page_title: Chester A. Arthur
section_title: Election of 1880
hierarchical_section_title: Chester A. Arthur / Election of 1880
caption_attribution_description: English: Grand national Republican banner 1880.
context_page_description: Chester Alan Arthur was an American attorney and politician who served as the 21st president of the United States from 1881 to 1885. Previously the 20th vice president, he succeeded to the presidency upon the death of President James A. Garfield in September 1881, two months after Garfield was shot by an assassin.
  Arthur was born in Fairfield, Vermont, grew up in upstate New York, and practiced law in New York City. He served as quartermaster general of the New York Militia during the American Civil War. Following the war, he devoted more time to New York Republican politics and quickly rose in Senator Roscoe Conkling's political organization. President Ulysses S. Grant appointed him to the post of Collector of the Port of New York in 1871, and he was an important supporter of Conkling and the Stalwart faction of the Republican Party. In 1878, President Rutherford B. Hayes fired Arthur as part of a plan to reform the federal patronage system in New York. Garfield won the Republican nomination for president in 1880, and Arthur was nominated for vice president to balance the ticket as an Eastern Stalwart.
context_section_description: Conkling and his fellow Stalwarts, including Arthur, wished to follow up their 1879 success at the 1880 Republican National Convention by securing the nomination for their ally, ex-President Grant. Their opponents in the Republican party, known as Half-Breeds, concentrated their efforts on James G. Blaine, a Senator from Maine who was more amenable to civil service reform. Neither candidate commanded a majority of delegates and, deadlocked after thirty-six ballots, the convention turned to a dark horse, James A. Garfield, an Ohio Congressman and Civil War general who was neither Stalwart nor Half-Breed.
  Garfield and his supporters knew they would face a difficult election without the support of the New York Stalwarts and decided to offer one of them the vice presidential nomination. Levi P. Morton, the first choice of Garfield's supporters, consulted with Conkling, who advised him to decline, which he did. They next approached Arthur, and Conkling advised him to also reject the nomination, believing the Republicans would lose. Arthur thought otherwise and accepted. According to a purported eyewitness account by journalist William C. Hudson, Conkling and Arthur argued, with Arthur telling Conkling, "The office of the Vice-President is a greater honor than I ever dreamed of attaining." Conkling eventually relented, and campaigned for the ticket.
  As expected, the election was close. The Democratic nominee, General Winfield Scott Hancock, was popular and, having avoided taking definitive positions on most issues of the day, he had not offended any pivotal constituencies. As Republicans had done since the end of the Civil War, Garfield and Arthur initially focused their campaign on the "bloody shirt"—the idea that returning Democrats to office would undo the victory of the Civil War and reward secessionists.
  With the war fifteen years in the past and Union generals at the head of both tickets, the tactic was less effective than the Republicans hoped. Realizing this, they adjusted their approach to claim that Democrats would lower the country's protective tariff, which would allow cheaper manufactured goods to be imported from Europe, and thereby put thousands out of work. This argument struck home in the swing states of New York and Indiana, where many were employed in manufacturing. Hancock did not help his own cause when, in an attempt to remain neutral on the tariff, he said that "[t]he tariff question is a local question", which only made him appear uninformed about an important issue. Candidates for high office did not personally campaign in those days, but as state Republican chairman, Arthur played a part in the campaign in his usual fashion: overseeing the effort in New York and raising money. The funds were crucial in the close election, and winning his home state of New York was critical. The Republicans carried New York by 20,000 votes and, in an election with the largest turnout of qualified voters ever recorded—78.4%—they won the nationwide popular vote by just 7,018 votes. The Electoral College result was more decisive—214 to 155—and Garfield and Arthur were elected.
caption: Garfield–Arthur campaign poster
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