RANSIER, Alonzo Jacob, politician, born in Charleston, South Carolina, 3 January, 1836; died there, 17 August, 1882. He was tile son of free colored people, and, having obtained by himself some education, was employed, when sixteen years of age, as a shipping-clerk by a merchant of Charleston. In October, 1865, he took part in a convention of the friends of equal rights in Charleston, and was deputed to present to congress the memorial that was adopted, tie was elected a member of tile Constitutional convention of 1868, was an elector on the Grant and Colfax presidential ticket, and was sent to the legislature in tile following year. He was also chosen chairman of the Republican state central committee, filling that office till 1872, and in 1870 was elected lieutenant-governor of South Carolina by a large majority. He was president of the convention from the southern states that was held at Columbia, South Carolina, in 1871, and was a vice-president of the Republican national convention at Philadelphia in 1872. In that year he was elected a representative in congress, and served from 1 December, 1873, till 3 March, 1875. When the Democratic party reached power in South Carolina in 1877, he lost his official posts, and afterward suffered great poverty, being employed from that time till his death as a street-laborer.