The first inauguration of Ulysses S. Grant as the 18th president of the United States was held on March 4, 1869, at the East Portico of the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C. This was the 21st presidential inauguration and marked the commencement of the first four-year term of Ulysses S. Grant as president and the only term of Schuyler Colfax as vice president. Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase administered the presidential oath of office. Outgoing president Andrew Johnson did not attend the inaugural ceremonies, as he and Grant refused to sit with each other in the carriage going to them. Johnson also refused to go in a separate carriage. Instead, he was in the White House signing last-minute legislation. This was the fourth time an outgoing president boycotted his elected successor's inauguration, an event that would not occur again until Donald Trump boycotted Joe Biden's inauguration in 2021 after failing to overturn the results.
The presidency of Ulysses S. Grant began on March 4, 1869, when Ulysses S. Grant was inaugurated as the 18th president of the United States, and ended on March 4, 1877. The Reconstruction era took place during Grant's two terms of office. The Ku Klux Klan caused widespread violence throughout the South against African Americans. By 1870, all former Confederate states had been readmitted into the United States and were represented in Congress; however, Democrats and former slave owners refused to accept that freedmen were citizens who were granted suffrage by the Fifteenth Amendment, which prompted Congress to pass three Force Acts to allow the federal government to intervene when states failed to protect former slaves' rights. Following an escalation of Klan violence in the late 1860s, Grant and his attorney general, Amos T. Akerman, head of the newly created Department of Justice, began a crackdown on Klan activity in the South, starting in South Carolina, where Grant sent federal troops to capture Klan members. This led the Klan to demobilize and helped ensure fair elections in 1872.
Ulysses S. Grant was the 18th president of the United States (1869–1877) following his success as military commander in the American Civil War. Under Grant, the Union Army defeated the Confederate military and secession, the war ending with the surrender of Robert E. Lee's army at Appomattox Court House. As president, Grant led the Radical Republicans in their effort to eliminate vestiges of Confederate nationalism and slavery, protect African American citizenship, and pursued Reconstruction in the former Confederate states. In foreign policy, Grant sought to increase American trade and influence, while remaining at peace with the world. Although his Republican Party split in 1872 as reformers denounced him, Grant was easily reelected. During his second term the country's economy was devastated by the Panic of 1873, while investigations exposed corruption scandals in the administration. Although still below average, his reputation among scholars has significantly improved in recent years because of greater appreciation for his commitment to civil rights, moral courage in his prosecution of the Ku Klux Klan, and enforcement of voting rights.
The 1950 State of the Union Address was given by Harry S. Truman, the 33rd president of the United States, on Wednesday, January 4, 1950. He spoke to the 81st United States Congress, to the United States House of Representatives and the United States Senate. It was a joint session, and the 160th address given. He said, "Our aim for a peaceful, democratic world of free peoples will be achieved in the long run, not by force of arms, but by an appeal to the minds and hearts of men." He also said, Our Social Security System should be developed into the main reliance of our people for basic protection against the economic hazards of old-age, unemployment, and illness.
The 1952 State of the Union Address was given by Harry S. Truman, the 33rd president of the United States, on Wednesday, January 9, 1952. It was given to both houses of the 82nd United States Congress at the same time. In it, he said these words: "If the Soviet leaders were to accept this proposal, it would lighten the burden of armaments, and permit the resources of the earth to be devoted to the good of mankind. But until the Soviet Union accepts a sound disarmament proposal, and joins in peaceful settlements, we have no choice except to build up our defenses."
The 1915 State of the Union Address was given by Woodrow Wilson, the 28th president of the United States on Tuesday, December 7, 1915. It was given to a joint session of the 64th United States Congress, to the United States Senate and United States House of Representatives. It was given shortly before the United States entered World War I. He said these words: "The moral is, that the states of America are not hostile rivals but cooperating friends, and that their growing sense of community or interest, alike in matters political and in matters economic, is likely to give them a new significance as factors in international affairs and in the political history of the world."
The 1876State of the Union Address was given by the 18th president of the United States, Ulysses S. Grant, on Tuesday, December 5, 1876. In it he said these words, "Reconstruction Era, as finally agreed upon, means this and only this, except that the late slave was enfranchised, giving an increase, as was supposed, to the Union-loving and Union-supporting votes. If free in the full sense of the word, they would not disappoint this expectation. Hence at the beginning of my first Administration the work of reconstruction, much embarrassed by the long delay, virtually commenced."
The 1938 State of the Union Address was given on Monday, January 3, 1938, by the 32nd United States president, Franklin D. Roosevelt. He stated,
The 1929 State of the Union Address was given by Herbert Hoover, the 31st United States President on Tuesday, December 3, 1929, to both houses of the 71st United States Congress. This is the first State of the Union Address that Herbert Hoover would give to the Congress, and the 1929 Stock Market Crash had just begun. He said,
The 1901 State of the Union Address was given on Tuesday, December 3, 1901, by the 26th president of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt. It was presented to both houses of the 57th United States Congress, but he was not present. He stated, "The Congress assembles this year under the shadow of a great calamity. On the sixth of September, President McKinley was shot by an anarchist while attending the Pan-American Exposition at Buffalo, and died in that city on the fourteenth of that month." He concluded it with, "Indeed, from every quarter of the civilized world we received, at the time of the President's death, assurances of such grief and regard as to touch the hearts of our people. In the midst of our affliction we reverently thank the Almighty that we are at peace with the nations of mankind; and we firmly intend that our policy shall be such as to continue unbroken these international relations of mutual respect and good will."
The 1801 State of the Union Address was written by Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the United States, on Tuesday, December 8, 1801. It was his first annual address, and it was presented in Washington, D.C, by a clerk. He did not speak it to the 7th United States Congress, because he thought that would make him seem like a king. He said, "Whilst we devoutly return thanks to the beneficent Being who has been pleased to breathe into them the spirit of conciliation and forgiveness, we are bound with peculiar gratitude to be thankful to Him that our own peace has been preserved through so perilous a season, and ourselves permitted quietly to cultivate the earth and to practice and improve those arts which tend to increase our comforts." During the address Jefferson proclaimed the Washington Doctrine of Unstable Alliances.
The 1912 State of the Union Address was given on Tuesday, December 3, 1912. It was written by William H. Taft, the 27th president of the United States. He stated, "The position of the United States in the moral, intellectual, and material relations of the family of nations should be a matter of vital interest to every patriotic citizen." He said, "Our small Army now consists of 83,809 men, excluding the 5,000 Philippine scouts. Leaving out of consideration the Coast Artillery force, whose position is fixed in our various seacoast defenses, and the present garrisons of our various insular possessions, we have to-day within the continental United States a mobile Army of only about 35,000 men. This little force must be still further drawn upon to supply the new garrisons for the great naval base which is being established at Pearl Harbor, in the Hawaiian Islands, and to protect the locks now rapidly approaching completion at Panama."
The 1875 State of the Union Address was given by Ulysses S. Grant, the 18th president of the United States on Tuesday, December 7, 1875. It was written by him, but not presented to the 44th United States Congress by him. He said, "In submitting my seventh annual message to Congress, in this centennial year of our national existence as a free and independent people, it affords me great pleasure to recur to the advancement that has been made from the time of the colonies, one hundred years ago. We were then a people numbering only 3,000,000. Now we number more than 40,000,000. Then industries were confined almost exclusively to the tillage of the soil. Now manufactories absorb much of the labor of the country." The Industrial Revolution had begun.
The 1796 State of the Union Address was given by George Washington, the first president of the United States, on Wednesday, December 7, 1796. It was given in Congress Hall, Philadelphia. He gave it directly to Congress. He began with, "In recurring to the internal situation of our country since I had last the pleasure to address you, I find ample reason for a renewed expression of that gratitude to the Ruler of the Universe which a continued series of prosperity has so often and so justly called forth." He ended with, "God's providential care may still be extended to the United States, that the virtue and happiness of the people may be preserved, and that the Government which they have instituted for the protection of their liberties may be perpetual."
The 1837 State of the Union Address was given by the eighth president of the United States, Martin Van Buren, on December 5, 1837. It was presented to the 25th United States Congress by a clerk, because it was not yet the custom for the president to deliver it himself. He began with, "We have reason to renew the expression of our devout gratitude to the Giver of All Good for His benign protection. Our country presents on every side the evidences of that continued favor under whose auspices it, has gradually risen from a few feeble and dependent colonies to a prosperous and powerful confederacy."
The 1815 State of the Union Address was given by the fourth president of the United States, James Madison. It was given to the 14th United States Congress on Tuesday, December 5, 1815, but not verbally by the president. The War of 1812 was over, and he said, "It is another source of satisfaction that the treaty of peace with Great Britain has been succeeded by a convention on the subject of commerce concluded by the plenipotentiaries of the two countries. In this result a disposition is manifested on the part of that nation corresponding with the disposition of the United States, which it may be hoped will be improved into liberal arrangements on other subjects on which the parties have mutual interests, or which might endanger their future harmony." He concluded with, "As fruits of this experience and of the reputation acquired by the American arms on the land and on the water, the nation finds itself possessed of a growing respect abroad and of a just confidence in itself, which are among the best pledges for its peaceful career."
The 1825 State of the Union Address was given by John Quincy Adams, the sixth president of the United States. It was given to the 19th United States Congress, on Tuesday, December 6, 1825. He said, "In taking a general survey of the concerns of our beloved country, with reference to subjects interesting to the common welfare, the first sentiment which impresses itself upon the mind is of gratitude to the Omnipotent Disposer of All Good for the continuance of the signal blessings of His providence, and especially for that health which to an unusual extent has prevailed within our borders, and for that abundance which in the vicissitudes of the seasons has been scattered with profusion over our land." He ended with, "And may He who searches the hearts of the children of men prosper your exertions to secure the blessings of peace and promote the highest welfare of your country."
The 1917 State of the Union Address was given by Woodrow Wilson, the 28th president of the United States on Tuesday, December 4, 1917, during his turbulent second term. He spoke in the United States House of Representatives chamber, in the United States Capitol. He said, "I shall not go back to debate the causes of the war. The intolerable wrongs done and planned against us by the sinister masters of Germany have long since become too grossly obvious and odious to every true American to need to be rehearsed." He addressed the 65th United States Congress, and spoke of World War I. He ended with, "A supreme moment of history has come. The eyes of the people have been opened and they see. The hand of God is laid upon the nations. He will show them favor, I devoutly believe, only if they rise to the clear heights of His own justice and mercy." In the middle of the speech, he said this about the German Empire, "The worst that can happen to the detriment the German people is this, that if they should still, after the war is over, continue to be obliged to live under ambitious and intriguing masters interested to disturb the peace of the world, men or classes of men whom the other peoples of the world could not trust, it might be impossible to admit them to the partnership of nations which must henceforth guarantee the world's peace." He is saying that empires' do not promote world peace. A year after he gave this speech, on December 4, 1918, the United States military would swallow Germany in victory, and the saying that is written would come true, "Death has been swallowed up in victory."
The 1918 State of the Union Address was given by the 28th president of the United States, Woodrow Wilson, on Monday, December 2, 1918, to the houses of the 65th United States Congress. He gave these war statistics, "A year ago we had sent 145,918 men overseas. Since then we have sent 1,950,513, an average of 162,542 each month, the number in fact rising, in May last, to 245,951, in June to 278,760, in July to 307,182, and continuing to reach similar figures in August and September, in August 289,570 and in September 257,438." By the end of 1918, America had won the peace, and World War I was over. He said, "And throughout it all how fine the spirit of the nation was: what unity of purpose, what untiring zeal!" He ended with, "I shall make my absence as brief as possible and shall hope to return with the happy assurance that it has been possible to translate into action the great ideals for which America has striven."
The 1793 State of the Union Address was given by George Washington, the first president of the United States. It was given in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania at Congress Hall. Washington stood before the 3rd United States Congress on Tuesday, December 3, 1793, and said, "While on the one hand it awakened my gratitude for all those instances of affectionate partiality with which I have been honored by my country, on the other it could not prevent an earnest wish for that retirement from which no private consideration should ever have torn me." He ended with, "Permit me to bring to your remembrance the magnitude of your task. Without an unprejudiced coolness the welfare of the Government may be hazarded; without harmony as far as consists with freedom of sentiment its dignity may be lost."
