As of 1876, these were the only remaining states in the South with Republican governments. The Republicans refused to accept defeat, however, and accused Democratic supporters of intimidating and bribing African-American voters to prevent them from voting in three southern states–Florida, Louisiana and South Carolina. By midnight, Tilden had 184 of the 185 electoral votes he needed to win and was leading the popular vote by 250,000. On Election Day that November, the Democrats appeared to come out on top, winning the swing states of Connecticut, Indiana, New York and New Jersey. In his acceptance of the nomination, Hayes wrote that if elected, he would bring “the blessings of honest and capable local self-government” to the South–in other words, restrict federal enforcement of unpopular Reconstruction-era policies. Tilden of New York as their candidate, while the Republicans nominated Rutherford B. As the 1876 presidential election approached, the Democrats chose Governor Samuel B. Grant and an economic depression had heightened discontent with the Republican Party, which had been in the White House since 1861. In addition, accusations of corruption within the administration of Ulysses S. Many southern whites had resorted to intimidation and violence to keep blacks from voting and restore white supremacy in the region.īeginning in 1873, a series of Supreme Court decisions limited the scope of Reconstruction-era laws and federal support for the so-called Reconstruction Amendments, particularly the 14th Amendment and 15 Amendment, which gave African Americans the status of citizenship and the protection of the Constitution, including the all-important right to vote.ĭid you know? After the most disputed election in American history, the Compromise of 1877 put Rutherford Hayes into office as the nation's 19th president outraged northern Democrats derided Hayes as "His Fraudulency." As a result of the so-called Compromise of 1877 (or Compromise of 1876), Florida, Louisiana and South Carolina became Democratic once again, effectively bringing an end to the Reconstruction era.īy the 1870s, support was waning for the racially egalitarian policies of Reconstruction, a series of laws put in place after the Civil War to protect the rights of African Americans, especially in the South. The Democrats agreed not to block Hayes’ victory on the condition that Republicans withdraw all federal troops from the South, thus consolidating Democratic control over the region. As a bipartisan congressional commission debated over the outcome early in 1877, allies of the Republican Party candidate Rutherford Hayes met in secret with moderate southern Democrats in order to negotiate acceptance of Hayes’ election. Immediately after the presidential election of 1876, it became clear that the outcome of the race hinged largely on disputed returns from Florida, Louisiana and South Carolina-the only three states in the South with Reconstruction-era Republican governments still in power. The Compromise of 1877 was an informal agreement between southern Democrats and allies of the Republican Rutherford Hayes to settle the result of the 1876 presidential election and marked the end of the Reconstruction era.
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