Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 04.djvu/259

 GARFIELD

GARFIELD

amendment abolishing slavery. He was re- elected to the 39th congress and at his own reijuest was transferred from the military to the ways and means committee that he might take part in the financial ijuestions in favor of the resumption of specie payment. He was returned to the 40th— 10th congresses; was made chairman of the committee on military affairs in the 40th; was selected as head of the newly created com- mittee on banking and currency in the 41st congress; was chairman of a committee on appro- priations in the 43d and 43d congresses; and in the Democratic houses of the 44th, 45th and 46th congresses he was given a place on the ways and means committee. He opposed the electoral commission of 1877, but accepted one of the two seats allotted to Reijublican representatives and discussed before the commission the Florida and Louisiana returns, the latter of which he had made a special personal study, having watched the counting of the Louisiana vote in New Orleans, where he went at the request of Presi- dent Grant in compan}- with other Republican leaders. When Mr. Blaine took his seat in the U.S. senate in 1877, Garfield became the Repub- lican leaJer of the house and the minority can- didate for speaker. On Jan. 13, 1880, he was elected U.S. senator from Ohio to succeed Allan G. Thurman, and in June, 1880, at the Republican national convention at Chicago, he was nomi- nated as the candidate of the party for President of the United States after a long and exciting contest in which John Sherman, James G. Blaine and General Grant were prominent candidates. His nomination came with the 30tli ballot, June 8, 1880. He took the stump in his own behalf and spoke in Ohio, New York and other states, his public appearance adding largely to his pop- ularity. His political enemies lirougbt against him the cliarges of venality as affecting his con- nection with the Credit Mobilier, as testified by Representative Oakes Ames, and with the De Golyer contract in the District of Cohunbia paving patents, both of which had been before the house of representatives and apparently thoroughly discus.sed and disposed of, with a verdict of possible indiscretion on the part of Representative Garfield in his not having been careful enough in avoiding the appearance of evil. He was elected, Nov. 2. 1880, by carrying every northern state except New Jersey. Nevada and California, the electoral vote standing 214 for Garfield and Arthur and loo for Hancock and English, and the popular vote standing: 4,4-!9.0.53 for James A. Garfield. Republican; 4.442.035 for Winfield S Hancock, Democrat: 307,000 for James B. Weaver, Greenback; 10,305 for Neal Dow, Prohibition; and 707 for John W. Phelps, American. He was inaugurated, March 4, 1881,

and made up his cabinet by appointing James G.

Blaine of Maine as secretary of state; William

Windom of Minnesota, secretaiy of the treasury;

r«e WHITE ri"";^

Robert T. Lincoln of Illinois, secretary of war; William T. Hunt of Louisiana, secretary of the navy; Wa3-ne MacVeagh of Penn.sylvania, attor- ney-general; Thomas L. James of New York, postmaster-general, and Samuel J. Kirk wood of Iowa, secretary of the interior. President Garfield at the opening of his administration incurred the enmity of Senator Conkling of New York — who had, late in the canvass, come to the I'escue of his party and secured New York to the Republican column — by nominating W. H. Robertson col- lector for the port of New York in direct oppo- sition to the senators from that state. Both Sena- tors Conkling and Piatt resigned their seats in the U.S. senate. May 16, 1881, and on May 18 the senate, relieved of senatorial courtesy theretofore binding it, promptly confirmed the nomination of Mr. Robertson as collector. Vice-President Arthur, who had represented the Grant-Conkling or stalwart wing of the party at the Republican national convention, had gained his nomination as a compromise candidate and was supposed to sympathize with the defeated New York senators. The blind partisanship of a di.sappointed office- seeker who imagined that assassination would make clear the way to patronage, led him to waylay and slioot the President in the sta- tion of the Baltimore and Potomac raih'oid, July 2, 1881, when f)i route to attend the c immencpment exer- cises of Williams col- l?ge. In the While House and subse quentlj' at Elberon, ^ ^

N.J., the President lin- -|^c::;Jts'-~'?? gered between life and deith, the subject of earnest solicitation of a nation forgetful of party strife in the presence of the great tragedy, until Sept. 19, 1881, when he diel. His body was carried to the national Capitol and there lay in state for twt) days, Sep-