In
1876 Rutherford Hayes was nominated as
the Republican presidential candidate.
The party had been hurt by the scandals during the presidency of Ulysses
S. Grant (1869-77) and were attracted by Hayes's clean record
in government. His Democratic Party
opponent, Samuel Tilden, also had an impressive
background, and during the election the Republican
supporting Thomas Nast, produced a series
of cartoons attacking him. This helped to undermine the Democrats
campaign but early returns suggested a Tilden victory and the first
Democratic president since the American
Civil War. When the votes were counted Tilden (4,284,757) had
won 51% of the vote, against 48% for Hayes (4,033,950).
After the election the Republican Party
challenged the validity of the voting in South Carolina, Florida and
Louisiana. These three southern states were still under post-war military
occupation, and over the next few days votes for Tilden were disqualified
shifting the majority to Hayes. Members of the Democratic Party were
furious and many refused to accept the new voting figures. Florida
sent two rival sets of electors to the electoral college and left
it to Congress to decide who should become president.
Congress was itself split with the Senate being controlled by Republicans
and the House of Representatives by the Democrats.
In an attempt to solve the problem both houses agreed to set up a
special Electoral Commission of 15 senators, representatives and supreme
court justices. In an attempt to produce a non-partisan decision,
it was agreed to appoint seven Republicans, seven Democrats, and one
independent justice to the commission. However, at the last moment
the independent justice was offered a senate seat in Illinois and
was replaced by a supporter of the Republican
Party.
During the investigation by the commission some voters claimed they
had been physically intimidated during the election. The committee
also discovered several cases of fraud including attempts to destroy
ballot papers. However, at the end of the investigation, all members
of the commission voted on party lines and Rutherford
Hayes was given the electoral votes for all three states. Hayes
was therefore elected with 185 electoral votes to Tilden's 184.
Leaders of the Democratic Party continued
to challenge the election result. Further negotiations took place
and it was eventually agreed that Samuel Tilden
would accept the result in return for federal troops being removed
from southern states. This decision enabled the whites to regain the
political control of the South that they had lost at the end of the
American Civil War. In most of these
states Black Codes were reintroduced
and a large percentage of African Americans lost the right to vote
in future elections.
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