The Most Controversial Election Ever (and it's not Bush v. Gore)
On March 2, 1877 (136 years ago today), just two days before what was to be inauguration day, the U.S. Congress declared Rutherford B. Hayes the winner of the 1876 Presidential election, even though Samuel J. Tilden had won the popular vote. It was probably the most contentious and controversial presidential elections in American history, even more so than the 2000 Bush v. Gore contest. Tilden outpolled Ohio Hayes in the popular vote, and had 184 electoral votes to Hayes's 165, with 20 votes uncounted. These 20 electoral votes were in dispute in three states: Florida, Louisiana, and South Carolina. Each party claimed that its candidate had won the state, while in Oregon one elector was declared illegal and was replaced.
The 20 disputed electoral votes were ultimately awarded to Hayes after a bitter legal and political battle, giving him the victory.An informal deal was struck to resolve the dispute: the Compromise of 1877. In return for the Democrats' acquiescence in Hayes's election, the Republicans agreed to withdraw federal troops from the South, ending Reconstruction.
I've looked in two of the more prominent biographies of Rutherford Hayes, but the accounting of what took place on that March 2nd didn't seem to capture the magnitude of the controversy. This account comes from Michael F. Holt's academic tome By One Vote: The Disputed Presidential Election of 1876 (which I reviewed here) at pages 241-2:
Evidently embarrassed by the way he had won the office, Hayes added several paragraphs about the proceedings of the electoral commission to the end of his inaugural address. Noting that only "the peculiar circumstances" of the 1876 election had required the creation of a "tribunal" to decide its outcome, he praised its members as "men of long established reputation for integrity and intelligence" whose decisions were "entitled to the fullest confidence of the American people." Nonetheless, he admitted "for the present, opinion will widely vary as to the wisdom of the several conclusions announced by that tribunal." Such disagreement was inevitable "in every instance where matters of dispute are made the subject of arbitration under the forms of law. Human judgement is never unerring and is rarely regarded as otherwise than wrong by the unsuccessful party in the contest." Still, he concluded, "the fact that the conflicting claims to the presidency" had been "amicably and peaceably adjusted" was "an occasion for general rejoicing."
Most Democrats never accepted such a rosy conclusion. Throughout Hayes' presidency, they insisted that it was illegitimate. Long before the count of the electoral vote was completed, the bitterness and rage among Democrats had already exploded. Most blamed the foolishness of congressional Democrats, especially Hewitt, for agreeing to the creation of the electoral commission, particularly once they knew that David Davis refused to serve on it. "If the Democratic house had been foolishly fleeced by a Republican confidence game," a Vermont Democrat wrote to Tilden on February 20, "neither you nor the Democratic Party are bound by that fraud." "The defeat of the Democratic Party is due measurably to the manipulation of inexperienced or overconfident directors" concurred a New Yorker two days later. "There has been so much willingness on the part of Democrats to compromise..." "To the imbeciles who allowed the consummation of this wicket scheme... point the finger of contempt" raged a Vermonter on March 2.
The 20 disputed electoral votes were ultimately awarded to Hayes after a bitter legal and political battle, giving him the victory.An informal deal was struck to resolve the dispute: the Compromise of 1877. In return for the Democrats' acquiescence in Hayes's election, the Republicans agreed to withdraw federal troops from the South, ending Reconstruction.
I've looked in two of the more prominent biographies of Rutherford Hayes, but the accounting of what took place on that March 2nd didn't seem to capture the magnitude of the controversy. This account comes from Michael F. Holt's academic tome By One Vote: The Disputed Presidential Election of 1876 (which I reviewed here) at pages 241-2:
Evidently embarrassed by the way he had won the office, Hayes added several paragraphs about the proceedings of the electoral commission to the end of his inaugural address. Noting that only "the peculiar circumstances" of the 1876 election had required the creation of a "tribunal" to decide its outcome, he praised its members as "men of long established reputation for integrity and intelligence" whose decisions were "entitled to the fullest confidence of the American people." Nonetheless, he admitted "for the present, opinion will widely vary as to the wisdom of the several conclusions announced by that tribunal." Such disagreement was inevitable "in every instance where matters of dispute are made the subject of arbitration under the forms of law. Human judgement is never unerring and is rarely regarded as otherwise than wrong by the unsuccessful party in the contest." Still, he concluded, "the fact that the conflicting claims to the presidency" had been "amicably and peaceably adjusted" was "an occasion for general rejoicing."
Most Democrats never accepted such a rosy conclusion. Throughout Hayes' presidency, they insisted that it was illegitimate. Long before the count of the electoral vote was completed, the bitterness and rage among Democrats had already exploded. Most blamed the foolishness of congressional Democrats, especially Hewitt, for agreeing to the creation of the electoral commission, particularly once they knew that David Davis refused to serve on it. "If the Democratic house had been foolishly fleeced by a Republican confidence game," a Vermont Democrat wrote to Tilden on February 20, "neither you nor the Democratic Party are bound by that fraud." "The defeat of the Democratic Party is due measurably to the manipulation of inexperienced or overconfident directors" concurred a New Yorker two days later. "There has been so much willingness on the part of Democrats to compromise..." "To the imbeciles who allowed the consummation of this wicket scheme... point the finger of contempt" raged a Vermonter on March 2.