date, with Francis P. Blair, Jr., of Missouri for Vice-President. The platform of the Republican party was dictated by the exigencies of the reconstruction difficulties and declared its unwavering resolution to secure suffrage for the liberated slave, and to carry out the principles already begun by the former administration as to restoration. The platform also denounced all forms of repudiation as a national crime, and declared that the national honor required the payment of the public debt in the utmost good faith to all creditors at home and abroad, not only according to the letter, but the spirit of the laws under which it was contracted.

General Grant was elected by a greater majority than Lincoln had received at his last election. In the electoral college, Grant had 214 votes and Seymour 80. The popular vote stood: Grant, 3,015,071; Seymour, 2,709,613.

In Grant's first administration the Fifteenth amendment to the Constitution was adopted, giving the right of suffrage to all citizens without distinction of "race, color or previous condition of servitude;" the notorious Ku Klux bands in the South were suppressed; the work of reconstruction practically completed by the readmission of the Southern States that had seceded; the Alabama claims of the United States against Great Britain, arising out of the depredations of the Anglo-rebel privateers, were settled; the Federal election law, or "Force Bill" as the Democrats called it, was passed; the amnesty bill adopted, reviewing the political disabilities of those who had been in rebellion; and the first civil service law was passed; and in 1872 President Grant was renominated by acclamation by the Republican National Convention which met in Philadelphia. Henry Wilson was nominated for VicePresident. The platform recited the glorious achievements of the party in its eleven years of administration, and insisted on no abatement in the Republican party's vigorous reconstruction policy. Those Republicans who deserted the party and formed the Liberal Republican organization nominated Horace Greeley for President and B. Gratz Brown for Vice-President, and the Democrats endorsed this ticket. Grant's popular vote was 3,597,070, and Greeley's 2,834,079. Greeley died of a broken heart within the month after the election, and the Democratic electors cast their votes for Thomas A. Hendricks and B. Gratz Brown, with scattering votes for other candidates, but President Grant had

the largest electoral vote ever given a presidential candidate up to that time, his vote being 286.

The Republican party did not leave its scandals to be unearthed and investigated by its opponents, but took vigorous hold upon them itself, and investigated the Credit Mobilier scandal, the Whisky Ring and the other scandals growing out of this and former administrations, and purified its own ranks.

In 1876 there was a spirited contest for the Republican nomination for President, with Blaine, Conkling, Bristow, Morton and Hayes as the leading candidates. The convention met in Cincinnati June 14, and on the seventh ballot Rutherford B. Hayes, then Governor of Ohio, was nominated. William A. Wheeler of New York was nominated for VicePresident. The platform confirmed the party belief in the transcendent power of the Constitution over the States, declaring that "the United States is a nation, not a league." It also advocated a tariff sufficient to meet the future expenses of the general government, and claimed the right of Congress to suppress polygamy in the Territories. On this platform General Hayes was elected President. He carried all the Northern States except Connecticut, New York, New Jersey and Indiana. The Democrats carried all the Southern States except South Carolina, Florida and Louisiana. These States were also claimed by the Democrats, and the result was reached through the Electoral Commission, created by Congress. The electoral vote as decided by the commission was as follows: Hayes, 185; Tilden, 184. The popular majority was against the Republicans. There was a Democratic House, and that branch of Congress sought to coerce the Senate and the President to repeal the Federal election laws by refusing to pass appropriation bills without this repeal as a rider. The Republicans stood firm and succeeded in an extra session of Congress in passing the necessary appropriation bills without riders. The resumption of specie payment was made under the Hayes administration, and on December 17, 1879, gold sold at par in New York. It was first sold at a premium January 13, 1862, and it reached its highest rate, $2.85, on July 11, 1864.

The campaign of 1880 for the Republican nomination was the greatest political battle ever fought in this country. The contest between the followers of General Grant and those who were opposed to a third term was bitter and stubborn. After thirty-five ballots in the convention the followers of Blaine and Sherman united on General Garfield, and he was

nominated on the thirty-sixth ballot. Chester A. Arthur was nominated for Vice-President. The platform advocated a tariff favorable to American artisans; discriminated between national and State power in favor of the former; advocated public improvements and opposed polygamy and Chinese immigration. General Garfield was elected, receiving 214 votes in the electoral college to 155 for General Hancock. The popular vote stood: Garfield, 4,454,416; Hancock, 4,444,952. President Garfield was shot by Charles J. Guiteau on July 2, 1881, and died September 19. Chester A. Arthur succeeded him as President, and conducted the administration safely through the term. The Edmunds anti-polygamy bill was passed, and signed by President Arthur, March 23, 1882. The antiChinese bill became a law in the same year; the civil service law was amended; and the policy of chaining closer together all the American Republics was begun. President Arthur began his administration facing greater embarrassments than any President of the United States, and overcame them in a way to surprise his friends and political opponents.

James G. Blaine and John A. Logan were the Republican candidates for President and Vice-President in 1884. The platform demanded the imposition of such duties on foreign imports to afford security to our diversified industries and protection to the rights and wages of the laborer, to correct irregularities of the tariff and to reduce the surplus; urged the effort be made to unite all commercial nations in the establishment of an international standard which shall fix for all the relative value of gold and silver coinage; and demanded the restoration of the money to its old-time strength and efficiency. Blaine was defeated and Grover Cleveland became President.

In 1888 Benjamin Harrison was nominated for President and Levi P. Morton of New York for Vice-President, by the Republican convention which met in Chicago. The platform reaffirmed the American doctrine of protection. It demanded the freedom of the ballot, and declared its opposition to trusts. This was the first political platform to denounce trusts and other combinations of capital to control arbitrarily the conditions of trade.

The Republican ticket was elected, Harrison receiving 233 electoral votes and Cleveland 168. There was a Republican Senate and House and the administration of President Harrison was noted for the passage of the McKinley tariff law, the Sherman anti-trust law, the firm foreign

policy maintained, and also for the firmness of Speaker Reed in ruling the House of Representatives so as to allow a majority to do business rather than have the House controlled by the minority.

The Harrison administration was accompanied by great prosperity in every department of trade and industry, and was called the golden era of prosperity. President Harrison was defeated for re-election in 1892, and the Democrats repealed the McKinley law, substituting for it the Wilson tariff law. They also repealed the Federal election law. The Cleveland administration was attended with commercial disaster throughout the country, and the Republicans again turned to William McKinley, the author of the McKinley tariff law, as the "advance agent of prosperity." He was nominated at St. Louis in 1896, and the platform condemned the tariff act passed by the 53d Congress and favored protection. It opposed the free coinage of silver and favored the "existing gold standard." President McKinley was elected by the largest popular vote ever given to a candidate. His administration has redeemed all Republican pledges made in his platform. He called an extra session of Congress within ten days after his inauguration and within three months the Dingley bill had been enacted and signed. Cuba was freed from the cruel domination of Spain. A foreign war was fought for humanity and new glories added the army and navy; and the Philippines and Porto Rico were ceded to the United States. The gold standard was fixed by law.

The Republican party has in forty years made this a nation and not a confederation of States, and at the beginning of the twentieth century it is to demonstrate anew that this government possesses national power and that Congress has the power to legislate for all American territory.

CHAPTER II.

PRESIDENT WILLIAM MCKINLEY-CAREER OF AN ILLUSTRIOUS SOLDIER AND STATESMAN-THE WAR PRESIDENT

William McKinley brought to the Presidency not only tried ability and ripe experience as a statesman, but the tact to manage men and bring his party into perfect harmony on all issues it had to meet, and also the party of the opposition on the great war issues which had to be settled by his administration. When it is remembered that in the past there has never been a war without "a peace party," the success of President McKinley in bringing to his support the unanimous vote of Congress and the enthusiastic approval of all sections of the country, the tact of the man is made conspicuous. And this is no insignificant quality in an executive of the nation. There have been Presidents whose ability was universally acknowledged, whose courage was beyond question, whose experience was great, but whose want of the tact to manage men and draw about them the enthusiastic support of those who represented the co-ordinate branches of the government has hampered their efforts to wisely govern and secure the best results for their administrations.

President McKinley's success in bringing all branches of the govern ment and all parties to his support on critical issues has been unprecedented. He has united the co-ordinate branches of the government in a harmonious purpose as never did any of his predecessors. He has deferred to Congress and Congress has come to his support until it has become an axiom that the great popular branch of the government has looked to the President as the leader in all national and international policies. It might be said that Congress has during this administration been the Cabinet of the President, so little has been the friction between these two co-ordinate branches of the government.

William McKinley came to the office of President as a man of the people, with a larger personal following than any man who had been elected to the office since Washington. Few public men ever enjoyed the confidence and enthusiastic admiration of the American people as did he, and they failed in their ambition. He has through all the trying period of war and the controversies over the fruits of the war, retained this