The National Convention of the Liberal Republicans, which was the first public step in the fusion with the Democracy, was held at Cincinnati on the first day of May (1872), under a call emanating from the Liberal State Convention of Missouri. There were no organizations to send delegates, and it was necessarily called as a mass convention. The attendance was large, especially from the States immediately adjoining the place of meeting and from New York. It was clear that with an aggregate so large and numbers so disproportionate from the different States the disorganized and irresponsible mass must be resolved into some sort of representative convention, and those present from the several States were left to choose delegates in their own way. The New-York delegation included Judge Henry R. Selden, General John Cochrane, Theodore Tilton, William Dorsheimer (who two years later was elected Lieutenant-Governor on the Democratic ticket with Samuel J. Tilden), and Waldo Hutchins, who has since been a Democratic member of Congress.—David Dudley Field, though participating in the preliminary consultations, was excluded from the delegation through the influence of Mr. Greeley's friends, because of his free-trade attitude.
—Other leading spirits were Colonel McClure and John Hickman of Pennsylvania; Stanley Matthews, George Hoadly, and Judge R. P. Spalding, of Ohio; Carl Schurz, William M. Grosvenor, and Joseph Pulitzer, of Missouri; John Wentworth, Leonard Swett, Lieutenant-Governor Koerner, and Horace White, of Illinois; Frank W. Bird and Edward Atkinson of Massachusetts; David A. Wells of Connecticut; and John D. Defrees of the District of Columbia. Men less conspicuous than these were present in large numbers from many States.—The proportion of free-traders outside of New York was a marked feature of the assemblage, and had an important bearing on some of the subsequent proceedings. From New York, also, a number were present, and they were of course opposed to Mr. Greeley; but Mr. Greeley's friends succeeded in keeping them off the list of delegates.
Stanley Matthews was made temporary chairman. In his brief speech he said that those who had assembled in this gathering were still Republicans, and he urged in justification of their independent action that the forces in control of the party machinery had perverted it to personal and unwarrantable ends. "As the war had ended," he continued, "so ought military rule and military principles." This imputation of a military character to the National Administration was the key-note of all the expressions. Mr. Carl Schurz was the leading spirit of the Convention, and amplified the same thought in his more elaborate address as permanent President.
The platform was the object of much labor, as well as the theme of much pride, on the part of its authors. It was designed to be a succinct statement and a complete justification of the grounds on which the movement rested. It started from the Republican position and aimed to be Republican in tone and principle, only marking out the path on which Liberal thought diverged from what were characterized as the ruling Republican tendencies. It recognized the equality of all men before the law, and the duty of equal and exact justice; it pledged fidelity to the Union, to emancipation, to enfranchisement, and opposition to any re-opening of the questions settled by the new Amendments to the Constitution; it demanded the immediate and absolute removal of all disabilities imposed on account of the Rebellion; it declared that local self-government with impartial suffrage would guard the rights of all citizens more securely than any centralized power, and insisted upon the supremacy of the civil over the military authorities; it laid great stress upon the abuse of the civil service and upon the necessity of reform, and declared that no President ought to be a candidate for re-election; it denounced repudiation, opposed further land-grants, and demanded a speedy return to specie payments.
On these questions there was no division in the Liberal ranks. But there was another issue, which caused a sharper controversy and came to a lame and impotent conclusion. The large numbers of free-traders who participated in the Convention has been noted. Indeed, its call emanated from free-traders, and outside of New York free-traders constituted its controlling forces. The Missouri group was unanimously and especially devoted to free trade; and the Illinois, Ohio, and New-England influences in the Convention were for the most part in full sympathy with it. The New-York element, which centred in Mr. Greeley, shared his view of protection. Whatever other reasons he might have had for joining the movement, his lifelong and conspicuous championship of Protection would have made it impossible for him to sustain any demonstration against that great doctrine. Even before his nomination was anticipated he was the most important factor in the revolt against the Administration, and any division (of a division) which sacrificed or endangered the chief pillar of strength seemed peculiarly fatuous and perilous.
Nevertheless the free-traders made a persistent effort to enforce their views, and a strenuous struggle ensued. The policy which Mr. Greeley had recommended finally prevailed. He knew there was a radical difference among the Liberals on this question. He could not surrender his position, and the free-traders would not surrender their position. He therefore proposed that they should acknowledge the differences and waive the question. This suggestion was accepted; and a compromise was effected by declaring that the differences were irreconcilable, remitting the subject to the people in their Congressional districts and to the decision of Congress free from Executive interference or dictation. Thus the only agreement reached was an agreement to disagree.
With this difficulty adjusted, the Convention was ready to proceed to the choice of a candidate. The struggle had been actively in progress for several days, and had developed sharp antagonisms. In its earlier stages it bore the appearance of a contest between Judge David Davis and Charles Francis Adams. Judge Davis had long been credited with aspirations and with some elements of political strength. He had been Lincoln's friend; he was rich, honest, and popular. He had watched politics from the Supreme Bench with judicial equipoise and partisan instincts, and by many discerning men was regarded as a highly eligible candidate. Mr. Adams was austere, cold, even repellent in his manner; but it was urged that the traditions of his name and his distinguished diplomatic services would appeal to the judgment of the people and take from the Republican party some of its best elements. He was earnestly supported by many of the strongest Liberals, who felt that their only hope of success lay in the selection of a candidate who was experienced in public life, and who could inspire public confidence.
The supporters of Mr. Adams displayed violent hostility to Judge Davis. They charged his friends with bringing a great body of hirelings from Illinois, and with attempting to "pack" the Convention,—with resorting, in short, to the alleged practices of the Republicans who were still opposing the Democratic party. They announced that even if Judge Davis should be nominated they would not sustain him. This influential and unyielding opposition was fatal to the Illinois candidate. As the Davis canvass declined the Greeley sentiment increased, and it soon became evident that the contest would lie between Adams and Greeley. On the first ballot the vote stood, Adams 205, Greeley 147, Trumbull 110, Gratz Brown 95, Davis 92½, Curtin 62, Chase 2½. The minor candidates were withdrawn as the voting proceeded, and on the sixth ballot Greeley had 332, Adams 324, Chief Justice Chase 32, Trumbull 19. There was at once a rapid change to Greeley, and the conclusion was not long delayed. He was declared by formal vote to be the nominee of the Convention. For the Vice-Presidency, Gratz Brown, Senator Trumbull, George W. Julian, and Gilbert C. Walker were placed in nomination. Mr. Brown was successful on the second ballot.
The result of the balloting created surprise and disappointment. Mr. Greeley's name had not been seriously discussed until the members assembled in Cincinnati, and no scheme of the Liberal managers had contemplated his nomination. It was evident from the first that with his striking individuality, his positive views, and his combative career, he had both strength and weakness as a candidate; but whatever his merits or demerits, his selection was out of the reckoning of those who had formed the Liberal organization. It was certainly a singular and unexpected result, that a Convention which owed its formal call to a body of active and aggressive free-traders, should commit its standard to the foremost champion of Protection in the country.
But there was another and still more important element of incongruity—another reason why the nomination was foreign to the whole theory of the political experiment of 1872. The indispensable condition attaching to the Liberal plan was its endorsement by the Democracy. This demanded the selection of a candidate who, while representing the Liberal Republican policy, would be acceptable to the Democratic allies. No man seemed so little likely to fulfil this requirement as Mr. Greeley. From the hour when he first entered political life and acquired prominence in the wild Whig canvass for Harrison and Tyler in 1840, he had waged incessant and unsparing war against the Democrats. He had assailed them with all the weapons in his well-filled armory of denunciation; and not only had every conspicuous Democratic leader received his stalwart blows, but the whole party had repeatedly felt the force of his fearless and masterful onset.