* * * * *
_The Administration of President Hayes._ BY JOHN W. BURGESS. Charles
Scribner's Sons, New York, 1916. Pp. 154.
These lectures, the author says, give in bare outline a description of
the administration of President Hayes. For various reasons his
administration has not received extended treatment by the students of
American History. Professor Burgess seeks to show that Hayes was one
of the greatest executives in the history of our nation, and that
wrongfully "the manner of his election has been used to depreciate his
service." He says: "As time goes on, however, and as the partisan
hatreds which are clustered around the election are lost from view,
his work looms larger and ever larger."
At the present time when there is such uncertainty in the election of
President and reference is made to that one of 1876, many are
repeating the contention that a partisan vote of the Electoral
Commission unconstitutionally made Hayes President. The author very
clearly points out that no president was more entitled to his office
on constitutional grounds than Rutherford B. Hayes. Contrary to the
assertion that eight Republican members of the Electoral Commission
voted on partisan grounds, Professor Burgess says that it was they who
stood squarely on the constitution and the seven Democratic members of
that commission voted purely on party lines. The Democrats had neither
"a leg nor a peg to stand upon in any one of the cases" of Oregon,
Louisiana, Florida or South Carolina. The Electoral Commission in each
case went back of the returns and accepted those certified by the
officials of the State, who had been in conformity with the
Constitution of the United States duly qualified to make them.
These lectures review the important problems of Hayes's
administration. Among these problems growing out of the Civil War was
the increasing aggression of the legislative branch of the federal
government. Beginning with the Reconstruction Period the government
was more and more becoming a parliamentary one. Hayes was determined
to reestablish it on its constitutional foundations. When he came into
power the lower house was in control of the Democrats and it was they
who were determined to usurp executive power. Riders were placed on
appropriation bills and efforts were made to force the President to
assent to laws which would eliminate the Federal Government from all
interference with the affairs of the Southern States. Notwithstanding
the fact that they forced an extra session of Congress when both
branches were Democratic, Hayes stood firm and in a long fight curbed
the aggression of the legislative branch. Among other great
achievements of his administration the author points out the reform of
the currency, improvements in civil service, and the adoption of a
wise policy in the treatment of the Indians.
The withdrawal of the troops from the defence of the Republican
governments in the South, President Hayes thought was necessary that
strife might cease and that those best fitted to rule should take
charge of their home affairs. The author considers this to be one of
the greatest acts of statesmanship that any president ever performed.
The old charge that this was a result of a deal between Southern
Democrats who were peacefully to permit Hayes to become President in
return for relieving them of military rule, he terms an invention of
the politicians and radical friends of the Negro. He maintains that
before Hayes ever became a candidate for the presidency it was well
known that he held such views favorable to the South.
The reader should bear in mind here that this theory of Mr. Burgess is
in keeping with his radical position that the Negro being inferior and
unfit for citizenship he should have been left at the mercy of the
white man who wanted to enslave him. Here as in all of Mr. Burgess's
Reconstruction discussions he sees only one side of the question. The
white man should be supreme and the Negro should merely have freedom
of body with no guarantee that even this would not be of doubtful
tenure. Reconstruction studies will always be valueless as long as
they are prosecuted by men of biased minds.