Hiram Rhodes Revels is elected the first black United States Senator, representing Adams County, Mississippi.

Wyatt Outlaw, town commissioner of Graham, North Carolina, is lynched by members of the Ku Klux Klan. Outlaw served as president of the Alamance County Union League of America, an anti-Klan organization. Dozens of Klansmen are arrested for his murder, and many confess, however a federal judge orders the release of all of the Klansmen without punishment over the protestations of the governor of North Carolina.

The first Black U.S. Senator, Hiram R. Revels, made his first official speech before the U.S. Senate on this date in Washington, D.C. Senator Revels was a Republican who represented the state of Mississippi. He filled the seat formerly held by Jefferson Davis.

Jonathan S. Wright becomes the first Black State Supreme Court Justice in South Carolina on this date.

The United States Congress ratifies the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution. The amendment grants male suffrage regardless of "race, color or previous condition of servitude." This leads to a debate over women's suffrage.

Congress passed the Civil Rights Enforcement Act on this date. This act recognized the equality of all men.

Chicago Defender founder Robert Sengstacke Abbott was born on this date in St. Simon's Island, Georgia. With the Defender, Abbott became one of the first Black self-made millionaires in the history of America.

World-famous rodeo cowboy Bill Pickett was born on this date in the state of Texas.

Joseph H. Rainey becomes the first black lawmaker sworn into the U.S. House of Representatives. Rainey, a Republican from South Carolina, fills the seat made vacant by the expulsion of Representative Benjamin F. Whittemore. Rainey serves for 10 years.

The Christian Methodist Episcopal Church was founded by and for Negros on this date in Jackson, Tennessee.