Review Of Samuel Tilden: The Real 19th President Elected By The People's Vote

Samuel Tilden: The Real 19th President Elected by the People’s Vote was written by Nikki Oldaker with John Bigelow. The book was published by Show Biz East Productions in the United States in 2006 and it contains 288 pages explaining how Samuel Jones Tilden lost the 1876 presidential election. Author and historian Nikki Oldaker endeavors to convince readers that managing editor of the New York Times John Reid flipped the results of the 1876 presidential election to make the Republican candidate Rutherford Birchard Hayes the winner instead of the Democratic candidate Samuel Tilden. In this essay, I will argue that Nikki Oldaker successfully proves that Samuel Tilden was robbed of a rightful victory in the 1876 election. Since the book was

He wants to disqualify a Republican elector who holds the postmaster position, Mr. Watts. As expected, the electors accuse Grover of rigging the election for replacing Mr. Watts with a Democrat, but the Governor denies the allegation, points to the U.S. Constitution, which states that a person holding an office in the United States shall not be appointed as elector, and retains the right to replace Mr. Watts with the next eligible candidate who happens to be a Democrat. In retaliation, the Republican electors in Oregon accuse the Governor of accepting a bribe from Tilden’s nephew in exchange for giving the votes to Tilden and they send duplicate electoral certificates to make it seem like the Governor substituted all three of the Republican electors for Democrat

The biography, The Life of Samuel J. Tilden, was found in the Proposed Tilden Trust Library. Oldaker’s book is certainly a well-researched account of the election from Samuel Tilden and the Democrats’ perspective. However, if she had used sources written by Hayes, John Reid, Zachariah Chandler, or other Republicans, then the story would have been different. There are noticeable biases for Samuel Tilden throughout the book, especially with how conniving Oldaker made the Republicans seem and how she emphasized that the flip was the work of John Reid. While he had a hand in the scheme, one cannot say he turned the tide single-handedly. I disagree with Oldaker that were it not for John Reid then this controversy would not have occurred. Since this election was still in the next few years after the Civil War and during Reconstruction, we know that this was a tumultuous period of history. The Republicans likely would have protested the election even if John Reid had not printed his “Doubtful Election” headline. Nevertheless, I am convinced that Tilden was robbed of the presidency as the final say came down to twenty disputed votes even though he had more popular