| First. | Second. | Third. | Fourth. | Fifth. | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Benjamin F. Wade, of Ohio | 147 | 170 | 178 | 206 | 38 |
| Reuben E. Fenton, of New York | 126 | 144 | 139 | 144 | 69 |
| Henry Wilson, of Massachusetts | 119 | 114 | 101 | 87 | — |
| Schuyler Colfax, of Indiana | 115 | 145 | 165 | 186 | 541 |
| Andrew G. Curtin, of Penn. | 51 | 45 | 40 | — | — |
| Hannibal Hamlin, of Maine | 28 | 30 | 25 | 25 | — |
| James Speed, of Kentucky | 22 | — | — | — | — |
| James Harlan, of Iowa | 16 | — | — | — | — |
| John A. J. Creswell, of Maryland | 14 | — | — | — | — |
| Samuel C. Pomeroy, of Kansas | 6 | — | — | — | — |
| William D. Kelley, of Penn. | 4 | — | — | — | — |
The swift mutations in American politics were strangely illustrated in the nomination for Vice-President at that convention. Senator Benjamin F. Wade, of Ohio, who was about closing a term of eighteen years in the service of the Senate, who was then President pro tem. of that body, and who was expected to reach the Presidency for a period of eight months by the impeachment and dismissal of President Johnson, was the prominent candidate for Vice-President before the meeting of the convention. It was generally believed that Johnson would be successfully impeached; that Wade would become President for the remainder of the term, with illimitable patronage, and that his nomination for the Vice-Presidency was apparently assured. But when many delegates were on their way to Chicago on Saturday, the 16th, the trained lightning sped the message westward that Johnson had been acquitted by a single vote in the Senate, and that ended Wade’s candidacy. He had many friends independent of the prospective power that had made him formidable, and they made a stubborn battle for him, but though he was highest of all on the 1st ballot, on the 5th and final vote he had but 38 votes to 541 for Schuyler Colfax and 69 for Senator Fenton, of New York. Thus two crushing disasters had befallen Wade in a single week. He had the Presidency apparently within his grasp—and this would have carried the Vice-Presidency for another term—but he was smitten in both efforts, and these crowning disasters closely followed his defeat for re-election to the Senate. He was the sturdy, bluff, uncompromising patriot of the Senate during the war, and after these three disasters came upon him in quick succession, the old man groped his way along for a few years in solitude and then slept the dreamless sleep of the dead.
The Democratic National Convention met in New York on the 4th of July, and there was a strong sentiment among the delegates favorable to the nomination of a liberal Republican for President. The Republicans had nominated a Democrat, and Chief Justice Chase, who was an old-time Democrat, and who had won a very large measure of Democratic confidence by his rulings in the impeachment case of President Johnson, was a favorite with a very powerful circle of friends, who had quietly, but very thoroughly, as they believed, organized to have him nominated by a spontaneous tidal wave after a protracted deadlock between the leading candidates. I have every reason to believe that Chase would have been nominated at the time Seymour was chosen, and in like manner, had it not been for the carefully laid plan of Samuel J. Tilden to prevent the success of Chase. Horatio Seymour, the ablest Democrat of that day, was president of the convention, and he had no more idea of being nominated for President than he had of becoming the Czar of Russia. It was generally supposed that Seymour left the chair of the convention because some votes had been cast for him for President, but he really left the chair because he expected to aid in the nomination of Chase, and when Seymour called another to preside, the Tilden strategy completed its purpose by an able Democrat demanding the nomination of Horatio Seymour, and delivering a most eloquent and impressive eulogy upon the confessed leader of the Democracy. In vain did Seymour give a peremptory declination. The convention had been organized for its work, and men in nearly every delegation who had been assigned to their task rose and swelled the hurrah for Seymour. When he found the tide was likely to be overwhelming, he declared with equal earnestness and pathos, “Your candidate I cannot be;” but the wave sped on and Seymour was made the candidate by a practically unanimous vote.
He was prevailed upon to consider the subject, and that meant, of course, that he could not decline. There had been twenty-one ballots before the nomination of Seymour, in which Pendleton, Hancock, and Hendricks were the leading competitors. It was then that the nomination of Chase was expected to be made just as the nomination of Seymour was made, and Tilden’s was the master hand that shaped the action of the convention.
Tilden was a master leader, as subtle and sagacious as he was able, and he thoroughly organized the plan to nominate Seymour, not so much because he desired Seymour as the candidate, as because he was implacable in his hostility to Chase. It was well known by Chase and his friends that Tilden crucified Chase in the Democratic convention of 1868, and this act of Tilden’s had an impressive sequel eight years later, when the election of Tilden hung in the balance in the Senate, and when the accomplished daughter of Chase decided the battle against Tilden.
The convention met on the 4th of July, which was Saturday, and nothing beyond organization was accomplished until Monday. The supporters of Pendleton were altogether the most aggressive of all the candidates. They represented the “Greenback” issue that had then taken form, and exhibited considerable popular strength, not only in the Democratic party, but to some extent in the Republican party. The two-thirds rule was reaffirmed, and on Tuesday the committee on platform reported the following resolutions, which were unanimously adopted:
The Democratic party, in national convention assembled, reposing its trust in the intelligence, patriotism, and discriminating justice of the people, standing upon the Constitution as the foundation and limitation of the powers of the Government and the guarantee of the liberties of the citizen, and recognizing the questions of slavery and secession as having been settled, for all time to come, by the war, or the voluntary action of the Southern States in constitutional conventions assembled, and never to be renewed or reagitated, do, with the return of peace, demand:
1. Immediate restoration of all the States to their rights in the Union under the Constitution, and of civil government to the American people.
2. Amnesty for all past political offences, and the regulation of the elective franchise in the States by their citizens.
3. Payment of the public debt of the United States as rapidly as practicable; all moneys drawn from the people by taxation, except so much as is requisite for the necessities of the Government, economically administered, being honestly applied to such payment, and where the obligations of the Government do not expressly state upon their face, or the law under which they were issued does not provide that they shall be paid in coin, they ought, in right and in justice, to be paid in the lawful money of the United States.