During the years 1894-1901 the Republican Party and the agrarian-born Populist Party joined forces to unseat the entrenched conservative Democrats, who, securely backed by railroad and manufacturing interests, had for years refused to institute much-needed political and social reform.

The Fusion Period in North Carolina saw a resurgence of African Americans in politics-a phenomenon unique among Southern states. Their association with the Republican Party made them highly significant both as voters and as officeholders. In response, with a determined campaign of white supremacy for North Carolina, the Democrats swept back into power in the election of 1898 and, once established, enacted suffrage legislation that virtually disfranchised African Americans.

Helen G. Edmonds offers a re-examination of the Fusion Period, giving a detailed and accurate record of the political careers of prominent African Americans in North Carolina who held federal, state, county, and municipal offices. Here, too, is a thorough account of the Wilmington race riot that followed the election of 1898, part of the racial whirlwind that blew the ballot from the hands of African Americans and restored North Carolina to the Democratic fold.

Helen G. Edmonds (1911-1995) taught for many years at North Carolina Central University and was active in the Republican Party. She was an alternative delegate to the General Assembly of the United Nations, served on the National Advisory Council of the Peace Corps, and was a member of the Defense Advisory Council on Women in the Armed Services.