they talk about separating them gaines said it cant be done they are of all shades of color and there is no dividing line and my children have the right to sit by the best mans daughter in the land and if they aint together in the day they will run together at night it was comments like this along with his militant approach to political organizing and his willingness to criticize even his fellow radical republicans that made gaines a target of considerable backlash i have heard that the democrats have threatened to kill me gaines once said to a crowd of over 3 000 in brenham they may kill me but i pray that if they do that you who are present today will take sevenfold vengeance for me ultimately his enemies chose a different angle of attack faced with gaines overwhelming popularity among the black residents of his district they chose to use the legal system to disqualify him from holding office in 1871 gaines was indicted on trumped up charges of bigamy though it was true that he married his second wife without annulling his first marriage he did so only because the first ceremony had been performed illegally and was thus considered invalid despite testimony revealing as much gaines was convicted jailed and later denied his seat in the 13th legislature the fact that his conviction had already been reversed by the texas supreme court was disregarded blanton said the ousting of gaines was a sign of things to come as the project of reconstruction was gradually abandoned former confederates returned to power and worked to claw back much of the progress that had been made you really began to see this coordinated effort to do away not just with the republican party as it then stood but to do away with the ideas they stood for: free education a public school system civil rights for african americans and the existence of a state police force that would actually enforce laws across county jurisdictions blanton said efforts to prevent black people from voting and holding public office became increasingly successful and the political environment that had empowered figures like gaines ceased to exist looking back more than a century later texas a&m history professor dale baum would remark in a speech to a&ms black graduate student association that texas a&m and prairie view a&m are today the only two tangible achievements of the bi-racial democracy which was briefly brought to power in texas by black political activism in the late 1860s and early 1870s ‘a long time for gaines part he continued to fight for equal treatment in 1875 he was arrested for giving a civil rights speech in his new hometown of giddings after that reports of the former senators activities became less and less frequent by the time he was buried in 1900 his name was already disappearing from history as the reactionary forces that had reclaimed control of the state worked to bury the stories and contributions of black texans the legacy of matthew gaines was i think intentionally and willfully forgotten by generations of texans blanton said theres a whole generation or two of historians who simply did not know or would not repeat what they knew about those african american state legislators not just matthew gaines but others as well gaines story could have ended there and for a time it did but as blanton notes just because something is forgotten doesnt mean it cant be remembered even before gaines himself was rediscovered many of his favored policies started to get a second look a lot of those ideas in the 1870s that came out of reconstruction they worked blanton said they just had to be brought back to life decades later when even reactionary texans had to admit that things like public schools were a good thing later on the civil rights movements of the 1950s and 60s ushered in a renewed interest in preserving and teaching black history soon historians across the country were rushing to recapture the stories of earlier black americans before they faded entirely when people die they take so much unshared history with them alexander-walls said our traditions are heavily based on oral history so when those people die and nobodys writing it down it takes resources and time to really research things when historians barr and calvert visited giddings in the 1970s residents could still recount stories of old man gaines the kind charismatic preacher and community leader who helped establish a local baptist church some told of gaines rumored ability to pray down the rain or the lengthy speeches he would deliver each juneteenth on the banks of the brazos river always ending with the assurance that in the eyes of god black men and women were as good and well-loved as any white (and) exhorting them to hold up their heads with pride even in troubled times at texas a&m baum and others started working to illuminate gaines role as one of the universitys earliest founding fathers today thanks to decades of work by historians writers activists and family members gaines contributions have been brought into even sharper focus when the statue of gaines at a&m was unveiled in 2021 alexander-walls was in attendance along with her 80-year-old sister sharon and about 50 other relatives for this to happen in her lifetime is something were all ecstatic about alexander-walls said and while theres plenty more work to be done like the daunting task of locating gaines grave sharon alexander says shes proud to see that her great grandfathers name and legacy are no longer just a footnote its taken a long time she said but some people have been fighting for it for a long time