The nation faced a major electoral challenge with the disputed Hayes-Tilden election of 1876. Democratic candidate Samuel J. Tilden won the popular vote for president on November 7 by a 250,000-vote margin. Preliminary Electoral College tallies predicted that Tilden would defeat Rutherford B. Hayes, his Republican opponent. The ballots of four states—Florida, Louisiana, South Carolina, and Oregon—were called into question, however, and each of these states subsequently posted two sets of certified election results, one favoring the Democrats and the other favoring the Republicans. Of the 20 electoral votes in dispute, Tilden needed only one to become president. Hayes needed to claim all 20 votes to defeat his opponent. With the country still recovering from the Civil War, a peaceful resolution was crucial.
As the impasse continued well into January 1877, with neither side willing to concede the election, the responsibility for resolving the conflict fell to Congress. But while the U.S. Constitution gives Congress certain election responsibilities—namely, that both the Senate and the House of Representatives must be present as the electoral certificates submitted by each state are counted—it gives no guidance as to what Congress should do if the validity of these certificates is disputed. Finally, on January 29, 1877, Congress created a special Electoral Commission to review the four states’ ballots and to determine the final outcome of the election. The commission was composed of 15 members drawn evenly from both parties among the Senate, the House of Representatives, and the Supreme Court of the United States, together with a single independent justice to ensure partisan balance. David Davis, the independent justice first chosen, declined to serve, and he was replaced by Joseph P. Bradley, a justice appointed to the bench as a Republican but who was acceptable to the Democrats.
The Electoral Commission held its first public hearing on February 1, 1877, and deliberations continued for nine days. Legislators, cabinet members, the press, and prominent men and women of Washington society crowded into the Capitol’s Old Senate Chamber (then serving as the Supreme Court’s regular meeting place). The long and bitter debate began with the Florida case. Although Tilden had almost certainly won in the electoral balloting, Republicans prevailed and the commission’s vote went to Hayes. Subsequent voting also followed party lines, with Bradley, the “independent” justice, joining the Republicans. By the findings of the commission, Rutherford B. Hayes received all of the disputed votes, and thus the required one-vote margin over Tilden. Though Democrats at first protested, they ultimately accepted the decision on the promise that federal troops would be removed from the South and Reconstruction brought to an end. Congress declared Hayes the victor on March 2, just two days before his term began.
The historic event of The Florida Case Before The Electoral Commission is depicted in an oil painting by Cornelia Adèle Strong Fassett .
