During the Obama presidency, I watched (in horror) the country seemed to become more and more polarized by social and political division.
I wondered if how I (and many of my friends and family) felt was anything like the mood of the people during the American Revolution. Because of my intense natural curiosity, I turned to the library (not the internet) to seek out and read books about the American Revolution. Specifically, I read books written before the middle of the 20th century for the greater trust that the history was faithfully and accurately reported.
Reading a few books on the American Revolution led me to a biography on George Washington, which then led me to a biography on John Adams, second president of the United States of America. I was so interested and fascinated by what I was learning that I thought: Wouldn’t it be cool to read a biography of every president, in order?
I wasn’t so interested in reading about the lives of the men themselves, but I was beginning to understand that the biographies of presidents were a good snapshot of the times in which the man lived, and the people surrounding them. In other words, I was vitally interested in the mood, politically, societally, and spiritually, of the people and the society. Since presidents served this country continuously beginning in 1789, it was a long, relatively unbiased (because presidents came from a number of different political parties) history of the country itself.
So, I added to my bucket list to read a biography of every president, in order.
This week I completed the biography of Rutherford B Hayes, the 19th president in America’s history. He was president from 1876-1880. Before election Hayes vowed to only serve only one term. He kept that promise. It took me a while to even get my hands on a Hayes biography. He wasn’t a particularly memorable president and rather than pay far too much money for a rare book I would only read once, I asked the local library to get one through their Interlibrary Loan program. It came, finally, from an obscure college in New Jersey. Written in 1954, it still had the check-out card pocket glued to the back cover and the card showed it had only been borrowed twice since it was written, once in 1956 and once in 1957. I was astounded but not surprised. Winston Churchill famously said…those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.
What struck me about the Hayes presidency was the actual election process of 1876. The country was terribly divided (still), this time by the aftermath of the slave issue and southern reconstruction in wake of the Civil War. The political party system was much less stable that it is now with just the 2 major parties. And then, as it appears there is now, an unbelievable amount of corruption, fraud, and voter suppression occurred. Voter suppression in 1876 came in the form of violence against blacks voting, particularly in the south. Women had not yet won the right to vote in America.
The “popular vote” was so fraught with dishonestly in 1876 that the electoral vote was not decided until March 2, 1877, just 2 days before the scheduled presidential inauguration. In the end, a 15-member Electoral Commission made up of 5 Congressmen, 5 Senators and 5 Supreme Court Justices made the final decision. The Commission conducted a trial-like review of all the evidence and awarded electoral votes from 4 contested states (some states sent 2 slates of electors, just as they did in the 2020 election). This resulted in Hayes winning the presidency by one electoral vote. There were those who never felt his presidency was legitimate. Sound familiar?
In this biography of Rud Hayes (as he was called), and the ones before him, I learned that there really is nothing new under the sun. The issues are different, and they change as time marches on, but people and politics were divided then, and have been divided over one thing or another since just after George Washington’s presidency.
Still, the country survives. No matter how much fear they try to strike into our hearts.
I’m still very much enjoying my journey through the history of the United States by reading biographies of her presidents. Now, on to the 20th President, James Garfield.
P.S. As far as when in history I’d want to live, now is as good a time as any. I thank God I didn’t live in the time before flush toilets and running water, during any of the great wars, or during the depression. Yes, things are getting more expensive, and sometimes there are slim pickings on the Walmart grocery shelves, but life is pretty dang good in my little bubble.
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