As yet, however, the Negro was not technically disfranchised, and at any moment a sudden turn of events might call him into prominence.  Formal legislation really followed the rise of the Populist party, which about 1890 in many places in the South waged an even contest with the Democrats.  It was evident that in such a struggle the Negro might still hold the balance of power, and within the next few years a fusion of the Republicans and the Populists in North Carolina sent a Negro, George H. White, to Congress.  This event finally served only to strengthen the movement for disfranchisement which had already begun.  In 1890 the constitution of Mississippi was so amended as to exclude from the suffrage any person who had not paid his poll-tax or who was unable to read any section of the constitution, or understand it when read to him, or to give a reasonable interpretation of it.  The effect of the administration of this provision was that in 1890 only 8615 Negroes out of 147,000 of voting age became registered.  South Carolina amended her constitution with similar effect in 1895.  In this state the population was almost three-fifths Negro and two-fifths white.  The franchise of the Negro was already in practical abeyance; but the problem now was to devise a means for the perpetuity of a government of white men.  Education was not popular as a test, for by it many white illiterates would be disfranchised and in any case it would only postpone the race issue.  For some years the dominant party had been engaged in factional controversies, with the populist wing led by Benjamin R. Tillman prevailing over the conservatives.  It was understood, however, that each side would be given half of the membership of the convention, which would exclude all Negro and Republican representation, and that the constitution would go into effect without being submitted to the people.  Said the most important provision:  “Any person who shall apply for registration after January 1, 1898, if otherwise qualified, shall be registered; provided that he can both read and write any section of this constitution submitted to him by the registration officer or can show that he owns and has paid all taxes collectible during the previous year on property in this state assessed at three hundred dollars or more”—­clauses which it is hardly necessary to say the registrars regularly interpreted in favor of white men and against the Negro.  In 1898 Louisiana passed an amendment inventing the so-called “grandfather clause.”  This excused from the operation of her disfranchising act all descendants of men who had voted before the Civil War, thus admitting to the suffrage all white men who were illiterate and without property.  North Carolina in 1900, Virginia and Alabama in 1901, Georgia in 1907, and Oklahoma in 1910 in one way or another practically disfranchised the Negro, care being taken in every instance to avoid any definite clash with the Fifteenth Amendment.  In Maryland there have been several attempts to disfranchise the