Historical Picture of the Day- The Disputed Election of 1876.

        The second "Historical picture of the Day" for today is the inauguration of President Rutherford B. Hayes on the east portico of the Executive Mansion, after the disputed election of 1876. We are nearing the presidential elections here in the United States, and I wanted to elaborate on the historical election of 1876, and how it relates to our modern sense of politics. Republicans and Democrats loathed, and fought bitterly against one another then, just as they do now. The election of 1876 was a backroom deal, in a sense, between Democrats and Republicans vying for political power. As the returns came in, it looked as though South Carolina, Florida and Louisiana were the only states still with Reconstruction/Republican governments still in place; and, the popular vote was won by the Democrat presidential candidate Samuel J. Tilden. However, these three southern states held key Electoral College votes that could tip the election to one side or the other. As a result, a deal was made, whereby Democrats agreed to accede to Republican victory, if the Republicans agreed to end Reconstruction and withdraw Federal troops in the south. So as we near this epic election in 2016, keep in mind that politics is politics, just as they were in the 19th century, respectively.