In 1865, Revels left the
AME Church, the first independent black denomination in the US, and joined the
Methodist Episcopal Church. He was assigned briefly to churches in
Leavenworth, Kansas, and
New Orleans, Louisiana. In 1866, he was called as a permanent pastor at a church in
Natchez, Mississippi, where he settled with his wife and six daughters. He became an elder in the Mississippi District of the Methodist Church, In 1869 he was elected to represent
Adams County in the
Mississippi State Senate. Congressman
John R. Lynch later wrote of him in his book on Reconstruction: Revels was comparatively a new man in the community. He had recently been stationed at Natchez as pastor in charge of the A.M.E. Church, and so far as known he had never voted, had never attended a political meeting, and of course, had never made a political speech. But he was a colored man, and presumed to be a Republican, and believed to be a man of ability and considerably above the average in point of intelligence; just the man, it was thought, the Rev. Noah Buchanan would be willing to vote for. In January 1870, Revels presented the opening prayer in the state legislature. Lynch wrote of that occasion, That prayer—one of the most impressive and eloquent prayers that had ever been delivered in the [Mississippi] Senate Chamber—made Revels a United States Senator. He made a profound impression upon all who heard him. It impressed those who heard it that Revels was not only a man of great natural ability but that he was also a man of superior attainments. When Revels arrived in Washington, D.C.,
Southern Democrats in office opposed seating him in the Senate. For the two days of debate, the Senate galleries were packed with spectators at this historic event. The Democrats based their opposition on the 1857
Dred Scott Decision by the
U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled that people of African ancestry were not and could not be citizens. They argued that no black man was a citizen before the
14th Amendment was ratified in 1868, and thus Revels could not satisfy the requirement of the Senate for nine years' prior citizenship. The more fundamental argument by Revels's supporters was that the Civil War, and the Reconstruction amendments, had overturned
Dred Scott. Because of the war and the Amendments, they argued, the subordination of the black race was no longer part of the American constitutional regime and, therefore, it would be unconstitutional to bar Revels on the basis of the pre-Civil War Constitution's citizenship rules. On February 25, 1870, Revels, on a party-line vote of
48 to 8, with Republicans voting in favor and Democrats voting against, became the
first African American to be seated in the
United States Senate. Everyone in the galleries stood to see him sworn in. and presented as evidence of its validity signatures from the clerks of the
Mississippi House of Representatives and
Mississippi State Senate, as well as that of
Adelbert Ames, the military
Governor of Mississippi. Wilson argued that Revels's skin color was not a bar to Senate service, and connected the role of the Senate to Christianity's
Golden Rule of doing to others as one would have done to oneself. He served on both the Committee of Education and Labor and the
Committee on the District of Columbia. (At the time, Congress administered the District.) Much of the Senate's attention focused on Reconstruction issues. While
Radical Republicans called for continued punishment of ex-Confederates, Revels argued for amnesty and a restoration of full citizenship, provided they swore an oath of loyalty to the United States. (left; dressed as
Iago from
William Shakespeare's
Othello) in US Senate. ''
Harper's Weekly'' February 19, 1870. Davis had been a senator from Mississippi until 1861. Revels's Senate term lasted a little over one year, from February 25, 1870, to March 3, 1871. He quietly and persistently, although for the most part unsuccessfully, worked for equality. He spoke against an amendment proposed by Senator
Allen G. Thurman (D-Ohio) to keep the schools of Washington, D.C., segregated and argued for their
integration. Revels supported bills to invest in developing infrastructure in Mississippi: to grant lands and right of way to aid the construction of the
New Orleans and Northeastern Railroad (
41st Congress 2nd Session S. 712), and
levees on the Mississippi River (41st Congress 3rd Session S. 1136). ==College president==