THE CAMPAIGN OF 1886.
The campaign of 1886 showed that the Republican party was capable of making gains in the South, especially in Congressional districts and upon protective and educational issues. Indeed, so plain was this in the State of Virginia that Randolph Tucker, for whom the Legislature had apportioned a district composed of eleven white counties, refused to run again, and Mr. Yost, editor of the Staunton Virginian, who had canvassed the entire district on tariff issues and in favor of the Blair educational bill, was returned over a popular Democrat, by 1900 majority. Of the ten Congressmen from Virginia the Republicans elected six. Morrison, the tariff reform leader of Illinois, was defeated, as was Burd of Ohio, while Speaker Carlisle’s seat was contested by Mr. Thoche, a protectionist candidate of the Knights of Labor. These and other gains reduced the Democratic majority in the House to about fifteen, and this could not be counted upon for any tariff reduction or financial measures. The Republicans lost one in the U. S. Senate.
Local divisions in the Republican ranks were seriously manifested in but one State, that of California, which chose a Democratic Governor and a Republican Lieutenant-Governor, so close was the contest. The Governor has since died, the Lieutenant-Governor has taken his place, but the Legislature re-elected Senator Hearst, Democrat, who had previously been appointed before the retirement of Governor Stoneman.
New York city witnessed, not a revolution, but such a marked change in politics that it excited comment throughout the entire country. The Labor party ran Henry George, the author of Progress and Poverty, and other works somewhat socialistic and certainly agrarian in their tendencies, for Mayor of the city. Hewitt, the well-known Congressman, was the candidate of the Democracy, while the Republicans presented Roosevelt, known chiefly for his municipal-reform tendencies. Hewitt was elected, but George received over 60,000 votes, and this unlooked-for poll changed the direction of political calculations for a year. George was aided by nearly all the Labor organizations, and he drew from the Democrats about two to the one drawn from the Republicans—a fact which greatly raised the hopes of the latter and at the same time made the Democrats more cautious.
In 1886 the Republicans and Democrats, with the qualifications noted above, held their party strength, with the future prospects so promising to both that at this early date preparations began for the Presidential campaign, General Beaver, defeated for Governor of Pennsylvania in 1882 by a plurality of 40,000, was now elected by a plurality of 43,000, though the Prohibitionists polled 32,000 votes, two-thirds of which came from the Republican party. The general result of the campaign indicated that the Republicans were gaining in unity and numbers.