What if Samuel Tilden won he 1876 Predsidential Election. I assume earlier civil service reform and maybe longer Reconstruction, but would the Southerners be allowed to regain political and social lost due to the Civil War. also without the 1877 Compromise, would African-Americans have more rights?
See my post at
https://groups.google.com/d/msg/soc.history.what-if/rPhL80fOHK4/qmeCGWe_gMgJ:
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Anyway, Holt notes (something I have mentioned here before), Tilden's
administration would have differed little from Hayes' in terms of policy.
Hayes ended what was left of Reconstruction, and of course Tilden would
have done the same. (Actually, it was Grant--after Hayes had finally been
elected on the morning of March 2--who ordered the troops in South
Carolina and Louisiana back to their barracks, which order guaranteed the
instant collapse of the Republican administrations in those states. But
for unknown reasons the order went astray, so it was left to Hayes to
issue similar orders within a few weeks of his inauguration. If Grant's
orders had been implemented, Hayes' reputation today might be a little
higher, since it would be harder to blame him for the betrayal of southern
African Americans.) Monetary policy? Both Hayes and Tilden were "sound
money" men, firm advocates of specie resumption (which was in fact
accomplished on schedule in 1879). Anyway, continued Senate control by
Republicans would have frustrated House Democrats' attempts to repeal the
Resumption Act even if Tilden had agreed to it (or if he had died and the
inflationist Hendricks became President). Civil service reform? Both
Hayes and Tilden made it a mantra, but Tilden would probably have been no
more successful in carrying it out than Hayes (consider all those
"deserving Democrats" ravenous for federal patronage after sixteen long
years out of power).
Another issue--one very important in the politics of the 1870's and
especially in Hayes' election as governor of Ohio in 1875--was Protestant
resentment of Catholic attempts to get a share of public school funds.
Tilden was probably indifferent to this issue. In 1875 the Democratic
legislature of New York had passed, and Tilden had signed, the "Gray Nuns
Act" which allowed Catholic nuns to teach in New York's public schools.
But in 1876, when the Republicans took control of the legislature and
immediately repealed the Act, Tilden just as readily signed the repeal. In
any event, Senate Republicans lacked the two-thirds vote to enact their
version of the "Blaine Amendment" throughout Hayes' term and indeed through
the rest of the nineteenth century. All they could do--often with the
support of Democrats--was to require western states to enact "Little Blaine
Amendments" as the price of admission to the Union. It is doubtful that
Tilden would disapprove of this, but in any event no additional western
states were admitted to the Union between 1877 and 1881. (Though if the
way Tilden wins is by Colorado not yet being admitted, presumably it would
be a candidate for admission. [1])
Finally, one of Hayes' most controversial acts was to deploy federal
troops to break up the massive (and massively destructive) strike by
railway workers against their employers in 1877. Would Tilden have acted
differently? Holt doubts it. Tilden had after all been an attorney for
railroad interests, and was no small-d democrat--he had recommended the
disfranchisement of non-property-owners in New York City's municipal
elections. The protection of property rights was too important for Tilden
not to intervene. Basically, Holt concludes, the ultimate significance of the 1876 election
was not that Hayes was counted in and Tilden out, but that the Democrats
(after being routed in 1872) and Republicans (after being routed in 1874)
both made remarkable comebacks--not so much by persuading voters to switch
parties as by mobilizing supporters who had previously stayed away from
the polls (the Democrats who could not bring themselves to vote for
Greeley in 1872 and the Republicans who could not swallow the depression
and Grant-administration corruption in 1874). This [2] created the very
close competitive equilibrium between the two parties which would exist
until the depression of the 1890's.
