United States presidential election, 1868
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| United States presidential election, 1868 |
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| 3 November 1868 | ||||
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| Nominee | Ulysses S. Grant | Horatio Seymour | ||
| Party | Republican | Democratic | ||
| Home state | Illinois | New York | ||
| Running mate | Schuyler Colfax | Francis Preston Blair, Jr. | ||
| Electoral vote | 214 | 80 | ||
| States carried | 26 | 8 | ||
| Popular vote | 3,013,650 | 2,708,744 | ||
| Percentage | 52.7% | 47.3% | ||
 Presidential election results map. red denotes states won by Grant/Colfax, Blue denotes those won by Seymour/Blair, Green denotes those states still under Union martial rule. Numbers indicate the number of electoral votes allotted to each state. |
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The United States presidential election of 1868 was the first presidential election to take place during Reconstruction. Three of the former Confederate states (Texas, Mississippi, and Virginia) were not yet readmitted to the Union and therefore could not vote in the election. The incumbent President, Andrew Johnson, had alienated so many people that his effort to win the Democratic nomination failed: Johnson had failed to help readmit Texas, Mississippi, and Virginia back into the US as individual states. Instead the Democrats nominated Horatio Seymour to take on the Republican candidate, Civil War hero General Ulysses S. Grant. With Freedmen voting in all of the South, and with massive popularity in the North as the man who won the Civil War, Grant won an impressive victory.
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[edit] Background
Reconstruction was a hotly debated issue north and south. Seymour ran what historian David Blight has called "arguably the most openly white supremacist election campaign in American history," with the slogan "This Is a White Man's Country, Let White Men Rule."
[edit] Nominations
[edit] Republican Party nomination
Republican candidates
- John A.J. Creswell, former U.S. senator from Maryland
- Ulysses S. Grant, Commanding General of the U.S. Army from Illinois
General Ulysses S. Grant announced he was a Republican and was unanimously nominated as the party's standard bearer. Speaker Schuyler Colfax was chosen for Vice President.
Other candidates for the vice-presidential nomination included
- John A.J. Creswell, former U.S. senator from Maryland
- Andrew G. Curtin, former Governor of Pennsylvania
- Reuben E. Fenton, Governor of New York
- Hannibal Hamlin, former Vice President from Maine
- James Harlan, U.S. senator from Iowa
- William D. Kelley, U.S. representative from Pennsylvania
- Samuel C. Pomeroy, U.S. senator from Kansas
- James Speed, former Attorney General from Kentucky
- Benjamin F. Wade, U.S. senator from Ohio
- Henry Wilson, U.S. senator from Massachusetts
| Vice Presidential Ballot | ||
| Ballot | 1st | 2nd |
|---|---|---|
| Andrew Johnson | 200 | 492 |
| Hannibal Hamlin | 145 | 9 |
| Daniel Dickinson | 113 | 17 |
| Benjamin Butler | 28 | 0 |
| Lovell Rousseau | 21 | 0 |
| Schuyler Colfax | 6 | 0 |
| Joseph Holt | 2 | 0 |
| Ambrose Burnside | 2 | 0 |
| David Tod | 1 | 0 |
| John M. King | 1 | 0 |
[edit] Democratic Party nomination
Democratic candidates
- Salmon P. Chase, Chief Justice of the United States from Ohio
- Sanford E. Church, former Lieutenant Governor of New York of New York
- James R. Doolittle, U.S. senator from Wisconsin
- James E. English, U.S. governor of Connecticut
- Winfield S. Hancock, U.S. Army major general from Pennsylvania
- Thomas A. Hendricks, U.S. senator from Indiana
- Andrew Johnson, President of the United States from Tennessee
- Asa Packer, former U.S. representative from Pennsylvania
- Joel Parker, former U.S. governor of New Jersey
- George H. Pendleton, former U.S. representative and 1864 vice-presidential nominee from Ohio
- Horatio Seymour, former Governor of New York and candidate for the 1860 and 1864 nominations
President Andrew Johnson had some initial support, but his refusal to ask the Democrats to nominate him eventually made Democrats vote for alternatives on future ballots. Johnson was powerless on Reconstruction issues and had never used his patronage to build a base of supporters. Two-time New York Governor Horatio Seymour emerged as the Presidential nominee for the Democrats, garnering 317 delegate votes to defeat 1864 Vice Presidential nominee George H. Pendleton (157 delegates), future Vice President Thomas Andrews Hendricks (146) and eventual 1880 Democratic presidential nominee Winfield Scott Hancock. Francis Preston Blair, Jr. was nominated for Vice President.
[edit] General election
[edit] Results
Grant swept the Electoral College winning the popular and electoral votes of every region. (31 states participated, with the addition of Nebraska. However the "unreconstructed" status of Texas, Mississippi and Virginia were not allowed to participate.)
The Republicans took steps to protect the Union victory in the war by passing the Fifteenth Amendment, enshrining Black suffrage in the Constitution.
| Presidential Candidate | Party | Home State | Popular Vote(a) | Electoral Vote(a) |
Running Mate | Running Mate's Home State |
RM's Electoral Vote(a) |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Count | Pct | |||||||
| Ulysses Simpson Grant | Republican | Illinois | 3,013,650 | 52.7% | 214 | Schuyler Colfax | Indiana | 214 |
| Horatio Seymour | Democratic | New York | 2,708,744 | 47.3% | 80 | Francis Preston Blair, Jr. | Missouri | 80 |
| Other | 46 | 0.0% | – | Other | – | |||
| Total | 5,722,440 | 100 % | 294 | 294 | ||||
| Needed to win | 148 | 148 | ||||||
Source (Popular Vote): Leip, David. 1868 Presidential Election Results. Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections (July 27, 2005). Source (Electoral Vote): Electoral College Box Scores 1789–1996. Official website of the National Archives. (July 31, 2005).
(a) Mississippi, Texas, and Virginia did not participate in the election of 1868 due to Reconstruction. In Florida, the state legislature cast its electoral vote.
[edit] References
- Gambill, Edward. Conservative Ordeal: Northern Democrats and Reconstruction, 1865-1868. (Iowa State University Press: 1981).
- Edward McPherson. The Political History of the United States of America During the Period of Reconstruction (1875) large collection of speeches and primary documents, 1865-1870, complete text online.[The copyright has expired.]
- Rhodes, James G. History of the United States from the Compromise of 1850 to the McKinley-Bryan Campaign of 1896. Volume: 6. (1920). 1865-72; detailed narrative history
- Simpson, Brooks D. Let Us Have Peace: Ulysses S. Grant and the Politics of War and Reconstruction, 1861-1868 (1991).
- Summers, Mark Wahlgren.The Press Gang: Newspapers and Politics, 1865-1878 (1994)
[edit] See also
- American election campaigns in the 19th century
- History of the United States (1865–1918)
- History of the United States Democratic Party
- History of the United States Republican Party
- Reconstruction
- Third Party System
- United States House elections, 1868
[edit] External links
- 1868 popular vote by counties
- 1868 State-by-state Popular vote
- How close was the 1868 election? - Michael Sheppard, Michigan State University
[edit] Navigation
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