Norwich bulletin. [volume] (Norwich, Conn.) 1895-2011, 1920-05-20

smallest man that can I'LL it." 1t simply
missed it calculation in Lincoln. Hayes
also proved to be rather more of man
than the politicians expected him to be.
Hayes had a geogra phical advantage,
and the map is unduly important in our
politics All the presidents that the re-
publicans have elected since Lincoln,
who was also born in the Ohio Valley
have been Ohioans by birth, excepting
only Roosevelt. And it is unlikely that
he ever would have been nominated for
the presidency if death had not promot-
ted him in the first place.
Another consideration favored Hayes.
Just as the old democratic party, when
it was under the domination of the
South, used to nominate Northern man
with Southern principles, the republican
party, as it became the representative of
! the business interests, resorted to the
strategy of nominating Western men with
Eastern principles.
Hayes was a transplanted Connect
cut Yankee, whose people migrated west
ward by way of Vermont. By the ACCT
| dent of birth he was an Ohioan, but in
blood, intemperatment and in thought he
was wholly a New Highlander, a straight
| laced Puritan in character and a scholar
in tastes.
| Like Jackson before him, he was a pos
| thunous child having been born 10
weeks after his fathers death. But a
| rich bachelor uncle Sardis Orchard, be-
came a father to the fatherless boy and
sent him to college in Ohio and to the
Harvard Law School, and finally leaving
i him his house and fortune two years be-
/ fore the nephew's nomination for presi-
dent.
This, then, is no story of a running
fight with poverty and ignorance. None
| of the presidents has tread a straighteT
a narrower or a smoother path to the
White House. The story tells is thrown
into despair at the outset by the assur-
ance of one of Hayes college mates
| Stanley Matthews, that HE never got
caught in any scrapes he never had any
boyish foolishness; he never had any
wild oats to SOW
! The child was father of the man.
Hayes life is bare of PERSONAL anec-
dotes and dramatic contrasts. A lawyer
and public man in the border city of
Cincinnati in the stirry days before the
| Civil War; an officer in the volunteer
army throughout the long conflict, where
he was wounded IN battle and where he
gallantiy commanded division under
Sheridan; il congress for two terms in
the turmoil of reconstruction thrice
elected governor of Ohio in close exciting
contests yet this man moved
so noiselessly through all these great
scenes that he was looked upon as an al
! most unknown actor on the National
stage For 20 years he had been playing
his several parts and always playing
them fairly well, but without becoming
q star or catching the spotlight.
When Ohio entered him as her favor
lite SON. so little account was taken o.
him that other candidates permitted tn,
convention to go to his state, this re
peating the mistake of the unsuspectins
politicians who let the convention of 1856
go to Lincolns state. Here is anothe
parallel: a majority of the delegate
when they arrived in Cincinnati in 1877
were for Blaine, just as majority wen
to Chicago favorable to Seward. An,
Blaine lost the nomination, precisely a
Seward lost it at Chicago, by an adjourn
ment over night. If the ballot had beel
taken, as it properly should have beer
while the convention wac aglow from tn
| eloouence of Robert Ingersoll's tribut
: to the 'Plumed Knight the conventio
. would have been swept off its feet for tn
. Man from Maine" How many me
: have missed the presidential nominatio
S by just such a mischance!
f When the balloting came the next day
n Hayes remained fourth and fifth throug
four ballots. He was nominated on tn
n seventh ballot only when the field wa
r forced to combine upon some one in or
t.. | der to beat Blaine, who had risen t
It within 80 votes of victory.
t Amid all the confusion and intriguin
= the convention followed the cold logi
of the situation. The republican part
S was sadly divided by factions and sac
S ly discredited by scandals.
I. Hayes had no part in any of the quar-
e quarreIs and to responsibility for the col