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476 HAYES SECURES DISPUTED VOTES; LOUISIANA ELECTION.

a vote of 191 to 86, and became a law decision of the majority of that body, on the 29th.*

On January 30 the Senate and the House appointed their members of the commission. The four associate justices Clifford, Miller, Field and Strong-chose David Davis, an independent in politics, as the fifth judicial member, who was satisfactory to both parties, but at the last moment he was elected to the Senate by the legislature of Illinois and was therefore disqualified. The justices then chose Joseph P. Bradley. On February 1 the commission and both Houses assembled and the count began, proceeding smoothly until Florida was reached. There were three sets of certificates from that State, and as objection was entered the matter was referred to the commission. On the 9th that body by a partisan vote of 8 to 7 decided that the four electoral votes of Florida should be counted for Hayes and Wheeler. On the 10th the Senate accepted this decision but on the 12th the House rejected it. As the decision of the commission was to stand unless overruled by both Houses, the Florida votes were cast for Hayes. The Louisiana returns were also referred to the commission and on the 16th by

*Haworth, Hayes-Tilden Election, pp. 196-219; Statutes-at-Large, vol. xix., p. 227; McPherson, Handbook of Politics, 1878, pp. 8-10; Curtis, Constitutional History, vol. ii., pp. 421-423; Bigelow's Tilden, vol. ii., pp. 57-84; Appleton's Annual Cyclopædia, 1877, p. 137.

† Senators Edmunds, Morton and Frelinghuysen, Republicans, and Bayard and Thurman, Democrats; Representatives-Garfield and Hoar, Republicans, and Payne, Abbott and Hunton, Democrats.

were ordered to be counted for Hayes.

But the Democrats now began to filibuster in the hope of putting off the final count until after the 4th of March. The counting of the Louisiana votes was delayed by these tactics until February 20 when the decision of the commission was confirmed by the Senate but rejected by the House. On the same day the returns from Oregon went to the commission and on the 23d the votes of this State were given to Hayes. The South Carolina returns were also decided in favor of Hayes on the 28th by the same vote of 8 to 7.*

In the meantime the condition of affairs in Louisiana and South Carolina was far from encouraging to either party. In Louisiana both candidates F. T. Nicholls, Democrat, and S. B. Packard, negro-Republican claimed the election, though on the face of the return, Nicholls had received a large majority. In January, 1877, both candidates had been installed in office, but the White League took possession of New Orleans and recognized the Nicholls faction. Grant was slow to send military aid, as he was too closely occupied in watching the electoral count, but after the Louisiana votes had been given to

For the votes on the various States see McPherson, Handbook of Politics, 1878, pp. 12-32. See also Bigelow's Tilden, vol. ii., pp. 89-105; Haworth, Hayes-Tilden Election, pp. 222-268.

For evidence as to the methods employed in the election, see Senate Report No. 701, House Report No. 156, and House Misc. Doc. No. 34, 44th Congress, 2d session,

[graphic]

THE FLORIDA CASE BEFORE THE ELECTORAL COMMISSION.
From the painting by Mrs. Cornelia Adéle Fassett in the Capitol at Washington.

"RED SHIRT CAMPAIGN" IN SOUTH CAROLINA.

Hayes, Grant notified Packard March 1 that he would remain neutral in the State controversy and that the military could not be used to support either faction.*

As had been said in a previous chapter South Carolina had been aroused by the election to the bench of a negro (Whipper) and a renegade white (Moses). All persons of whatever political color had endorsed Governor Chamberlain's refusal to sign the commissions of Whipper and Moses. But a national election was in sight, and both the Democrats and Republicans in the North condemned the actions of their Southern branches, the Republicans because Governor Chamberlain had pointed out the rottenness and corruption existing in a Republican legislature, whereas he should have covered it, and the Democrats because their allies in South Carolina had honored and sustained Chamberlain (a Republican) against the time honored custom of partisan party politics. The Democrats were now in a position to regain their lost control of the State because of the exposures and they began to organize their members for a hard struggle.

At the election Wade Hampton was the Democratic nominee and Governor Chamberlain the Republican nominee, and then followed the "Red Shirt Campaign "in which "Hampton or Military Rule " was the slogan.

Bands of armed men known as " Rifle Clubs," "Sabre Clubs" and "Artillery Clubs," countenanced by some of

* McPherson, Handbook of Politics, 1878, p. 67.

477

the leading Democratic politicians, patroled the election districts for the purpose, it was charged, of preventing the Republicans from voting. Fearing they could not command a full party vote at the coming election, and especially that the negroes would lack courage to vote against the Democrats, the Republicans persuaded President Grant to issue a proclamation on October 17, tober 17, 1876, commanding the

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'rifle clubs" to disperse within three days. On the same day the Secretary of War issued an order to General Sherman to direct all the available troops to proceed to Columbia, the capital of South Carolina, to enforce the President's proclamation. Hampton won the election, but the Republicans refused to submit, claiming Chamberlain's election by over 3,100 votes. Both Hampton and Chamberlain were inaugurated, and for five months the State was forced to undergo the suspense and disorganization of a "dual government."

A group of Southern politicians (including Gordon of Georgia, Ellis and Levi, of Louisiana, and Watterson, of Kentucky) now resolved upon a bold and shrewd stroke. In order to gain control of the Southern States and establish home rule there, they determined to sacrifice the national office. They therefore agreed with some Richardson, Messages and Papers, vol. vii., pp.

*

396-397.

Avary, Dixie after the War, chap. xxx.; Allen, Governor Chamberlain's Administration, p. 258 et seq.; Fleming, Documentary History, vol. ii., pp. 405–414; Haworth, Hayes-Tilden Election, pp. 122-156; House Report No. 175; House Ex. Doc. No. 30, 44th Congress, 2d session.

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prominent friends of Hayes (including John Sherman, Garfield, Matthews, Dennison, and Foster) to discontinue the filibustering tactics and allow the electoral count to be completed in time if the Republicans would pledge the new administration to withdraw the troops from the statehouses at Columbia and New Orleans.* While Hayes himself was not a party to this agreement, the Southern leaders were satisfied that his friends were strong enough to fulfil their part of the bargain" without committing Hayes himself to any explicit pledge. The agreement was therefore consumated at a conference in the apartments of Mr. Evarts at Wormley's Hotel, February 26. The Democrats then allowed the count to proceed without serious interruption and it was completed early on the morning of March 2d, when the president of the Senate announced that Hayes and Wheeler had been elected by a majority of one vote. On Saturday, March 3, the Forty-fourth Congress adjourned.

The leaders of the Democratic party now raised a cry of fraud, and threats were made that Mr. Tilden would be inaugurated by force, but Mr. Hayes quietly proceeded to Washington, and as the 4th of March fell on Sunday, he

*Haworth, Hayes-Tilden Election, pp. 265-282; Testimony of Roberts and Burke in House Misc. Doc. No. 31, pp. 884, 964, 45th Congress, 3d session; McClure, Recollections, p. 101.

† Almira R. Hancock, Reminiscences of Winfield Scott Hancock, p. 161; Haworth, Hayes-Tilden Election, pp. 187 et seq., 285.

privately took the prescribed oath of office on Saturday the 3d, and on Monday, the 5th, was publicly inaugurated, Chief Justice Waite administering the oath.

*

Such

Dunning says that though the Democrat-Republican agreement" was not generally known when Hayes was inaugurated, the substance of it was in the thoughts of many men. Generalized the famous bargain meant: Let the reforming Republicans direct the National government and the Southern whites may rule the negroes. were the terms on which the new administration took up its task. They precisely and consciously reversed the principles of reconstruction as followed under Grant, and hence they ended an era. Grant in 1868 had cried peace, but in his time, with the radicals and carpet-baggers in the saddle, there no peace; with Hayes peace

was

came."

In his inaugural address President Hayes indicated that he would pursue a conciliatory course toward the South. The state of affairs in Louisiana and South Carolina, therefore, received early attention. As loud complaints were made against the presence of the troops in those States he sent a commission to investigate and upon a favorable report the troops were removed from both capitals. In Louisiana the Packard government broke down, thus securing to the conservative whites nearly everything for

* Reconstruction Political and Economic, p. 341.

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