Prefatory Note

The election of General Grant to the Presidency by the people of the United States was another instance illustrating the gratitude of a republic to a successful soldier. But for the great civil war no one supposes he would ever have been elevated to this exalted post. His services in that heroic struggle were such as to win the highest encomiums from his countrymen, and naturally at the first opportunity after the closing of the war when a Chief Executive was to be chosen they turned their eyes to the most conspicuous figure in that war and made him President of the United States. This volume, the seventh of the series, comprises his eight years and the four years of his successor, Mr. Hayes. During this period of twelve years—that is, from March 4, 1869, to March 4, 1881— the legislation for the restoration of the Southern States to their original positions in the Union was enacted, the reunion of the States was perfected, and all sections of the land again given full and free representation in Congress. Much of the bitterness engendered by the war, and which had been left alive at its closing, and which was not diminished to any appreciable extent during President Johnson's term, was largely assuaged during President Grant's Administration, and under that of President Hayes was further softened and almost entirely dissipated.

It will be seen that President Grant in his papers dwelt especially upon the duty of paying the national debt in gold and returning to specie payments; that he urged upon Congress a proposition to annex Santo Domingo; that during his Administration the "Quaker Peace Commission" was appointed to deal with the Indians, the fifteenth amendment to the Constitution of the United States was proclaimed, the treaty of Washington was negotiated, and, with a subsequent arbitration at Geneva, a settlement was provided of the difficulties relating to the Alabama claims and the fisheries; that in 1870 and frequently afterwards he urged upon Congress the need of reform in the civil service.

His appeals secured the passage of the law of March 3, 1871, under which he appointed a civil service commission. This commission framed rules, which were approved by the President. They provided for open competitive examination, and went into effect January 1, 1872; and out of these grew the present civil-service rules. One of his most important papers was the message vetoing the "inflation bill."

The closing months of his public life covered the stormy and exciting period following the Presidential election of 1876, when the result as between Mr. Tilden and Mr. Hayes was so long in doubt. There is very little, however, in any Presidential paper of that period to indicate the great peril to the country and the severe strain to which our institutions were subjected in that memorable contest.

The Administration of Mr. Hayes, though it began amid exciting scenes and an unprecedented situation which threatened disasters, was rather marked by moderation and a sympathy with what he considered true reform. Some of his vetoes are highly interesting, and indicate independence of character and that he was not always controlled by mere party politics. One of the most famous and best remembered of his messages is that vetoing the Bland-Allison Act, which restored the legal-tender quality to the silver doliar and provided for its limited coinage.

Other papers of interest are his message recommending the resumption of specie payments; vetoes of a bill to restrict Chinese immigration, of an Army appropriation bill, of a legislative, executive, and judicial appropriation bill, and of the act known as the "funding act of 1881." It was during Mr. Hayes's Administration, when the Forty-fifth Congress met in extraordinary session on March 18, 1879, that for the first time since the Congress that was chosen with Mr. Buchanan in 1856 the Democratic party was in control of both Houses.

JAMES D. RICHARDSON,

FEBRUARY 22, 1898.

1

NOTE.

The pages of "The Messages and Papers of the Presidents" have been renumbered from page one to the end, and the division into volumes has been altered. This plan is required by the addition of new matter and the desirability of keeping the volumes as nearly uniform in size as possible.

October 1, 1909.

Chester A. Arthur

September 19, 1881, to March 4, 1885

SEE VOLUME XI.

Volume eleven is not only an index to the other volumes, not only a key that unlocks the treasures of the entire publication, but it is in itself an alphabetically arranged brief history or story of the great controlling events constituting the History of the United States.

Under its proper alphabetical classification the story is told of every great subject referred to by any of the Presidents in their official Messages, and at the end of each story the official utterances of the Presidents themselves are cited upon the subject, so that you may readily turn to the page in the body of the work itself for this original information.

Next to the possession of knowledge is the ability to turn at will to where knowledge is to be found.