Running Men of the 19th Century Quiz

Answer: Andrew Jackson

In the election of 1824, Andrew Jackson received over 150,000 popular votes to John Quincy Adams' 108,000+ vote, receiving 99 electoral votes to Adams' 84. Problem was, William Crawford received 41 electoral votes and Henry Clay received 37, thus denying Jackson a majority. According to the 12th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, added in 1804 after the problematic election of 1800, when no candidate received a majority of ALL electoral votes cast, the election then goes to the House of Representatives, from which they choose amongst the three highest vote getters. With Clay having been eliminated and Crawford having recently suffered a debilitating stroke, it was basically a two-man contest. Jackson believed that, since he was from the West (Tennessee being the western edge of the U.S. at that time), he would have the advantage of garnering the support of those who had backed Clay.

Henry, however, had more in common, philosophically speaking, with John Quincy than "Old Hickory" and urged his supporters to vote for Adams.

The final vote, taken on 9 Feb. 1825, saw Adams receiving 13 votes, Jackson 7, and Crawford 4. It has been long believed that Clay and Adams had struck a deal, whereby Clay was named secretary of state in return for his support. Although this was never proven, the charge dogged Clay for the rest of his career.

Answer: Alabama

In the election of 1876, the Democratic nominee, Gov. Samuel Tilden of New York, won the popular vote by roughly 250,000 votes over the Republican nominee, Gov. Rutherford B. Hayes of Ohio. Tilden carried the states of New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Indiana, and the South. That was until Gen. Dan Sickles and his wooden leg walked into Republican headquarters and saw that the results in four states (Florida, Louisiana, South Carolina and Oregon) were extremely close. Without these states, Tilden would have only 184 electoral votes, one shy of election (sound familiar?) In the ensuing weeks, confusion and corruption reigned supreme, as 2 sets of electoral returns, one by Democrats and one by republicans, were sent in for each of the four states. According to the Constitution, the President of the Senate, in the presence of both houses of Congress, was to open the certificates and count the votes.

But as to which results from these four states should be counted, the Constitution was silent. If the republican majority in the Senate pushed for the republican results, then Hayes would win. If the Democratic majority in the House pushed for the Democratic votes, then Tilden's new address was 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. To resolve the issue, it was decided that an electoral commission, consisting of five members of the House (3 Democrats, 2 Republicans), five members of the Senate (3 Republicans, 2 Democrats) and five justices from the U.S. Supreme Court. Four of them were named in the bill, two Democrats and 2 Republicans.

The fifth justice was to be an independent, David Davis, thereby making his vote the deciding one. However, Davis had been elected to the Senate by the Illinois state legislature, and withdrew his name. He was replaced by Joseph Bradley, a Republican. The result was a straight party-line vote of 8-7 to certifyGrover Cleveland won the popular vote in the elections of 1884, 1888 and 1892 the Republican results, thereby giving Hayes the electoral advantage, 185-184.

Answer: True

The first president to serve two non-consecutive terms in the White House, Cleveland won the elections of 1884 and 1892, but lost the election of 1888 to Republican candidate Benjamin Harrison, even though he won the popular vote by almost 100,000. Harrison carried the key states of Indiana (Harrison's home state) and New York (Cleveland's home state) to clinch the electoral vote, 233-168.

In 1892, Cleveland came back to decisively win both the popular and electoral votes. Cleveland's feat made him the second man to win the popular vote in three presidential elections, Andrew Jackson being the first (1824, 1828, 1832).

Answer: 1836

During the first four elections (1788, 1792, 1796, 1800) the person receiving the second-most votes was declared vice-president. After the debacle of 1800, when Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr tied and sent things into the House of Representatives, the Constitution was amended so that states voted for one person for president and one person for vice president.

As no vice presidential candidate received a majority of votes in 1836, the election was tossed into the Senate, where Richard Johnson, who was the Democratic nominee for vice president, was elected by a vote of 33-16. Beginning with the election of 1872, the electors generally cast their vice-presidential votes for the running mate of the presidential candidate that they cast their votes for.

Answer: New Hampshire

The popular story is that the vote for John Quincy Adams was cast so that George Washington would be the only president unanimously elected. In reality, elector William Plummer felt that Monroe just hadn't done a good job and didn't deserve to be re-elected. Three voters abstained from voting for any candidate.

Answer: 1852 & 1880

The 1852 election featured two veterans of the U.S. Army in the Mexican-American War, Gen. Winfield Scott, the Whig candidate, who commanded the southern U.S. Army (Zachary Taylor commanded the northern forces) and Franklin Pierce, the Democratic candidate, who rose from the rank of colonel to brigadier general of volunteers, serving underneath Scott in the war. The election of 1880 saw two former Union commanders going head to head, Republican congressman James Garfield and Democratic candidate Gen. Winfield Hancock. Garfield rose to the rank of major general in Don Carlos Buell's Army of the Ohio, commanding troops at Shiloh and seeing action at Chickamauga. He resigned in 1863 when Ohio voters elected him to the House of Representatives. Hancock also rose to the rank of major general, and participated in many of the great battles of the Army of the Potomac, including Fredericksburg and Gettysburg, where, after the death of Gen. John Reynolds, he was given command of the Union forces until Gen. George Meade arrived.

The Mexican-American War produced seven major party presidential candidates (Pierce; Scott; Hancock; Zachary Taylor, 1848; John Fremont, 1856; George McClellan, 1864; U.S. Grant, 1868-1872;), as did the Civil War (McClellan; Hancock; Garfield; Rutherford Hayes, 1876; Benjamin Harrison, 1888, 1892; William McKinley, 1896). Bringing up the rear is the War of 1812 (Taylor; Scott; William Henry Harrison, 1836, 1840; Andrew Jackson, 1824, 1828, 1832) with four vets and the Revolutionary War (Jackson; James Monroe, 1816, 1820) with two. All of the aforementioned candidates attained the rank of general, save for McKinley, who rose from a volunteer private to major in the Civil War, serving in the same regiment as Hayes, and Monroe, who rose to the rank of colonel and participated in Washington's crossing of the Delaware and was severely wounded in the attack on Hessian troops in Trenton, NJ, in December, 1776

Answer: False

On the contrary, Pierce very much did want the nomination, but was thwarted by such things as the furor over the Ostend Manifesto and the Kansas-Nebraska Act, and the filibuster activities in South America of William Walker, all of which had divided the country against one another, but united them against Pierce. James Buchanan, who had been secretary of state under James Polk, and, as minister to France and Great Britain, had been one of the major players in the Ostend Manifesto, was nominated as the standard bearer for the Democratic Party.

Answer: 9

Thomas Jefferson (1789-94, under Washington), James Madison (1801-09, under Jefferson), James Monroe (1811-1817, under Madison), John Quincy Adams (1817-1825, under Monroe), Henry Clay (1825-29, under Adams), Martin Van Buren (1829-31, under Jackson), James Buchanan (1845-49, under Polk), Lewis Cass (1857-60, under Buchanan), and James Blaine (March 1881-Dec. 1881, under Garfield and Arthur; 1889-1892, under Benjamin Harrison). True, Daniel Webster did helm the State Department, but his first stint as secretary didn't begin until 1841, AFTER he had been a Whig nominee in 1836.

Answer: 2

Martin Van Buren was the presidential candidate for the Free Soil ticket in 1848, and Millard Fillmore was the choice of the American Party, better known as the "Know-Nothings," in 1856, and managed to pull in eight electoral votes.

Answer: John Adams and Charles Pinckney

Adams garnered 65 votes, while Pinckney captured 64. John Jay finished a distant 5th, with only one vote. In the House vote, Hamilton, who saw Jefferson as the lesser of two evils, used his influence in Congress to swing the vote away from Burr.