The election of 1880 was memorable only for the type of politics with which that contest was so inextricably involved. The party leaders were second-rate men; the platforms, except for that of the Greenback party, were as lacking in definiteness as the most timid office-seeker could desire; in brief, it was a cross-section of American professional politics at its worst. The election of 1884 was a distinct, although not a complete contrast. It was not a campaign of platforms, but like the election of 1824 it was a battle of men. Two genuine leaders, each representing a distinct type of politics, contended for an opportunity to try out a philosophy of government in the executive chair. In 1880 the conventions were the chief interest--the campaign was dull. The campaign of 1884, on the other hand, was one of the most remarkable in our history.

It will be remembered that the year 1882 had been characterized by political upheavals. In Pennsylvania the Greenbackers had demanded that currency be issued only by the central government--not by the national banks--and that measures be taken to curb monopolies; the independent Republicans had revolted against Cameron, and demanded civil service reform and the overthrow of bossism; and the Democrats had elected a governor of the reformer type, Robert E. Pattison. Massachusetts Republicans had gasped the day after the election to find that "Ben" Butler, who bore a questionable reputation as a politician, as a soldier and as a man, had been elected by a combination of Greenbackers and Democrats on a reform program. In New York the Democrats had taken advantage of a factional quarrel among their opponents to elect as governor a man who had achieved a reputation as a reformer--Grover Cleveland. That some of the states which had been Democratic in 1882, had become Republican again in 1883 illustrates the unstable character of the politics of the time.

The beginning of the convention season of 1884 gave hint of the vigorous campaign ahead. An Anti-Monopoly party nominated Benjamin F. Butler, who was also supported by the Greenbackers. The Prohibitionists presented a ticket headed by John P. St. John. The action of the Republican convention, which met at Chicago on June 3, proved to be the turning point in the campaign. President Arthur was frankly a candidate for another term, but he did not have the united support of the professional politicians and was distrusted by most of the reform element. Nor had his veto of the Chinese immigration bill and the rivers and harbors act tended to increase his popularity. Most enthusiastic, confident and vociferous were the supporters of James G. Blaine, of Maine. The independent element hoped to nominate Senator Edmunds, of Vermont, and was particularly disturbed at the character of the workers for the "Man from Maine." His campaign manager, Stephen B. Elkins, had been charged with a discreditable connection with the star-route scandals; men of the Platt type were urging that it was now Blaine's "turn"; and Powell Clayton, an Arkansas carpet- bagger of ill-repute, was the Blaine candidate for the position of temporary chairman of the convention.

Before a candidate was chosen the delegates turned to the adoption of the platform. This was of the usual type but was an advance over that of 1880 in several respects. It committed the party to a protective tariff and advocated an interstate commerce law and the extension of civil service reform.

The balloting for candidates proved that Blaine was clearly the choice of the convention. The mere mention of his name threw the delegates into storms of applause and even on the first ballot he received votes from every state in the union save five. On the fourth ballot he received an overwhelming majority and became the nominee. John A. Logan of Illinois, a prominent politician and soldier, was nominated for the Vice-Presidency--a tail to the ticket, in the opinion of the Democrats, which was designed to "Wag Invitation to the Soldier Vote." The choice of Blaine was variously received by the different factions in the convention. The Pacific coast delegates, in a special train, went from Chicago to Augusta, Maine, before starting for home, in order personally to pledge their support to the candidate. On the other hand, Theodore Roosevelt disgustedly remarked that he was going to a cattle-ranch in the West to stay he knew not how long. George William Curtis sadly declared that he had been present at the birth of the Republican party and feared that he was to be a witness of its death. Other reformers were no less disaffected.

The outspoken Republican opposition to Blaine gave infinite aid and comfort to the Democrats whose convention, coming a month later, could take advantage of the growing schism in the opposition. During the interval between the two conventions the growing sentiment in favor of the nomination of Grover Cleveland received the additional impetus of independent Republican support. The Democratic party was still an object of suspicion to them, but they were ready to run the risks of even a Democratic administration, if a leader of proved integrity should be nominated, and Cleveland seemed to them to meet the demands of the times. The first work of the convention, which met in Chicago on July 8, was the adoption of a reform platform. Characterizing the opposition party as a "reminiscence," it condemned Republican misrule, and promised reform; it proposed a revision of the tariff that would be fair to all interests, and reductions which would promote industry, do no harm to labor and raise sufficient revenue; and it briefly advocated "honest" civil service reform.

The enthusiasm which the independent Republicans were manifesting for Cleveland was balanced by the hostility of elements within his party. As Governor he had exercised his veto power with complete disregard for the effect on his own political future. He had, for example, vetoed a popular measure reducing fares on the New York City elevated railroad, basing his objections on the ground that the bill violated the provisions of the fundamental railroad law of the state. He was opposed by Tammany Hall, led by John Kelley, who declared that the labor element disliked him. Kelley's reputation, however, was such that his hostility seemed like a compliment and gave force to General Bragg's assertion, in seconding the nomination of Cleveland, that his friends "love him most for the enemies he has made." The first ballot proved that the Governor was stronger than his competitors, Senator Bayard, Allen G. Thurman, Samuel J. Randall and several men of lesser importance, and on the second ballot he received the nomination.

The choice of Cleveland gave the independent movement more than the expected impetus. The New York Times at once crossed the line into the Cleveland camp and Harpers Weekly, long a supporter of the Republicans, the Boston Herald, Springfield Republican, New York Evening Post, The Nation, the Chicago Times and a host of less important ones followed. A conference of Independents in New York City, which was composed of five hundred delegates and which enlisted the support of such men as Carl Schurz, George William Curtis, Henry C. Lea, Charles J. Bonaparte, Moorfield Storey and President Seelye of Amherst College, gave striking evidence of the revolt which Blaine's nomination had aroused. Curtis said in the conference, that the chief issue of the campaign was moral rather than political. The New York Times declared that the issue was a personal one. Some of the better element, however, like Senator Hoar, earnestly urged the election of Blaine, while Senator Edmunds refused either to aid or oppose his party. Others, like Roosevelt, were unable to give ungrudging support, but felt that reform would be better promoted by working within the party than by withdrawing. It is obvious that Blaine and Cleveland, not the platforms of the parties, had become the issue of the campaign.

James G. Blaine was born in Pennsylvania in 1830, was educated at Washington College in his native state, later moved to Augusta, Maine, and purchased an interest in the Kennebec Journal. On assuming his journalistic duties he familiarized himself with the politics of the state and became powerful in local, and later in federal affairs. He was a member of the first Republican convention and was chairman of the state Republican committee for more than twenty years, from which point of vantage he had a prevailing influence in Maine politics. He served in the state and federal legislatures as well as in Garfield's cabinet and was a prominent candidate for the presidential nomination in 1876 and in 1880.

Grover Cleveland, although only seven years younger than Blaine, was relatively inexperienced on the stage of national affairs. He was born in New Jersey, the son of a Presbyterian minister, grew up with little education, was salesman in a village store and later clerk in a law office, at the age of eighteen. Although he had been sheriff of Erie County, it was not until 1881, when he became mayor of Buffalo, that he took an important part in politics, and here his record as the business- like "veto mayor" was such as to carry him into the governor's chair a year later. The huge majority which he received in the gubernatorial contest was not wholly due to his own strength--doubtless factional quarrels among the Republicans assisted him--but the prominence which this election gave him and his conduct as Governor made inevitable his candidacy for higher office.

Few men could have been nominated who would have presented a more complete contrast than Blaine and Cleveland. In personality Blaine was magnetic, approachable, high-strung, possessed of a vivid imagination and of a marvellous memory for facts, names and faces. Over him men went "insane in pairs," either devotedly admiring or completely distrusting him. Cleveland was almost devoid of personal charm except to his most intimate associates. He was brusque and tactless, unimaginative, plodding, commonplace in his tastes and in the elements of his character. Men threw their hats in the air and cheered themselves hoarse at the name of Blaine; to Cleveland's courage, earnestness and honesty, they gave a tribute of admiration. When the campaign was at fever heat, Blaine was lifting crowds of eager listeners to the mountain peaks of enthusiasm; Cleveland was in the governor's room in Albany, phlegmatically plodding away at the business of his office. He was too heavy, unimaginative, direct, to indulge in flights of oratory. Yet scarcely anything that Blaine said still lives, while some of Cleveland's phrases have passed into the language of every-day.

No less a contrast existed between Blaine and Cleveland as political characters. The former's experience in the machinery of politics, in the disposal of its loaves and fishes, has already been mentioned. Of that part of politics, Cleveland had had no experience. It is said that he never was in Washington, except for a single day, until he went there to become President. Both were bold and active fighters, but Blaine was a strategist, a manager and a diplomat, while Cleveland could merely state the policy which he desired to see put into effect, and then crash ahead. Blaine had the instinct for the popular thing, was never ahead of his party, was surrounded by his followers; Cleveland saw the thing which he felt a moral imperative to accomplish and was far in advance of his fellows. The Republican was popular among the professional political element in his party and was supported by it; the Democrat never was. Cleveland openly declared his attitude on controverted issues, in words that admitted of no ambiguity and at times when only silence or soft words would save him from defeat. Blaine lacked the moral courage and the indifference to immediate results which were necessary for so exalted an action. Cleveland had more of the reformer in his nature, and had so keen a sense of responsibility and duty that his political career was a succession of battles against things that seemed wrong to him. Blaine accepted the party standards as they were; he belonged to the past, to the policies and political morality of war and reconstruction; Cleveland belonged to the transition from reconstruction to the twentieth century.

The particular thing, however, that came out of Blaine's past to dog his foot-steps, give him the enmity of the Independents--better known as the "Mugwumps"--and, doubtless, to defeat him, was a series of transactions exposed in the Mulligan letters. In order to understand these, it is necessary to inquire into events that occurred fifteen years before the overturn of 1884. In April, 1869, a bill favorable to the Little Rock and Fort Smith Railroad--an Arkansas land-grant enterprise--was before the House of Representatives. Blaine was Speaker. As the session was near its close and the bill seemed likely to be lost, its friends bespoke Blaine's assistance. He suggested that a certain point of order be raised, which would facilitate the passage of the measure, and also asked General John A. Logan to raise the point. Logan did so, Blaine sustained him and the act was passed. Nearly three months later, Warren Fisher, Jr., a Boston business man, asked Blaine to participate in the affairs of the Little Rock Railroad. Blaine signified his readiness, closing his letter with the words, "I do not feel that I shall prove a dead-head in the enterprise if I once embark in it. I see various channels in which I know I can be useful." When Blaine's enemies got hold of this, they declared that he intended to use his position as Speaker to further the interests of the road, as he had done at the time of the famous point of order; his friends asserted that he intended merely to sell the securities of the road to investors. Whether one of these contentions is true, or both, he did sell considerable amounts of the securities of the road to Maine friends, getting a "handsome commission." Considerable correspondence passed between Blaine and Fisher from 1869 to 1872 when their relations ended. Blaine understood that all their correspondence was mutually surrendered.

In the spring of 1876, the presidential campaign was on the horizon and Blaine was a prominent candidate for the Republican nomination. Meanwhile ugly rumors were flying about concerning the connection of certain members of Congress, Blaine among them, with questionable railroad transactions, and he arose in the House to deny the charges. He did not discuss the matter fully, as he did not wish his Maine constituents to know that he had received a large commission for selling Little Rock securities. Gossip grew, however, and a congressional investigation resulted in May, 1876. Blaine was one of the witnesses, but was doubtless anxious to bring the investigation to an end, since it clearly reduced his chances of receiving the nomination. Presently gossip said that Warren Fisher and James Mulligan were going to testify. Mulligan had been confidential clerk to one of Mrs. Blaine's brothers and later to Fisher. When Mulligan began his testimony it appeared that he intended to lay before the committee a package of letters that had passed between Blaine and Fisher, and thereupon, at Blaine's whispered request, one of the members of the committee procured an adjournment for the day. That evening Blaine found Mulligan at the latter's hotel and prevailed on him to surrender the letters temporarily, in order that Blaine might read and then return them. Blaine thereupon consulted two lawyers and on their advice he refused to restore the package to Mulligan. Merely to keep silence, however, was to admit guilt. Blaine, therefore, arose one day in the House of Representatives and holding the letters in his hand read selections and defended himself in a remarkable burst of emotional oratory. At the climax of this defence he elicited from the chairman of the committee of investigation an unwilling admission that the committee had suppressed a dispatch which Blaine declared would exonerate him. Blaine was triumphant, his friends sure that he had cleared himself and the matter dropped for the time. Further investigation was prevented by Blaine's refusal to produce the letters even before the committee and by his sudden illness shortly afterward. His election to the Senate soon took him out of the jurisdiction of the House committee and no action resulted.

The nomination of Blaine in 1884 was a fresh breeze on the half-dead embers of the Mulligan letters. Harper's Weekly and other periodicals published them with damaging explanatory remarks. Campaign committees spread them abroad in pamphlet form. Attention was directed to such phrases as "I do not feel that I shall prove a dead-head" and "I see various channels in which I know I can be useful." Hostile cartoonists used the phrases with an infinite variety of innuendo. But the most powerful evidence was still to come. On September 15, 1884, Fisher and Mulligan made public additional letters which Blaine had not possessed at the time of his defence in 1876. The most damaging of these was one in which Blaine had drawn up a letter completely exonerating himself, which he asked Fisher to sign and make public as his own. Blaine had marked his request "confidential" and had written at the bottom "Burn this letter." Fisher had neither written the letter which was requested nor burned Blaine's. Meanwhile it was recalled that Blaine had earlier characterized the reformers as "upstarts, conceited, foolish, vain" and as "noisy but not numerous, pharisaical but not practical, ambitious but not wise," and the already intemperate campaign became more personal than ever.

Thomas Nast's able pencil caricatured Blaine in Harper's Weekly as a magnetic candidate too heavy for the party elephant to carry; Puck portrayed him as the "tattooed man" covered all over with "Little Rock," "Mulligan Letters" and the like. Life described him as a

"Take all I can gettery,
Mulligan lettery,
Solid for Blaine old man."

Nor was the contest of scurrility entirely one-sided. Judge caricatured Cleveland in hideous cartoons. The New York Tribune described him as a small man "everywhere except on the hay-scales." Beginning in Buffalo rumors spread all over the country that Cleveland was an habitual drunkard and libertine. As is the way of such gossip, its magnitude grew until the Governor appeared in the guise of a monster of immorality. The editor of the Independent went himself to Buffalo and ran the rumors to their sources. He came to the conclusion that Cleveland as a young man had been guilty of an illicit connection, that he had made amends for the wrong which he had done and had since lived a blameless life. Such religious periodicals as the Unitarian Review, however, continued to describe him as a "debauchee" and "roue." Nearly a thousand clergymen gathered in New York declared him a synonym of "incapacity and incontinency." Much was made, also, of the fact that Cleveland had not served in the war, and John Sherman denounced him as having no sympathy for the Union cause. It did little good in the heated condition of partisan discussion to point out that young Cleveland had two brothers in the service, that he was urgently needed to support his widowed mother and her six other children, and that he borrowed money to obtain a substitute to take the field. On the other side, Harper's Weekly dwelt upon the Mulligan scandal; The Nation, while deploring the incident in Cleveland's past, considered even so grave a mistake as less important than Blaine's, since the latter's vices were those by which "governments are overthrown, states brought to naught, and the haunts of commerce turned into dens of thieves."

As the campaign neared an end it appeared that the result would turn upon New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, and Indiana, and especially upon the first of these. In New York several elements combined to make the situation doubtful and interesting. Tammany's dislike of Cleveland was well-known, but open opposition, at least, was quelled before election day. Roscoe Conkling, still influential despite his retirement, refused to take the stump in behalf of Blaine, declaring that he did not engage in "criminal practice." The Republicans also feared the competition of the Prohibitionists, because they attracted some Republicans who refused to vote for Blaine and could not bring themselves to support a Democrat. On the eve of the election an incident occurred which would have been of no importance if it had not been for the closeness of the contest. As Blaine was returning from a speaking tour in the West, he was given a reception in New York by a delegation of clergymen. The spokesman of the group, the Reverend Dr. Burchard, referred to the Democrats as the party of "Rum, Romanism and Rebellion." Blaine, weary from his tour, failed to notice the indiscreet remark, but the opposition seized upon it and used it to discredit him in the eyes of the Irish. On the same evening a dinner at Delmonico's at which many wealthy men were present, provided material for the charge that the Republican candidate was the choice of the rich classes.

Early returns on election night indicated that the Democrats had carried the South and all the doubtful states, with the possible exception of New York. There the result was so close that some days elapsed before a final decision could be made. Excitement was intense; and business almost stopped, so absorbed were people in the returns. At length it was officially decided that Cleveland had received 1,149 more votes than Blaine and by this narrow margin the Democrats carried New York, and with it the election.

Contemporary explanations of Blaine's defeat were indicated by a transparency carried in a Democratic procession which celebrated the victory:

The World Says the Independents Did It
The Tribune Says the Stalwarts Did It
The Sun Says Burchard Did It
Blaine Says St. John Did It
Theodore Roosevelt Says It Was the Soft Soap Dinner[1]
We Say Blaine's Character Did It
But We Don't Care What Did It
It's Done.

None of these explanations took into account the strength of Cleveland, but the closeness of the result made all of them important. From the vantage ground of later times, however, it could be seen that greater forces were at work. By 1884 the day had passed when political contests could be won on Civil War issues. The younger voters had no recollections of Gettysburg and felt no animosity toward the Democratic South. Moreover, Cleveland's success was the culmination of a long-continued demand for reform, which he satisfied better than Blaine.

The opening of the first Democratic administration since Buchanan's time excited great interest in every detail of Cleveland's activities and characteristics.[2] Moreover, many who had voted for him distrusted his party and were apprehensive lest it turn out that a mistake had been made in placing such great confidence in one man. The more stiffly partisan Republicans firmly believed that Democratic success meant a triumphant South, with the "rebels" again in the saddle. Sherman declared that Cleveland's choice of southern advisors was a "reproach to the civilization of the age," and Joseph B. Foraker, speaking in an Ohio campaign, found that the people wished to hear Cleveland "flayed" and wanted plenty of "hot stuff."

The President's early acts indicated that the partisans were unduly disturbed. His inaugural address was characterized by straightforward earnestness. The exploitation of western lands by fraudulent claimants was sharply halted. The cabinet, while inexperienced, contained several able men, of whom Thomas F. Bayard, Secretary of State, William C. Whitney, Secretary of the Navy, and L.Q.C. Lamar, the Secretary of the Interior, were best known.[3]

The first great obstacle that Cleveland faced was well portrayed by one of Nast's cartoons, in which the President, with an "Independent" club in his hand, was approaching a snarling, open-jawed tiger, which represented the office-seeking classes. The drawing was entitled "Beware! For He is Very Hungry and Very Thirsty." It was not difficult to foresee grave trouble ahead in connection with the civil service. The Democrats had been out of power for twenty-four years, the offices were full of Republicans, about 100,000 positions were at the disposal of the administration, and current political practice looked with indifference upon the use of these places as rewards for party work. Hordes of office-seekers descended upon congressmen, in order to get introductions to department chiefs; they filled the waiting rooms of cabinet officers; they besieged Cleveland. Disappointed applicants and displaced officers added to the clamor and confusion.

The President's policy, as it worked out in practice, was a compromise between his ideals and the wishes of the party leaders. He earnestly approved the Pendleton act and desired to carry out both its letter and its spirit. He removed office holders who were offensively partisan and who used their positions for political purposes. He gave the South a larger share in the activities of the government, both in the cabinet and in the diplomatic and other branches of the service. When the term of a Republican office holder expired he filled the place with a fit Democrat, if one could be found, in order to equalize the share of the two parties in the patronage. Nearly half of the diplomatic and consular appointments went to southerners, and eventually most of the Republicans were supplanted.

The displacement of so many officials gave the Republicans an opportunity to attempt to discredit the President in the eyes of his mugwump supporters. An amended law of 1869 gave the Senate a certain control over removals, although the constant practice of early times had been to give the executive a free hand. Moreover the law had fallen into disuse--or, as the President put it--into "innocuous desuetude." The case on which the Senate chose to force the issue was the removal of George M. Duskin, United States District Attorney in Alabama, and the nomination of John D. Burnett in his place. The Senate called upon the Attorney-General to transmit all papers relating to the removal; the President directed him to refuse, on the ground that papers of such a sort were not official papers, to which the Senate had a right, and also on the ground that the power of removal was vested, by the Constitution, in the president alone. In the meantime it had been hinted to Cleveland that his nominations would be confirmed without difficulty if it were acknowledged that the suspensions were the usual partisan removals. To do this would, of course, make his reform utterances look hypocritical and he refused to comply:

"I ... dispute the right of the Senate ... in any way save through the judicial process of trial on impeachment, to review or reverse the acts of the Executive in the suspension, during the recess of the Senate, of Federal officials."

As he was immovable and was taking precisely the position that such Republican leaders as President Grant had previously taken, the Senate was obliged to give way. Although it relieved its feelings by censuring the Attorney-General, it later repealed the remains of the Tenure of Office act of 1869, leaving victory with the President.

In connection with the less important offices Cleveland was forced to compromise between the desirable and the practicable. Most of the postmasters were changed, although in New York City an efficient officer was retained who had originally been appointed by Garfield. All the internal revenue collectors and nearly all the collectors of customs were replaced. On the other hand, the classified service was somewhat extended by the inclusion of the railway mail service, a change which, with other increases, enlarged the classified lists by 12,000 offices.

It seems evident that Cleveland pressed reform far enough to alienate the politicians but not so far as to satisfy the reformers. When he withstood Democratic clamor for office, the Independents applauded, and the spoilsmen in his own party accused him of treason. When he listened to the demands of the partisans, the reformers became disgusted and many of them returned to their former party allegiance. Eugene Field expressed Republican exultation at the dissension in the enemy's ranks:

"... the Mugwump scorned the Democrat's wail,
And flirting its false fantastic tail,
It spread its wings and it soared away,
And left the Democrat in dismay,
Too hoo!

Aside from the President, official Washington seems to have had but little real interest in reform. The Vice-President, Hendricks, was a partisan of the old school, and so many members of Congress were out of sympathy with the system that they attempted to annul the law by refusing appropriations for its continuance. On the whole a fair judgment was that of Charles Francis Adams, a Republican, who thought that Cleveland showed himself as much in advance of both parties as it was wise for a leader of one of them to be.

In addition to further improvements in the civil service laws, Cleveland was interested in a long list of reforms which he placed before Congress in his first message: the improvement of the diplomatic and consular service; the reduction of the tariff; the repeal of the Bland-Allison silver-coinage act; the development of the navy, which he characterized as a "shabby ornament" and a naval reminder "of the days that are past"; better care of the Indians; and a means of preventing individuals from acquiring large areas of the public lands. The fact that Hayes and Arthur had urged similar reforms showed how little Cleveland differed from his Republican predecessors. It was not likely, however, that the program would be carried out, for Congress was not in a reforming mood and the Republicans controlled the upper house so that they could block any attempt at constructive policies.

The latent hostility which many of the Civil War veterans felt toward the Democratic party was fanned into flame by Cleveland's attitude toward pension legislation. The sympathy of the country for its disabled soldiers had early resulted in a system of pensions for disability if due either to wounds or to disease contracted in the service. Early in the seventies the number of pensioners had seemed to have reached a maximum. Two new centers of agitation, however, had appeared, the Grand Army of the Republic and the pension agent. The former was originally a social organization but later it took a hand in the campaign for new pension legislation. The agents were persons familiar with the laws, who busied themselves in finding possible pensioners and getting their claims established. The agitation of the subject had resulted in the arrears act of 1879, which gave the claimant back-pensions from the day of his discharge from the army to the date of filing his claim, regardless of the time when his disability began. As the average first payment to the pensioner under this act was about $1,000, the number of claims filed had grown enormously and the pension agents had enjoyed a rich harvest. The next step was the dependent pensions bill, which granted a pension to all who had served three months, were dependent on their daily toil, and were incapable of earning their livelihood, whether the incapacity was due to wounds and disease or not. President Cleveland's veto of the measure aroused a hostility which was deepened by his attitude toward private pension acts.

For some time it had been customary to pass special acts providing pensions for persons whose claims had already been rejected by the pension bureau as defective or fraudulent. So little attention was paid to private bills in Congress that 1454 of them passed between 1885 and 1889, generally without debate and often even without the presence of a quorum of members. Two hours on a day in April, 1886, sufficed for the passage of five hundred such bills. Nobody would now deny that many were frauds, pure and simple. Cleveland was too frugal and conscientious to pass such bills without examination and he began to veto some of the worst of them. Each veto message explained the grounds for his dissent, sometimes patiently, sometimes with a sharp sarcasm that must have made the victim writhe. In one case where a widow sought a pension because of the death of her soldier husband it was discovered that he had been accidentally shot by a neighbor while hunting. Another claimant was one who had enlisted at the close of the war, served nine days, had been admitted to the hospital with measles and then mustered out. Fifteen years later he claimed a pension. The President vetoed the bill, scoffing at the applicant's "valiant service" and "terrific encounter with the measles." Altogether he vetoed about two hundred and thirty private bills. Time after time he expressed his sympathy with the deserving pensioner and his desire to purge the list of dishonorable names, and many applauded his courageous efforts. Nevertheless, his pension policy presented an opportunity for hostile criticism which his Republican opponents were not slow to embrace. His efforts in behalf of pension reform were said to originate in hostility to the old soldiers and in lack of sympathy with the northern cause. In 1887 it even became necessary for him to withdraw his acceptance of an invitation to attend a meeting of the Grand Army in St. Louis, because of danger that he might be subjected to downright insult.[4]

Before the hostility due to the pension vetoes had subsided, Adjutant- General Drum called the attention of the President to the fact that flags taken from Confederate regiments by Union soldiers during the war and also certain flags formerly belonging to northern troops had for many years lain packed in boxes in the attic and cellar of the War Department. At his suggestion Cleveland ordered the return of these trophies to the states which the regiments had represented. Although recommended by Drum as a "graceful act," it was looked upon by the old soldiers with the utmost wrath. The commander of the Grand Army called upon Heaven to avenge so wicked an order and such politicians as Governor Foraker of Ohio gained temporary prominence by their bitter condemnation of it. Eventually the clamor was so great that the President rescinded the order on the ground that the final disposition of the flags was within the sphere of action of Congress only. In February, 1905, however, Congress passed a resolution providing for the return of the flags and the exchange was effected without excitement.

For the reasons already mentioned, little legislation was passed during President Cleveland's administration that was of permanent importance. An exception was the Interstate Commerce Act, which is a subject for later discussion. A Presidential Succession Act, which has earlier been described, provided for the succession of the members of the cabinet in case of the removal or death of the president and vice-president. The Electoral Count Act placed on the states the burden of deciding contests arising from the choice of presidential electors. When more than one set of electoral returns come from a state, each purporting to be legal, Congress must decide which shall be counted. Of some importance, too, was the establishment of the Department of Agriculture in 1889 and the inclusion of its secretary in the cabinet. The admission of the Dakotas, Montana and Washington as states took place in the same year. The improvement of the navy, begun so auspiciously by Secretary Chandler under President Arthur, was continued with enthusiasm and vigor, and the vessels constructed formed an important part of our navy.

Of less popular interest than many of the political questions, but of more lasting importance, was the rapid reduction of the public land supply. The purpose of the Homestead law of 1862 had been to supply land at low rates and in small amounts to bona fide settlers, but the beneficent design of the nation had been somewhat nullified by the constant evasion of the spirit of the laws. Squatters had occupied land without reference to legal forms; cattlemen had fenced in large tracts for their own use and forcibly resisted attempts to oust them; by hook and by crook individuals and companies had got large areas into their possession and held them for speculative returns. Western public opinion looked upon many such violations with equanimity until the supply of land began to grow small. Then came the demand for the opening of the Indian reservations, which comprised 250,000 square miles in 1885. The Dawes act of 1887 provided for individual ownership of small amounts of land by the Indians instead of tribal ownership in large reservations. By this means a considerable amount of good land was made available for settlement by whites. The dwindling supply of western land also called attention to certain delinquencies on the part of the railway companies. Many of them had been granted enormous amounts of land on certain conditions, such as that specified parts of the roads be constructed within a given time. This agreement, with others, was frequently broken, and question arose as to whether the companies should be forced to forfeit their claims. Cleveland turned to the problem with energy and forced the return of some millions of acres. Nevertheless, the fact that it was becoming necessary to be less prodigal with the public land indicated that the supply was no longer inexhaustible, and led the President in his last annual message to urge that the remaining supply be husbanded with great care. Congress was not alert to the demands of the time, however, and no effective steps were taken for many years.

H.C. Thomas, The Return of the Democratic Party to Power in 1884 (1919), is most complete and scholarly on the subject; Sparks, Curtis, Dewey, and Stanwood continue useful; H.T. Peck, Twenty Years of the Republic, 1885-1905 (1907), is illuminating and interesting; H.J. Ford, Cleveland Era (1919), is brief; the files of The Nation and Harper's Weekly are essential, while those of the New York Sun, Evening Post and Tribune add a few points. The Mulligan letters are reprinted in Harper's Weekly (1884, 643-646).

On the administration, consult the general texts and the special volumes mentioned in chapter V; G.F. Parker, Recollections of Grover Cleveland (1909); and Political Science Quarterly (June, 1918), "Official Characteristics of President Cleveland," give something on the personal side; J.L. Whittle, Grover Cleveland (1896), is by an English admirer; Cleveland's own side of one of his controversies is in Grover Cleveland, Presidential Problems (1904); on Blaine, Edward Stanwood, James G. Blaine (1905). The Annual Cyclopaedia has useful biographical articles.

[1] A reference to the Dorsey dinner at which Arthur told how Indiana was carried.

[2] His marriage to Miss Frances Folsom, which occurred in 1886, occasioned lively interest.

[3] Other members were: Daniel Manning, N.Y., Secretary of the Treasury; William C. Endicott, Mass., Secretary of War; A.H. Garland, Ark., Attorney- General; William F. Vilas, Wis., Postmaster-General.

[4] President Cleveland also frequently used his veto power to prevent the passage of appropriations for federal buildings which he deemed unnecessary.

The most significant legislative act of President Cleveland's administration was due primarily neither to him nor to the great political parties. It concerned the relation between the government and the railroads, and the force which led to its passage originated outside of Congress. The growth of the transportation system, therefore, the economic benefits which resulted, the complaints which arose and the means through which the complaints found voice were subjects of primary importance.

Beginning with the construction of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad about 1830, the extension of the railways went forward with increasing rapidity so that they soon formed a veritable network: between 1830 and 1850 over 7, 000 miles were laid; by 1860 the total was 30,000 miles; the Civil War and the financial depression of 1873 retarded progress somewhat, but such delays were temporary, and by 1890 the total exceeded 160,000 miles. In the earlier decades most construction took place in the Northeast, where capital was most plentiful and population most dense. Later activity in the Northeast was devoted to building "feeders" or branch lines. In the South, the relatively smaller progress which had been made before the war had been undone for the most part by the wear and tear of the conflict, but the twenty-five years afterward saw greatly renewed construction. The most surprising expansion took place in Texas where the 711 miles of 1870 were increased to 8,754 by 1890. In the Middle West, roads were rapidly built just before the war and immediately after it, and the first connection with the Pacific Coast, as has been shown, was made in 1869.

[image: Railroad Mileage, 1860-1910, in thousands of miles]

Many of the circumstances accompanying this rapid expansion were novel and important. Beginning with a federal grant to the Illinois Central, for example, in the middle of the century, both the nation and the states assisted the roads by gifts of millions of acres of land. It was to the advantage of the companies to procure the grants on the best possible terms, and they exerted constant pressure upon congressmen whose votes and influence they desired. Frequently the agents of the roads were thoroughly unscrupulous, and such scandals as that connected with the Credit Mobilier were the result. More important still, the fact that the federal and state governments had aided the railroads so greatly gave them a strong justification for investigating and regulating the activities of the companies.

Mechanical inventions and improvements had no small part in the development of the transportation system. The early tracks, constructed of wood beams on which were fastened iron strips, and sometimes described as barrel-hoops tacked to laths, were replaced by iron, and still later by heavy steel rails. By 1890 about eighty per cent. of the mileage was composed of steel. Heavy rails were accompanied by improved roadbeds, heavier equipment and greater speed. A simple improvement was the gradual adoption of a standard gauge--four feet eight and a half inches--which replaced the earlier lack of uniformity. The process was substantially completed by the middle eighties, when many thousands of miles in the South were standardized. On the Louisville and Nashville, for example, a force of 8,763 men made the change on 1,806 miles of track in a single day. The inauguration of "standard" time also took place during the eighties. Hitherto there had been a wide variety of time standards and different roads even in the same city despatched their trains on different systems. In 1883 the country was divided into five vertical zones each approximately fifteen degrees or, in sun-time, an hour wide. Both the roads and the public then conformed to the standard time of the zone in which they were.

[image: Map of the United States showing railroads in 1870]

Of greater importance was the consolidation of large numbers of small lines into the extensive systems which are now familiar. The first roads covered such short distances that numerous bothersome transfers of passengers, freight and baggage from the end of one line to the beginning of the next were necessary on every considerable journey. No fewer than five companies, for example, divided the three hundred miles between Albany and Buffalo, no one of them operating more than seventy-six miles. In 1853, these five with five others were consolidated into the New York Central Railroad. Sixteen years later, in 1869, the Central combined with the Hudson River, and soon afterwards procured substantial control of the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern, the Rock Island, and the Chicago and Northwestern. As the result of this process a single group of men directed the interests of a system of railroads from New York through Chicago to Omaha. The Pennsylvania Railroad began with a short line from Philadelphia to the Susquehanna River, picked up smaller roads here and there-- eventually one hundred and thirty-eight of them, representing two hundred and fifty-six separate corporations--reached out through the Middle West to Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis, and in 1871 controlled over three thousand miles of track, with an annual income of over forty million dollars. In the eighties a railroad war in northern New England started the consolidation of the Boston and Maine system.

The beneficial results of the growth of the transportation facilities of the nation were immediate and revolutionary. The fact that average freight rates were cut in halves between 1867 and 1890 helped make possible the economic readjustments after the Civil War to a degree that is not likely to be overestimated. Not only did railway construction supply work for large numbers of laborers and help bring about an ever greater westward migration, but it opened a market for the huge agricultural surplus of the Middle West. Without the market in the cities of the populous Atlantic Coast and Europe, the expansion of the West would have been impossible. Moreover, the railways brought coal, ore, cotton, wool and other raw materials to the Northeast, and thus enabled that section to develop its manufacturing interests.

[image: Map of the United States showing railroads in 1890]

Despite the admittedly great benefits resulting from the railroad system, there was a rising tide of complaint on the part of the public in regard to some aspects of its construction and management. It was objected, for example, that many of the western roads especially were purely speculative undertakings. Lines were sometimes built into new territory where competition did not exist and where, consequently, the rates could be kept at a high point. The Chicago, Burlington and Quincy presented such a case in 1856. Profits were so great as to embarrass the company, since the payment of large dividends was sure to arouse the hostility of the farmers who paid the freight rates. "This, indeed," declared the biographer of one of the presidents of the road, "was the time of glad, confident morning, never again to occur in the history of railroad-building in the United States." Sometimes lines were driven into territory which was already sufficiently supplied with transportation facilities, in order to compel the company already on the ground to buy out the new road. If, as time went on, traffic enough for both roads did not appear, they had to be kept alive through the imposition of high rates; otherwise, one of them failed and the investors suffered a loss. The opportunities for profit, however, were so numerous that the amount of capital reported invested in railways increased by $3,200,000,000 during the five years preceding 1885.

A practice which was productive of much wrong-doing and which was suggestive of more dishonesty than could be proved, related to the letting of contracts for the construction of new lines. The directors of a road frequently formed part or all of the board of directors of a construction company. In their capacity as railroad directors they voted advantageous contracts to themselves in their other capacity, giving no opportunity to independent construction companies who might agree to build at a lower cost. As the cost of construction was part of the debt of the road, the directors were adding generously to their own wealth, while the company was being saddled with an increased burden. It cost only $58,000,000, for example, to build the Central Pacific, but a construction company was paid $120,000,000 for its services. When John Murray Forbes was investigating the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy he found that the president of the road was paying himself a salary as president of a construction company, out of the railroad's funds, without the supervision of the treasurer or any one else, and without any auditing of his accounts. Moreover, six of the twelve members of the board of directors were also members of the construction company. Such an attempt to "run with the hare and hunt with the hounds" was suggestive, to say the least, of great possibilities of profit to the directors and a constant invitation to unnecessary construction.

Another grievance against the railways was the reckless, irresponsible and arrogant management under which some of them operated. An eminent expert testified before an investigating commission in 1885 that Jay Gould once sold $40,000,000 of Erie Railway stock and pocketed the proceeds himself. Most of the energy of the officers of some roads was expended in deceiving and cheating competitors. "Railroad financiering" became a "by-word for whatever is financially loose, corrupt and dishonest." If certain roads demonstrated by successful operation that honest methods were better in the long run, their probity received scant advertisement in comparison with the unscrupulous practices of their less respectable neighbors. It is to be remembered, also, that the growth of the railway system had been so rapid and so huge that it was impossible to meet the demand for trained administrators. Naturally, men possessed of little or no technical understanding of transportation problems could not provide highly responsible management.

The dishonest manipulation of the issues and sales of railroad stocks is a practice that was not confined solely to the twenty-five years after the Civil War, but the numerous examples of it which occurred during that period aggravated the exasperation which has already been mentioned. Daniel Drew, the treasurer of the Erie Railway in 1866, furnished an excellent illustration of this type of activity. Drew had in his possession a large amount of Erie stock which had been secretly issued to him in return for a loan to the company. The stock in the market was selling near par and still rising. Drew instructed his agents to make contracts for the future delivery of stock at prices current at the time when the contracts were made. When the time came for fulfilling his contracts, Drew suddenly threw the secret stock on the market, drove general market prices on Erie stock down from ninety-five to fifty, bought at the low figure, and sold at the high price which was called for in the contracts made by his agents. The effect of such sharp dealing on investors, the railroad or the public seems not to have entered into the calculation. Indeed, the Erie and many another road was looked upon by its owners merely as a convenient piece of machinery for producing fortunes.

Gould, Drew and other railroad men of their time were also expert in the practice of "stock-watering." This consists in expanding the nominal capitalization of an enterprise without an equivalent addition to the actual capital. The rates which the railway has to charge the public tend to increase by approximately whatever dividends are paid on the water.[1] Then, as later, when a road was prospering greatly it would sometimes declare a "stock dividend," that is, give its stockholders additional stock in proportion to what they already owned. The addition would frequently be water. Its purpose might be to cover up the great profits made by the company. If, on a million dollars' worth of stock, it was paying ten per cent. dividends, the public might demand lower freight and passenger rates; but if the stock were doubled and earnings remained stationary, then the dividends would appear as five per cent.--an amount to which there could be no objection. H.V. Poor, the railroad expert, declared before a commission of investigation in 1885 that the New York Central Railroad was carrying $48,000,000 of water, on which it had paid eight per cent. dividends for fifteen years. He also estimated that of the seven and a half billions of indebtedness which the roads of the country were carrying in 1883, two billions represented water. Others thought that the proportion of water was greater. In any case the unnecessary burden upon business to provide dividends for the watered stock was an item of some magnitude. The investor, however, looked upon stock-watering with other eyes. The building of a new road was a speculation; the profits might be large, to be sure, but there might in many cases be a loss. In order to tempt money into railroad enterprises, therefore, inducements in the form of generous stock bonuses were necessary.

The rate wars of the seventies gave wide advertisement to another aspect of railroad history. The most famous of these contests had their origin in the grain-carrying trade from the Lakes to the sea-board. The entry of the Baltimore and Ohio and the Grand Trunk into Chicago in 1874, stimulated a four-cornered competition among these roads and the Pennsylvania and New York Central for the traffic between the upper Mississippi Valley and the coast. Rates on grain and other products were cut, and cut again; freight charges dropped to a figure which wiped out profits; yet it was impossible for any line to drop out of the competition until exhaustion forced all to do so. A railroad can not suspend business when profits disappear, for fixed expenses continue and the depreciation of the value of the property, especially of the stations, tracks and rolling stock, is extreme. Since the rate wars were clearly bringing ruin in their train, rate agreements and pooling arrangements were devised. The latter took several forms. Sometimes a group of competing roads agreed to divide the business among the competitors on the basis of an agreed-upon percentage. Another plan was to pool earnings at the close of a period and divide according to a prearranged ratio. Sometimes destructive competition was prevented by a division of the territory, each company being allowed a free hand in its own field. In general, pooling agreements were likely to break down, although a southern pool organized by Albert Fink on a very extensive scale lasted for many years and was thought to have had a vital influence in eliminating rate-wars. Their efficacy depended mainly on good faith, and good faith was a rarity among railroad officials in the seventies and eighties. In the eyes of the public, rate agreements and pools were vicious conspiracies which left the rights and well-being of the private shipper completely out of the calculation.

Still another indictment of the railways resulted from their participation in politics. It was inevitable, of course, that the roads should be drawn into the field of legislation--the grants of public land, for example, helped bring about the result. It early seemed advantageous to attempt to influence state legislatures to pass favorable laws, and it seemed a necessity to bring pressure to bear in order to protect the roads from hostile acts. The methods used by the railway agents in their political activity naturally varied all the way from legitimate agitation to crude and subtle forms of bribery. An insidious method of influencing both law- making and litigation was the pass system. Under it the roads were accustomed to give free transportation to a long list of federal and state judges, legislators and politicians. For a judge to accept such favors from a corporation which might at any time be haled before his court, and for a legislator to receive a gift from a body that was constantly in need of legislative attention is now held to be improper in the extreme. But in those days a less sensitive public opinion felt hardly a qualm. That the practice was likely to arouse an unconscious bias in the minds of public officials is hardly debatable. The more crude forms of bribery, too, were not uncommon. It was testified before a committee of investigation that the Erie Railway Company in one year expended $700,000 as a corruption fund and for legal expenses, carrying the amount on the books in the "India-rubber account." The manipulation of the courts of New York by the Erie and the New York Central during the late sixties was nothing short of a scandal. Alliances between political rings and railroad officials for the purpose of caring for their mutual interests were so common that reformers questioned whether the American people could be said to possess self-government in actuality. Immediately after the Civil War, Charles Francis Adams, an acute student of transportation, declared that it was scarcely an exaggeration to say that the state legislatures were becoming a species of irregular boards of railroad direction. The evils of the alliance between the roads and politics were not, of course, due entirely to the former. The receiver of a pass shared with the giver the evil of the system. Many a legislator was corrupt; more shared in practices which were little removed from dishonorable. Adams, for example, gives an account of his experiences, as a director of the Union Pacific, in dealing with a United States senator in 1884. The congressman was ready to take excellent care of railroad corporations which retained him as counsel, but was a corrupt and ill-mannered bully toward the Union Pacific, which had not employed him.[2]

The most constant grievance was discrimination--that the roads varied their rates for the benefit or detriment of especial types of freight, of individuals and of entire localities. Through business between competing points was carried at a low figure, while the roads recouped themselves by charging heavily in towns where competition was absent. Shippers complained that rates between St. Paul and Chicago, for example, where competition existed were hardly more than half the charges to places at a similar distance where a single road was in a position to demand what it pleased. Manufacturers in Rochester could send goods to New York City and reship them to Cincinnati, back through Rochester, for less than the rate direct to their destination. Yet the direct haul was seven hundred miles shorter than the indirect. Secret arrangements were commonly made with favored shippers by which they secured lower rates than their competitors. When it became evident that transportation cost entered into the price of substantially everything which the ordinary citizen consumed, and when it was considered that a slight rise in railroad rates might easily amount to a heavy tax on a shipper or an entire region, it was seen that uniformity of rates was a matter of the utmost concern.

In brief, then, it was complained that the growth of the transportation system had placed enormous power in the hands of a small group of men, many of whom had indicated by their selfishness, arrogance and questionable practices that they ought not to be entrusted with so great a measure of authority.

The best example of the American railroad president after the war was Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt. Vanderbilt began his career by ferrying passengers and freight between Staten Island and New York City. Later he turned his attention to shipping, in which he made a fortune, and planned the operation of steamships on a large scale. Becoming interested in railroading, he clearly perceived the importance of the western trade and the necessity of consolidation. Vanderbilt was a man of vision, a man who combined magnitude of plan with the vigorous grasp of the practical details necessary for the realization of his ambitions. He was buoyant, energetic, confident, ambitious, determined, despotic. Unhampered by modern conceptions of public duty, undeterred by the hostility of powerful opponents, with eyes fixed upon the combination and control of a great transportation system, Vanderbilt entered courageously upon bitter struggles for supremacy which involved the misuse of the courts, the control of the New York state legislature and a thousand charges of corrupt influence and bribery, but he welded railroads together, replaced wood and iron with steel, and constructed tracks and terminals. At his death in 1877 he left a huge fortune and bequeathed to his successors a great, consolidated railroad enterprise, skillfully and successfully administered. The great weakness of Commodore Vanderbilt and his associates, and of those who later imitated his work was their fundamental conception of the railroad as a private venture. Success consisted in bigness, great profits, crushing or buying out competitors, and administering the business for the best good of the few owners, regardless of the interests of the region through which the railway passed. Vanderbilt and many of his contemporaries were men of business sagacity and foresight, but their ethical outlook was restricted and their sense of public responsibility not well developed.

So considerable a list of grievances naturally bestirred the people to seek relief at the hands of their legislators. Two lines of action were followed. In Massachusetts, as early as 1869, a state commission was formed with purely advisory powers. Under the able leadership of Charles Francis Adams it attained great influence and worked effectively for the elimination of railroad abuses through conference and the weight of public opinion. In Illinois, on the other hand, reliance was placed upon compulsory action. The state constitution of 1870 declared the railroads to be public highways and required the legislature to fix rates for the carriage of freight and passengers, and to pass laws to correct abuses connected with the railways and grain warehouses. In compliance with the constitution the state passed the necessary legislation and placed their execution in the hands of a commission with considerable power. Other western states followed the Illinois model.

On the national scale the agitation for government action began with the minor parties. In 1872 the Labor Reformers demanded fair rates and no discrimination; in 1876 the Prohibitionists called for lower rates; in 1880 the Greenbackers stood for fair and uniform rates; four years later they urged laws which would put an end to pooling, stock-watering and discrimination, and in the same year the Republicans promised an act to regulate commerce if they were elected. The most effective force behind the demand for railroad regulation was the Patrons of Husbandry, better known as the "Grange." This society was founded by O.H. Kelley, a government clerk in Washington, in 1867. Its initial purpose was the organization of the agricultural classes for social and intellectual improvement, but later it engaged in the effort to correct transportation abuses and to arouse cooperation among the farmers in other ways. The movement grew astonishingly, especially in the Middle West, where its membership reached nearly 759,000 in 1875.

Transportation conditions in the West had not reached the relatively stable situation which characterized those of the East. In the West much new work was being done, with the attendant evils of construction companies and unnecessary and speculative undertakings. Much of the railroad stock was in the hands of eastern investors whom the western farmers pictured as living in idle ease on swollen incomes, careless of the high rates and unfair discriminations under which the farmer groaned. The constantly falling prices, which influenced the West in so many other ways, served to heighten the discontent with any abuse which increased the farmer's burden. Moreover, the western states had contributed huge amounts of land to help build the railways and they were not minded to give up the hold which their generosity had justified.

Impelled, then, by such force as the Grange and similar organizations supplied, the western states proceeded to the adoption of laws whose purposes ordinarily included railroad rate-making by the legislature or by a commission, the doing away with such abuses as discrimination, and the prohibition of free passes. The railroads promptly opposed the laws and carried the battle to the courts. The so-called "Granger Cases" resulted. Three of these were representative of the general trend of the decisions.

The famous case Munn v. Illinois, which was decided by the Supreme Court in 1876 was possibly the most vital case in the history of the regulation of public service corporations after the Civil War. The legislature of Illinois, in conformity with the state constitution of 1870, had passed a law fixing maximum charges for the storage of grain in warehouses. The owners of a certain warehouse refused compliance with the law on the ground that it was contrary to the Constitution and hence null and void. They argued that when the state fixed rates it deprived the owners of the right to set higher charges and so, in effect, deprived them of their property, in defiance of that portion of the Fourteenth Amendment forbidding a state to "deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law."

On examination of the history of the control of such enterprises, the Court found that it had been customary in England for many centuries and in this country from the beginning, to regulate rates on ferries, charges at inns, and similar public enterprises, and that it had never been thought that such action deprived persons of property without due process of law. In other words, the established common law, at the time of the passage of the Fourteenth Amendment, did not look upon rate regulation as a deprivation of property. The Court, therefore, declared the Illinois warehouse law constitutional, and in doing so made the following statement:

"Property does become clothed with a public interest when used in a manner to make it of public consequence, and affect the community at large. When, therefore, one devotes his property to a use in which the public has an interest, he, in effect, grants to the public an interest in that use, and must submit to be controlled by the public for the common good, to the extent of the interest he has thus created."

While the Munn case was before the Court, the case Peik v. the Chicago and Northwestern Railway Company was raising a question which struck at the heart of the chief practical impediment in the way of state control of transportation. The central question in the litigation was whether the legislature of Wisconsin could lawfully regulate rates on railroads inside the state. Since the bulk of the traffic on most roads crosses state borders at one time or another in its transit, the regulation of rates within a state normally affects interstate commerce. But the regulation of interstate commerce is vested in Congress by the terms of the Constitution. The railroad was quick to take advantage of the division of power between the states and the nation. Indeed, when fighting state legislation, the roads earnestly emphasized the exclusive power of Congress over interstate commerce; but when fighting national regulation, they equally deprecated any interference with the reserved rights of the states. Acting in accordance with its established practice, the Court decided that the state was authorized to regulate rates within its borders, even though such regulation indirectly affected persons outside, until Congress passed legislation concerning interstate commerce. Obviously this decision allowed the states to work out their railroad problems unhampered, and constituted one of the chief victories for the Grangers.

In 1886, however, the Court overturned some of the principles which had been established in the Munn and Peik cases. The new development came about in connection with the Wabash railroad. It appeared that the road had been carrying freight from Peoria, Illinois, to New York for smaller rates than were charged from Gilman to New York, despite the fact that Peoria was eighty-six miles farther away. Since Illinois law forbade a road to levy a greater charge for a short haul than for a long one, a suit was instituted and carried to the Supreme Court. The company held that the Illinois legislation affected interstate commerce and hence trenched upon the constitutional power of Congress. This time the Court upheld the road. It decided that the transportation of goods from Illinois to New York was commerce among the states, that such commerce was subject to regulation by Congress exclusively, and that the Illinois statute was void. It seemed, then, that state regulation was a broken reed on which nobody could safely lean, and attention thereupon turned to the federal government.

Congress had already been discussing federal regulation intermittently for some years. The so-called "Windom Report" of 1874 had advised federal construction and improvement of transportation facilities in order to lower rates through competition, but no action had resulted. In 1878 the "Reagan bill" had proposed government regulation, and from that time the subject had been almost continuously before Congress. In 1885 the Senate had appointed a select committee of five to investigate and report upon the regulation of freight and passenger transportation. The committee was headed by Shelby M. Cullom, who had been a member of the legislature of Illinois and later governor, in the years when the railroad and warehouse laws were being put into effect. It endeavored to discover all shades of opinion by visiting the leading commercial centers, and by consulting business men, state commissioners of railroads, Granger officials and others. After a somewhat thorough investigation, the committee expressed its conviction that no general question of governmental policy occupied so prominent a place in the attention of the public as that of controlling the growth and influence of corporations. The needed relief might be obtained, the committee thought, through any one of four methods: private ownership and management, with a greater or less degree of government oversight; government ownership and management; government ownership with private management under public regulations; partial state ownership and management in competition with private companies. The widespread opposition to state ownership of railroads, the commission thought, seemed to point to some form of government regulation and control of the existing situation.

Impressed with the magnitude of the abuses involved, and the hopelessness of regulation through state laws, the committee presented a bill designed to bring about regulation on a national scale through a federal agency. The resulting law was the Interstate Commerce Act of February 4, 1887. It provided that all railway charges should be reasonable and just; forbade the roads to grant rebates, or to give preferences to any person, locality or class of freight, or to charge more for a short haul than for a long one except with the consent of the proper authorities; it made pooling unlawful; and it ordered the companies to post printed copies of their rates, which were not to be altered except after ten days' public notice. The act also created an Interstate Commerce Commission of five members to serve six-year terms, into whose hands the administration of the measure was placed. Persons who claimed that the railways were violating the provisions of the law could make complaint to the Commission, or bring suit in a United States Court. In order that the Commission might know the condition of the roads, it was given power to call upon the carriers for information, to demand annual reports from them, and to require the attendance of witnesses. If the railroads refused to carry out the orders of the Commission, they could be brought before a United States district court.

In forbidding pools, the Act committed the railroads to the policy of enforced competition, a policy which was commonly accepted at the time as the best one for the public interest. Such experts, however, as Professor A.T. Hadley and Charles Francis Adams, Jr., raised important objections. They cited the rate wars to indicate the results of competition and declared that railroads ought to be monopolies. If two grocery stores are established where trade enough exists for only one, they asserted, the weaker competitor can close his doors and the public loss is not heavy; but in the case of the railways a weak competitor must continue business even at disastrously low rates because all his interest charges continue and the depreciation on his property is extreme. The construction of an unnecessary road and its subsequent operation at a loss, its failure or its abandonment, constitute a great drain upon the public. Such objectors contended that pooling combinations did away with many of the evils of cut- throat competition, and they accordingly urged that the carriers be permitted to make such arrangements, under whatever government regulation might be needed to prevent unreasonable charges. By such means the available business of a region might be fairly divided among the roads entering it, without resort to competitive rate-cutting and its consequent evils.

The passage of the law was looked upon with much hostility on the part of the railroad interests. James J. Hill thought that the railroads might survive, although the country would be ruined, and he predicted that Congress would shortly be called in special session to repeal the act. More important than mere hostility was the constant opposition and evasion which characterized the attitude of the carriers toward the operation of the law. Discriminations were commonly practiced and hidden away in accounts under false or misleading headings. Rebates were given and received, a fact which was due in no small degree to the shippers themselves. A large shipper might demand advantageous rates and threaten to turn his trade over to a rival road. As the arrangement would be secret, and the likelihood of discovery small, the temptation to break the law was correspondingly great.

The good results of the passage of the law were disappointingly slight. To be sure, the Commission was gaining experience, administrative precedents were being established and injustice was somewhat less common than before. The first chairman was Judge T.M. Cooley, a noted lawyer whose appointment was considered an admirable one. Most important of all, the principle of government regulation was established. Nevertheless, progress was so slow as to be almost invisible. The courts hampered the activities of the Commission. When cases arose involving its decisions, they allowed a retrial of the entire case from the beginning, permitting the introduction of facts which had been designedly withheld by the carriers in order to undermine the influence of the Commission, and sometimes they reversed its findings and so dulled the effectiveness of its labors. Eleven years after the Act was passed the Commission declared that abuses were so constant that the situation was intolerable; a prominent railroad president made the charge that "good faith had departed from the railway world"; and an important authority on railroad affairs declared that the Commission had become an impotent bureau of statistics. More study has been made of railroad regulation and the technical side of railroading than of the history of transportation and the effects of the roads on the political and economic life of the people. An excellent single volume is John Moody, The Railroad Builders (1919), which devotes attention to the important personages of railroad history, discusses the growth of large systems and contains valuable maps; the best concise account of the history of the railways is W.Z. Ripley, Railroads: Rates and Regulation (1912). Chap. I; W.Z. Ripley, Railway Problems (rev. ed., 1913), is reliable; E.R. Johnson and T.W. Van Metre, Principles of Railroad Transportation (1916), has some excellent chapters and several informing maps; C.F. Carter, When Railroads were New, (1909), is a popular account; C.F. Adams, Chapters of Erie (1886), exposes early railroad practices; H.G. Pearson, An American Railroad Builder (1911), presents the career of J.M. Forbes as a railroad president; A.T. Hadley, Railroad Transportation (1886), is a classic, early account. Consult also E.R. Johnson, American Railway Transportation (1903); Frank Parsons, Heart of the Railroad Problem (1906); C.F. Adams, Jr., Railroads: Their Origin and Problems (1878, rev. ed., 1893); "A Decade of Federal Railway Regulation," in Atlantic Monthly (Apr., 1898). On the personal side, the following are valuable: E.P. Oberholtzer, Jay Cooke, Financier of the Civil War (2 vols., 1907); J.G. Pyle, Life of J.J. Hill (2 vols., 1917); Memoirs of Henry Villard (1909). On the subject of land grants and regulation: L.H. Haney, Congressional History of Railways (2 vols., 1910); S.J. Buck, The Granger Movement (1913), and the same author's The Agrarian Crusade (1920), are best on the relation of unrest among the agricultural classes to the railroad problem. The "Cullom Report" is in Senate Reports, 49th Congress, 1st session (Serial Number 2356), in 2 vols., and is a mine of information on early abuses. The most important Granger cases are in United States Reports, vol. 94, p. 113 (Munn v. Ill.), and vol. 118, p. 557 (Wabash case).

[1] For example, an investor might contribute $100 in cash to an enterprise. The "paid in capital" or "actual" capital would, then be $100. He might receive in return $100 in stock and $100 in bonds, in which case the "nominal capital" would be $200; the additional $100 would be "water." If the enterprise paid interest on the bonds, and dividends on the stock, it would, of course, be paying a return on the water. The practice of stock-watering did not end with the days of Gould and Drew.

[2] In this connection Professor Farrand mentions the statement of a railroad magnate that "in Republican counties he was a Republican, and in Democratic counties he was a Democrat, but that everywhere he was for the railroad." Development of the United States, p. 290.

That the election of 1888 differed from its predecessors since 1865 was due chiefly to the independence, courage and political insight of President Cleveland. Hitherto campaigns had been contested with as little reference to real issues as conditions rendered possible. Neither party had possessed leaders with sufficient understanding of the needs of the nation to force a genuine settlement of an important issue. That 1888 saw a clear contest made it a memorable year in recent politics.

It will be remembered that the tariff act of 1883 had been satisfactory only to a minority in Congress, because it retained the high level of customs duties that had been established during the Civil War. The congressional election of 1882 had resulted in the choice of a Democratic House of Representatives and had offered another opportunity for downward revision. Early in 1884, therefore, William R. Morrison presented a bill making considerable additions to the free list and providing for a "horizontal" reduction of about twenty per cent. on all other duties as levied under the act of 1883. The measure was defeated by four votes. Opposed to it were substantially all the Republicans and forty-one Democrats, most of them from the industrial states of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Ohio. The Democratic tariff plank of 1884, as has been seen, was practically meaningless, but the election of Cleveland, and the choice of a Democratic House gave another opportunity for revision. Again Morrison attempted a reduction, and again he was defeated by Samuel J. Randall and the other protectionist Democrats.

The entire matter, however, was about to receive a new and important development at the hands of President Cleveland and John G. Carlisle, who was the Speaker of the House during the four years from 1885 to 1889. Carlisle was a Kentuckian, a man of grave bearing, unflagging industry and substantial attainments. His tariff principles were in accord with those of the President, and his position as Speaker enabled him to determine the make-up of the Committee on Ways and Means, which would frame any tariff legislation. Cleveland had expressed his belief in the desirability of tariff reduction in his messages to Congress of 1885 and 1886, basing his recommendations on the same facts that had earlier actuated President Arthur in making similar suggestions. His recommendations, however, had received the same slight consideration that had been accorded those of his Republican predecessor. He therefore determined to challenge the attention of the country and of Congress by means of a novel expedient.

Previous presidential messages had covered a wide variety of subjects-- foreign relations, domestic affairs, and recommendations of all kinds. Departing from this custom, the President made up his mind to devote an entire message to tariff reform. His project was startling from the political point of view, for his party was far from being a unit in its attitude toward reduction, a presidential campaign was at hand, and the Independents, who had had a strong influence in bringing about his success in 1884, sent word to him that a reform message would imperil his chances of re-election. This type of argument had little weight with Cleveland, however, and his reply was brief: "Do you not think that the people of the United States are entitled to some instruction on this subject?"

On December 6, 1887, therefore, he sent to Congress his famous message urging the downward revision of the tariff. The immediate occasion of his recommendation, he declared, was the surplus of income over expenditure, which was piling up in the treasury at a rapid rate and which was a constant invitation to reckless appropriations. The portion of the public debt which was payable had already been redeemed, so that whatever surplus was not expended would be stored in the vaults, thus reducing the amount of currency in circulation, and making likely a financial crisis. The simplest remedy for the situation seemed to Cleveland to lie in a reduction of the income, and the most desirable means of reduction seemed to be the downward revision of the tariff, a system of "unnecessary taxation" which he denominated "vicious, inequitable, and illogical." Disclaiming any wish to advocate free trade, he expressed the hope that Congress would turn its attention to the practical problem before it:

"Our progress toward a wise conclusion will not be improved by dwelling upon the theories of protection and free trade. This savors too much of bandying epithets. It is a condition which confronts us, not a theory."

The effect of the message was immediate. Men began at once to take sides as if everybody had been waiting for a leader to speak his mind; and the parties adopted the definite principles to which they adhered for many years afterwards. The Democrats very generally rallied to the support of their champion; gaps in the ranks were closed up; and doubtless the usual pressure was applied to obstinate members who were disinclined to follow the leader. The Republican attitude was well expressed in the phrase of one of the politicians: "It is free-trade, and we have 'em!" The most prominent Republican, James G. Blaine, was in Paris, but true to his instinctive recognition of a good political opportunity he gave an interview which was immediately cabled to America. In it Blaine maintained that tariff reduction would harm the entire country, and especially the South and the farmers, and urged the reduction of the surplus by the abolition of the tax on tobacco, which he termed the poor man's luxury. The "Paris Message" was generally looked upon as the Republican answer to Cleveland, and as pointing to Blaine as the inevitable candidate for the ensuing campaign. On one point, most men of both parties were agreed--that the President had displayed great courage. "The presidential chair," declared James Russell Lowell, "has a MAN in it, and this means that every word he says is weighted with what he is."

The chairman of the Ways and Means Committee in the House of Representatives, Roger Q. Mills, promptly presented a bill which conformed to the principles for which the President had argued. The discussion of the Mills bill was long known as the "Great Tariff Debate of 1888." The House seethed with it for more than a month. Mills and Carlisle on one side and William McKinley and Thomas B. Reed on the other typified the new leadership and the new positions which the parties were taking. Senator Morrill's idea that the war tariff was a temporary one, President Arthur's advice that the tariff be revised, the recommendations of the Tariff Commission of 1882 that reductions were necessary,--all these were no longer heard. Instead, the Republicans upheld the protective system as the cause of the unexampled prosperity of the nation. It is not to be supposed that protectionist or reductionist converts were made by the endless discussion, but the initial prejudices of each side were undoubtedly deepened. Each telling blow on either side was applauded by the partisans of each particular speaker, so that "applause" fairly dots the dull pages of the Congressional Record. McKinley enlivened his colleagues by pulling from his desk and exhibiting a suit of clothes which he had purchased for $10.00, a figure, he asserted, which proved that the tariff did not raise prices beyond the reach of the laboring man. Mills tracked down the cost of the suit and the tariff on the materials composing it, and further entertained the House by an exhibit showing that it cost $4.98 to manufacture the suit and that the remainder of the price which the laborer paid was due to the tariff. In the end, the Mills bill passed the House with but four Democrats voting against it. Randall was so ill that he was unable to be present when the final vote was taken, but a letter from him declaring his opposition to the bill was greeted with great applause on the Republican side. Randall's day was past, however, and leadership was passing to new men.

Meanwhile the Republicans in the Senate, where they were in control, had prepared a tariff bill which was designed to give evidence of the sort of act which would be passed if they were successful in the campaign. Senator Allison and Senator Aldrich were influential in this connection. The passage of leadership in tariff matters to Senator Aldrich and men of his type was as significant as the transition in the House. Aldrich was from Rhode Island, an able man who had had experience in state affairs, had served in the federal House of Representatives and had been in the Senate since 1881. He had already laid the foundations of the great financial and industrial connections which gave him an intimate, personal interest in protection and which later made him an important figure in American industry and politics. Since neither party controlled both branches of Congress, it was impossible to pass either the Mills bill or the Senate measure; but the proposed legislation indicated what might be expected to result from the election. Each side had thoroughly committed itself on the tariff question.

In the meanwhile, great interest attached to the question of leaders for the campaign. Opposition to Cleveland was not lacking. His efforts in behalf of civil service reform had not endeared him to the office-seekers, and the hostility of the Democrats in the Senate was shown by their feeble support of him. The West did not relish his opposition to silver coinage, while his vetoes of pension legislation were productive of some hostility, even in his own party. Nor was the personality of the President such as to allay ill-feeling. Indeed, Cleveland was in a position comparable to that of Hayes eight years before. He was the titular party leader, but the most prominent Democratic politicians were not in agreement with his principles, and any step taken by him was likely to arouse as much hostility in some Democratic quarters as among the Republicans. Opposition to his nomination focused upon David B. Hill, Governor of New York, a man who was looked upon as better disposed towards the claims of party workers for office. Other leaders like Bayard, Thurman and Carlisle aroused little enthusiasm, and the gradual drift of sentiment toward Cleveland became unmistakable. If the politicians did not accept him with joy, they at least accepted him; for he was master of the party for the moment at least, and his hold on a large body of the rank and file was not to be doubted. When the Democratic convention met in St. Louis in June, 1888, his nomination was made without the formality of a ballot.[1]

The platform was devoted, for the most part, to the question of revenue reform, indorsing the President's tariff message and urging that the party be given control of Congress in order that Democratic principles might be put into effect. Resolutions were also adopted recommending the passage of the Mills bill, which was still under discussion when the convention met.

Among the Republicans the choice of a candidate was a far more difficult matter. The probable choice of the party was Blaine, but his letter from Italy, where he was travelling early in the convention year, forbade the use of his name and opened the contest to a great number of less well- known leaders. Publicly it was stated that Blaine refused for reasons which were "entirely personal," but intimate friends knew that he would accept a nomination if it came without solicitation and as the result of a unanimous party call. Although the demand for him still continued, there were smaller "booms" for various favorite sons, and as his ill health continued he made known his irrevocable decision to withdraw. Except for Blaine, the most prominent contender was Senator Sherman, whose candidacy reached larger proportions than ever before. The Ohio delegation was unitedly in his favor and considerable numbers of southern delegates were expected to vote for him. On the other hand, his lack of personal magnetism was against him and his career had been connected with technical matters which did not make a popular appeal. On the first ballot in the nominating convention his lead was considerable, although not decisive, but no fewer than thirteen other leaders also received votes. One of these was Senator Benjamin Harrison of Indiana whom Blaine had suggested as an available man and whom the New York delegation considered a strong candidate because he was poor, a reputable senator, a distinguished volunteer officer in the war and a grandson of William H. Harrison of Tippecanoe fame. Further voting only emphasized the lack of unanimity until the eighth ballot, when the delegates suddenly turned to Harrison and nominated him.

The platform was long and verbose. It devoted much attention to the protective tariff which, in imitation of Henry Clay, it entitled the "American system"; it advocated the reduction of internal revenue duties, if necessary to cut down the surplus; and it urged civil service reform, liberal pensions and laws to control oppressive corporations.

Two factions of the Labor party, as well as the Prohibitionists, nominated candidates and urged programs to which no attention was paid, but which were later taken up by both the great parties, such as arbitration in labor disputes, an income tax, the popular election of senators, woman suffrage and the prohibition of the manufacture of alcoholic beverages.

The campaign deserves attention because of the unusual elements that entered into it. A spectacular feature which, although not new, was developed on a large scale, was the formation of thousands of political clubs, which paraded evenings with flaming torches. In this type of organization the Republicans were more successful than the Democrats and thus steered many young men into the party at a time when they were looking forward to casting their first ballot. The most unwholesome feature was, as before, the methods used to finance the campaign. In this connection both parties were guilty, but the Republicans were able to tap a new source of supply. The campaign was in the hands of Matthew S. Quay, a Pennsylvania senator whose career as a public official left much to be desired. Quay's political methods were vividly described at a later time by his friend and admirer Thomas C. Platt, whose account lost none of its delightfulness in view of the fact that Platt obviously felt that he was complimenting his friend in telling the story. Believing in the "rights" of business men in politics, Platt declared, Quay was always able to raise any amount of money needed, although when funds were raised by business interests against him, he lifted the "fiery cross" and virtuously exposed his opponents before the people. Having calculated with skill the number of votes needed for victory, he found out where he could get them--"and then he got them."

That Quay was able to tap a new source of supply was due to a combination of circumstances. It will be remembered that the Pendleton civil service act of 1883 had forbidden the assessment of office-holders in political campaigns, and had made it necessary to procure funds elsewhere. In the campaign of 1888, business men who believed that the success of Cleveland would hurt their interests, and manufacturers who profited directly by the protective tariff rallied to the defence of Harrison and contributed heavily to his campaign fund.[2]

The use to which the funds thus contributed were put was revealed in a letter written apparently by W.W. Dudley, treasurer of the National Republican Committee, and sent to party leaders in Indiana. The latter were directed to find out who had the "Democratic boodle" and force them, presumably by competition, to pay big prices for their own men. The leaders were also instructed to "divide the floaters into blocks of five and put a trusted man with the necessary funds in charge of these five, and make him responsible that none get away, and that all vote our ticket."

On the other hand the most wholesome feature of the campaign was its educational aspect. Hundreds of societies, tons of "literature," thousands of stump speeches attacked and defended the tariff. Schoolboys glibly retailed the standard arguments on one side or the other. Attention was centered, as it had not been since the war, on an important issue.

At the close of the campaign the Republicans played a trick which was reminiscent of the Morey letter of Garfield's day. A letter purporting to be from a Charles F. Murchison, a naturalized American of English birth, was sent to the British minister in Washington, Lord Sackville-West. Murchison requested the minister's opinion as to whether President Cleveland's hostile policy in a recent controversy with Canada had been adopted for campaign purposes and whether after election the President would be more friendly toward England. Lord Sackville indiscreetly replied that he believed President Cleveland would show a conciliatory spirit toward Great Britain. The correspondence was held back until shortly before the election and was then published in the newspapers and on hand bills. Republicans triumphantly declared that Cleveland was the "British candidate." The President was at first inclined to overlook the incident but eventually gave way to pressure and dismissed the minister, whereupon the English government refused to fill the vacancy until there was a change of administration.

In the ensuing election the vote cast was unusually heavy; the protectionists felt that a supreme effort must be made to preserve the tariff system, and the Democrats, having experienced the joys of power, were determined not to loosen their grip on authority; the Prohibitionists increased their vote over that of 1884 by 100,000, while the Labor party cast 147,000, almost as many ballots as the Prohibitionists had numbered in the earlier year. Cleveland received somewhat over 100,000 more votes than Harrison, but his support was so placed that his electoral vote was sixty-five less than his opponent's.

From the standpoint of political history the result was unfortunate. The tariff question had been sadly in need of a definite answer, the people had been educated upon it and had given a decision, but the electoral system placed in power the party pledged to the theories of the minority. Aside from the unusual effect of our machinery of election, many small elements entered into the Republican victory. Some of the Independents had become disaffected since 1884 and had returned to the Republican fold. Disgruntled office-seekers opposed a President who did not reward his workers. In New York, which was the decisive factor, Hill was a candidate for re-election as governor and was elected by a small majority, while Cleveland lost the state by 7,000 votes. This gave color to charges that the enemies of the President had made a bargain with the Republicans by which the latter voted for Hill as governor and the Democrats for Harrison as President.

Benjamin Harrison, veteran of the Civil War in which he had attained the rank of brevet brigadier-general, and senator from Indiana for a single term, was hardly a party leader when he was nominated for the presidency. Although he was by no means unknown, he had been sufficiently obscure to be unconnected with factional party quarrels, and his career and character were without blemish. At the time of his accession to the executive chair he was fifty-six years of age, a short man with bearded face, and with head set well down between his shoulders. Accounts of his characteristics, drawn by his party associates, did not differ in any essential detail. As a public speaker, the new President was a man of unusual charm--felicitous in his remarks, versatile, tactful. In a famous trip through the South and West in 1891, he made speech after speech at a wide variety of places and occasions, and created a genuine enthusiasm. His remarks were widely read and highly regarded. Nevertheless there seems to have been some truth in the remark of one of his contemporaries that he could charm ten thousand men in a public speech but meet them individually and send every one away his enemy. His manner, even to senators and representatives of his own party, was reserved to the point of frigidity. When he granted requests for patronage he was so ungracious as to anger the recipients of favor. Although his personal character and integrity were as unquestioned as those of Hayes, and although he was a man of cultured tastes, well- informed, thoughtful and conscientious, it must be admitted that he lacked robust leadership and breadth of vision, and that he did not understand the real purposes of the policies which his party associates were embarking upon, or if he did that he tamely acquiesced in them. The party leaders were soon engaged in initiating practices and passing legislation which would strengthen the organization with certain groups of interested persons. Harrison, conscientious but aloof, provided no compelling force to turn attention toward wider and deeper needs.

Two appointments to the cabinet were important. Since Blaine was the foremost leader of the party and had done much to bring about the election of Harrison, it was well-nigh impossible for the latter to fail to offer him the position of Secretary of State. The appointment was so natural that popular opinion looked upon it as the only possibility, yet the natures of the two men were so diverse and their positions in the party so different that friction seemed likely to result. Even before the administration began it was freely predicted that Blaine would "dominate" the cabinet, a prophecy that might well create a feeling of restraint between the two. The invitation to John Wanamaker to become Postmaster- General was regarded as significant. Wanamaker was a wealthy merchant of Philadelphia, who had organized an advisory campaign committee of business men which contributed and expended large sums of money during the canvass. Critical reformers like the editor of The Nation were not slow to connect Wanamaker's large contribution to the campaign fund with his elevation to the cabinet, and to suggest that the business interests were being brought into close relations with the administration. T.C. Platt, expectant of a return for his campaign assistance, in the form of a cabinet position, and in fact understanding that a pledge had been made that he would be appointed, found himself superseded by William Windom of Minnesota in the Treasury and became a bitter opponent of the President.[3]

It was an odd turn of the fortune of politics that brought Benjamin Harrison face to face with the responsibility for furthering the cause of civil service reform--the same Harrison who, as a senator, had sneered at Cleveland for surrendering to difficulties. The party platform had urged the continuation of reform, which had been "auspiciously begun under the Republican administration" and had declared that the party promises would not be broken as Democratic pledges had been; and Harrison had announced his adherence to the party statement. In some respects real progress was made. Secretary of the Navy Tracy introduced reform methods in his department. The appointment of Theodore Roosevelt to the Civil Service Commission was productive of good results. The work of reform was defended forcefully and successfully; its opponents were challenged to substantiate their charges. When Senator Gorman declared that in an examination for letter carriers in Baltimore the candidates were asked to tell the most direct route from Baltimore to China, Roosevelt at once wrote asking him to state the time and place of the examination himself or to send somebody to look over the papers, copies of which were in the commission's office. The senator did not reply.

The removal of office holders, however, proceeded with amazing rapidity. The First Assistant Postmaster-General was J.S. Clarkson, who had been vice-chairman of the Republican National Campaign Committee. The speed with which he cleared the service of Democrats earned him the title "headsman" and is indicated by the estimate that he removed one every three minutes for the first year. When the force of clerks was increased for the taking of the census of 1890, the superintendent of the census office found himself "waist deep in congressmen" trying to get places for friends. The Republican postmaster of New York who had been continued by Cleveland was not re-appointed. It was soon discovered, also, that the President was placing his own and his wife's relatives in office and giving positions to large numbers of newspaper editors, thus indirectly subsidizing the press. The Commissioner of Pensions, Corporal James Tanner, distributed pensions so freely as to arouse wide-spread comment and was soon relieved of his position.[4]

Curtis, addressing the National Civil Service Reform League, flayed the President because he had despoiled the service. A Republican newspaper, he declared, had said that the administration whistled reform down the wind "as remorselessly as it would dismiss an objectionable tramp." Prominent members of the party went to the President in person to urge on him the redemption of the platform promises.

Although progress was not general, nevertheless there were particular reforms that commended themselves. The offensive Clarkson gave way to hostile criticism and retired. During the last half of the administration, the civil service rules were amended so as to add a considerable number of employees to the classified service, especially in the post office department. Quay and Dudley found their methods condemned by public opinion and resigned their positions on the National Republican Committee.[5]

Aside from his choice of subordinates, Harrison contributed little to the political history of his administration, for the leadership was seized by a small coterie of extreme Republicans in the House of Representatives, of whom the chief figure was the Speaker, Thomas B. Reed. The House which had been elected with Harrison contained 159 Democrats and 166 Republicans. The Republican majority was too slight for safety, for the questions which were coming before Congress were such as to arouse party feeling to a high pitch. The Republicans felt themselves commissioned, by a successful election, to put the party program into force, but so powerful a minority could readily block any legislation under the existing parliamentary rules. Only Reed knew what expedient would be resorted to in the attempt to put through the party program, and not even he could guarantee that the adventure would be successful.

Thomas B. Reed had long represented Maine in the House of Representatives. He was a man of huge bulk, bland in appearance, imperturbable in his serenity, caustic, concise and witty of tongue, rough, sharp, strong, droll. In the cut-and-thrust of parliamentary debate and manoeuvre, as well as in his knowledge of the intricacies of procedure, Reed was a past master. He worsted his adversaries by turning the laugh on them, and his stinging retorts, which swept the House "like grapeshot," made him a powerful factor in partisan contests.[6]

The political and economic philosophy of Reed and his associates was unusually important, because it controlled their action during the time when they dominated the House and determined the character of the legislation passed during Harrison's time. When President Cleveland's tariff message welded the Democrats together to demand reduction, it likewise influenced the Republicans to adopt the other extreme. That is not to say, of course, that the Republican attitude was due solely to Cleveland, for the party was already committed to protectionism. Nevertheless, many of its prominent leaders, including its presidents, had urged revision. That recommendation was now no longer heard. Such men as McKinley in the House fairly apotheosized the protective system. The philosophy of the party leaders received full exposition in a volume edited by John D. Long, ex-governor of Massachusetts, and composed of articles written by sixteen of the most prominent Republicans. It had been published during the campaign. The attitude of the party toward its chief tenet was expressed in the phrase, "The Republican party enacted a protective tariff which made the United States the greatest manufacturing nation on earth"; and its conception of the Democratic party in the statement that the Democrats were mainly old slave-holders, liquor dealers and criminals in the great northern cities. In the field of national expenditure, also, the party reacted from Cleveland's frugality. Senator Dolph frankly urged the expenditure of the surplus revenue rather than the reduction of taxation. McKinley took the position that prices might be too low. "I do not prize the word cheap," he said; "cheap merchandise means cheap men and cheap men mean a cheap country." Harrison remarked that it was "no time to be weighing the claims of old soldiers with apothecary's scales." This philosophy was now to have its trial, but first the obstructive power of the minority must be curbed. Reed's plan for accomplishing this result appeared late in January, 1890.

A contested election case was up for decision in the House. The roll was called and three less than a quorum of representatives answered. Scores of Democrats were present, but by merely refusing to answer to their names they could be officially absent. Unless the Republicans could provide a quorum--that is, more than half the total membership of the chamber of their own number, they were helpless. Clearly they could not muster their full force at all times and especially on questions upon which the party might be divided. On the other hand, the right to refuse to vote was a long-standing one and had been used over and over again by Republicans as well as Democrats. Reed, however, had made up his mind to cut the Gordian knot. Looking over the House he called the names of about forty Democrats, directed the clerk to make note of them and then declared a quorum present. The meaning of the act was not lost on the opposition. Pandemonium broke loose. Members rushed up the aisle as if to attack the Speaker, but Reed, huge, fearless and undisturbed, stood his ground. The Democrats hissed and jeered and denounced him with a wrath which was not mollified by the derisive laughter of the Republicans, who were surprised by the ruling, but rallied to their leader. Two days later, when a member moved to adjourn, the Speaker ruled the motion out of order and refused to entertain any appeal from his decision. He then firmly but quietly stated his belief that the will of the majority ought not to be nullified by a minority and that if parliamentary rules were used solely for purposes of delay, it was the duty of the Speaker to take "the proper course."

The rules committee then presented a series of recommendations designed to expedite business. One of the proposed changes provided that the chair should entertain no dilatory motions. Such motions, whose purpose was merely to obstruct action, had long been common. The Republicans were said to have alternated motions to adjourn and to fix a day for adjournment no less than one hundred and twenty-eight times in an attempt to defeat the Kansas-Nebraska bill in 1854. The second rule allowed the speaker to count members who were present and not voting in determining whether a quorum was present. Other rules systematized procedure and facilitated the passage of legislation. The Democrats raged, denounced Reed as a "Czar," fought against the adoption of the rules--all to no avail. The majority had its way; the Speaker dominated legislation.[7]

The efficacy of the Reed reforms in expediting legislation was quickly demonstrated. One of the earliest proposals to pass the House was Henry Cabot Lodge's federal election law, which was intended to insure federal control at polling places. Theoretically the measure was applicable to the North as well as to the South, but no doubt existed that it was really designed to prevent southern suppression of the negro vote. The Democrats rallied to the opposition and denounced Lodge's plan as a "force act." Despite objections it passed the House, but it languished in the Senate and finally was abandoned. The generous expenditure policy which the new philosophy called for brought forth certain increases which were noteworthy. The dependent pension bill which Cleveland had vetoed was passed, and a direct tax which had been levied on the states during the Civil War was refunded. Another extreme party measure was the Sherman silver act which became law on July 14, 1890. By it, 4,500,000 ounces of silver were to be purchased each month. Its partisan character was indicated by the fact that no Republicans voted against it, and no Democrats for it. Since the amount of silver to be purchased was practically the total output of the country, it was evident that the western mine owners were receiving the same attention that was being accorded manufacturers who sought protective tariff laws. Indeed, western Republicans, who were opposed to the high tariff which eastern Republicans favored, were brought to support such legislation only by a bargain through which each side assisted the other in getting what it desired.[8]

The tariff measure which was thus entwined with the silver bill was intended to carry out the pledge made in the party platform. Harrison had early called the attention of Congress to the need of a reduction of the surplus, had urged the passage of a new tariff law and the removal of the tobacco tax which, he declared, would take a burden from an "important agricultural product." The framing of the bill was in the hands of William McKinley, the chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means. McKinley was a thorough-going protectionist whose attitude on the question had already been expressed somewhat as follows: previous Democratic tariffs have brought the country to the brink of financial ruin; without the protective tariff English manufacturers would monopolize American markets; under the protective system the foreign manufacturer largely pays the tax through lessened profits; under protection the American laborer is the best paid, clothed and contented workingman in the world; since it is necessary, then, to preserve protection, the surplus should be reduced by the elimination of the internal revenues; and protective tariff duties should be raised and retained, not gradually lowered and done away with.

The Committee early proceeded to hold public hearings at which testimony was taken, and to which manufacturers came from all over the country to make known what duties they thought they ought to have. The bill which was finally presented to the House proposed a level of duties which was so high that it has generally been considered the extreme of protection. McKinley himself justified the high rates only on the ground that without them the bill could not be passed. With the help of the Reed rules and the western Republicans the McKinley tariff reached the President and was signed by him on October 1, 1890. It went into effect at once.

The more prominent features of the measure sprang from the tariff creed which had been advocated through the campaign. In order to conciliate the farmers, the protective principle was applied to agricultural products, and tariffs were laid on such articles as cereals, potatoes and flax. On the cheaper grades of wool and woolens and on carpet wools there was a slight rise over even the rates of 1883. On the higher grades of woolen, linen and clothing the increase was marked. The duty on raw sugar was removed and one-half cent per pound retained on the refined product, but domestic sugar producers were given a bounty of two cents a pound in order to protect them against the free importation of the raw material. As the sugar duty had been productive of large amounts of revenue, its remission reduced the surplus by about sixty to seventy millions of dollars. In order to encourage the manufacture of tin-plates, a considerable duty was imposed, which was to cease after 1897 unless domestic production reached specified amounts. As the result of Blaine's urgency, a reciprocity feature was introduced. The usual plan had been to reduce duties on certain products in case concessions to American goods were given by the exporting countries, but in the McKinley act the Senate inserted a novel provision. Instead of being given power to lower duties in case reciprocal reductions were made, the President was authorized to impose duties on certain articles on the free list when the exporting nation levied "unjust or unreasonable" customs charges on American products. It was expected that this plan would be applied to Latin-American countries and would increase our exports to them in return for sugar, molasses, tea, coffee and hides. In general, the McKinley act was the climax of protection. Under the impetus of President Cleveland's reduction challenge, the Republican party had recoiled to the extreme.

The high rates levied by the new tariff act were quickly reflected in retail prices and caused immediate and wide-spread discontent. The benefits which the farmer had been led to expect did not put in their appearance. Unhappily for McKinley and his associates the congressional elections occurred early in November, scarcely a month after the new law went into effect, and when the dissatisfaction was at its height. The result was a stinging defeat for the Republicans. The 159 Democrats were increased to 235, and the 166 Republicans dwindled to 88. Even in New England the Democrats gained eleven members, in New York eight, and in Iowa five. In Wisconsin not one Republican survived, and among the lost in Ohio was McKinley himself.

Although the Republicans retained control of the Senate after 1890, the Democratic House brought an end for a time to the domination of Reed and the primacy of the lower chamber in the government. Such extreme legislation as had characterized the first half of the Harrison regime stopped abruptly. The role played in all this by Harrison himself seems to have been a minor one. Many of his recommendations lacked the solid character of those made by Hayes, Arthur and Cleveland, and he did not make his influence felt in connection with the silver legislation, of which he probably disapproved. It is significant that the one piece of legislation which had the most enduring results was not a partisan act. This act, the Sherman Anti-Trust law, demands attention in detail.

In addition to the general and special works already mentioned, C. Hedges, Benjamin Harrison: Speeches (1892), provides useful material; Cleveland's tariff message of Dec. 6, 1887 is in J.D. Richardson, Messages and Papers of the Presidents, VIII, 580-591.

On the administration, and particularly the ascendancy of the House of Representatives under Reed, consult: De A.S. Alexander, History and Procedure of the House of Representatives (1916); Mary P. Follett, Speaker of the House of Representatives (1896); C.S. Olcott, William McKinley (2 vols., 1916); J.G. Cannon in Harper's Magazine (Mar., 1920); Annual Cyclopaedia, 1890, pp. 181-191; S.W. McCall, Thomas B. Reed (1914), well written, although adding little to what was already known; H.D. Croly, Marcus A. Hanna (1912); W.D. Foulke, Fighting the Spoilsman (1919), on Harrison and the civil service; G.W. Curtis, Orations and Addresses (2 vols., 1894), summarizes the administration's attitude toward civil service; T.B. Reed, Reed's Rules, A Manual of General Parliamentary Law (1894), gives a concise summary of parliamentary conditions from Reed's standpoint; H.B. Fuller, The Speakers of the House (1909), excellent on the personal side. The tariff is well treated in Stanwood, Taussig and Tarbell. On pensions consult W.H. Glasson, History of Military Pension Legislation in the United States (1900), or better, the same author's Federal Military Pensions in the United States (1918).

[1] The vice-presidential candidate was Allan G. Thurman of Ohio, affectionately known as the "noble old Roman," one of whose titles to fame was the ownership of a large red bandanna handkerchief which he nourished on all occasions.

[2] A party worker who realized the opportunity which this fact presented complained that Pennsylvania manufacturers who made fortunes under protection did not contribute to the Republican campaign fund, and remarked: "If I had my way about it I would put the manufacturers of Pennsylvania under the fire and fry all the fat out of them."

[3] The r