 The delegates at the constitutional convention largely followed Perry's guidelines for the constitution, but they strayed by adopting the black codes to prevent black suffrage.President Johnson, as well as several leading statesmen of South Carolina, urged the granting of suffrage to blacks while also including a property qualification clause.A property qualification would essentially disenfranchise all blacks without giving the appearance of impropriety towards blacks and prevent the imposition of harsh terms by the Radical Republicans

Benjamin Franklin Perry said in 1865, "The African," "has been in all ages, a savage or a slave.