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Samuel
Jones Tilden (1814 -1886) was the
Democratic candidate for the US presidency
in the disputed election of 1876, the most
controversial American election of the 19th
century.
Tilden
won the popular vote over his Republican
opponent, Rutherford B. Hayes. But the result
in the Electoral College was in question
because the states of Florida, Louisiana,
and South Carolina each sent two sets of
Electoral Votes to Congress. There was separately
a conflict over one elector from Oregon,
who was disqualified on a technicality.
Republicans
had taken over the state governments in
the South during Reconstruction, but were
unpopular with the overwhelmingly Democratic
southerners, many of whom resented what
they perceived as interference from the
North, and blamed the Republicans for the
Civil War. As a result, one set of Electoral
Votes from each of these three states had
cast their ballots for the Republican Hayes,
and another set had cast their ballot for
the Democrat Tilden. Without these three
states, Tilden had won 184 Electoral Votes,
but needed 185 to win the Presidency. If
he had taken even one state, he would have
become President. However, if Hayes were
to win all the contested votes, he would
receive 185 Electoral Votes and win the
election. Because the Constitution does
not address how Congress is to handle such
a dispute, a constitutional crisis appeared
imminent.
Congressional
leaders tried to avert the crisis by creating
a 15-member Electoral Commission who would
determine which set of votes were valid.
The Commission consisted of five members
from the Republican-controlled Senate (three
Republicans and two Democrats), and five
from the Democratic-controlled House of
Representatives (3 Democrats, 2 Republicans).
The remaining 5 members were chosen from
the Supreme Court—originally 2 Republicans,
2 Democrats, and independent Justice David
Davis. Davis, however, was elected to the
US Senate from Illinois and resigned from
the Court. Justice Joseph P. Bradley, a
Republican, was named to replace him. Unsurprisingly,
the Commission voted 8-7 to award all the
votes to Hayes. The dispute, however, did
not end, as Democrats threatened to filibuster
in the Senate. Eventually, a compromise
was reached whereby Hayes agreed to name
at least one Southerner to his cabinet and
to withdraw all federal troops in the South,
bringing to an end the era of Reconstruction.
Tilden
was born in New Lebanon in New York State.
Briefly at Yale College and at the College
of the City of New York, he graduated from
New York University School of Law (then
known as the School of Law of the University
of the City of New York) and was admitted
to the bar in 1841 and became a skilled
corporate lawyer, with many railroads as
clients in the shaky railroad boom decade
of the 1850s. His legal practice, combined
with shrewd investments, made him rich.
In
1848, largely on account of his personal
attachment to Martin Van Buren , he participated
in the revolt of the 'Barnburners' or Free-Soil
faction of the New York Democrats. He was
among the few such who did not join the
Republican Party and in 1855 was the candidate
of the anti-slavery faction for attorney-general
of the state. After the Civil War Tilden
became chairman of the Democratic state
committee and soon came into conflict with
the notorious Tweed ring of New York City
. As the systematically corrupt New York
judges were its tools, Tilden, after entering
the Assembly in 1872 to promote the cause
of reform, took a leading part in their
impeachment . By analyzing the bank accounts
of certain members of the ring, he obtained
legal proof of the principle on which the
spoils had been divided. As a reform-spirited
Governor in 1874 , he turned his attention
to a second set of plunderers, the 'canal
ring', made up of members of both parties
who had been systematically robbing New
York State through the maladministration
of its canals. Tilden succeeded in breaking
them up.
His
successful service as governor gained him
the presidential nomination.
After
losing the presidency to Hayes, Tilden counseled
his followers to abide quietly by the result,
but he declined re-nomination in 1880 and
1884. The remainder of his life was spent
in retirement at his country home, Greystone,
near Yonkers, New York. He died a bachelor
in 1886 . He confided to a friend that he
had never slept with a woman in his life.
Of
his fortune (estimated at $5,000,000) approximately
$4,000,000 was bequeathed for the establishment
and maintenance of a free public library
and reading-room in the City of New York;
but, as the will was successfully contested
by relatives, only about $2,000,000 of the
bequest was applied to its original purpose;
in 1895 the Tilden Trust was combined with
the Astor and Lenox libraries to found the
New York Public Library , whose building
bears his name on its front.
In
1878 the Republican New York Tribune published
a series of telegraphic dispatches in cipher,
accompanied by translations, by which it
attempted to prove that during the crisis
following the 1876 election, Tilden had
been negotiating for the purchase of the
electoral votes of South Carolina and Florida.
Tilden denied emphatically all knowledge
of such dispatches, and appeared voluntarily
before a Congressional sub-committee in
New York City to clear himself of the charge.
The attempts to implicate him in corrupt
transactions were not successful; but his
political opponents endeavored to make capital
in subsequent campaigns, out of the so-called
'Cipher Dispatches'.
Click
here to visit the Samuel Jones Tilden website.
Click
here for a Toast to Samuel Tilden
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