Samuel J. Tilden.[[275]]

599. Electoral Commission.—The importance of the question caused great anxiety from November until March. The result involved not only an entire change of national policy with regard to the South, but also the tenure of nearly one hundred thousand officials. There was talk of another civil war. For weeks the matter was debated in Congress, with no result. As the time for inauguration approached, the most temperate men on both sides agreed upon an Electoral Commission, to whom the whole matter should be submitted for decision. Such decision was to be final, unless both Senate and House agreed in rejecting it. The commission was to consist of five members of the House (three of them Democrats), five Senators (three of them Republicans), and five members of the Supreme Court (two Democrats, two Republicans, and one Independent). It turned out that the only Independent member of the Supreme Court, David Davis, resigned in order to accept a seat in the Senate. He therefore could not serve, and after some delay a Republican was put in his place. All the points in dispute were ably presented and argued. A bare majority of the Commission decided that they could not accept returns that were not regularly certified to and that they must accept those of the duly authorized returning boards. Accordingly, the questions in regard to each of the states involved were decided in favor of the Republicans, by a vote of eight to seven, all the Republicans voting one way and all the Democrats the other. As the Republican Senate would not vote to reject this result, it was conclusive, and Hayes was declared elected. The question was not settled, however, till March 2, two days before the inauguration. The feeling on the part of the Democrats throughout the country was naturally intense; but the decision was legal, and no formal objection to it could be made. Thus Hayes and Wheeler were chosen by an electoral vote of one hundred and eighty-five, while Tilden and Hendricks received one hundred and eighty-four. Nothing has ever occurred in the history of our government to subject the Constitution to so violent a strain; and nothing could be more creditable to the sense of loyalty on the part of the aggrieved portion of the people than their peaceful submission to the results of the legal decision. Recent opinion seems to be favorable to the technical merits of Tilden’s claims, yet it is generally conceded that the country, on the whole, profited from the actual course of events.

References.—Grant, Memoirs, Vol. II.; Stanwood, Elections, 273-344; Johnston, Orations, Vol. IV., 296-366, 367-420; Fiske, Civil Government, 261; G. W. Curtis, Orations (for reports in regard to the progress of Civil Service Reform, these addresses are unequaled); Andrews, The South since the War; Kelley, The Old South and the New; J. W. Burgess, Reconstruction and the Constitution (1902). Allen’s Governor Chamberlain’s Administration in South Carolina is valuable as a picture of methods during the reconstruction period. See also bibliographical note to Chapter XXXII.

[268] The Union Pacific was to receive $16,000 for each mile across the plains, $48,000 for each mile across the mountains, and $32,000 per mile for the remainder of the way. The Central Pacific was to receive an average of a little more than $31,000 a mile. The total amount received was $55,076,000.
[269] The Northern Pacific, which extends from St. Paul to Puget Sound, was built with the help of forty-seven million acres of land, but was not completed until 1883. The Southern Pacific, which extends from New Orleans to San Francisco, was also assisted by the government and was completed some years later. The Santa Fé and the Great Northern, at a still later period, also connected the Mississippi Valley with the Pacific Coast.
[270] Born in New Hampshire, 1811; died, 1872. Edited various newspapers in New York City until he founded the Tribune, 1841, which he edited with great power till the year of his death; was first a Whig, then a Republican; always an advocate of protection, and during the later years of his life an advocate of universal suffrage and general amnesty; became one of the bondsmen of Jefferson Davis in 1867; was nominated for President by discontented Republicans and Democrats in 1872.
[271] Tweed (1823–1878) was a son of a chair-maker which trade he first followed. He became a power in local politics through the influence he acquired as a popular member of a fire company. He served as alderman and congressman, but did his chief plundering as commissioner of public works of New York City. He was finally convicted in 1873 and imprisoned and fined, but in 1875 his imprisonment was declared illegal. Civil suits were still pending against him and the enormous bail of $3,000,000 was required, in default of which he was put in jail. He escaped to Cuba and Spain, but was brought back and died in jail.
[272] Born in Ohio, 1839; died, 1876. Graduated from West Point, 1861. Served with distinction in Civil War, especially in Shenandoah Valley; brigadier general of volunteers, 1863; brevetted brigadier general United States Army, 1865; served later in the West against the Indians; killed in the massacre of his command, 1876.