President Cleveland, his sister, Miss Rose Cleveland, who came from Holland Patent to preside over the White House for her bachelor brother, with Vice President and Mrs. Hendricks, attended for a short time.
While such of the populace as paid five dollars per ticket danced at the President’s ball, the rest of the city enjoyed the fireworks on the ellipse south of the White House. The following evening, a band concert in the Pension Building drew another crowd, who cheerfully paid the admission fee to see the rooms and their decorations.
Cleveland had not come into office unopposed. When it had become evident that President Arthur would not be nominated to succeed himself, Republican attention had again turned to James G. Blaine, who had been nursing presidential ambitions for a number of years, and who was the outstanding leader of that party. The National Republican Convention assembled in Chicago on June 3, 1884, with no organized opposition to threaten the prospects of Mr. Blaine, who was nominated, early in the course of the proceedings. Having a coloured man as temporary chairman was the unusual feature of this convention, the office being filled by John R. Lynch, former representative from Mississippi. Ex-Senator John B. Henderson, of Missouri, was the permanent chairman. General John A. Logan (“Black Jack”), was nominated as the running mate of Blaine. Their nicknames, the “Plumed Knight” and the “Black Eagle,” formed the basis for some of the campaign jingles.
The National Democratic Convention likewise convened in Chicago, July 6, 1884, at which Grover Cleveland was put forward, his nomination having been made certain by the withdrawal in his favour of Samuel J. Randall of Pennsylvania. Grover Cleveland was nominated on the second ballot. Thomas Hendricks of Indiana received the nomination for Vice President without opposition.
Conventions were plentiful in the land that summer. A national Prohibition convention chose Pittsburgh for the scene of its operations, opening on July 23d. Ex-Governor St. John of Kansas and William Daniel of Maryland were chosen for the president and vice president. The National Greenback Convention met in Indianapolis on May 29th, nominating General Benjamin F. Butler of Massachusetts for president and A. M. West of Mississippi for vice president. Still another was that of the Woman’s Equal Rights Party, which met in San Francisco, September, 1884, and nominated Mrs. Belva Lockwood, of New York, lawyer, lecturer, and suffrage leader, for the Presidency.
To Belva Ann Lockwood belongs the honour of being the second woman nominated for the Presidency of the United States; likewise to her also belongs the honour of being the first woman admitted to practise before the Supreme Court. For this privilege, she had to get a bill through Congress permitting women to practise law, and worked tirelessly for three years to create favourable sentiment before the barrier was lifted. When she finished her efforts, every court in the land was open to her, and never again was a woman lawyer’s application refused because she was a woman and, as in Mrs. Lockwood’s case, a married woman.
Mrs. Lockwood worked tirelessly for equal rights for men and women and drafted and secured the passage of a bill giving to women in governmental service equal pay with men for equal work.
The Woman’s Equal Rights Party nominated her for the Presidency, in San Francisco in 1884 and again in 1888. While she had not sought the honour, she conducted vigorous campaigns.
In forty-three years of legal practice, her greatest effort was always on behalf of the soldier, sailor, and marine, and during this time she handled more than seven thousand pension cases, alone. She also secured the passing of a bill appropriating $50,000 for bounties for soldiers and marines.
Through her work for world peace, she probably acquired the greatest fame. For thirty-six years she was a member of the Universal Peace Union, attending the International Peace Bureau at Bern for more than a quarter of a century, and taking a leading part in every large gathering in this cause, beginning with the first Peace Congress in 1885. She compiled the peace treaties of the United States and secured the introduction of the first bill in Congress for an international arbitration court.