ELECTION OF 1872: THE PASSING OF THE FIRST GENERATION

 

 

“The Hon. Horace Greeley, the “Liberal” Republican Candidate for President,” in Harper’s Weekly, May 18, 1872.

 

 

“It Is Only a Truce to Regain Power (‘Playing Possom’),” in Harper’s Weekly, August 24, 1872.

Republican apostates Greeley and Charles Sumner encourage a black man gazing on his murdered family to “clasp hands over the bloody chasm” with a Ku-Klux-Klansman and a racist Irishman.         

 

 

In 1872 two major New York illustrated weeklies were on opposite sides.  Harper’s supported Grant, and Frank Leslie’s supported Greeley.  Their cartoonists, Harper’s Thomas Nast and  Leslie’s Matt Morgan, engaged in a lively exchange of graphic invective.                                                  

 

 

“Decorating the White House,” in Harper’s Weekly, June 1, 1872.

 

 

“The ‘Liberal’ Conspirators (Who You All Know Are Honorable Men),” in Harper’s Weekly, March 16, 1872.

Nast likens Greeley’s supporters, headed by Charles Sumner and Carl Schurz, to the Roman conspirators plotting Caesar’s demise.                                                                     

 

 

“Grant’s First and Last Vote,” in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, September 14, 1872.

 

“A Leaf from History for our Foreign-Born Citizens,” in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, September 28, 1872.

These two cartoons question the political past of Grant and Wilson.  The last time Grant voted in a presidential election was in 1856, when he voted for James Buchanan.  And, Henry Wilson’s days in the Know Nothing movement are recalled in this image of him kneeling before the alter of this secret society.

 

 

“Our Modern Belshazzar.  The People’s Handwriting on the Wall,” in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, April 1, 1872.

In this biblical allusion, Grant presides over his court of Republican corruption as the words of Greeley’s running mate, Benjamin Gratz Brown, magically appear on the wall

Jasper Packard, The Republican Party—Its Present Duties and Past Achievements, and Democratic Repudiation.  Speech . . . In the House of Representatives, February 5, 1870 (Washington, 1870).

With political and fiscal bankruptcy and violence undermining Republican governments in the South and apathy and corruption weakening Republican resolve in the North, Republicans struggled to find their way regarding Reconstruction and reform. Radical Republicans, such as Packard of Indiana, argued for renewed Republican efforts to protect republican government and the party in the South as a matter of principle and self-interest and to endorse the 15^th Amendment as a matter of right.

                                                                                                

 

Francis P. Blair, Protection of Life, etc., in the South.  Speech . . . Delivered in the Senate of the United States, April 3 and 4, 1871 (Washington: F. & J. Rives & Geo. A. Bailey, 1871).

Conservative Republican Blair, who had fought bitterly against the Radicals in his home state and had been the Democratic nominee for vice president in 1868, thought the Republicans had done enough by saving the Union and ending slavery and insisted that further federal interference in state affairs to shore up unpopular regimes in the South was unconstitutional and unwise.

 

 

Honest Government!  Proceedings of the Liberal Republican Convention, In Cincinnati, May 1^st, 2d and 3d, 1872 (New York: Baker & Godwin, Printers, 1872).

Amid personal and factional disputes over policy and patronage, and disgust over the corruption plaguing the Grant administration, a group of Republicans led by such Radicals as Carl Schurz and Charles Sumner, split off from the regular party support for Grant in 1872 to focus on civil service reform and “honest government.” They nominated Horace Greeley as president on the pledge to restore morality to the government and called “the best men” to public service, but retreated from Reconstruction and ignored the needs of labor.

                                                                                               

 

John T. Campbell, The Great Problem of the Age.  An Address on Labor Reform, Delivered in Terre Haute, Indiana, January 31, 1872.  Why Millions Must be Poor that Few May be Rich (Philadelphia & Lancaster: Labor Tribune, Print., 1872).

The major parties’ preoccupation with Reconstruction, race, railroads, and even reform of the political system left laboring men and women and others feeling abandoned in an age of intense political consciousness. Third parties sprang up to address particular needs ignored by the major parties. In 1872 the Labor Reform Party organized to “fight monopolies” and defend labor’s interest—a harbinger of the shift to economic issues that would drive politics by the end of the century.

 

 

“New York—Reception Given by Horace Greeley to the Committee of the Democratic National Convention, at his Chappaqua Farm . . . ,” in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, August 3, 1872.

The Democrats, divided among themselves over a host of issues and desperate for a consensus candidate after their debacle in 1868, offered the party’s nomination to Greeley in 1872, adding the Liberal Republicans’ critique of Grant’s corruption to their own campaign. Greeley’s nomination by party insiders outraged many Democrats, who bolted the party to nominate their own candidate, and it embarrassed and discouraged Liberal Republicans, who were now linked to the party of low tariffs, white supremacy, and leaving southern Republicans to their own fate.

 

 

Everett Chamberlin, The Struggle of ’72.  The Issues and Candidates of the Present Political Campaign . . . (Chicago: Union Publishing Co., 1872).

The Republican Party machinery in 1872 cranked out loads of books, papers, pamphlets, hand cards, broadsides, songsters, and any number of printed items drumming up support for Grant and the regular party candidates. Party literature reminded voters that Grant had saved the Union after the Democrats had conspired to destroy it. Chamberlain’s Struggle of `72 was boilerplate Republican propaganda. It pointed to General Grant’s biography as proof of his steady course while mocking Greeley for his apostasy and waving the “bloody shirt” of Republican patriotism and Democratic disunion, murder of Lincoln, and lawlessness after the war.

 

 

Cartoon cards:

Republicans and Democrats used cartoons distributed easily on hand cards to contrast the basic character of the parties and candidates in the simplest terms.

How they Vote for Grant in the 4^th Ward

The Republicans Party relied on patronage and local party organizations to get out the vote. In key states such as Pennsylvania, the party used every means to do so. Typical was this handbill urging good Republicans to show up at the polls.

The Reformers alias Democrats, going overboard, like the Rebels will in November with Greely.

What are the Principles of the Dem. Party?

 

 

Grant & Wilson!  Eighth Ward, 10^th Division (Philadelphia, 1872). 

An election day handbill.

 

 

“The Republic on the Brink,” in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, November 9, 1872.      

Grant won handily in 1872, getting 286 Electoral College votes against 63 for all of his opponents and none for Greeley. The defeated reformers likened Grant’s victory to the burial of honest government, claiming that ballot-box stuffing and machine politics delivered the vote to Grant and his allies but gave them a dubious claim to legitimacy. Whatever divisions persisted among Republicans over governmental ethics and obligations to extend and protect freedom in the South or elsewhere, the 1872 election marked the coming of age of the Republican Party. A new generation of Republicans, in many cases indifferent to the reform interests of the party’s founding generation, stood ready to take command.