Samuel J Tilden

Early life and career

Tilden was born in New Lebanon in New York, the youngest of Elam Tilden and Polly Jones Tilden's three sons. He was descended from Nathaniel Tilden, an early English settler who came to America in 1634, and his father and other family members were the makers of Tilden's Extract, a popular patent medicine of the 1800s and early 1900s derived from cannabis.

He studied at Yale University, then at New York University School of Law. He was admitted to the bar in 1841, and became a skilled corporate lawyer, with many railroads as clients in the railway construction boom of the 1850s. His legal practice, combined with shrewd investments, made him rich. Tilden's success at money management and investing caused many of his friends, relatives, and political allies, including Martin Van Buren, to allow Tilden to manage their finances.

From 1843 to 1844, he served as New York City's Corporation Counsel. He was a member of the New York State Assembly (New York Co.) in 1846, and a delegate to the New York State Constitutional Convention of 1846. In 1848, largely on account of his personal attachment to Martin Van Buren, he participated in the revolt of the "Barnburners" or Free-Soil faction of the New York Democrats, which nominated Van Buren for President and helped ensure the defeat of Democrat Lewis Cass and victory by Whig nominee Zachary Taylor. He was among the Barnburners who later returned to the Democratic Party rather than joining the anti-slavery Republican Party. In 1855, Tilden was the unsuccessful candidate of the Soft faction (Barnburners who favored compromise and reconciliation with the Democratic Party) for New York State Attorney General. In 1859 he was an unsuccessful candidate for New York City Corporation Counsel.

In the years immediately preceding the American Civil War, Tilden favored a conciliatory approach to the slave holding states and opposed going to war. Once the war started, Tilden supported the Union, but was critical of Abraham Lincoln's "strong executive" approach to the presidency. After the war, Tilden again favored conciliation and opposed the Radical Republican approach to Reconstruction. He was a delegate to the 1867 New York Constitutional Convention. In 1867, Tilden received the honorary degree of LL.D. from New York University.

Tilden became chairman of the Democratic State Committee after the Civil War. After initially having good relations with William M. Tweed and working closely together with him in the Democratic Party, Tilden came into conflict with the Tweed Ring and the Tammany Hall Democratic organization over its involvement in bribery and corruption.

After breaking with Tammany, Tilden led the reform movement in the Democratic Party, and played a key role in the Tweed Ring's demise. By analyzing the bank accounts of certain members of the Tweed organization, he obtained legal proof of the principle on which the bribes and graft they took had been distributed, which was used as evidence to convict them in their trials. He was again a member of the New York State Assembly (New York Co., 18th D.) in 1872, and took a leading part in the impeachment of George G. Barnard, a Tweed-connected judge.

Tilden was the successful Democratic nominee for Governor in 1874, receiving 52 percent of the vote against incumbent Republican John Adams Dix and Prohibition Party nominee Myron H. Clark. As a reform-spirited Governor in 1875 and 1876, he turned his attention to a second set of plunderers, the "Canal Ring", made up of members of both parties who had been systematically robbing New York State by overcharging for maintenance and construction of the New York State Canal System. Tilden succeeded in breaking them up.

In 1875, Tilden received an honorary LL.D. from Yale University. At the same time, Yale also enrolled him as a graduate of the Class of 1837 and he received his Bachelor of Arts degree.

Tilden's successful service as Governor made him a favorite for the 1876 presidential nomination. Tilden's appeal to the national party was strong: a reputation for reform, his electoral success in a state the Democrats needed to win, a supporter of hard currency, and a skilled organizer whose canvassing system and field knowledge was so thorough that, months before the 1874 election, he'd predicted his own winning margin accurately to within 300 votes. Tilden was also a multi-millionaire who spent freely to promote himself and to woo delegates. His efforts were successful; with 488 votes required to win the nomination under the Democratic Party's two-thirds rule, Tilden received 401 votes on the first ballot, and won the nomination with 535 on the second. Second place finisher Thomas A. Hendricks was nominated for vice president on the first ballot.

Presidential election of 1876

During the 1876 presidential election, Tilden won the popular vote over his Republican opponent, Rutherford B. Hayes, proving that the Democrats were once again competitive in the American political process following the Civil War. But the result in the Electoral College was in question because the states of Florida, Louisiana, and South Carolina each sent two sets of electoral votes to Congress. (There was separately a conflict over one elector from Oregon, who was disqualified on a technicality.)

Republicans had taken over the state governments in the South during Reconstruction, but were unpopular with the overwhelmingly Democratic white southerners, many of whom resented what they perceived as interference from the North and blamed the Republicans for the Civil War. However Republicans were almost universally preferred by the South's newly enfranchised blacks. By 1876 white southerners had regained control of most southern states, but in one state with a black majority (South Carolina) and two with very large black minorities (Louisiana and Florida) Republicans still held power. Democrats used violence and intimidation to keep blacks from the polls, while Democrats claimed that Republicans weren't simply disallowing votes tainted by violence but also legitimate returns that favored Democrats. Both sides claimed victory, though the Democratic claim was tainted by violence and the Republican by fraud. As a result, one set of electors from each of these three states had voted for the Republican Hayes, and another set had voted for the Democrat Tilden. Without these three states, Tilden had won 184 electoral votes, but needed 185 to win the Presidency. If he had taken even one more state, he would have become President. However, if Hayes were to win all the contested states, he would receive 185 electoral votes and win the election.

While the Republicans boldly claimed the election, Tilden mystified and disappointed his supporters by not fighting for the prize or giving any leadership to his advocates. Instead he devoted more than a month to the preparation of a complete history of the electoral counts over the previous century to show it was the unbroken usage of Congress, not of the President of the Senate, to count the electoral votes.

Congressional leaders moved to resolve the crisis by creating a 15-member Electoral Commission on January 25, 1877, which was empowered to determine which set of votes were valid. The Commission consisted of five members from the Republican-controlled Senate (three Republicans and two Democrats), and five from the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives (three Democrats, two Republicans). The remaining five members were chosen from the Supreme Court – originally two Republicans, two Democrats, and independent Justice David Davis. Davis, however, was elected to the US Senate from Illinois, resigned from the Court and turned down the commission appointment. (Ironically, the election of Davis was the brainchild of Tilden's nephew who assumed it would secure his commission vote for the Democratic side.) Justice Joseph P. Bradley, a Republican, was named to replace Davis. The Commission voted 8–7 along party lines to award all the votes to Hayes. Some Democrats threatened to filibuster in the Senate to prevent the electoral votes from being counted, but were dissuaded. Part of resolving the election dispute was the Compromise of 1877, whereby the Democrats agreed to Hayes's election and he agreed to complete the withdrawal of federal troops in the South which had begun during the Ulysses S. Grant administration, bringing an end to Republican Reconstruction in the South. The Compromise of 1877 was in line with views that Hayes had already expressed; in his letter accepting the Republican nomination, he had indicated his desire that the South enjoy "the blessings of honest and capable local government" (but only with guarantees that the states would guard the civil rights of the freedmen).

Upon his defeat, Tilden said, "I can retire to private life with the consciousness that I shall receive from posterity the credit of having been elected to the highest position in the gift of the people, without any of the cares and responsibilities of the office."

Tilden, Al Gore, and Hillary Clinton are the only presidential candidates to win the popular vote without being elected President. Andrew Jackson also lost the 1824 election after winning the popular vote, but he attained the presidency in 1828. In addition, Grover Cleveland won the popular vote in all three elections in which he was the Democratic nominee -- 1884, 1888, and 1892 -- but lost the presidency in 1888 because Republican nominee Benjamin Harrison won more electoral votes.

The Cipher Dispatches

Congress appointed an investigating committee during its 1877 session. This panel, chaired by Democratic Congressman Clarkson Nott Potter of New York, investigated allegations of fraud and corruption in the three contested states. Rather than produce conclusive evidence of Republican malfeasance, as Tilden's supporters hoped, the committee exonerated Tilden of wrongdoing, but uncovered conflicting evidence that showed state election officials of both parties and members of both campaigns in an unfavorable light.

For ten months beginning in May 1878, the Potter Committee subpoenaed all telegrams sent by political operatives during the election dispute. 29,275 telegrams had been sent; all but 641 had been routinely destroyed by Western Union. However, the remaining telegrams were in cipher, as was common with business and political communication in the telegraph era, and nothing could be made of them. 27 of these telegrams were leaked to the Tribune.

In summer 1878, Tribune editor Whitelaw Reid published several of the enciphered telegrams in response to Tilden ally Manton Marble, who had publicly compared the alleged secrecy of Republicans with Tilden's supposed openness. Reid implied that the ciphering of the messages showed Democratic hypocrisy, and suggested that Republicans try to decipher the messages in order to learn their content. Other Republicans sent him additional ciphered telegrams. Eventually, nearly 400 telegrams were deciphered, mostly by Reid's Tribune staff. In October, the Tribune published the story of the Democratic effort to sway election officials in the three disputed states, including the ciphered text of the messages and the details of the decryption.

The telegrams revealed intriguing by Democrats, though most of it was ineffective. Marble reported an offer from Florida's governor and election board (all Republicans) to fix the results for Tilden for $200,000; the Democrats responded "Proposition too high" and offered $50,000. Another Democratic agent asked for $10,000 to bribe a Republican elector in Oregon; the funds were not forthcoming. There were also Democratic contacts with the election boards in Louisiana and South Carolina.

All these negotiations fell through, due to delays in communication, time required to raise the money, and the December deadline for states to report their results. But the revelation of the attempts reflected poorly on the Democrats, who lost some of the moral authority behind their argument that Tilden had been cheated out of the presidency. In the 1878 elections, voter unhappiness with these revelations led to Republicans gaining eight U.S. House seats in New York, which undercut the argument that Tilden should be renominated in 1880 because he was the only candidate strong enough to carry the largest state in the Union for the Democrats. Republicans also won the governorship of New York in 1879, further undercutting the argument that Tilden could carry New York in 1880.

Many of the telegrams Reid published had been sent or received by Tilden's secretary and nephew, Colonel William Pelton, at Tilden's New York residence. Tilden appeared voluntarily before a Congressional sub-committee in New York City, and under oath denied all knowledge of the dispatches. There was no definite evidence to show otherwise, but his reputation for honesty suffered; Tilden was still presumably the strongest candidate leading up to the 1880 Democratic National Convention, but the Republican gains in New York, the damage to his image as an honest politician, and failing health all combined to dissuade him from running, and he withdrew from contention.

Tilden was again considered likely to become a candidate for the Democratic nomination in the 1884 presidential election, but his health continued to worsen and he declined to run.

Later life

Tilden retired in the early 1880s, living as a near-recluse at his 110-acre (0.45 km²) estate, Graystone (Greystone), in Yonkers, New York. He died a bachelor at Greystone on August 4, 1886, at 8 am. He is buried at Cemetery of the Evergreens in New Lebanon, Columbia County, New York. In reference to the 1876 election, Tilden's gravestone bears the words, "I Still Trust The People".

Of his fortune, estimated at $7 million (over $190 million in 2016), $4 million (over $108 million in 2016) was bequeathed for the establishment and maintenance of a free public library and reading-room in the City of New York; but, as the will was successfully contested by relatives, only about $3 million (over $81 million in 2014) was applied to its original purpose. In 1895, the Tilden Trust was combined with the Astor and Lenox libraries to found the New York Public Library, whose building bears his name on its front.

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