Rutherford B. Hayes (1822 - 1893) was an American lawyer, Union Army general and politician who served as the nineteenth president of the United States from 1877 to 1881. [1] He reached the White House through the most disputed election in American history, resolved only by a special electoral commission, and his presidency coincided with the withdrawal of federal troops from the South and the collapse of Reconstruction. [2] He pursued civil service reform and declined to seek a second term.
Early life and education
Rutherford Birchard Hayes was born on 4 October 1822 in Delaware, Ohio, some weeks after his father's death, and was raised by his mother with the support of an uncle. [1] He graduated at the top of his class from Kenyon College and then studied at Harvard Law School, completing his legal training in 1845.
He established a law practice in Cincinnati, where he defended fugitive slaves in several cases and became associated with the emerging Republican Party. He served as the city solicitor before the Civil War. [3]
Civil War and political rise
Hayes joined the Union Army in 1861 and served throughout the war, rising to the rank of major general. He was wounded on several occasions, most seriously at the Battle of South Mountain in 1862, and his war record became central to his later political appeal. [1]
Elected to the United States House of Representatives in 1864 while still in uniform, he declined to campaign and took his seat after the war. He subsequently served three terms as governor of Ohio, where he supported ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment and backed the establishment of what became Ohio State University. [3]
The election of 1876
Nominated for president in 1876, Hayes faced the Democrat Samuel J. Tilden in a contest whose result was left unsettled by disputed returns from Florida, Louisiana, South Carolina and Oregon. [2] Tilden held a lead in the popular vote, and neither candidate had an undisputed electoral majority.
Congress created a fifteen-member Electoral Commission to adjudicate the disputed ballots; it awarded every one to Hayes, giving him victory by 185 electoral votes to 184. The outcome was accepted in an informal settlement, often called the Compromise of 1877, under which Republican leaders agreed to end federal military support for the remaining Reconstruction governments in the South. [2]
Presidency
Shortly after taking office Hayes ordered the withdrawal of federal troops from the statehouses of South Carolina and Louisiana, ending Reconstruction and leaving the newly enfranchised Black population of the South without federal protection against the restoration of white supremacist rule. [1]
His administration promoted civil service reform, challenging the patronage system and issuing an order restricting political activity by federal officeholders, a stance that brought him into conflict with party leaders including Senator Roscoe Conkling. [4] He used federal troops to suppress the Great Railroad Strike of 1877, vetoed legislation restricting Chinese immigration, and supported a return to the gold standard through the resumption of specie payments.
Later life and legacy
Hayes had pledged to serve only one term and left office in 1881. He retired to Spiegel Grove, his estate at Fremont, Ohio, and devoted his remaining years to causes including public education, prison reform and educational opportunity for Black Americans in the South. [3] He died at Fremont on 17 January 1893.
Historians generally rank his presidency in the middle of the field, crediting his personal integrity and reform efforts while noting that the settlement that installed him in office marked the abandonment of federal enforcement of Black civil rights for nearly a century. [4]
