By the time the Presidential election of 1876 arrived the Republican party bad regained some of the ground it had lost. Rutherford B. Hayes, of Ohio, was nominated for President in the convention at Cincinnati, 14-16 June 1876. William A. Wheeler, of New York, was nominated for Vice-President. The Demo cratic candidates, nominated at Saint Louis, were Samuel J. Tilden, of New York, and Thomas A. Hendricks, of Indiana. The Demo crats went into the campaign with a cry of °Turn the rascals In the election which followed Tilden and Hendricks received a ma jority of the popular vote. There was a dis pute in regard to the electoral votes of South Carolina, Florida, Louisiana and Oregon. The disputed votes were finally referred to an electoral commission, composed of five sena tors, five representatives and five justices of the Supreme Court. After a long hearing, dur ing which the country was in great excitement, the commission held that it had no authority to go behind the returns, upon which the choice of electors had been certified. With this de cision all the contested votes were awarded to Hayes and Wheeler, and they were declared elected, receiving 185 electoral votes. Tilden and Hendricks received 184 votes. The ad ministration of President Hayes is notable for two reasons. He withdrew Federal troops from the South, thus leaving the negro voters at the mercy of the white population. The Southern States, which under reconstruction had been Republican up to 1876, now passed under Dem ocratic control, and have remained Democratic with only occasional exceptions, ever since. Under the administration of John Sherman, as Secretary of the Treasury, specie payments, as sured by legislation urged and made law by Grant, were resumed, and the finances of the government were fixed firmly on a substantial foundation. President Hayes bad to deal with a Democratic House of Representatives throughout his term.
In the election of 1880, James A. Garfield, of Ohio, and Chester A. Arthur, of New York, nominated at Chicago, 2-8 June, were chosen President and Vice-President, respectively, re ceiving 214 votes against 155 electoral votes cast for Hancock and English, their Democratic opponents. They also received a plurality of the popular vote. For the first time since 1874 the Republicans controlled the House of Rep resentatives. The Senate was evenly divided. President Garfield was shot on 2 July 1881, and died on 19 September, leaving the administra tion in the hands of President Arthur. During Arthur's administration the Civil Service Com mission was created and effective steps were taken to divorce the great body of subordinate offices in the civil service from the changes in cident to party politics. Under the administra tion of William E. Chandler, as Secretary of the Navy, the building of the new navy was begun. A treaty was negotiated with the gov ernment of Nicaragua, looking to the construc tion of an inter-ocearnt canal. This treaty had not been ratified by the Senate when the ad ministration came to an end, and President Cleveland promptly withdrew it upon entering the White House. The administrations of Garfield and Arthur were marked by factional differences in the Republican party. The elec tions for Congress in 1882 resulted adversely, and in the 48th Congress there was a Demo cratic majority of 73. Grover Cleveland was
elected governor of New York by a majority of nearly 200,000 over Secretary Folger, who had been nominated for governor through ad ministration influence: In the election of 1884, Blaine and Logan, the Republican candidates for President and Vice-President — nominated at Chicago, 3-6 June—were defeated by Cleve land and Hendricks, the Democratic candi dates, receiving 182 electoral votes as com pared with 219 for their opponents. The cam paign was fought almost solely on the per sonality of Mr. Blaine, and had never been exceeded in bitterness. The result was de termined by a plurality of 1,149 in a total vote of 1,200,000 in the State of New York. The Democrats controlled the House throughout the Cleveland administration, but the Republicans had a majority in the Senate, a combination which prevented affirmative legislation of any consequence. President Cleveland brought the tariff question sharply to the front in his mes sage of and the agitation which grew out of that message resulted in a campaign fought on the tariff issue in 1888. The Re publicans in that year, in a convention at Chicago, 19-25 June, nominated Benjamin Har rison, of Indiana, for President, and Levi P. Morton, of New York, for Vice-President. The Democrats renominated President Cleve land, and placed Allen G. Thurman, of Ohio, second on the ticket. Harrison and Morton received 233 electoral votes; Cleveland and Thurman received 168. Both Senate and House were strongly Republican. The adminis tration of President Harrison was signalized by the enactment of important legislation and by a strong foreign policy. Thomas B. Reed was speaker of the House of Representatives in the 51st Congress, with a narrow Republican ma jority. The Democratic minority essayed at the beginning of the Congress to prevent all Re publican legislation by appealing to the tech nicalities of antiquated rules. Speaker Reed, in the face of vehement opposition, secured the adoption of new rules,. under which it became possible for the majority to do business. The Reed rules, although angrily assailed by the Democratic minority, were adopted by the ocratic party when it next came into control of the House, and they prevailed for nearly 20 years. Having obtained the power to legislate, the Republican party in the House proceeded to enact a tariff bill in obedience to the com mand of the electorate. The McKinley Act was signed 1 Oct. 1890. A law was passed, known as the Sherman Anti-Trust Law, providing pen alties for creating combinations in restraint of interstate trade. The House of Representatives passed a bill looking to the more efficient con trol of Federal elections. This measure aroused great Democratic opposition. It failed to pass the Senate. During Harrison's ad ministration a revolution in Hawaii resulted in the deposition of Liliuokalani, the native queen. A republic was set up, and a commission was sent to Washington seeking annexation to the United States. President Harrison made a treaty of annexation, which the Senate failed to ratify in the few weeks remaining of the ad ministration. The treaty was withdrawn by President Cleveland and the queen was re stored to the throne, but Hawaii was finally annexed shortly after the return of the Re publican party to power in 1897.