U.S. presidential election, 1876

[A18]

EDIT: No hindsight.

The election of 1876 pitted Samuel Tilden of the Democratic Party against Republican Rutherford Hayes.

Backers of Tilden focused their attacks on the corruption of the Grant administration. Hayes supporters labeled Democrats the party of treason and rebellion.

The Republican platform committed the party to "permanent pacification" of the South, continued sound-money policy, and civil service reform. It opposed federal aid to Catholic or other sectarian schools and land grants to railroads or other corporations. The platform also called for a congressional investigation into the effects of Oriental immigration "upon the moral and material interest of the country," and vowed to eradicate polygamy in Utah.

The Democratic platform, in turn, called for an end to "the rapacity of carpet-bag tyrannies" in the South. The platform also promised treaty protection for naturalized U.S. citizens visiting their homeland, restrictions on Oriental immigration, and tariff reform. It opposed land grants to railroads.