The Election of 1876

[Name of the Institute]

The Election of 1876

Introduction

The election of 1876 was one of the most controversial in U.S. history. Democratic candidate Samuel J. Tilden won the popular vote over Republican Rutherford B. Hayes, but 20 electoral votes from four states were claimed by both parties. After a bitter dispute, a special commission appointed by Congress gave the votes and the presidency to Hayes. The main issues of the time were Reconstruction, an economic depression, and the corruption scandals of the Grant administration. In this paper I will be focusing on the important events of 1876 election and discuss the implications of its results.

Discussion

The disputed presidential election of 1876 was the culmination of the election disputes that arose from Reconstruction after the Civil War. During the late 1860s and 1870s, a large majority of southern whites denied the legitimacy of Republican state governments elected by black votes under constitutions ratified according to the Reconstruction Acts. When southern Democrats, almost all of whom were white, resorted to fraud, violence, and terror to suppress black voting, Republican election boards rejected or changed returns, often relying on the simple conviction that black voters were Republicans rather than on hard evidence of wrongdoing. During the 1876 election, the impact of this power struggle threw the nation into a dangerous political crisis (Rehnquist, 2005).

In the South during Reconstruction, rival candidates often claimed to have won the same local and state offices. Sometimes, unsuccessful candidates turned to the local courts to resolve these disputes. At other times, they threatened force, leading one side or another or both to appeal to President Ulysses S. Grant to carry out the federal government's constitutional obligation to guarantee each state a republican form of government. Democrats won the control of several southern states through such violence, which persisted through the 1870s. In other states, Republicans hung on to power with the aid of federal troops, which the president authorized. By 1875, however, Grant expressed impatience with the repeated requests for federal intervention (Leland, Haworth, 2009).

The 1876 presidential election pitted Republican Rutherford B. Hayes against Democrat Samuel J. Tilden. The contest took place in an atmosphere of violence and intimidation, especially in South Carolina (with seven electoral votes), Louisiana (eight electoral votes), and Florida (four electoral votes). In each of these three states, a majority of voters were African American and presumably Republican. In South Carolina and Louisiana, especially, Democrats campaigned in armed, uniformed groups, broke up Republican meetings by force, and threatened Republican candidates and voters. Republicans alleged similar conduct in parts of Florida. Although the raw returns from the election on November 7 gave all three states and their 19 electoral votes to Tilden, Republican election boards had the power to counteract the fraud and violence (Haworth, 1906). This emerging dispute took on immense importance because the presidential election was close.

Nationwide, Tilden appeared to have won a majority of the popular canvas by roughly a quarter-million votes, but the electoral vote was extremely tight, with Tilden leading 184 to ...