Hayes, Rutherford Birchard (1822-1893), was elected president of the United States in 1876 by a margin of only one electoral vote. His victory over Samuel J. Tilden climaxed one of the most disputed presidential elections in U.S. history. Congress created a special Electoral Commission to decide the winner.
Hayes was a studious, good-natured man who enjoyed books more than politics. Ohio Republicans nominated him for Congress while he was an officer in the Union Army during the American Civil War (1861-1865). Hayes refused to campaign. He declared that any officer who “would abandon his post to electioneer for a seat in Congress, ought to be scalped.” Hayes won the election. He later served three terms as governor of Ohio.
When Hayes became president, the United States was suffering from a business depression and the political scandals of the previous administration of Ulysses S. Grant. The unsolved problem of Reconstruction in the South still divided the American people, even though the Civil War had ended 12 years before. Hayes was not popular at first. Democrats charged he had “stolen” the election. His fellow Republicans were bitter because he refused to give special favors to party politicians.
However, by the time Hayes left office, most Americans respected him for his sincerity and honesty. He had promised to end Reconstruction, and he did. Within two months after he took office, he removed the last federal troops from statehouses in the South. Hayes also put the government on the path toward civil service reform. Throughout his career, Hayes tried to live by his motto: “He serves his party best who serves his country best.”
During Hayes’s administration, the United States continued its remarkable growth. The nation became more industrialized than ever before, and labor unions gained thousands of new members. The population of New York City soared above a million. Civil War General Lew Wallace won nationwide fame for his novel Ben-Hur. And Thomas A. Edison visited the White House to demonstrate his favorite invention, the phonograph.
Early life
Rutherford Birchard Hayes was born on Oct. 4, 1822, in Delaware, Ohio. He was the fifth child of Rutherford Hayes, Jr., and Sophia Birchard Hayes. The family had migrated to Ohio from Dummerston, Vermont, in 1817. Hayes had two brothers and two sisters, but only he and his sister Fanny grew to adulthood. Hayes’s father, a successful store owner, died two months before Rutherford, or “Rud,” was born. A bachelor uncle, Sardis Birchard, became the children’s guardian.
Education.
Hayes was a champion speller in elementary school. He later boasted that “not one in a thousand could spell me down!” Hayes prepared for college at private schools in Norwalk, Ohio; and Middletown, Connecticut. In 1838, he entered Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio. He graduated in 1842 at the head of his class. Hayes entered Harvard Law School the next year. He graduated and was admitted to the bar in 1845.
Lawyer.
Hayes began practicing law in Lower Sandusky (later Fremont), Ohio, where his uncle lived. In 1850, he opened a law office in Cincinnati. At first, Hayes had so few clients and was so poor that he slept in his office to save money. He enjoyed studying literature, and joined the recently formed Literary Club of Cincinnati.
Hayes’s law practice gradually increased. In 1852, he won statewide attention as a criminal lawyer in two widely publicized murder trials. His brilliant defense arguments saved his clients from receiving the death penalty. In 1858, the Cincinnati City Council elected Hayes to fill a vacancy as city solicitor. He held this influential political and legal post until shortly before the Civil War began three years later.
Hayes’s family.
On Dec. 30, 1852, Hayes married Lucy Ware Webb (Aug. 28, 1831-June 25, 1889). They had eight children, but three died in infancy. 
Lucy Hayes was the daughter of a Chillicothe, Ohio, physician. She had graduated in 1850 from the Wesleyan Female College in Cincinnati and was the first president’s wife to have a college degree. Her intelligence and social grace helped Hayes throughout his career. Mrs. Hayes championed many of the leading moral causes of the day. She became active in supporting the abolition of slavery, temperance (elimination of the use of alcoholic beverages), and aid to the poor.
Soldier.
When the Civil War began in 1861, the Literary Club of Cincinnati formed a military drilling company and elected Hayes captain. He was later appointed a major of a regiment of Ohio Volunteers. Hayes distinguished himself in several battles and earned rapid promotion during his four years in the Union Army. He was wounded four times and had four horses shot from under him. On June 8, 1865, two months after the war ended, Hayes resigned from the Army with the rank of brevet major general.
Political career
Congressman.
Hayes was nominated for the U.S. House of Representatives in 1864. He received the news while fighting in the Shenandoah Valley in northern Virginia under General Philip H. Sheridan. He refused to campaign for the office because the outcome of the war was still in doubt. Hayes won the election but did not take his seat in Congress until December 1865. He won reelection in 1866 but resigned in July 1867, a month after he was nominated for governor of Ohio.
While in Congress, Hayes did outstanding work as chairman of the Joint Committee on the Library of Congress. Under his leadership, Congress transferred the scientific library of the Smithsonian Institution to the Library of Congress.
Governor.
In 1867, Hayes won election to the first of three terms as governor of Ohio. His election was a personal triumph because he campaigned in favor of an unpopular Black suffrage amendment to the state constitution. Hayes planned to retire from politics at the end of his second term in 1872. But Republican leaders persuaded him to run for Congress. He was defeated, and spent the next three years at his home near Fremont, Ohio, where he lived quietly and dealt in real estate. In 1875, he won a third term as governor.
Hayes gained nationwide attention as a courageous administrator. He worked hard for economy in government and for a strong civil service program based on merit rather than political influence. He also helped establish the college that became Ohio State University.
Campaign of 1876.
As President Grant’s second term drew to a close, the corruption-torn Republican Party split into two main factions. The Stalwarts, who were led by Senator Roscoe Conkling of New York, favored a third term for Grant. The Half-Breeds, who were led by Representative James G. Blaine of Maine, opposed the Stalwarts. Grant refused to run for a third term, but neither the Stalwarts nor the Half-Breeds had enough votes to nominate a presidential candidate. Many of the party leaders supported Hayes as a compromise candidate. At the Republican National Convention in June 1876, Hayes won the presidential nomination on the seventh ballot. The delegates nominated Representative William A. Wheeler of New York for vice president.
Samuel J. Tilden, who had gained fame as a reform governor of New York, was Hayes’s Democratic opponent. The Democrats chose Governor Thomas A. Hendricks of Indiana for vice president. The new Greenback Party nominated Peter Cooper for president.
The Republicans seemed to have little chance for victory. The Democrats had increased their voting strength since 1874, when they gained control of the U.S. House of Representatives. As election day approached, however, President Grant sent federal troops to South Carolina and Louisiana to protect the rights of Black voters, who formed the largest group among Southern Republicans. Tilden received 4,288,546 popular votes to 4,034,311 for Hayes.
The election dispute.
Four states—Louisiana, South Carolina, Florida, and Oregon—submitted two sets of electoral returns, one by the Democrats and one by the Republicans. As a result, both parties claimed victory. On December 6, the Electoral College met and voted. Hayes received 165 unquestioned votes. Tilden got 184 votes, one short of a majority. Twenty electoral votes, from the four states that submitted conflicting returns, were disputed. In January 1877, Congress appointed a 15-member Electoral Commission to settle the matter. Its decisions were to be final, unless both houses of Congress voted otherwise. During the debate in Congress, members of both parties threatened to seize the government by force.
As Inauguration Day approached, leaders of both parties feared that the country might be left without a president. In a private meeting, Southern Democrats in Congress agreed not to oppose the decision of the Electoral Commission. This agreement gave Hayes the presidency because the commission had a Republican majority. To win this agreement from the Democrats, the Republicans promised to end Reconstruction and withdraw the remaining federal occupation forces from Southern statehouse grounds. The Democrats, in turn, agreed to recognize the civil and political rights of African Americans. On March 2, 1877, just 56 hours before Inauguration Day, Hayes was formally announced as the winner.
Hayes’s administration (1877-1881)
The end of Reconstruction.
One of Hayes’s first acts as president was to withdraw the remaining federal forces from statehouses in the South, as the Republicans had promised. Without the military support, Republican governments fell. White Southerners thus regained complete political control over their state and local governments for the first time since the Civil War.
Civil service reform.
Hayes had announced that he intended to serve only one term as president so he could strive for civil service reform. Hayes based his appointments on merit rather than on the spoils system. He even appointed a Southern Democrat, David M. Key, to his Cabinet. This and other Cabinet appointments angered members of his own party. Hayes also forced the removal of three fellow Republicans from their jobs in the New York Custom House. One of the men was Chester A. Arthur, who became the 21st president (see Arthur, Chester Alan (Custom house collector)).
Congress refused to act on the civil service legislation that Hayes proposed, but Hayes was the first president to fight Congress on this issue. His struggle gained wide public support and opened the way for later presidents to make civil service reforms.
Money problems.
Because of the depression of the 1870’s, many people demanded cheap money. Farmers and business owners, for example, believed that putting more money into circulation would raise the prices of their products and thus help them pay off their debts. They wanted the government to issue more paper and silver money even though the money could not be backed by gold in the Treasury. Hayes favored a conservative money policy and resisted their demands.
In 1878, Hayes vetoed the Bland-Allison Act, which required the Treasury to buy and coin between $2 million and $4 million worth of silver a month. Congress passed the bill over his veto. But the Treasury coined only the minimum amount required in an attempt to limit the inflationary effect of putting more money into circulation.
In 1879, the Hayes administration resumed payment of specie (metal coin) for greenbacks (paper money issued to finance the Civil War). Secretary of the Treasury John Sherman gathered enough gold in the Treasury to redeem all of the greenbacks that were likely to be brought in. As soon as this became known, no one was anxious to exchange notes for gold. This policy helped restore financial confidence, and business improved.
Life in the White House.
Rutherford and Lucy Hayes tried to set a good example for American families. They quickly won respect for their hospitality, simplicity, and modesty. They were both concerned about the problem of alcoholism, as were many other people in the country. As a symbol of the temperance cause, the Hayeses stopped the practice of serving alcoholic drinks at the White House, even at formal dinners and receptions.
A typical day in the White House began with morning prayers. Early in the evening, the family often gathered for music and singing. Mrs. Hayes held public receptions almost every evening and welcomed everyone who wished to visit the White House. In 1878, she and President Hayes introduced the custom of Easter egg rolling by children on the White House lawn.
Later years
“Nobody ever left the Presidency with less regret … than I do,” Hayes said when his term ended in 1881. Few people seemed sorry that he did not run for a second term. But Hayes believed that the public showed its approval of his administration by electing James A. Garfield, his friend and political supporter, as president.
Hayes returned to his home at Spiegel Grove, near Fremont, Ohio, and completely withdrew from politics. He devoted himself to philanthropic work in education, prison reform, Christianity, and veterans’ affairs.
Mrs. Hayes died in June 1889. Hayes became ill while visiting friends in Cleveland in January 1893. His friends urged him to remain in bed. But Hayes insisted on returning home, saying: “I would rather die at Spiegel Grove than to live anywhere else.” He died on Jan. 17, 1893, and was buried in Fremont. Spiegel Grove is now open to the public. It is part of the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center, which also includes a museum and the nation’s first presidential library.
