy from his positions and settlement on the Senate seat, he had a large mansion built off Fourteenth Street near the Chinese embassy.<ref name="leslie"/> At the time, his oldest son, Pinckney Pinchback, was established as a pharmacist in Philadelphia; the younger three ranged in age from 22 to 26 and were still living at home.<ref>Kerman (1989), ''The Lives of Jean Toomer'', p.24</ref> The Pinchback family was part of the [[mixed-race]] elite in Washington; people in the group had generally been free before the Civil War and often were educated and had acquired property. The ''[[Washington Post]]'' covered Pinchback's housewarming reception and his many high-ranking guests.<ref name="leslie"/>

Later, Pinchback worked for a time in New York as a [[United States Marshals Service|U.S. Marshal]].<ref name=Ingham/>

By his death in 1921 in Washington, D.C., Pinchback was little known politically.<ref name=Ingham/> His body was returned to New Orleans, where he was interred in [[Metairie Cemetery]].

==Legacy==
Pinchback and his wife Nina were the maternal grandparents of [[Jean Toomer]].<ref name="leslie"/> Their daughter Nina Pinchback Toomer returned to live with her parents after her husband abandoned her when Jean was an infant. They helped raise him, and he started school in Washington, D.C.. After his mother remarried, they moved to New Rochelle, New York. He returned to his grandparents after his mother died in 1909, and went to high school at the academic M Street School. As an adult, Toomer became a poet and writer who was prominent as a modernist in New York during the [[Harlem Renaissance]].{{citation needed|date=December 2020}}

==See also==
* [[List of African-American officeholders during Reconstruction]]
* [[List of African-American United States representatives]]
* [[List of African-American United States senators]]
* [[List of African-American United States Senate candidates]]
* [[List of minority governors and lieutenant governors in the United States]]
* [[Military history of African Americans in the American Civil War]]
* [[David Paterson]]
* [[Deval Patrick]]
* [[Douglas Wilder]]

==References==
{{reflist|30em}}

==Further reading==
* Dray, Philip. ''Capitol men: the epic story of Reconstruction through the lives of the first Black congressmen'' (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2010).
* Grosz, Agnes Smith, "The Political Career of Pinckney Benton Stewart Pinchback," ''Louisiana Historical Quarterly'', XXVII (1944)
* Haskins, James. ''Pinckney Benton Stewart Pinchback''(New York: Macmillan, 1973)
*{{Cite book|author=Hollandsworth, James G. |title=The Louisiana Native Guards: The Black Military Experience During the Civil War |publisher=[[Louisiana State University Press]] |location=Baton Rouge |year=1998 |isbn=0-8071-2336-6 }}
*{{cite book |last=Patler |first=Nicholas |title="The Startling Career of P.B.S. Pinchback: A Whirlwind Crusade to Bring Equality to Reconstructed Louisiana," pp 211-233, in Matthew Lynch, ed., Before Obama: A Reappraisal of Black Reconstruction Era Politicians |publisher=Praegar Publishing |location=Santa Barbara, CA |year=2012 |isbn=978-0-313-39791-2}}
* ''Pinckney Benton Stewart Pinchback Papers,'' Manuscript Department, Moorland-Spingarm Research Center, Howard University, Washington, D.C., 3 includes "Here under the protecting care" speech quoted by Nicholas Lemann in ''Redemption: The Last Battle of the Civil War''
* [http://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/simmons/simmons.html#p759 ''Men of Mark: Eminent, Progressive and Rising'', by Rev. William J. Simmons, D. D., President of the State University, Louisville, Kentucky (1887)]
*[[David Paterson|Paterson, David]] "Black, Blind, & In Charge: A Story of Visionary Leadership and Overcoming Adversity."Skyhorse Publishing. New York, New York, 2020
*{{Cite book |author1=Toomer, Jean |author2=Turner, Darwin T. |title=The Wayward and the Seeking: A Collection of Writings by Jean Toomer |publisher=[[Howard University Press]] |location=Baton Rouge |year=1980 |isbn=0-88258-014-0 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/waywardseekingco0000toom }}

==External links==
{{Commons category}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20080110153652/http://www.sos.louisiana.gov/tabid/383/Default.aspx State of Louisiana&nbsp;– Biography]
*[http://www.la-cemeteries.com/Governors/Pinchback,%20Pickney%20Benton%20Stewart/Pinchback,PickneyBentonStewart.shtml Cemetery Memorial] by La-Cemeteries

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{{s-off}}
{{s-bef|before=[[Oscar Dunn]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[Lieutenant Governor of Louisiana]]|years=1871–1872}}
{{s-aft|after=[[Davidson Penn]]}}
|-
{{s-bef|before=[[Henry C. Warmoth]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[List of Governors of Louisiana|Governor of Louisiana]]|years=1872–1873}}
{{s-aft|after=[[John McEnery (Louisiana politician)|John McEnery]]}}
{{s-end}}

{{Governors of Louisiana}}
{{Lieutenant Governors of Louisiana}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pinchback, P. B. S.}}
[[Category:1837 births]]
[[Category:1921 deaths]]
[[Category:19th-century Methodists]]
[[Category:African-American Methodists]]
[[Category:African-American politicians of the Reconstruction era]]
[[Category:African-American state governors of the United States]]
[[Category:African-American state legislators in Louisiana]]
[[Category:African Americans in the American Civil War]]
[[Category:Law enforcement officials from New York (state)]]
[[Category:Methodists from Louisiana]]
[[Category:American people of German descent]]
[[Category:American people of Scotch-Irish descent]]
[[Category:American people of Welsh descent]]
[[Category:Republican Party governors of Louisiana]]
[[Category:Lieutenant governors of Louisiana]]
[[Category:Louisiana lawyers]]
[[Category:Republican Party Louisiana state senators]]
[[Category:People from Macon, Georgia]]
[[Category:People of Louisiana in the American Civil War]]
[[Category:People of the African Methodist Episcopal church]]
[[Category:Politicians from Cincinnati]]
[[Category:Politicians from New Orleans]]
[[Category:Straight University alumni]]
[[Category:19th-century United States Marshals]]
[[Category:Union army officers]]
[[Category:African-American candidates for the United States Senate]]
[[Category:19th-century members of the Louisiana State Legislature]]