Jasper County Democrat, Volume 15, Number 62, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 November 1912 — PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS. [ARTICLE]

PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS.

Notable Votes By States and People Are Recalled. The first presidential election was held in 1789. Only 10 states voted in this election; New York did not vote. It was not until the election of 1828 that political parties began to assert themselves in the affairs of the country, and it was not until four years later that all presidential candidates were named at national conventions, Until then there had been no conventions, no platforms, the candidates having been chosen by common consent, the legislatures of the several states expressing their choice. What Washington feared as the bane of popular government, the cultivation of party spirit, has since

dominated the politics of the United States. The whole story cannot be told in one chapter; but there is a good deal of present-day interest in some of the facts of past history that might well be recalled for the information of the people who fought the real battle of Amrageddon, speaking in the political sense, at the ballot Tuesday. Let us take the post-bellum period.

In 1868, the first presidential year after the close of hostilities, there were two tickets in the field—the Republican hosts, led by General Grant, and the Democratic ticket, by Horatio Seymour. In that election 34 states voted. - Of these states 25 were carried by the Republicans. Mississippi, Texas and Virginia had not been sufficiently reconstructed to vote in that election. Alabama, Arkansas, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee voted the Republican ticket—they Could not help it, the presence of the soldiers at the polls exercising s o restraining an influence on the Democratic voters as to make them stay away from the ballot boxes. The total vote wak only s,724,oß6—Republican 3,015,071, Democratic 2,709,615. The Republican plurality was 305,456. The electoral vote was 294—Republican 214, Democratic 80. The republican majority in the electoral college was exactly the total of the electoral vote cast for Grant.

In 1872 37 states voted, and of this number only six voted the democratic ticket. The total vote was 6,466,165 : —Republican 3,597,070, Democratic 2,834,079. Charles O. O’Connor received 29,408 votes, and James Black, Prohibitionist, received 5,608 votes. The Republican plurality was 726,991. At that election some of “the states lately in rebellion,” as the phrase ran in those faraway days, had not been strong enough to assert themselves and voted the Republican ticket, which received 286 Electoral votes out of a possible 349, a clear majority of 223.

In 1876, one of the most eventful years in politics, 38 states voted. Of these 21 voted the Republicau ticket, or, at least, that is the way the returns, after they had been carefully revised, made it appear, and 17 states voted the Democratic ticket—2l states for Hayes ard 17 for Tilden. The. “Solid South” was getting together then. There was a great deal of excitement about the vote in the southern states. Commissions were appointed by the government at Washington, and there was talk of direct military interference by the government, as if there had not already been quite enough of that, and when the election was finally settled. to the satisfaction of the party in power it was found that, while the Democrats had received 4,284,757 votes and the Republicans 4,033,950 a democratic- plurality of 250,935, out of the total vote of 8,412,733—rthe Republicans had won by a majority of one in the Electoral College, the vote standing, as finally manipulated, 164 for Tlden and 165 for Hayes. That was the closest electoral vote that has ever been cast in ap election in this (Country. > In 1880 there were 38 states vot-, ing—Republicans 18, Democrats 18, split 1, California, wmen even at that early time was manifesting some of the bull moose spirit. The popular vote that year was 9,218,251; Republican 4,454,416, Democratic 4,444,952, Greenback 308,578, Prohi bitionist 10,305. The Republican plurality was 9,464. The majority vote for the Republican candidate (Garfield) was 214; the o'ectoral vote for the Democratic candidate (Hancock) was 155. The total electoral vote was 369. The Republican

majority in the Electoral College was 59.

I In 1884, when Cleveland ran for* President, 38 states voted against him and 20 states voted for him. The total popular vote was 10,035,731. Cleveland received 4,914,986 I votes and Blaine received 4,855,011 i votes. Cleveland’s plurality was 59,975, but his total vote was 265,759 less than a majority of all the votes cast. , In the Electoral College he received 219 votes an dßaine received 182 votes. Cleveland’s majority in the Electoral vote was 37. In 1888 Harrison was elected by an electoral majority of 68 in a total vote of 401, but a total popular vote of 11,376,022 lacked 496,916 ' of obtaining a popular majority. | There is a good dea’l of "recent his tory” in the presidential elections that have followed the eighties. The most remarkable of these was the election of 1904, when Mr. Roosevelt was the candidate for the Republcan party and Judge Parker was the standard bearer of the Democracy. The total vote that year was 13,4 60,648, and of' these Roosevelt received 7,613,486, and his majority over all the other candidates, of whom there were five, was 1,766,324. The electoral vote in 1904 was 476, of which Roosevelt received 336 and Parker 140, a majority of 196. — New York Times-.