John Harrison Wilson, The life of Charles Henry Dana

[443] of five senators, five representatives, and five justices of the Supreme Court of the United States, so divided politically that the casting vote rested with Justice Bradley. After careful consideration, the commission made a decision which gave the presidency to Hayes, and doubtless saved the country from an outbreak, or at least from confusion and uncertainty, which might have ended in anarchy and violence.

It is an anomaly of history that while the vote of Louisiana was counted for Hayes, the Republican government of the State, which was instrumental in establishing the charge of fraud, and should have logically stood with the decision, was soon repudiated by the Hayes administration and forced to give place to a government composed mostly of white men.

The Sun, having done its utmost to carry the country for Tilden, and having come so close to success, opposed the Electoral Commission from the day it was first suggested till it ceased to exist. It claimed that there was no proper warrant for it, either in law or justice; that Tilden was legally elected by a majority of the votes deposited in the ballot-boxes, and that while many votes may have been wrongfully excluded or wrongfully thrown out after they were received, there was no warrant in law for counting votes not deposited, nor for the assumption that if deposited they would have been in favor of Hayes and Wheeler rather than for Tilden and Hendricks. It contended to the end that “the only real settlement” of the controversy which could satisfy the country would be one giving the office to the man who had been really elected; that the Democratic majority in the House of Representatives, in favoring the Electoral Commission, had committed “official suicide” ; and that

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