Sketches of Successful New Hampshire Men

by Various

After Mr. Hayes had been by the commission declared elected president, when his administration surrendered the state governments of South Carolina and Louisiana into the hands of the Democratic claimants, Mr. Chandler vigorously opposed it, and criticised the surrender and the men connected with it in most scathing terms, in letters published in the winter of 1877-78. His fidelity to his convictions of duty was conspicuous; and his courage and boldness in attacking the Hayes administration gave him a lasting hold upon the confidence of the country.

In 1880 he was elected at the head of the ticket of Blaine delegates from New Hampshire to the Chicago convention, and was especially active in the contests in the national committee prior to the convention, and as a member of the committee on credentials, of which Senator Conger was chairman, and which made the successful report in favor of district representation. The following is an extract from the report of the committee on credentials:—

This long current of precedents, and this universal custom of the past, most conclusively establish the right of congressional district representation. It is a question of substance and not of form. Whether the delegates have come certified from separate district conventions, or whether they have come from a state convention where the district members thereof have selected their district representatives, and formally reported them to the state convention, and their election has been certified, for brevity and convenience, only by the officers of the state convention, district representation in fact has always been allowed. The right of the congressional district to two members residing within it and representing its sentiments, has been treated as sacred, and your committee do not believe that it should be now for the first time invaded with the approval of a national convention.

Not only does the call for the convention, and the practice and precedents of the party in one unbroken line, indicate and secure the right of single district representation, but every consideration of the reason of the practice tends to confirm its wisdom. The purpose to be secured in nominating a President is the selection of a candidate the most likely to be accepted by the people; and the nearer we get to the popular feeling, in the manner of selecting delegates, the wiser and safer will be our nominations. If a state convention called to choose delegates to a national convention can, by a bare majority, over-rule the choices of the congressional districts and select delegates residing within the districts who do not represent its sentiments, they might as well he allowed to select all the delegates from one congressional district. Residence within a district, coupled with misrepresentation of its sentiments, is a mockery. The delegates thus selected by a state convention will not fairly represent the masses of the Republicans of the state, but frequently will misrepresent them. Nominations made by conventions of such delegates will not be so likely to be ratified at the polls; and, in the opinion of the committee, it is the duty of the convention emphatically to disapprove these attempts to over-ride time-honored customs of the party, and to vindicate the right of every congressional district to be represented in a national convention by two delegates of its own selection, and expressing its own sentiments.

When his favorite candidate was withdrawn in the convention, he supported General Garfield, and during the campaign which resulted in his election was a member of the national committee and served on the executive committee.

On March 23, 1881, he was nominated, by President Garfield, as solicitor-general in the Department of Justice; but his confirmation was opposed by Attorney-General MacVeagh, and also by all the Democratic senators, on account of his extreme radicalism on the southern question. The Republicans, with Vice-President Arthur's vote, would have had one majority; but the whole Democratic vote, the absence of the New York senators, the abstention of Senator Mitchell, and the adverse vote of Senator Cameron of Pennsylvania, caused his rejection, on May 20, by five majority.

Mr. Chandler had been, in November, 1880, elected a member from Concord in the state legislature, which assembled in June, 1881, and he took a leading position. He favored stringent legislation against bribery at elections, and against the issuing of free passes by railroads, and was in favor of controlling by law the regulation of freight and fares upon all railroads within the state. After the close of the session of the legislature, when consolidation was effected between certain Massachusetts and New Hampshire railroads without the consent of the proper authorities, and against the law, he contended against their action in the courts, in the press, and in all legitimate ways. Its success would have placed the whole railroad interest in the lines running through the center of the state and their branches under the control of Massachusetts capital and Massachusetts corporations. His legal positions have been sustained by the court, and the custody and control of the roads ordered to be taken and exercised by their rightful owners.

The latest honor conferred upon Mr. Chandler was his selection by President Arthur as a member of his cabinet. He was nominated, April 7, 1882, for Secretary of the Navy, and confirmed April 12, by a vote of twenty-eight to sixteen; he qualified and took possession of the office, April 17, 1882.

In closing this sketch of a busy and useful life, I must add a few words appreciative of the character of one whom as a boy and man I have known for forty years. In his personal habits Mr. Chandler is above reproach,—pure in speech as in action,—with a mind quick to perceive, prompt to execute, and comprehensive in its scope. He is a man with convictions and the courage to express and maintain them. He has never sought advancement by flattery or pandering to prejudice. Those who know him best have the most faith in his integrity. The best evidence of it is the fact that in twenty-five years of aggressive political life, while occupying positions of temptation, and criticising freely the action of men who forgot their moral obligations or were shirking their official duties to the detriment of the public good, no one of them has been able to connect him with personal dishonesty, corrupt practice in official life, or political treachery or double-dealing. His methods are direct, positive, systematic, exact, and logical. The positions he has held have all come to him in recognition of his ability and earnest efforts in serving the cause he espouses.

Mr. Chandler has been twice married,—in 1859, to a daughter of Gov. Joseph A. Gilmore, and in 1874, to a daughter of Hon. John P. Hale. He has three sons,—Joseph Gilmore, born in 1860; William Dwight, in 1863; and Lloyd Horwitz, in 1869. Mr. Chandler's father died in 1862. His mother is still living in Concord. He has two brothers,—John K. Chandler, formerly a merchant in Boston and the East Indies, now residing on a farm in Canterbury, N. H.; and George H. Chandler, who was first adjutant and afterwards major of the Ninth New Hampshire regiment, and is now a lawyer in Baltimore. Mr. Chandler's father was a Whig, a man of great intelligence and firmness of character. His mother is a woman of equally positive traits, and has contributed much to the formation of the character which has given success to her sons.