Rutherford B. Hayes and JOHN SHERMAN by JEANNETTE PADDOCK NICHOLS |
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At noon on Wednesday, January 18, 1893, the United States Senate con- vened and, according to custom, heard a brief opening prayer by the Chap- lain. When Dr. J. G. Butler had finished, the senior Senator from Ohio, John Sherman, addressed his colleagues: Mr. President, it becomes my painful duty to announce to the Senate the death of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, at his residence in Fremont, Ohio, last evening at 11 o'clock. . . . It was my good fortune to know President Hayes intimately from the time we were law students until his death. To me his death is a deep personal grief. All who had the benefit of personal association with him were strengthened in their appreciation of his generous qual- ities of head and heart. His personal kindness and sincere enduring at- tachment for his friends was greater than he displayed in public inter- course. He was always modest, always courteous, kind to every one who approached him, and generous to friend or foe. He had no sympathy with hatred or malice. He gave every man his due according to his judgment of his merits. I therefore, as is usual on such occasions, move that the Senate, out of respect to the memory of President Hayes, do now adjourn.1 This was no routine eulogy. John Sherman spoke from the heart, much more feelingly than was his wont. The two politicians, near of age (Hayes seven months the senior),2 had known each other and had participated in the vagaries of political life in Ohio through half a century. Their particu- lar differences in temperament, opportunity, experience and abilities had been of sorts that enabled them to build and maintain through the decades NOTES ON PAGE 197 |
126 OHIO HISTORY
mutual feelings of respect and liking.
Their relationship flowered into a
lasting affection that came easily in
the life of Hayes, more rarely in that
of Sherman.3 The strains so
common between presidents and cabinet mem-
bers were minimal between these two.
Their mutual regard was due in part
to the fact that their respective
ambitions approached fruition at junc-
tures when fulfillment could be
complementary rather than antagonistic.
This was in marked contrast to the tides
of fate which upon occasion made
rivalry a frequent factor in relations
between Ohio's longtime Nestor at the
National Capitol and such ambitious
shorter-term politicos as Garfield and
Foraker, for example.4
To understand the foundation on which
the President and his Secretary
of the Treasury built their warm
relationship it is necessary to note various
episodes and to compare their
experiences as fellow-Ohioans. Sherman's
admission to the bar at the age of
twenty-one in 1844 had been preceded by
schooling no higher than an academy and
by private law instruction from
friends and relatives in Mansfield. At
this county seat he engaged actively
in legal practice. There he had emerged
as a "self-made" man, a keen stu-
dent of finance and politics known for
his competence and dignity. Since
he lacked easy warmth of manner,
however, his political advancement was
based more on respect for his ability
than on the comraderie easy for per-
sons of less reserve. He had cultivated
Whig affiliations until he helped to
found the Republican party and won
(1854-1860) four elections to the na-
tional House of Representatives.5
On the other hand, Hayes graduated from
Kenyon College and Harvard
Law School before he was admitted to the
bar in 1845 in his twenty-third
year, and later enjoyed at Cincinnati
more than a decade of law practice.
There he had emerged a person of modest
ability, firm in his beliefs, ambi-
tious but chary of antagonisms, and
pleasant in his dealings. He had won in
1858 a single term as City Solicitor,
but his frequently Democratic area pre-
vented a second term.
Thus, prior to the Civil War, Sherman
had acquired six years of ex-
perience in successfully wooing the Ohio
voters while becoming a notable
Republican leader on the national scene,
but Hayes thus far had not gone
much beyond the confines of a city
victory. Then came the accession of Lin-
coln and the Civil War, which altered
the political destinies of each man.
The elevation of Senator Salmon P. Chase
to Lincoln's cabinet enabled
Sherman (after a hard fought caucus
struggle)6 to leave the House for the
Senate, and Lincoln was moved to ask him
not to leave that chamber for an
army post. Sherman had become engrossed,
before the called summer ses-
sion of 1861, in unpaid service as a
colonel of Ohio Volunteers. The Presi-
dent felt he needed senatorial
leadership on Capitol Hill no less than mili-
tary leadership on the Virginia slopes.
To a man who had amply demon-
strated his legislative skill--by forcing through the
presecession House ap-
propriations essential to the federal
government--Lincoln's call to battle
for wartime financial legislation on the
Senate level could not be without its
personal and patriotic challenge.7 But
Sherman acceded to Lincoln's re-
HAYES and JOHN SHERMAN 127
quest before he had ever led a charge in
uniform. His return to service in
the toga cheated him of the military
identification acquired by Garfield and
many other men, who would find it
helpful in later political warfare.
Hayes, on the other hand, left the law
court that June for what proved
to be extended military service,
beginning as a major of Ohio Volunteers.
His tour of duty carried him into the
not-too-horrendous8 campaigning in
West Virginia. He had won recognition
for bravery and suffered three bat-
tle wounds when Ohio voters elected him
to Congress in 1864, at the mo-
ment he was promoted to brigadier
general. By the time of the official be-
ginning of his congressional service in
December of 1865, he had won a
brevet of major general and numerous
military friendships which were cher-
ished by him ever after.9
The importance of military insignia to
Ohio's Republican party in the
post-Civil War period scarcely can be
overestimated. All but two of its
gubernatorial candidates between 1865
and 1903 possessed war records, as
did all but four of the men actually
elected to that office. "Lesser offices
reveal a similar situation."10 On
the national level, James G. Blaine was
the only Republican candidate for
President between Lincoln and William
Howard Taft that did not possess
military experience. Sherman later com-
plained that his lack of war service was
responsible, in part, for his failure
to obtain the presidential nomination,
which lie sought three times.1l Colo-
nel John Sherman gave his sword, sash
and epaulets, which he wore so
briefly in mid-summer of 1861, to the
then Colonel Tecumseh Sherman;
and by the irony of fate that brother
later enjoyed the refusal of the high
office the Senator desperately craved.
Military insignia was the more precious
because of the continual can-
nonading on Ohio's political front, both
between parties and within them.
Divisiveness was indigenous to that
state, born of the original disparate im-
migration, nurtured by different
sectional reactions to political, economic
and social change, and perpetuated by an
incessantly revolving political cal-
endar. Politicking could hardly pause.
Partisans battled over the choice of
governor and legislature in odd-numbered
years, scarcely waiting to whet
their knives before renewing the fray
over congressional nominations in
even-numbered years and indulging in the
highest pitch of rivalry in their
quadrennial presidential canvasses.
More fertile soil for controversy hardly
could be found; in it Hayes and
Sherman cultivated their careers,
becoming political veterans of different
sorts. In due time Hayes tended to
become more palatable to the so-called
"liberals" and Sherman to the
"conservatives." But both established records
of cautious party regularity which
tended to protect their eligibility in fac-
tional contests. To both of these
ex-Whigs the Republican party was an
article of faith. On the whole, Hayes
proved to be the more fortunate, be-
cause his principal opponents until 1876
were mainly candidates of the op-
posite party; Sherman's were candidates
within his own party from the mo-
ment he became an aspirant for the
Senate.
It can be said that Sherman got, and
kept, his grip on the senatorship
through the medium of Ohio's chronic
disunity. In 1861 the refusal of
128 OHIO HISTORY
radical and conservative Republicans in
the state legislature to come to cau-
cus agreement among three older, leading
contestants gave the nomination
on the seventy-eighth ballot to Sherman
as a middle-of-the-road, compromise
candidate. When his term neared an end
in 1865, luck was on his side.
Sherman's party--then calling itself
"Union"--was split over the issue of
Negro suffrage, which might cost it victory.
This was the parlous situation midsummer
of 1865 when Sherman jour-
neyed down to Cincinnati, and found
occasion to call at the office of Con-
gressman Hayes. The Senator there
learned that the General could not yet
quite take party antagonisms in stride.
Hayes, unlike Sherman, had not been
tried in the fires of ten years of
bitter prewar and wartime political infight-
ing. Also, he was aggravated by the
premature patronage clamor with which
constituents can impatiently pester a
member of Congress even before he
takes his seat. Altogether, the job of
Representative seemed less likely to
prove satisfying than had leading troops
in the field. In this state of mind
Hayes confided to his Diary, after
Sherman had departed that July day,
"'Politics a bad trade' runs in my
head often. Guess we'll quit."12
But Hayes did not quit. The fledgling
Representative had found some-
thing of a mentor in the experienced
Senator. They shared the ardors of
that campaign--and others to follow.
That summer Hayes could observe
how Ohio's Republican factionalism could
be mitigated by an even greater
lack of finesse in Democratic counsels.
Vallandigham in 1865 was leading
the Democracy to campaign for
conservative reconstruction, which then
helped the Sherman men to shift their
emphasis to anti-Copperheadism.
With this safer issue the Unionists won
control of the legislature by a two
to one margin.13 But the total situation
remained such that the Unionists
did not long indulge any latent
propensity for an intra-party knock-down,
dragout fight over which one of the
party faithful should get the plum. Al-
though Radical members from the Western
Reserve now found Sherman
too conservative for their tastes, and southern
Ohio thought it was their
turn, and adherents of Sherman's
colleague, Benjamin F. Wade, feared
Sherman's selection would jeopardize
Wade's renomination next time, only
two ballots were needed to name Sherman
in 1865.14
Actually Ohio was a political
battleground so closely fought that no sen-
atorship could be a sinecure. Sherman's
experience in garnering six elec-
tions to the Senate demonstrated the
fact. Each time the legislature was to
select a colleague for him, from 1867 up
to 1897, the Democrats contrived
to be in control with the result that he
never had a Republican colleague
after Benjamin F. Wade lost out in
1867.15 On the other hand, when the
expiration of a Sherman term approached,
the Republicans managed to be
in a position to name the Senator, but
their disunity was such that the va-
rious internal factions did not combine
effectively on a nominee to dis-
place him. Of such factors--not too
reassuring--was Sherman's luck com-
posed.16
Hayes also found Ohio's mercurial
politics an advantage at times. As the
General won a reputation of being the best Republican
vote-getter,l7 his
eligibility for party nominations rose.
He wrote of his satisfaction in the
HAYES and JOHN SHERMAN 129
victorious campaign of 1866 which
brought him his second term in the
House; but his doubts about the joys of
being a congressman returned.18
Before his new term had fairly begun, he
was glad to resign it to accept
nomination to the governorship. As
Governor of Ohio for two consecutive
terms, Hayes became well and favorably
known far beyond his Cincinnati
congressional district. Since the legislature
was Democratic in his first term,
this fact seemed to free him from blame
for its sins of omission and com-
mission; but it lessened the influence
of Ohio Republicans in Washington
by enabling the Democrats to give
Sherman a Democratic colleague.19
At the same time the Republican party
was losing power in Ohio. In
1868 three of its congressmen lost their
seats, and eight scraped through by
majorities under one thousand votes. In
1869 Hayes's plurality was but 7500
votes, and his own Hamilton County Republicans
sent to the legislature a
contingent of reformists possessed of
the balance of power in both houses
and not above cooperating with
Democrats. The Reserve also sent some men
of liberal leanings; but they, like
their favorite Representative Garfield,
thought twice about possible future
punishment for party disloyalty.
Exposure of the corruption in the Grant
administration forced Hayes
and Sherman, both of them party
loyalists, to walk a tightrope. When Gov-
ernor Hayes was invited to attend a
conference of liberals held in Wash-
ington April 19-20, 1870, he stayed home
at Columbus for he "wanted no
new party and would have nothing to do
with organizing a new one."20
Sherman for his part habitually
accommodated himself to temporary shifts
in political winds, but he kept within
the boundaries of a cherished com-
mitment to a Republican majority,
thereby suffering the wrath of conserva-
tives who hated his concessions to
liberals, and of liberals who denounced
him as tarred with Grantism.
The positions of both Governor and
Senator, concerned for Republican
success, remained uncomfortable.
Although their party had won fourteen of
Ohio's nineteen congressional seats in
1870, and both the governorship and
lieutenant-governorship in 1871, Ohio's
incoming legislature that fall con-
sisted of an evenly divided upper house
and an assembly in which the fifty-
seven Republicans facing the forty-eight
Democrats included men of di-
vided loyalties. This body would
determine, in January of 1872, whether
Sherman might succeed himself. Hayes,
Garfield and others were approached
by Sherman's enemies to help unseat him.21
Here arose the first crisis in the
friendship between Hayes and Sherman.
To the delight of Democrats, the faction
opposing Sherman denounced him
as "utterly corrupt";22 they
sought to oust him, even if he won in the party
caucus, which was generally conceded to
be his during late 1871. Rumors
were rife that the dissidents would stay
out of the caucus to be free of its
mandate, and with Democratic cooperation
would get a majority for a com-
promise candidate on the day when they
voted in the legislature itself.
Hayes at first refused to believe the
rumors and then declined to be a candi-
date under a Democratic-Republican
endorsement. When the caucus finally
convened Thursday, January 4, 1872,
Sherman won easily, 71 to 4, with
most of the dissidents voting for him although some
claimed "they were
130 OHIO HISTORY
not to be bound by the result."23
Under these circumstances talk of a Hayes,
Garfield, or other candidacy persisted.
Hayes lightened the tension perhaps
by giving a reception Monday evening for
the incoming Republican gov-
ernor, General Edward F. Noyes. It was
attended by the warring factions
and described by Hayes as "A very
lively, happy thing."24
Late on Tuesday evening two
Republicans--a state senator and a repre-
sentative--rang Hayes's doorbell. They
assured him that enough new coali-
tion votes would materialize Wednesday
to make him United States Senator
and that this would guarantee him the
next presidency of the United States.
Luckily for Sherman the ambitions of
Hayes and Garfield were less strong
than their fears of the effects which
disloyalty to their party's caucus would
have upon the future of their party and
themselves. Hayes made it clear
that he would not consent to be a
candidate other than through regular
caucus endorsement. His two callers
departed, only to be followed by a
final suppliant, who insisted that his group now had
the votes to elect Hayes.
But the Governor, answering the doorbell
at midnight, standing in his
nightshirt, stood his ground. This with
a firm finality which his garb could
not diminish.25
Next day the roll call in the
legislature gave Sherman a majority, overall,
of only six votes, and some members
hastily undertook to switch. An alert
lieutenant-governor quickly declared
Sherman "duly elected." Afterward
Sherman claimed that he had had enough
Democratic promises to over-
balance Republican losses in any case.26
The crucial moment had been
Hayes's refusal; the rest was
anti-climax. To Hayes, Sherman was now much
in debt.
The Senator was destined to repay it,
and at a high rate of interest; but
an unpleasant misunderstanding marred
their relationship soon after
Grant's second inauguration. The eager
Republicans who on January 9,
1872, had dangled before Hayes the
presidency of the United States proved
unable to give him, on October 8
following, even so modest a place as a
seat in the House of Representatives of
the Forty-Third Congress. The party
phalanx which swept the state for Grant
included Hayes, Sherman and Gar-
field, but they could not stem a strong
Democratic tide in Hayes's district.
This rejection inflicted upon the
reputed "best vote-getter" his first ex-
perience with defeat for an important
office; it may have made him unwont-
edly sensitive.
At any rate, Grant in March of 1873 sent
the Senate hasty nomination
of Hayes for a position he did not
expect, had not applied for, and did not
much desire--that of Assistant Treasurer
at Cincinnati. The nomination
caught Ohio's Republican Senator, under
whose purview such matters must
come, off base. The outgoing and
incoming Secretary of the Treasury
(George S. Boutwell and William A.
Richardson) had both assured Sher-
man that necessary preparations under
the law were such that no appoint-
ment need be made until June 1; on this
understanding he had assured sev-
eral applicants that no choice would be
made until they had had a fair op-
portunity to present their
qualifications. He would be charged with mis-
HAYES and JOHN SHERMAN 131
leading them if the Hayes appointment
went through earlier. Therefore,
when the matter came up in executive
session, he asked that it go over. All
this Sherman explained to Hayes,
assuring him that he would "heartily and
cheerfuly concur in your appointment."27
But by an irony of fate damage had been
done. Hayes's pride was
wounded by postponement of a place which
he might have declined even if
confirmed. Tempermentally inclined to
over-simplification of patronage
problems it was hard for him to
"comprehend the crochet of Mr. Sherman."
Although he absolved Sherman of personal
hostility, he replied quite can-
didly. "The action taken was
calculated, although not so intended, to in-
jure me and to wound my feelings and
frankness required that I should
say that I think you were in error in
your views of duty under the circum-
stances."28
Fortunately, neither Hayes nor Sherman
made the prime political mis-
take of cherishing personal
misunderstandings. The campaign of 1874 found
them appearing together amiably, with
Hayes according Sherman high
praise for straightforward presentation.
The next year, when his party for
the third time nominated Hayes to wrest
the governorship, from a Demo-
crat, he especially sought Sherman's
company on the stump, in preachment
against the fiat money tenets of the
incumbent governor, William Allen.29
They managed to squeak through, by 5544
votes; but Sherman was appre-
hensive lest Republican disunity enable
the Democrats to capture the presi-
dency in the 1876 election and undo
gains obtained through the Civil War.
Thus he called on Ohio Republicans to
give Hayes a united delegation at
the national convention, because he
could "combine greater popular
strength and greater assurance of
success than other candidates." Though
not "greatly distinguished" as
a general or as a member of Congress, he was
"always sensible, industrious and
true to his convictions and the principles
and tendencies of his party." As
governor, he had "shown good executive
abilities." Moreover he was
"fortunately free from the personal enmities
and antagonisms that would weaken some
of his competitors."30
Such arguments, pressed by Sherman upon
Senator A. M. Burns of the
Ohio legislature in a letter of January
21, 1876, gained force. Ohio was
actually a unit bloc at this national
convention, which met, luckily for
Hayes, in Cincinnati.31 That
body, after wrangling over Blaine and his
chief competitors through six ballots,
on the seventh, adopted Sherman's
reasoning and chose Hayes. Fortunately
Sherman was spared the foreknowl-
edge that Hayes's most valuable
asset--his current lack of enemies--could
not work for himself in 1880.
Indicative of the affinity in 1876
between these two politicians was the
interchange which ensued. Hayes wrote
Sherman June 19:
I trust you will never regret the
important action you took in the in-
auguration and carrying out the movement
which resulted in my nom-
ination. I write these few words to
assure you that I appreciate and am
grateful for what you did.32
132 OHIO HISTORY
Sherman replied by hand on Senate
Chamber notepaper next day:
Your kind note is rec'd for which accept
my thanks. The importance
of your nomination was with me a
mathematical deduction and if any
outside fact gave color to my reasoning
it was your honorable & proper
course when during my last canvass for
Senator you refused to accept
the benefit of a small defection of a
few political friends. I am more
than happy when following reason and
duty to recognize also a per-
sonal kindness. We opened the campaign
here gloriously last night &
the acquiescence in your nomination is
general and hearty.33
Acquiescence in Hayes's election was destined,
in many areas, to be
neither general nor hearty, a fact which
put Hayes in debt to Sherman and
took toll of Sherman's political future.
The incoming President would not
infrequently find useful to him his
personal and political ties to his Secre-
tary of the Treasury, but the bond would
not always operate to the per-
sonal and political advantage of his
exceptionally faithful servitor.
Election evening, November 7, brought
dismay to both men; they went
to bed thinking Tilden had won. But
before dawn an unwary Democratic
official asked the editors of the New
York Times (a Republican group) for
an estimate of Tilden's votes, thus
suggesting that the Democrats were un-
sure. Before sunrise the editors were
communicating with "Zack" Chand-
ler, chairman of the Republican national
committee; they persuaded him
to telegraph the Republican leadership
in each of the three key states:
"Hayes is elected if we have
carried South Carolina, Florida and Louisiana.
Can you hold your state? Answer at
once." Whatever their answers, Chand-
ler a few hours later boldly told the
press: "Hayes has 185 votes and is
elected." This would leave Tilden
with only 184. Next the Republicans had
to make good Chandler's brashness.34
Both sides sent "visitors" to
watch the count of votes in each of the three
states. Louisiana was the most doubtful
and Grant asked Sherman (and
others) to hurry to New Orleans. After
stopping at Columbus to see Hayes
and at Cincinnati to meet other of Ohio's
emissaries, Sherman entered upon
"a long, anxious and laborious time
in New Orleans."35 Soon he was re-
porting to his wife Cecilia his
unhappiness over his assignment and a sharp
prescience of consequences to himself.
I have been assigned a much more conspicuous position here than I
wished and am almost sorry that I came.
We are acting only as witnesses
but public opinion will hold us as
partisans. . . . This whole business is
a thankless, ungracious task not free
from danger entirely unofficial
and at our individual expense. . . . I
frequently regret that I ever came.
Grant in 8 years did not remember my
existence until he had this most
uncomfortable task to perform and then
by his selections forced me to
come. I am carefully studying the case
as it is developed and will say
what I think is true without fear or
favor. . . . We have done nothing
of which we need to be ashamed.36
The Republicans had been shamed before
the nation by the exposure of
corruption in Grant's entourage and
Sherman was one of the party's leader-
HAYES and JOHN SHERMAN 133
ship who feared such vulnerability. As
Hayes phrased their mutual appre-
hension: "You feel, I am sure, as I
do about this whole business. A fair
election would have given [it to] us but
. . . there must be nothing crooked
on our part."37 Down in Louisiana
the intimidation on both sides which
had marred the casting of ballots made
itself felt in the counting of them.
Two government employees, testifying
before the Returning Board about
coercion by the Democrats, demanded of
the worried chairman of the Re-
publican "visitors" a written
guarantee of future employment outside the
state.
The age-old obligation for each party to
take care of its faithful had been
sanctified by immemorial custom; but
these employees required a pledge
in writing, which is not so customary.
To this the badgered chairman, over-
estimating their party loyalty, acceded.
Within a twelve-month he and Hayes
would rue this documentary testimonial
to pressure, which confirmed Sher-
man's prediction that "no
good" could come of the visitation.38
Numerous messages passed back and forth
between New Orleans, Colum-
bus and other centers, often in code;
and at long last Sherman, Garfield
and four companions stopped in Columbus
on December 4, enroute to
Washington. In the governor's office
that afternoon the cautious Hayes
polled each man individually. As he
reported in his Diary, "All concurred
in saying in the strongest terms that
the evidence and law entitled the Re-
publican ticket to the certificate of
election, and that the result would in
their opinion be accordingly." At
the gubernatorial mansion that Monday
evening the Governor and his Lady
entertained the emissaries with "a jo-
vial little gathering."39
Not so jovial was the atmosphere Sherman
found in Washington on Tues-
day, the second day of the final session
of the Forty-Fourth Congress. That
body was scheduled to meet in February
in joint session to attend the open-
ing of the electoral certificates by the
president of the Senate and the count-
ing of them. But who should count them?
The House was Democratic 168
to 107, and the Senate Republican 43 to
29 with two Liberal Republicans.
On a joint ballot Hayes would lose.40
He might win, however, if the Senate's
presiding officer could determine
which of the four sets of conflicting
returns-from Oregon, Florida, South
Carolina, and Louisiana--should be
counted. This was the solution favored
by Sherman and Hayes. The Senator, as a
quasi-agent of Hayes, participated
to some extent in weeks of discussion aimed at securing
Democratic consent
to this method of counting. Sherman was
one of the negotiators who con-
ferred with important southerners, many
of them Old Whigs, arguing that
Hayes--like Sherman an Old Whig--would
do more for them than Tilden
who opposed appropriations for the
internal improvements badly needed
by the devastated South. A Hayes
administration, it was proposed, would
remove federal troops from the South and
give it a place in the Cabinet,
besides granting more patronage, funds
for railroads and other improve-
ments, engineered with the help of
Garfield, as the proposed Speaker of the
House.41 This planning proved
to be an exercise in futility. It suggests an
unwarranted hopefulness on the part of
Sherman and Hayes. Much of the
134 OHIO HISTORY
proposed program could not be
implemented, although Hayes would prove
able to fulfill part of it.
In the meantime, a committee from each
house had been working to-
gether. The members intended to take
matters out of the hands of the
group affiliated with Hayes and Sherman.
As a result of their efforts, a bill
emerged to create an
extra-constitutional electoral commission to which
Congress, acting in joint session, would
refer conflicting sets of returns. Its
decisions need be accepted by only one
house to become final. This com-
plicated measure, which Sherman and
Hayes disapproved as risky for him,
invited filibustering which delayed its
enactment until January 29. There-
upon the Electoral Commission was set up
with five Senators, five Repre-
sentatives and five Supreme Court
Justices, so selected as to give the decid-
ing vote to Justice David Davis, an
"Independent." Here the legislature of
Illinois intervened, electing Davis to
the Senate--with the result that a Re-
publican Justice, Joseph P. Bradley,
took his place. Thereafter the houses
and the commission went through the roll
of states, slowed by sporadic fili-
bustering.42
While the counting was in progress,
Sherman conferred with Hayes in
Columbus. He returned with the reputed
authorization to promise with-
drawal of the troops by Hayes--a promise
which Grant (to the surprise of
Sherman) already had given. After a
final intensive burst of filibustering
the announcement came of Hayes's
election at 4:00 A.M. on March 2.43
That same morning Hayes and his family
reached Washington where
Senator Sherman and his brother General
William Tecumseh Sherman
awaited them at the station, to welcome
them as house guests of the Senator
until after the formal inauguration.
Before noon Hayes called on Grant
and went with him to the Capitol where
(it is reported) they found the
Democrats cheerful and cordial as they
waited their pound of flesh. Satur-
day evening Grant gave Hayes the
customary state dinner, with the extra
precaution of a private swearing in, to
insure the nation a president during
the Sabbath intervening before the
formal inauguration on Monday, March
5.44
Sherman had had a hectic four months
since November 7, largely occu-
pied with labor on behalf of Hayes and
the party. What would be his recom-
pense? Hayes formulated a tentative
cabinet slate and after some hesitation
offered Sherman the Treasury.45
To a Senator with keen interest in na-
tional financial problems and long
experience in working upon them, the
opportunity to achieve further
distinction in the field was most attractive.
He might, on the other hand, have
considered potential hazards threaten-
ing the peace of mind and political
future of any member of a Republican
administration installed in 1877. There
were five hazards of major im-
portance: a Congress with a Democratic
majority in both houses in most of
the four years; the dubious title to the
throne; possible opposition to a con-
ciliatory southern approach; an
entrenched patronage system to resist civil
service reform; and, perhaps the
greatest obstacle, powerful resistance to a
"sound" dollar.
HAYES and JOHN SHERMAN 135
Any or all of these forces could
obstruct the path of a politician stumb-
ling along the boulder-strewn trail
toward the presidential eminence. They
could not wreck the future career of a
President such as Hayes, who ab-
jured a second term and therefore could
face with more composure the
slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.
What here follows is a summary of
the reactions of the President and his Secretary
of the Treasury to these five
basic problems.46
First, as to the primary handicap, the
Democrats held a majority in the
House all four years, and in the Senate
for the last two years. Hayes and
Sherman therefore could never plan
legislation in easy confidence of a co-
operative push into enactment;
compromise skills were prerequisite. This
disadvantage was compounded by the fact
that Republicans themselves
were not a unit in response to executive
leadership. Some of them openly
fought the Hayes administration in the
three fields it sought most to stress
--conciliation of the South, reform of
the Civil Service, and strengthening
of the nation's credit. Some of them
were ex-Republicans of whom Hayes
sadly observed to Sherman,"New converts
are proverbally bitter and unfair
to those they have recently
left."47 Under such party handicaps executive
achievements could not be numerous or
easy of accomplishment.
The lack of Republican cohesiveness was
due also, in part, to the second
handicap listed above, the clouded title
to the throne. Subsequent advanced
scholarship would conclude that Hayes
lost Florida (although he probably
was entitled to a favorable decision in
South Carolina and Louisiana) and
that therefore, instead of besting Tilden
by 185 to 184, he lost on the over-
all count by 181 to 188. The Democrats
during Hayes's administration loud-
ly proclaimed that they had been
cheated; they were only too happy to in-
stitute an investigation complete with
witnesses, documentation, and a ma-
jority report attesting the election of
Tilden. A report by the Republicans
held the contrary. Eager Republicans
subpoened Western Union "cipher
dispatches," using and preserving
those which revealed Democratic corrup-
tive practices.48 In the
course of these exposures Sherman's unwary pledge
to the two Louisiana office-holders was
revealed, to the disgust of the Presi-
dent and his Secretary.49
Before Democratic efforts to unseat the
administration lost momentum,
embarrassments for Hayes and Sherman
were further increased by their
own party's attacks upon the third
handicap--their conciliatory southern
policy which had included choice of an
ex-Confederate, David M. Key, as
Postmaster General. The removal of
fulltime troops from the South also
aroused Radical Republicans to
blistering denunciation for (supposedly)
undermining the structure of
Reconstruction erected by the sacrifice of the
Civil War. Hayes stood his ground, with
Sherman's endorsement, and occu-
pation of southern centers by federal
troops gradually ended.50
By an irony of fate the Hayes
administration and the South came to swords
points on a different aspect of federal
supervision not confined to the South.
Postwar laws had authorized supervision
of presidential and congressional
elections throughout the nation by
federal supervisors and marshals. The
136 OHIO HISTORY
Democratic majority, seeking local
control of elections, attached "riders"
to army and other appropriation bills,
prohibiting polling place use of any
part of the army. Hayes and Sherman
interpreted the riders as efforts to
reduce their party's influence at the
polls. A sharp four years' contest en-
sued marked by eight stout presidential
vetoes, none of them overridden.51
Administration confrontation with the
other two major handicaps--the
entrenched patronage system and the
resistance to strengthening the na-
tion's credit--gave Hayes and Sherman
repeated challenges and saddled
Sherman with enmities encumbering his
ultimate ambition.
Grantism had made the nation
corruption-conscious, and rumors grew
rife and ripe about its pervasive
presence. Prominent among proposed tar-
gets for reform were the New York,
Boston, and Philadelphia customs
houses, under control of the state
machines of Roscoe Conkling, Benjamin
F. Butler, and Simon Cameron. Conkling
had been uncooperative on
Hayes's nomination and election and his
bailiwick was selected by Hayes
as the first target, against Sherman's
wishes.52 Apparently it was not as badly
mismanaged as some other centers but a
special Jay Commission exposed
the facts with the result that the
collector Chester A. Arthur and naval of-
ficer Alonzo B. Cornell were removed.
But Hayes was not able to obtain
Senate confirmation of their successors
until February of 1879 and then
only through a thorough expose by
Sherman of the custom house scandals.53
The intervening period had been
characterized by wavering and equivoca-
tion among the principal actors with
Secretary of State William M. Evarts
involved in the political scheming. The
situation illustrated the great need
for civil service reform, the divisive
effect of the issue upon the party, and
the hard alternatives among which Hayes
and Sherman sought to make
selections.54
While all these hot political chestnuts
had to be handled, the fifth prob-
lem--that of the nation's credit--was
the hottest of all, particularly as the
nation was just emerging from a serious
depression. On this subject Sher-
man possessed a thorough knowledge and
broad experience acquired in
sixteen years of congressional handling
of it. Intimately involved in the
wartime establishment of the greenback
currency and the national banking
system,55 he now was
determined to protect the nation's credit by making
the greenbacks redeemable in gold (known
as resumption of specie pay-
ments) and by avoiding unlimited coinage
of cheap silver dollars.
Hayes stood firmly for resumption but
was so completely opposed to sil-
ver dollars that he vetoed the
compromise Bland-Allison bill that permitted
a limited issue of them. Not at all to
Sherman's surprise, Congress passed
the bill over the veto. This concession
to inflationary sentiment contributed
some quota to lessening the opposition
to resumption of specie payments
which Sherman achieved on schedule,
January 1, 1879, partly by virtue of
improving business trends and partly by
his own careful management of
Treasury bond issues and other
government resources.56
In his expert handling of this fifth and
greatest of the administration's
problems Sherman took great pride. He
felt that it in no small manner
HAYES and JOHN SHERMAN 137 |
justified his hope for the nation's highest award. Unfortunately, in securing a presidential nomination, merit and ability are less influential than a warm personality, united backing by one's state delegation, and a middle stance not too sharply identified with divisive issues. Of the first two assets, Sher- man had much.57 In regard to the last three far more important qualifica- tions, he was sadly lacking. Of hail-fellow-well-met cronies (military or leg- islative), this naturally-reserved gentleman had few. Of unity, the state's delegation was bereft by the refusal of nine Blaine men to unite in Sher- |
138 OHIO HISTORY
man's support as the state convention
had suggested; Sherman unfortunate-
ly selected Garfield (who gained
attention this way) as the one to nom-
inate him. Of a middle stance, Sherman
had deprived himself by contribu-
tions to the Hayes administration, by
his recent opposition to free coinage,
and by insistence upon resumption; all
this made the Secretary less "avail-
able" than men not as competent.58
Hayes did not publicly endorse Sherman,
feeling that interference by the
President would be "unseemly."
Perhaps he, better than Sherman, realized
that the Secretary was not
"available." Commenting in his Diary on nom-
ination developments, he casually wrote,
after mentioning Grant and Blaine,
"It may be Sherman or a
fourth--either Edmunds or Wilson."59 Garfield in
nominating Sherman said that he did not
present him "as a better man or a
better Republican than thousands of
others," and called for Republican
unity. A majority of the convention
proceeded (on the thirty-fourth bal-
lot) to unite on Garfield.60
To Hayes the Garfield nomination was
"altogether good," being a defeat
for Conkling and others who were
pressing a third term for Grant. But this
did not mean that the President was
indifferent to Sherman's future wel-
fare. Perhaps he felt that it now was
his turn to pay a debt. At any rate,
the final decision of the Ohio
legislature to give Sherman the Senate chair
which Garfield was relinquishing (as Senator-elect)
seems not to have been
unrelated to Hayes's desire that
Garfield should cooperate to that end.61
Sherman was deeply appreciative of his
endorsement by the Ohio legisla-
ture, unanimous this time. He went to
Columbus to tell them so, and in
so doing the Secretary of the Treasury
could be said to be thanking also
the President of the United States:
I can only say then, in conclusion,
fellow-citizens, that I am glad that
the opportunity of the office you have
given me will enable me to come
back here home to Ohio to cultivate
again the relations I had of old.
It is one of the happiest thoughts that
comes to me in consequence of
your election that I will be able to
live again among you and to be one
of you, and I trust in time to overcome
the notion that has sprung up
within two or three years that I am a
human iceberg, dead to all human
sympathies. I hope you will enable me to
overcome that difficulty. That
you will receive me kindly, and I think
I will show you, if you doubt
it, that I have a heart to acknowledge
gratitude--a heart that feels for
others, and willing to alleviate where I
can all the evils to which men
and women are subject. I again thank you
from the bottom of my
heart.62
THE AUTHOR: Jeannette Paddock
Nichols formerly was chairman of the
Graduate Group in Economic History at
the University of Pennsylvania.
Rutherford B. Hayes and JOHN SHERMAN by JEANNETTE PADDOCK NICHOLS |
|
At noon on Wednesday, January 18, 1893, the United States Senate con- vened and, according to custom, heard a brief opening prayer by the Chap- lain. When Dr. J. G. Butler had finished, the senior Senator from Ohio, John Sherman, addressed his colleagues: Mr. President, it becomes my painful duty to announce to the Senate the death of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, at his residence in Fremont, Ohio, last evening at 11 o'clock. . . . It was my good fortune to know President Hayes intimately from the time we were law students until his death. To me his death is a deep personal grief. All who had the benefit of personal association with him were strengthened in their appreciation of his generous qual- ities of head and heart. His personal kindness and sincere enduring at- tachment for his friends was greater than he displayed in public inter- course. He was always modest, always courteous, kind to every one who approached him, and generous to friend or foe. He had no sympathy with hatred or malice. He gave every man his due according to his judgment of his merits. I therefore, as is usual on such occasions, move that the Senate, out of respect to the memory of President Hayes, do now adjourn.1 This was no routine eulogy. John Sherman spoke from the heart, much more feelingly than was his wont. The two politicians, near of age (Hayes seven months the senior),2 had known each other and had participated in the vagaries of political life in Ohio through half a century. Their particu- lar differences in temperament, opportunity, experience and abilities had been of sorts that enabled them to build and maintain through the decades NOTES ON PAGE 197 |