Ohio History Journal

164                                              OHIO HISTORY

A key maneuver in Hayes's attempt to implement his Southern policy

was the appointment of Frederick Douglass as Marshal of the District of

Columbia--a move which seems to have reconciled both white and black

to the Hayes administration.⁸² Hayes himself chose to look upon the ap-

pointment of Douglass as symbolic of an intention to upgrade the Negro

in the eyes of the nation.⁸³ Douglass caused quite a stir after a bare month

in office when he made a speech in Baltimore on the state of race relations

in the District of Columbia. He said that Washington represented "a most

disgraceful and scandalous contradiction to the march of civilization as

compared with many other parts of the country." On May 18, 1877, the

New York Times said that Douglass had spoken the truth and that such

truth had been spoken about the nation's capital many times before, "but

never by a man whose skin was dark-colored, and who had been appointed

to office in the District.84 There was an immediate hue and cry for Doug-

lass' removal from office, but Hayes did not bow to these demands.

In early September 1877, the President took a nineteen day trip into the

middle South, presumably to obtain a personal view of the results of his

racial policy. He visited Ohio, Tennessee. Kentucky, Georgia, and Virginia.

In spite of much in his mailbag that should have dampened his optimism,

he pronounced his policy a success and was jubilant upon his return from

the tour. He had been heartily received, if not in the deep South, and he

noted triumphantly in his Diary: "The country is again one and united!

I am very happy to be able to feel that the course taken has turned out

so well.^"85 Throughout the tour his theme was that of reunion between

northern and southern whites, universal adherence to the war amendments,

and racial harmony. To a northern audience he called his Southern policy

"an experiment" which the failure of the last six years demanded.⁸⁶ But

when he was in former enemy territory (Georgia), he swore that his policy

was not dictated "merely by force of special circumstances," but that he

believed it right and just.⁸⁷ He tried to convince the people of the North

and the Negroes of the South that he had not abandoned the freedmen

and that their rights could be protected without federal interference. Turn-

ing to the Negroes in his Georgia audience he said:

And now my colored friends, who have thought, or who have been

told that I was turning my back upon the men whom I fought for, now

listen. After thinking it over, I believe your rights and interests would

be safer if this great mass of intelligent white men were left alone by

the General Government.

This last phrase brought cheers from the crowd, but whether by white

or black was not disclosed.⁸⁸ Six months after the commencement of his

policy Hayes was convinced that the Negro was safer in the South without

the protection of the federal bayonets, which he had withdrawn.⁸⁹ He chose

to believe that "the white people of the South have no desire to invade

the rights of the colored people."⁹⁰ In his first annual message he defended

his removal of the troops from South Carolina and Louisiana as a "much

HAYES and RACE                                                 165

needed measure for the restoration of local self-government and the pro-

motion of national harmony.^"91

The President's heart must surely have leaped for joy when he received

a letter from Wade Hampton of South Carolina, reassuring him of his in-

tentions to protect the Negro in his rights and to coexist with Republi-

cans. But even here Hampton reported that he was having trouble with

dissident members of his own party: "My position here has been a very

difficult one, for besides the opposition to me from political opponents, I

have had to meet & control that of the extreme men of my own party."

If that were not enough to awaken Hayes from his optimistic stupor, a

newspaper clipping which Hampton sent him should have been sufficient.

The article called Hayes's attention to the "Straight-Out Democrat" who

wanted nothing to do with Negroes or Republicans, or southern whites

who fraternized with either.⁹²

As soon as the midyear elections of 1878 drew near, the racial volcanoes

erupted again. According to a Negro congressman from South Carolina,

the whites were again resorting to violence and intimidation to prevent

Negro political participation. The President could do nothing but lament

in his Diary that color was still the hallmark of political division in South

Carolina: black Republicans and white Democrats. He lamented, too, that

intelligence, property, and courage were on the side of the whites while

the poor Negro was ignorant:⁹³ "The South is substantially solid against

us. Their vote is light ... A host of people of both colors took no part . . .

the blacks, poor, ignorant, and timid can't stand alone against the whites."

The "better elements of the South," in whom Hayes had placed so much

faith, were not organized. Only a party division of the whites would im-

prove the situation but Hayes had no definite plan to effect the change

and seemed reconciled to let nature take its course.⁹⁴ He had further cause

for dejection when he received a thirty-signature petition from some Ne-

groes in Mississippi who wanted financial assistance to emigrate to Kansas

to escape oppression.⁹⁵ The President could do nothing but report the un-

fortunate situation in the South to his Diary.⁹⁶

Is it possible to render a final judgment on the President's Southern

policy? The subject is a very controversial one. Although he was aware

of its shortcomings, even after he left the White House, Hayes never

doubted the underlying wisdom of his Southern policy and that by it he

had allayed sectional and racial bitterness in the face of strenuous opposi-

tion from both political parties.⁹⁷ Contemporaries were more doubtful of

its success. A leading Radical Republican, W. E. Chandler, felt that Hayes

had abandoned the white southern Republican politician and the Negro

to the mercy of the "redeemers."⁹⁸ Frederick Douglass was grateful to the

man who had given him the highest office held by a Negro in the federal

government up to that time, but later accused Hayes of making a virtue

out of necessity.⁹⁹ Others reflecting on the past, pronounced the Hayes

policy a failure.¹⁰⁰

166                                                OHIO HISTORY

Historians also have had their views on the Hayes policy. John W. Bur-

gess said that Hayes's biggest struggle with himself concerned the question

of whether he was deserting the black man with his Southern policy.101

Charles Beard contended that "President Hayes could not strike out boldly

had he desired to do so," because he had to deal with a Democratic House

for four years and a Democratic Senate for two years.102 On the other hand

there is no evidence to suggest that Hayes showed any inclination to en-

force the laws already passed with anything other than oral vigor.

Rayford Logan has judged President Hayes rather harshly, accusing him

of abandoning the Negro, of complacency in the face of the failure of the

South to live up to its part of the alleged "bargain" in the compromise of

1877, and of aiding and abetting the liquidation of the Negro from poli-

tics by suggesting qualified suffrage based on education.¹03 Yet, all but

three of the southern states had fallen to the "redeemers" before Hayes

took office. While the net result of the Hayes policy was disfranchisement

of the Negro, it was fully ten years after Hayes left office that the "redeem-

ers" felt sufficiently strong enough to consummate their victory. The fail-

ure of Hayes to enforce the laws in regard to civil rights should not be

construed as complacency or apathy on his part. He certainly was concerned

about national impotence in this area. However helpless to correct the

situation he may have felt, he by no means viewed Negro disfranchisement

with indifference and approval. Logan interpreted the President's sincere

concern for honest and efficient government in the South as an indication

of his "approval of the curtailment of the rights of Negroes by the resur-

gent South." Hayes did not suggest education as a means of keeping the

Negro out of politics but as a vehicle by which the Negro could ultimately

attain full citizenship.

Like most Presidents of this post-war period, Hayes was either afraid or

unwilling to enforce the laws in regard to the civil rights of Negroes. His

desire for white reconciliation and his virtuous penchant for reform made

him unduly optimistic about the likelihood of the southern whites protect-

ing Negro rights. What Professor Rubin found to be true of the former

President Hayes during his tenure with the Slater Fund [1881-1887] might

well apply to his presidency with special reference to the Southern policy:

He was unduly optimistic in the face of the repeated onslaughts of south-

ern white supremacy which sought relentlessly during this period to push

the Negro into political oblivion.¹⁰⁴

What final observations can be made about Hayes? He saw Negroes as

members of a "weaker" though not necessarily inferior race. He was defi-

nitely conscious of race difference. But still he looked to the eventual inte-

gration of Negroes into American life.

He preferred to leave social equality, a necessary condition for legal race

mixing, to time and natural inclinations. Hayes said that it was better left

alone until both races learned to live by the Golden Rule. Nevertheless, in

a rare reference or two, he intimated a disinclination toward forced inte-

gration and also gave the impression that biologically he preferred to leave

HAYES and RACE                                                 167

racially asunder what God and nature obviously had not put together. Yet

there were times when he demonstrated in his thoughts and actions that

democracy could transcend the color line.

While Hayes was by no means immune to political motivation, little

opportunism can be detected in his basic outlook on race. On the other

hand, it is difficult to reconcile the obvious change in his attitude toward

the South from the time he was a Radical (on Negro rights) gubernatorial

candidate in Ohio in 1867 to the time when his name was prominently

mentioned for the presidential nomination. It may be that his changed at-

titude toward the South represented a sincere disenchantment with Recon-

struction.

The idea that Hayes abandoned the Negro for southern support cannot

be proved. His big error, if one wishes to call it that, was that he trusted

the South to keep its promise to protect Negro rights, in the absence of

federal interference. That there was an explicit agreement to this effect

seems improbable, because Hayes had already determined to make this

approach long before anyone could possibly have known that the election

of 1876 would be disputed. He had become disenchanted with Reconstruc-

tion as early as 1875. More than this, a reading of the Hayes correspondence

disposes one to believe that at least some of those southern Whigs were in

earnest when they made the proffer of protection for the Negro. What

really happened, it appears, was that the better class of whites, the so-called

"natural leaders" of the South, made a promise which was not really with-

in their power to keep. As things turned out, if seems that the promise was

made without the consultation or approval of the "red-necked" and un-

washed constituency or its leaders. Ironically it was the rise of southern

Democracy, its roots dug deep into the bedrock of Negrophobia, that con-

stituted the high tide of white supremacy which in the 1890's inundated

Whig, Bourbon, and Negro alike.

As President, the problem of race was ever before Hayes. He had not

been long in the White House before matters of race threatened to domin-

ate his thinking. His determination to bring about a reunion between

northern and southern whites seemed to immobilize his obligation to en-

force the laws in the face of an ever-recalcitrant South. Hayes was more dis-

posed to use sweet persuasion than brute force. It may be that the Presi-

dent was impressed by the advice of those who told him that in any con-

test between the Negro and the Anglo-Saxon, the black man was destined

to be defeated. The seeming futility of the struggle for basic change of

attitude in the South may have deterred him from trying to enforce the

law in a stubbornly unwilling section. Had not President Grant already

tried as much, and failed?

THE AUTHOR: George Sinkler is As-

sociate Professor of History at Morgan

State College.

170                                              OHIO HISTORY

In his first term, 1868-69, Governor R. B. Hayes was as unsuccessful

as the previous governors in securing legislation to establish the college.

The act of Congress of July 2, 1862, specified that the states were required

to provide not less than one college within five years in order to qualify

under the provisions of the bill. The deadline had been extended five years

by Congress on July 23, 1866, but even this time would expire soon.⁵

In his annual message of January 3, 1870, Hayes urged the Ohio General

Assembly to act quickly. He said that Ohio had accepted the land grant

which had created the funds to establish an agricultural and mechanical

college and warned that it must become a reality on or before July 2, 1872.

He stated:

Much time and attention has been given to the subject of the loca-

tion of the College. No doubt it will be of great benefit to the county

in which it shall be established, but the main object of desire with the

people of the State can be substantially accomplished at any one of

the places which have been prominently named as the site of the Col-

lege.⁶

This time the General Assembly responded quickly. On January 12,

Representative Reuben P. Cannon of Portage County introduced a bill

to establish and maintain an agricultural and mechanical college in Ohio.7

The Morrill Act had specified:

The leading object shall be, without excluding other scientific and

classical studies, and including military tactics, to teach such branches

of learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanic arts.

Hayes thought that the act should be interpreted as broadly as it could and

that the best teaching facility possible should result from it.⁸ The legis-

lature passed the Cannon bill on March 22, 1870, without limiting the

course of instruction. It left that problem, along with those relating to the

location of the university and selection of the faculty, to the trustees. The

act said that the governor should appoint nineteen trustees, one from each

congressional district.

Hayes was interested in getting a board of high quality and did not let

a man's views on politics or the ultimate goals of the agricultural college

interfere with his appointments. Years later, Thomas C. Mendenhall,

professor of chemistry at The Ohio State University and editor of Alexis

Cope's History of The Ohio State University, wrote, in the introduction

to the volume:

It was universally conceded at the time that in the selection of the

members of the first Board of Trustees, the men who were to deter-

mine the character and shape the policy of the new institution, the

Governor (Rutherford B. Hayes) had shown great wisdom, good judg-

ment and fairness to both sides of the controversy (which had already

begun) as to whether it should be "narrow" or broad and liberal in

its organization and sceme of instruction .... Political affiliation had

been given little attention in making the appointments and some of