Turner, Benjamin Sterling

March 17, 1825
March 21, 1894

Born into slavery near Weldon, North Carolina, congressman and merchant Benjamin S. Turner was taken by his owner, a widow, to Alabama when he was five. Allegedly taught by his owner's children to read, Turner was sold when he was twenty. His new master permitted him to hire his own time. As a result, Turner became a successful merchant and ran a thriving livery stable. After the Civil War he ran an omnibus company and accumulated property in Selma, Alabama.

Turner became involved in local politics, serving as a tax collector for Dallas County and later on the city council of Selma. In 1870 he was easily elected to Congress. While he never addressed the floor, two of Turner's eloquent speeches were read into the Congressional Record. One speech called for a refund of the cotton tax levied on the South, which Turner claimed was economically crippling to blacks and whites alike. The other, much less controversial, proposed federal grants to help rebuild government buildings in Selma destroyed by the war.

Turner was generally loyal to the Republican Party, almost always voting the party line on such issues as education, the test oath, and civil rights. A proponent of reconciliation, Turner also urged amnesty for ex-Confederates. In 1872 Turner faced freeborn African American Philip Joseph for the nomination. Both candidates ran anyway, split the vote, and the Democrat won. In March 1873, Turner returned to Alabama and his business. Although he participated in Republican conventions, he never again ran for office. After losing much of his fortune during the recession in the 1870s, he returned to farming and died in Alabama in 1894 in relative poverty and obscurity.

See also Entrepreneurs and Entrepreneurship; Free Blacks, 1619–1860; Politics in the United States

Bibliography

Christopher, Maurine. Black Americans in Congress. New York: Crowell, 1976.

Foner, Eric. Freedom's Lawmakers: A Directory of Black Officeholders during Reconstruction. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993.

McFarlin, Annjennette Sophie. Black Congressional Reconstruction Orators and their Orations, 1869–1879. Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1976.

alana j. erickson (1996)