Presidential election results map. Red denotes states won by Hayes/Wheeler, blue denotes those won by Tilden/Hendricks. Numbers indicate the number of electoral votes allotted to each state.
The election was among the most contentious in American history, and was only resolved by the Compromise of 1877, where Hayes agreed to end Reconstruction in exchange for recognition of his presidency. On March 2, 1877, the House and Senate confirmed Hayes as president. Tilden won 184 electoral votes to Hayes's 165 in the first count, with the 20 votes from Florida, Louisiana, South Carolina, and Oregon disputed. To address this constitutional crisis, Congress established the Electoral Commission, which awarded all twenty votes and thus the presidency to Hayes in a strict partyline vote. Some Democratic representatives filibustered the commission's decision, hoping to prevent Hayes's inauguration; their filibuster was ultimately ended by party leader Samuel J. Randall.
Ulysses S. Grant, the incumbent president in 1876, whose second term expired on March 4, 1877
It was widely assumed during the year 1875 that incumbent President Ulysses S. Grant would run for a third term as president despite the poor economic conditions, the numerous political scandals that had developed since he assumed office in 1869, and despite a longstanding tradition set by George Washington not to stay in office for more than two terms. Grant's inner circle advised him to go for a third term and he almost did so, but on December 15, 1875, the House, by a sweeping 233–18 vote, passed a resolution declaring that the two-term tradition was to prevent a dictatorship.[6] Later that year, Grant ruled himself out of running in 1876. He instead tried to persuade Secretary of State Hamilton Fish to run for the presidency, but the 67-year-old Fish declined since he believed himself too old for that role. Grant nonetheless sent a letter to the convention imploring them to nominate Fish, but the letter was misplaced and never read to the convention. Fish later confirmed that he would have declined the presidential nomination even if it had been offered to him.
When the Sixth Republican National Convention assembled in Cincinnati, Ohio, on June 14, 1876, James G. Blaine appeared to be the presidential nominee. On the first ballot, Blaine was just 100 votes short of a majority. His vote began to slide after the second ballot, however, as many Republicans feared that Blaine could not win the general election. Anti-Blaine delegates could not agree on a candidate until his total rose to 41% on the sixth ballot. Leaders of the reform Republicans met privately and considered alternatives. They chose the reforming Ohio Governor Rutherford B. Hayes, who had been gradually building support during the convention until he finished second on the sixth ballot. On the seventh ballot, Hayes was nominated for president with 384 votes, compared to 351 for Blaine and 21 for Benjamin Bristow. New York Representative William A. Wheeler was nominated for vice president by a much larger margin (366–89) over his chief rival, Frederick Theodore Frelinghuysen, who later served as a member of the Electoral Commission, which awarded the election to Hayes.
Interior of the Merchants Exchange Building of St. Louis, Missouri, during the announcement of Samuel J. Tilden as the Democratic presidential nominee
The Democratic Party's failure to nominate its own ticket in the previous presidential election, in which they had instead endorsed the Liberal Republican candidacy of Horace Greeley, had resulted in much debate about the party's viability. Any doubts about the party's future were dispelled firstly by the collapse of the Liberal Republicans in the aftermath of that election, and secondly by significant Democratic gains in the 1874 mid-term elections, which saw them take control of the House of Representatives for the first time in sixteen years.
The 12th Democratic National Convention assembled in St. Louis, Missouri, in June 1876, which was the first political convention ever held by one of the major American parties west of the Mississippi River. There were 5000 people jammed inside the auditorium in St. Louis amid hopes for the Democratic Party's first presidential victory in 20 years. The platform called for immediate and sweeping reforms in response to the scandals that had plagued the Grant administration. Tilden won more than 400 votes on the first ballot and the presidential nomination by a landslide on the second.
The Democratic platform pledged to replace the corruption of the Grant administration with honest, efficient government and to end "the rapacity of carpetbag tyrannies" in the South. It also called for treaty protection for naturalized United States citizens visiting their homelands, restrictions on Asian immigration, tariff reform, and opposition to land grants for railroads.[8] It has been claimed that the voting Democrats received Tilden's presidential nomination with more enthusiasm than any leader since Andrew Jackson.[9]
The Greenback Party had been organized by agricultural interests in Indianapolis, Indiana, in 1874 to urge the federal government to inflate the economy through the mass issuance of paper money called greenbacks. Its first national nominating convention was held in Indianapolis in the spring of 1876. Peter Cooper was nominated for president with 352 votes to 119 for three other contenders. The convention nominated Anti-Monopolist Senator Newton Booth of California for vice president. After Booth declined to run, the national committee chose Samuel Fenton Cary as his replacement on the ticket.[11][12]
This small political party used several different names, often with different names in different states. It was a continuation of the Anti-Masonic Party that met in 1872 and nominated Charles Francis Adams, Sr., for president. When Adams declined to run, the party did not contest the 1872 election.
The convention was held from June 8 to 10, 1875 in Liberty Hall, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. B.T. Roberts of New York served as chairman, and Jonathan Blanchard was the keynote speaker.
The platform supported the Reconstruction Amendments to the Constitution, international arbitration, the reading of the scriptures in public schools, specie payments, justice for Native Americans, abolition of the Electoral College, and prohibition of the sale of alcoholic beverages. It declared the first day of the week to be a day of rest for the United States. The platform opposed secret societies and monopolies.
The convention considered three potential presidential candidates: Charles F. Adams, Jonathan Blanchard, and James B. Walker. When Blanchard declined to run, Walker was unanimously nominated for president. The convention then nominated Donald Kirkpatrick of New York unanimously for vice president.[13][14]
General election
Campaign
The election was hotly contested, as can be seen by this poster, which was published in 1877.A certificate for the electoral vote for Rutherford B. Hayes and William A. Wheeler for the State of Louisiana"A truce – not a compromise, but a chance for high-toned gentlemen to retire gracefully from their very civil declarations of war." By Thomas Nast in Harper's Weekly, 1877 Feb 17, p. 132.
Tilden, who had prosecuted machine politicians in New York and sent the political boss William M. Tweed to jail, ran as a reform candidate against the background of the corruption of the Grant administration. Both parties backed civil service reform. Both sides mounted mudslinging campaigns, with Democratic attacks on Republican corruption being countered by Republicans raising the Civil War issue, a tactic that was ridiculed by Democrats, who called it "waving the bloody shirt." Republicans chanted, "Not every Democrat was a rebel, but every rebel was a Democrat."
Hayes was a virtual unknown outside his home state of Ohio, where he had served two terms as a US Representative and then two terms as governor. Henry Adams called Hayes "a third-rate nonentity whose only recommendations are that he is obnoxious to no one". Hayes had served in the Civil War with distinction as colonel of the 23rd Ohio Regiment and was wounded several times, which made him marketable to veterans. He had later been brevetted as a major-general. His most important asset was his help to the Republican ticket in carrying Ohio, a crucial swing state. On the other side, the newspaperman John D. Defrees described Tilden as "a very nice, prim, little, withered-up, fidgety old bachelor, about one-hundred and twenty-pounds avoirdupois, who never had a genuine impulse for many nor any affection for woman".[15]
The Democratic strategy for victory in the South relied on paramilitary groups such as the Red Shirts and the White League. These groups saw themselves as the military wing of the Democrats. Using the strategy of the Mississippi Plan, they actively suppressed both black and white Republican voting. They violently disrupted meetings and rallies, attacked party organizers, and threatened potential voters with retaliation for voting Republican.[16][17]
Because it was considered improper for a candidate to pursue the presidency actively, neither Tilden nor Hayes appeared publicly during the campaign. Speaking and leading rallies were left to their surrogates.
Colorado
Colorado was admitted to the Union as the 38th state on August 1, 1876; this was the first presidential election in which the state sent electors. There was insufficient time or money to organize a presidential election in the new state. Therefore, Colorado's state legislature selected the state's three Electoral College electors. The Republican Party held a slim majority in the state legislature following a closely contested election on October 3, 1876. Many of the seats in that election had been decided by only a few hundred votes.[18] On November 7, 1876, in a 50 to 24 vote, the state legislature chose Otto Mears, William Hadley, and Herman Beckurts to serve as the state's electors for president. All three of the state electors cast their votes for Hayes.[19][20] This was the last election in which any state chose electors through its state legislature, rather than by popular vote.[21]
Florida (with 4 electoral votes) and Louisiana (with 8) reported returns that favored Tilden, while Hayes led in South Carolina (with 7). However, the elections in each state were marked by electoral fraud and threats of violence against Republican voters. The most extreme case was in South Carolina, where an impossible 101 percent of all eligible voters in the state had their votes counted,[22] and an estimated 150 Black Republicans were murdered.[23] One of the points of contention revolved around the design of ballots. At the time, parties would print ballots or "tickets" to enable voters to support them in the open ballots. To aid illiterate voters, the parties would print symbols on the tickets, and in this election, many Democratic ballots were printed with the Republican symbol of Abraham Lincoln on them.[24] The Republican-dominated state electoral commissions subsequently rejected enough Democratic votes to award their electoral votes to Hayes.
In two Southern states, the governor recognized by the United States had signed the Republican certificates; the Democratic certificates from Florida were signed by the state attorney-general and the newly elected Democratic governor. Those from Louisiana were signed by the Democratic gubernatorial candidate and those from South Carolina by no state official. The Tilden electors in South Carolina claimed that they had been chosen by the popular vote although they were rejected by the state election board.[25]
Meanwhile, in Oregon, the vote of a single elector was disputed. The statewide result clearly favored Hayes, but the state's Democratic governor, La Fayette Grover, claimed that one of the Republican electors, Ex-Postmaster John Watts, was ineligible under Article II, Section 1, of the United States Constitution since he had been a "person holding an office of trust or profit under the United States." Grover substituted a Democratic elector in Watts's place.
The two Republican electors dismissed Grover's action and reported three votes for Hayes. However, the Democratic elector, C. A. Cronin, reported one vote for Tilden and two votes for Hayes. The two Republican electors presented a certificate signed by the secretary of state of Oregon, and Cronin and the two electors whom he appointed (Cronin voted for Tilden while his associates voted for Hayes) presented a certificate signed by the governor and attested by the secretary of state.[25]
Ultimately, all three of Oregon's votes were awarded to Hayes, who had a majority of one in the Electoral College. The Democrats claimed fraud, and suppressed excitement pervaded the country. Threats were even muttered that Hayes would never be inaugurated. In Columbus, Ohio, a shot was fired at Hayes's residence as he sat down to dinner. After supporters marched to his home to call for the President, Hayes urged the crowd that "it is impossible, at so early a time, to obtain the result".[26] Grant quietly strengthened the military force in and around Washington.[25]
The Constitution provides that "the President of the Senate shall, in presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the [electoral] certificates, and the votes shall then be counted." The Republicans held that the power to count the votes lay with the President of the Senate, with the House and Senate being mere spectators. The Democrats objected to that construction, since the President Pro Tempore of the Senate, the Republican Thomas W. Ferry, could then count the votes of the disputed states for Hayes.
The Democrats insisted that Congress should continue the practice followed since 1865: no vote objected to should be counted except by the concurrence of both houses. Since the House had a solid Democratic majority, rejecting the vote of one state, therefore, would elect Tilden.[25]
Facing an unprecedented constitutional crisis, the Congress passed a law on January 29, 1877, to form a 15-member Electoral Commission, which would settle the result. Five members were selected from each house of Congress, and they were joined by five members of the United States Supreme Court, with William M. Evarts serving as counsel for the Republican Party. The majority party in each house named three members and the minority party two members. As the Republicans controlled the Senate and the Democrats controlled the House of Representatives, that yielded five Democratic and five Republican members of the commission. Of the Supreme Court justices, two Republicans and two Democrats were chosen, with the fifth to be selected by those four.
The justices first selected the independent Justice David Davis. According to one historian, "No one, perhaps not even Davis himself, knew which presidential candidate he preferred."[26] Just as the Electoral Commission Bill was passing Congress, the Illinois Legislature elected Davis to the Senate, and Democrats in the legislature believed that they had purchased Davis's support by voting for him. However, they had miscalculated, as Davis promptly excused himself from the commission and resigned as a Justice to take his Senate seat.[27] As all of the remaining available Justices were Republicans, Republican Justice Joseph P. Bradley, who was considered the most impartial remaining member of the court was selected. That selection proved decisive.
Results by county explicitly indicating the percentage of the winning candidate in each county. Shades of blue are for Tilden (Democratic), and shades of red are for Hayes (Republican). Note that Ripon – the commonly recognized birthplace of the Republican Party – is in Fond du Lac County, Wisconsin, which voted for Tilden.
Since it was drawing perilously near to Inauguration Day, the commission met on January 31. Each of the disputed state election cases (Florida, Louisiana, Oregon, and South Carolina) was respectively submitted to the commission by Congress. Eminent counsel appeared for each side, and there were double sets of returns from every one of the states named.[25]
The commission first decided not to question any returns that were prima facie lawful.[25] Bradley then joined the other seven Republican committee members in a series of 8–7 votes that gave all 20 disputed electoral votes to Hayes, which gave Hayes a 185–184 electoral vote victory. The commission adjourned on March 2. Hayes privately took the oath of office the next day and was publicly sworn into office on March 5, 1877, and Hayes was inaugurated without disturbance.[25]
The Compromise of 1877 might be a reason for the Democrats accepting the Electoral Commission. During intense closed-door meetings, Democratic leaders agreed reluctantly to accept Hayes as president in return for the withdrawal of federal troops from the last two Southern states that were still occupied: South Carolina and Louisiana. Republican leaders in return agreed on a number of handouts and entitlements, including federal subsidies for a transcontinental railroad line through the South. Although some of the promises were not kept, particularly the railroad proposal, that was enough for the time being to avert a dangerous standoff.
The returns accepted by the Commission put Hayes's margin of victory in South Carolina at 889 votes, the second-closest popular vote margin in a decisive state in U.S. history, after the election of 2000, which was decided by 537 votes in Florida. In 2000, the margin of victory in the Electoral College for George W. Bush was five votes, as opposed to Hayes' one vote.
Upon his defeat, Tilden said, "I can retire to public life with the consciousness that I shall receive from posterity the credit of having been elected to the highest position in the gift of the people, without any of the cares and responsibilities of the office."
Congress would eventually enact the Electoral Count Act in 1887 to provide more detailed rules for the counting of electoral votes, especially in cases of multiple slates of electors being received from a single state.
Results
37.1% of the voting age population and 82.6% of eligible voters participated in the election.[28] According to the commission's rulings, of the 2,249 counties and independent cities making returns, Tilden won in 1,301 (57.9%), and Hayes carried only 947 (42.1%). One county (<0.1%) in Nevada split evenly between Tilden and Hayes.
The Greenback ticket did not have a major impact on the election's outcome by attracting slightly under one percent of the popular vote; nonetheless, Cooper had the strongest performance of any third-party presidential candidate since John Bell in 1860. The Greenbacks' best showings were in Kansas, where Cooper earned just over six percent of the vote, and in Indiana, where he earned 17,207 votes, which far exceeded Tilden's margin of victory of roughly 5,500 votes over Hayes in that state.
The election of 1876 was the last one held before the end of the Reconstruction era, which sought to protect the rights of African Americans in the South, who usually voted for Republican presidential candidates. No antebellum slave state would be carried by a Republican again until the 1896 realignment, which saw William McKinley carry Delaware, Maryland, West Virginia, and Kentucky. This is the closest electoral college result in American history, and the second-closest victory in the tipping point state with South Carolina being decided by 889 votes (only the 2000 election in Florida was closer).
No Republican presidential candidate until Warren G. Harding in 1920 would carry any states that seceded and joined the Confederacy. That year, he carried Tennessee, which had never experienced a long period of occupation by federal troops and had been completely "reconstructed" well before the first presidential election of the Reconstruction period (1868). None of the Southern states that experienced long periods of occupation by federal troops was carried by a Republican again until Herbert Hoover in 1928, when he won Texas, Florida, North Carolina, and Virginia. 1876 proved to be the last election until 1956 in which the Republican nominee carried Louisiana, as well as the last in which the Republican won South Carolina until 1964. Both states would not defect from the Democratic ticket again until 1948, when they backed the "Dixiecrat" candidate Strom Thurmond.
18.33% of Hayes' votes came from the eleven states of the former Confederacy, with him taking 40.40% of the vote in that region.[29] Although 1876 marked the last competitive two-party election in the South before the Democratic dominance of the South until 1948 and of the Border States until 1896, it was also the last presidential election (as of 2020) in which the Democrats won the wartime Unionist Mitchell County, North Carolina;[30]Wayne County, Tennessee; Henderson County, Tennessee; and Lewis County, Kentucky.[31] Hayes was also the only Republican president ever to be elected who failed to carry Indiana, and the first to win without New York and Connecticut.
Presidential elections were held in the United States on November 2, 1880. Republican nominee James A. Garfield defeated Winfield Scott Hancock of the Democratic Party. The voter turnout rate was one of the highest in the nation's history. Garfield was assassinated during his first year in office, and he was succeeded by his vice president, Chester A. Arthur.
Samuel Jones Tilden was an American politician who served as the 25th governor of New York and was the Democratic nominee in the disputed 1876 United States presidential election.
The Compromise of 1877, also known as the Wormley Agreement, the Bargain of 1877, or the Corrupt Bargain, was an unwritten political deal in the United States to settle the intense dispute over the results of the 1876 presidential election, ending the filibuster of the certified results and the threat of political violence in exchange for an end to federal Reconstruction.
The Electoral Commission, sometimes referred to as the Hayes-Tilden or Tilden-Hayes Electoral Commission, was a temporary body created by the United States Congress on January 29, 1877, to resolve the disputed United States presidential election of 1876. Democrat Samuel J. Tilden and Republican Rutherford B. Hayes were the main contenders in the election. Tilden won 184 undisputed electoral votes, one vote shy of the 185 needed to win, to Hayes' 165, with 20 electoral votes from four states unresolved. Both Tilden and Hayes electors submitted votes from these states, and each claimed victory.
The 1880 Democratic National Convention was held June 22 to 24, 1880, at the Music Hall in Cincinnati, Ohio, and nominated Winfield S. Hancock of Pennsylvania for president and William H. English of Indiana for vice president in the United States presidential election of 1880.
The presidency of Rutherford B. Hayes began on March 4, 1877, when Rutherford B. Hayes was inaugurated as President of the United States, and ended on March 4, 1881. Hayes became the 19th president, after being awarded the closely contested 1876 presidential election by Republicans in Congress who agreed to the Compromise of 1877. That Compromise promised to pull federal troops out of the South, thus ending Reconstruction. He refused to seek re-election and was succeeded by James A. Garfield, a fellow Republican and ally.
The 1876 Democratic National Convention assembled in St. Louis just nine days after the conclusion of the Republican National Convention in Cincinnati.
The 1876 Republican National Convention was a presidential nominating convention held at the Exposition Hall in Cincinnati, Ohio on June 14–16, 1876. President Ulysses S. Grant had considered seeking a third term, but with various scandals, a poor economy and heavy Democratic gains in the House of Representatives that led many Republicans to repudiate him, he declined to run. The convention resulted in the nomination of Governor Rutherford B. Hayes of Ohio for president and Representative William A. Wheeler of New York for vice president.
The 1876 United States presidential election in California was held on November 7, 1876, as part of the 1876 United States presidential election. State voters chose six representatives, or electors, to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president.
The 1876 United States elections were held on November 7. In one of the most disputed presidential elections in American history, Republican Governor Rutherford B. Hayes of Ohio ended up winning despite Democratic Governor Samuel J. Tilden of New York earning a majority of the popular vote. The Republicans maintained their Senate majority and cut into the Democratic majority in the House.
The 1876 United States presidential election in New York took place on November 7, 1876. All contemporary 38 states were part of the 1876 United States presidential election. Voters chose 35 electors to the Electoral College, which selected the president and vice president.
The 1876 United States presidential election in Virginia took place on November 7, 1876, as part of the 1876 United States presidential election. Voters chose 11 representatives, or electors to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president.
The 1876 United States presidential election in Wisconsin was held on November 7, 1876, as part of the 1876 United States presidential election. State voters chose ten electors to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president.
The 1876 U.S. presidential election occurred at the twilight of Reconstruction and was between Republican Rutherford B. Hayes and Democrat Samuel J. Tilden. After an extremely heated election dispute, a compromise was eventually reached where Hayes would become U.S. President in exchange for the end of Reconstruction and a withdrawal of U.S. federal troops from the South.
The 1876 United States presidential election in Ohio was held on November 7, 1876, as part of the 1876 United States presidential election. State voters chose 22 electors to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president.
The 1876 United States presidential election in Alabama took place on November 7, 1876, as part of the 1876 presidential election. Alabama voters chose ten representatives, or electors, to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president.
The 1876 United States presidential election in Florida took place on November 7, 1876, as part of the 1876 United States presidential election. Florida voters chose four representatives, or electors, to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president.
The 1876 United States presidential election in Indiana took place on November 7, 1876, as part of the 1876 United States presidential election. Indiana voters chose 15 representatives, or electors, to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president.
William Archer Cocke was an American attorney and politician who served as the 13th Florida Attorney General. Cocke was placed into the national spotlight due to his role in the controversy following the 1876 presidential election.
↑ Havel, James T. (1996). U.S. Presidential Elections and the Candidates: A Biographical and Historical Guide. Vol.2: The Elections, 1789–1992. New York: Simon & Schuster. pp.47–48. ISBN0-02-864623-1.
↑ Hinshaw, Seth (2000). Ohio Elects the President: Our State's Role in Presidential Elections 1804–1996. Mansfield: Book Masters, Inc. p.50.
↑ Holt, Michael F., By One Vote, University Press of Kansas, 2008, p. 129
↑ The violent origin of the term bulldoze as a means of intimidation came from this election. To "bulldose" or "bulldoze" meant to intimidate by violent means, sometimes by whipping or flogging. Bulldozing was used by some groups of Republicans and Democrats around the country to intimidate political opponents and to intimidate blacks in the South, particularly in Louisiana.
1 2 Morris, Roy, Jr. (2003). Fraud of the Century: Rutherford B. Hayes, Samuel Tilden and the Stolen Election of 1876. New York: Simon and Schuster, pp. 168, 239. ISBN978-0-7432-5552-3
Woodward, C. Vann (1951). Reunion and Reaction: The Compromise of 1877 and the End of Reconstruction.
Further reading
Calhoun, Charles W. Conceiving a New Republic: The Republican Party and the Southern Question, 1869–1900 (University Press of Kansas, 2006) .
Clendenen, Clarence C. "President Hayes'" Withdrawal" of the Troops: An Enduring Myth." South Carolina Historical Magazine 70.4 (1969): 240–250. online
De Santis, Vincent P. " Rutherford B. Hayes and the Removal of the Troops and the End of Reconstruction," in Region, Race, and Reconstruction: Essays in Honor of C. Vann Woodward .ed by Morgan Kousser and James McPherson, (Oxford University Press, 1982) 417–451.
Flynn, James Joseph. "The Disputed Election of 1876" (PhD dissertation, Fordham University; ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 1953. 10992419).
Holt, Michael F. By one vote: the disputed presidential election of 1876 (University Press of Kansas, 2008) online
Palen, Marc-William. "Election of 1876/Compromise of 1877." in A Companion to the Reconstruction Presidents 1865–1881 (2014): 415–430. doi:10.1002/9781118607879.ch21
Peskin, Allan. "Was there a Compromise of 1877." Journal of American History 60.1 (1973): 63–75. online
Woodward, C. Vann. "Yes, there was a Compromise of 1877." Journal of American History 60#2 (1973): 215–23.
Shofner, Jerrell H. "Fraud and Intimidation in the Florida Election of 1876." Florida Historical Quarterly 42.4 (1964): 321–330. online
Simpson, Brooks D. "Ulysses S. Grant and the Electoral Crisis of 1876–77." Hayes Historical Journal . 11 (1992): 5–17.
Sternstein, Jerome L. "The Sickles Memorandum: Another Look at the Hayes-Tilden Election-Night Conspiracy." Journal of Southern History (1966): 342–357. online
Zuczek, Richard. "The last campaign of the Civil War: South Carolina and the revolution of 1876." Civil War History 42.1 (1996): 18–31. excerpt
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