President Donald Trump and his supporters refuse to acknowledge the reported results of the 2020 presidential election, seeking to turn this into another contested election. Many of us have not-so-fond memories of Florida’s chads from 20 years ago. But while this moment feels tense, with multiple accusations of fraud, it is nothing compared to the most sharply contested, and most fraudulent in U.S. history: the 1876 Hayes-Tilden election.
In the two weeks after the election, Trump posted over 300 tweets about the election. These included both tweets claiming he had won fairly, and accusations that the election was fraudulent. His legal team, led by Rudy Giuliani, has launched numerous legal actions, none of which has been successful. Hearing Trump’s claims of fraud and a stolen election, I can’t help but be reminded of the election of 1876.
Rutherford B. Hayes really should never have become president. Initially after Ulysses Grant’s two terms as President, the most likely Republican candidate was Grant himself. After Grant’s decision not to run, the next obvious choice was Congressman James G. Blaine. Late in the campaign, Democrats in the House of Representatives opened an investigation into Blaine’s dealings with a railroad. Damning letters were produced, and Blaine gained no popularity by securing the letters himself, then refusing to hand them over. Nevertheless, he still entered the Republican nomination as the frontrunner, with five others considered serious competitors, including Hayes. On the first ballot, though he received 285 votes, and his closest rival only 124, Blaine was still short of the majority of 378. Subsequent votes saw his tally increase, and the gap grow. Hayes was low in field, but significantly his tally increased with each subsequent vote. If the anti-Blaine faction could agree on a compromise, their combined votes would reach a majority. That compromise came in the form of Rutherford B. Hayes. While the final tally saw Blaine rise all the way to 351, Hayes jumped from 113 to 384, narrowly winning the nomination.
Hayes faced New York Governor Samuel J. Tilden in the general election. Tilden won the popular vote, and had 184 electoral votes, just one shy of a majority, to Hayes’s 165; in Florida, Louisiana, and South Carolina each party claimed victory, while a single elector from Oregon was ruled out and had to be replaced. Tilden needed only one state, or even just the one elector from Oregon, to win the presidency, while Hayes needed to run the table. As a Democrat, Tilden performed very well in the south, comfortably winning each former Confederate state, except the contested three, which happened to be the final three states still under federal control as part of Reconstruction after the Civil War. By the morning after the election, nearly everyone, even Republicans, had acknowledged Tilden’s victory, believing the final counts to be a mere formality. However, John C. Reid, managing editor of the hugely influential New York Times, telegraphed the Republican managers in each of the three states, informing them that all was not lost, and asking, “Can you hold your State?” Each dutifully reported a Hayes victory, and the Republicans announced that Hayes had won.
One can only imagine the chaos of these vote counts. Unlike today’s electronic records and instant communication, ballots were paper, and news travelled slowly. President Grant ordered federal troops in the three southern states to maintain order while the vote counting proceeded. Ultimately, two contradictory certified returns were sent to Washington from each state, and there was no guidance in the Constitution for how to address the crisis. Some Republicans wanted the Executive to decree the results, and defend them with the military. The controversy dragged on into the new year. Congress created a fifteen member committee, comprised of seven Republicans and seven Democrats. The fifteenth was supposed to be an independent, but at the last moment he was unable to serve, and the committee chose an eighth Republican in his stead.
The hearing dragged on. Democrats demanded that the committee investigate the legitimacy of the votes themselves, while Republicans insisted that the only purpose of the committee was to determine which of the conflicting returns was the one properly certified by the state board. Of course, in the end, it came down to Florida. The Republican-led electoral commission rather blatantly threw out enough Democrat votes to see Hayes received the majority. A cursory investigation by the electoral commission would have exposed the fraud. Yet, instead of standing firmly behind their demand for just such an investigation, Democrats calmly allowed each contested return to be ruled in favor of the Republicans, each time by a solid 8-7 partisan vote. Each decision was ratified by not only the Republican-led Senate, but also the Democratic House. Why did Democrats allow it?
It is at this point that the story moves from official, documented, public information to the realm of shady, behind-closed-doors deal making. While there is no hard evidence to support the theory, it is widely believed by historians that Democrats allowed the committee to rule in favor of the Republicans in exchange for an end to Reconstruction. The removal of federal troops from the south was the biggest point of the compromise, but it also included cabinet appointments, a transcontinental railroad, and, in a betrayal that would shape race relations forever, the implicit promise of Republicans not to interfere with White southern Democrats’ treatment of still newly freed Blacks. Rutherford B. Hayes, beneficiary of two compromises, neither of which could be said to reflect the will of the voters, was inaugurated on March 5, 1877.