Orange Township had been in the Western Reserve until 1800, and like many who settled there, Garfield's ancestors were from New England, his ancestor Edward Garfield immigrating from Hillmorton, Warwickshire, England, to Massachusetts around 1630.
James Abram Garfield (November 19, 1831September 19, 1881) was the 20th president of the United States, serving from March to September 1881.
Guiteau was executed for Garfield's murder in June 1882. ==Childhood and early life== Garfield was born the youngest of five children on November 19, 1831, in a log cabin in Orange Township, now Moreland Hills, Ohio.
James was named for an older brother who died in infancy. In early 1833, Abram and Eliza Garfield joined the Church of Christ, a decision that shaped their youngest son's life.
Eliza Garfield remarried in 1842, but soon left her second husband, Warren Belden (or Alfred Belden), and a then scandalous divorce was awarded in 1850.
He left home at age 16 in 1847.
Accordingly, in 1848, he began at Geauga Seminary, in nearby Chester Township, Geauga County, Ohio.
a precious 17 years when a boy with a father and some wealth might have become fixed in manly ways." ==Education, marriage and early career== At Geauga Academy, which he attended from 1848 to 1850, Garfield learned academic subjects for which he had not previously had time.
Eliza Garfield remarried in 1842, but soon left her second husband, Warren Belden (or Alfred Belden), and a then scandalous divorce was awarded in 1850.
a precious 17 years when a boy with a father and some wealth might have become fixed in manly ways." ==Education, marriage and early career== At Geauga Academy, which he attended from 1848 to 1850, Garfield learned academic subjects for which he had not previously had time.
Garfield had attended church more to please his mother than to worship God, but in his late teens underwent a religious awakening, and attended many camp meetings, at one of which he was born again on March 4, 1850, baptized into Christ by being submerged in the icy waters of the Chagrin River. After leaving Geauga, Garfield worked for a year at various jobs, including teaching.
Mathematics historian William Dunham wrote that Garfield's trapezoid work was "really a very clever proof". After his conversion experience in 1850, religious inquiry was a high priority for Garfield.
From 1851 to 1854, he attended the Western Reserve Eclectic Institute (later named Hiram College) in Hiram, Ohio, a school run by the Disciples.
From 1851 to 1854, he attended the Western Reserve Eclectic Institute (later named Hiram College) in Hiram, Ohio, a school run by the Disciples.
By 1854, Garfield had learned all the Institute could teach him and was a full-time teacher.
Arthur. Garfield graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Williams in August 1856 as salutatorian, giving an address at the commencement.
After graduating from Williams College, Garfield studied law and became an attorney before entering politics as a Republican in 1857.
He returned to Hiram to teach at the Institute, and in 1857 was made its president.
In 1858, he married Lucretia; they had seven children, five of whom survived infancy.
He served as a member of the Ohio State Senate from 1859 to 1861.
stemmed from his prosecution in 1859 of a newspaper editor who had assisted two runaway slaves." Because Matthews was "a professed abolitionist at the time, the case was later framed as political expediency triumphing over moral principle." Matthews served on the Court until his death in 1889. ===Reforms=== Grant and Hayes had both advocated civil service reform, and by 1881 civil service reform associations had organized with renewed energy across the nation.
He served as a member of the Ohio State Senate from 1859 to 1861.
He was admitted to the bar in 1861. Local Republican leaders invited Garfield to enter politics upon the death of Cyrus Prentiss, the presumptive nominee for the local state senate seat.
He was nominated at the party convention on the sixth ballot, and was elected, serving until 1861.
In April 1861, the rebels bombarded Fort Sumter, one of the South's last federal outposts, beginning the Civil War.
Following a trip to Illinois to purchase muskets, Garfield returned to Ohio and, in August 1861, received a commission as a colonel in the 42nd Ohio Infantry regiment.
He was first elected to Congress in 1862 to represent Ohio's 19th district.
The march was uneventful until Union forces reached Paintsville, Kentucky, on January 6, 1862, where Garfield's cavalry engaged the rebels at Jenny's Creek.
They attacked the rebel positions on January 9, 1862, in the Battle of Middle Creek, the only pitched battle Garfield personally commanded.
Following a brief skirmish at Pound Gap, the last rebel units in the area were outflanked and retreated to Virginia. Garfield's promotion gave him command of the 20th Brigade of the Army of the Ohio, which was ordered in early 1862 to join Major General Ulysses S.
The trial lasted almost two months, from November 1862 to January 1863, and by its end, Garfield had procured an assignment as Chief of Staff to Major General William S.
According to historian Jean Edward Smith, Grant and Garfield had a "guarded relationship", since Grant promoted Thomas, rather than Garfield, to command of the Army of the Cumberland after Rosecrans's dismissal. ==Congressional career== ===Election in 1862; Civil War years=== While serving in the Army in early 1862, Garfield was approached by friends about running for Congress from Ohio's newly redrawn, heavily Republican 19th district.
Home on medical leave, he refused to campaign for the nomination, leaving that to political managers who secured it at the local convention in September 1862 on the eighth ballot.
The trial lasted almost two months, from November 1862 to January 1863, and by its end, Garfield had procured an assignment as Chief of Staff to Major General William S.
After a council of war and lengthy deliberations, Rosecrans agreed to attack. At the ensuing Battle of Chickamauga on September 19 and 20, 1863, confusion among the wing commanders over Rosecrans's orders created a gap in the lines, resulting in a rout of the right flank.
The fact that the new Congress would not hold its first regular session until December 1863 allowed him to continue his war service for a time.
Once he took his seat in December 1863, Garfield was frustrated that Lincoln seemed reluctant to press the South hard.
By then, Chase had left the Cabinet and had been appointed Chief Justice, and his relations with Garfield became more distant. Garfield took up the practice of law in 1865 as a means to improve his personal finances.
President Johnson sought the rapid restoration of the Southern states during the months between his accession and the meeting of Congress in December 1865; Garfield hesitantly supported this policy as an experiment.
In 1865, he was placed on the House Ways and Means Committee, a long-awaited opportunity to focus on financial and economic issues.
Garfield foresaw conflict even before February 1866, when Johnson vetoed a bill to extend the life of the Freedmen's Bureau, charged with aiding the former slaves.
By April, Garfield had concluded that Johnson was either "crazy or drunk with opium". The conflict between the branches of government was the major issue of the 1866 campaign, with Johnson taking to the campaign trail in a Swing Around the Circle and Garfield facing opposition within his party in his home district.
Garfield, having overcome his challengers at his district nominating convention, was easily reelected. Garfield opposed the initial talk of impeaching Johnson when Congress convened in December 1866, but supported legislation to limit Johnson's powers, such as the Tenure of Office Act, which restricted Johnson in removing presidential appointees.
Senate. ===Legal career and other activities=== Garfield was one of three attorneys who argued for the petitioners in the landmark Supreme Court case Ex parte Milligan in 1866.
In February 1866, Garfield and Ohio School Commissioner Emerson Edward White drafted a bill for the National Department of Education.
This break with his party likely cost him his place on the Ways and Means Committee in 1867, and though Republicans held the majority in the House until 1875, Garfield remained off that committee.
Testifying before the committee in January, Ames said he had offered Garfield ten shares of stock at par value, but that Garfield had never taken them or paid for them, though a year passed, from 1867 to 1868, before Garfield had finally refused.
Due to a court case, he was absent on the day in April 1868 when the House impeached Johnson, but soon gave a speech aligning himself with Thaddeus Stevens and others who sought Johnson's removal.
Grant succeeded Johnson in 1869, Garfield had moved away from the remaining radicals (Stevens, their leader, had died in 1868).
Testifying before the committee in January, Ames said he had offered Garfield ten shares of stock at par value, but that Garfield had never taken them or paid for them, though a year passed, from 1867 to 1868, before Garfield had finally refused.
Grant succeeded Johnson in 1869, Garfield had moved away from the remaining radicals (Stevens, their leader, had died in 1868).
Garfield said, "I would say Grant was not fit to be nominated and Greeley is not fit to be elected." Both Grant and Garfield were overwhelmingly reelected. ===Crédit Mobilier scandal; Salary Grab=== The Crédit Mobilier of America scandal involved corruption in the financing of the Union Pacific Railroad, part of the transcontinental railroad which was completed in 1869.
He hailed the ratification of the 15th Amendment in 1870 as a triumph, and he favored Georgia's readmission to the Union as a matter of right, not politics.
Part of the reason he was denied a place on Ways and Means was the opposition of the influential Republican editor Horace Greeley. In September 1870, Garfield, then chairman of the House Banking Committee, led an investigation into the Black Friday Gold Panic scandal.
Waite. In 1871, Garfield traveled to Montana Territory to negotiate the removal of the Bitterroot Salish tribe to the Flathead Indian Reservation.
Garfield blamed the easy availability of fiat money greenbacks for financing the speculation that led to the scandal. Garfield was not at all enthused about President Grant's reelection in 1872—until Greeley, who emerged as the candidate of the Democrats and Liberal Republicans, became the only serious alternative.
He offered some of his colleagues the opportunity to buy Crédit Mobilier stock at par value, well below what it sold for on the market, and the railroad got its additional appropriations. The story broke in July 1872, in the middle of the presidential campaign.
Garfield had said in September 1872 that Ames had offered him stock but he had repeatedly refused it.
Appearing before the committee on January 14, 1873, Garfield confirmed much of this.
Garfield was responsible, as Appropriations Committee chairman, for shepherding the legislative appropriations bill through the House; during the debate in February 1873, Massachusetts Representative Benjamin Butler offered the increase as an amendment, and despite Garfield's opposition, it passed the House and eventually became law.
In 1873, after the death of Chase, Garfield appealed to Grant to appoint Justice Noah H.
With many of his leadership rivals defeated in the 1874 Democratic landslide, and Blaine elected to the Senate, Garfield was seen as the Republican floor leader and the likely Speaker should the party regain control of the chamber. Garfield thought the land grants given to expanding railroads was an unjust practice.
This break with his party likely cost him his place on the Ways and Means Committee in 1867, and though Republicans held the majority in the House until 1875, Garfield remained off that committee.
In a bad year for Republicans, who lost control of the House for the first time since the Civil War, Garfield had his closest congressional election, winning with only 57% of the vote. ===Minority leader; Hayes administration=== With the Democratic takeover of the House of Representatives in 1875, Garfield lost his chairmanship of the Appropriations Committee.
He especially wished to eliminate the common practice whereby government workers, in exchange for their positions, were forced to kick back a percentage of their wages as political contributions. As the 1876 presidential election approached, Garfield was loyal to the candidacy of Senator Blaine, and fought for the former Speaker's nomination at the 1876 Republican National Convention in Cincinnati.
Garfield never convinced Charlo to sign, although the official treaty document voted on by Congress bore his forged mark. In 1876, Garfield displayed his mathematical talent when he developed a trapezoid proof of the Pythagorean theorem.
Blaine sent word to Vice President Arthur in New York City, who received threats against his life because of his animosity toward Garfield and Guiteau's statements. Although Joseph Lister's pioneering work in antisepsis was known to American doctors, with Lister himself having visited America in 1876, few of them had confidence in it, and none of his advocates were among Garfield's treating physicians.
He initially agreed with Radical Republican views on Reconstruction, but later favored a moderate approach to civil rights enforcement for freedmen. At the 1880 Republican National Convention, delegates chose Garfield, who had not sought the White House, as a compromise presidential nominee on the 36th ballot.
In the 1880 presidential election, he conducted a low-key front porch campaign and narrowly defeated Democrat Winfield Scott Hancock.
James took his mother's side and when Belden died in 1880, noted it in his diary with satisfaction.
This labor was used to good effect by Horatio Alger, who wrote Garfield's campaign biography in 1880. After six weeks, illness forced Garfield to return home and, during his recuperation, his mother and a local education official got him to promise to postpone his return to the canals for a year and go to school.
Garfield was elected to the Senate by the General Assembly in January 1880, though his term was not scheduled to commence until March 4, 1881.
The intensity of Garfield's religious thought was also shaped in part by his experience in combat and his interaction with voters. ==Presidential election of 1880== ===Republican nomination=== Having just been elected to the Senate with Sherman's support, Garfield entered the 1880 campaign season committed to Sherman as his choice for the Republican presidential nominee.
To Blaine's chagrin, the victorious Garfield returned to his goal of balancing the interests of party factions, and nominated a number of Conkling's Stalwart friends to offices. ===Supreme Court nomination=== In 1880, President Hayes had nominated Stanley Matthews to the Supreme Court of the United States.
In April 1880, there had been a congressional investigation into corruption in the Post Office Department, in which profiteering rings allegedly stole millions of dollars, securing bogus mail contracts on star routes.
Guiteau had followed various professions in his life, but in 1880 had determined to gain federal office by supporting what he expected would be the winning Republican ticket.
Several of his doctors inserted their unsterilized fingers into the wound to probe for the bullet, a common practice in the 1880s.
Peskin noted that, "In mourning Garfield, Americans were not only honoring a president; they were paying tribute to a man whose life story embodied their own most cherished aspirations." As the rivalry between Stalwarts and Half-Breeds faded from the scene in the late 1880s and after, so too did memories of Garfield.
James Abram Garfield (November 19, 1831September 19, 1881) was the 20th president of the United States, serving from March to September 1881.
Arthur, as the Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act. On July 2, 1881, Charles J.
The wound was not immediately fatal, but he died on September 19, 1881, from infections caused by his doctors.
Garfield was elected to the Senate by the General Assembly in January 1880, though his term was not scheduled to commence until March 4, 1881.
In March 1881, Garfield re-nominated Matthews to the Supreme Court.
stemmed from his prosecution in 1859 of a newspaper editor who had assisted two runaway slaves." Because Matthews was "a professed abolitionist at the time, the case was later framed as political expediency triumphing over moral principle." Matthews served on the Court until his death in 1889. ===Reforms=== Grant and Hayes had both advocated civil service reform, and by 1881 civil service reform associations had organized with renewed energy across the nation.
Blaine favored a resolution that would not result in Peru yielding any territory, but Chile, which by 1881 had occupied the Peruvian capital, Lima, rejected any settlement that restored the previous status quo.
Guiteau knew Garfield would leave Washington for a cooler climate on July 2, 1881, and made plans to kill him before then.
Pappas and Joharifard say this caused the septic decline in Garfield's condition that was visible starting from July 23, 1881. Guiteau was indicted on October 14, 1881, for the murder of the president.
More than 70,000 citizens, some waiting over three hours, passed by Garfield's coffin as his body lay in state at the United States Capitol rotunda; later, on September 25, 1881, in Cleveland, more than 150,000—a number equal to the entire population of that city—likewise paid their respects.
Guiteau was executed for Garfield's murder in June 1882. ==Childhood and early life== Garfield was born the youngest of five children on November 19, 1831, in a log cabin in Orange Township, now Moreland Hills, Ohio.
After two "star route" ring trials in 1882 and 1883, the jury found Brady not guilty. ===Civil rights and education=== Garfield believed the key to improving the state of African American civil rights would be found in education aided by the federal government.
Garfield authorized Blaine to call for a Pan-American conference in 1882 to mediate disputes among the Latin American nations and to serve as a forum for talks on increasing trade.
Nine countries had accepted invitations to the Pan-American conference, but the invitations were withdrawn in April 1882 after Blaine resigned from the cabinet and Arthur, Garfield's successor, cancelled the conference.
Garfield, and not me." In a chaotic trial in which Guiteau often interrupted and argued, and in which his counsel used the insanity defense, the jury found him guilty on January 5, 1882, and he was sentenced to death by hanging.
He was executed on June 30, 1882. ==Funeral, memorials and commemorations== Garfield's funeral train left Long Branch on the same special track that had brought him there, traveling over tracks blanketed with flowers and past houses adorned with flags.
On April 10, 1882, seven months after Garfield's death, the U.S.
He also proposed substantial civil service reforms, which were passed by Congress in 1883 and signed into law by his successor, Chester A.
After two "star route" ring trials in 1882 and 1883, the jury found Brady not guilty. ===Civil rights and education=== Garfield believed the key to improving the state of African American civil rights would be found in education aided by the federal government.
Pendleton, a Democrat from Ohio, launched a reform effort that resulted in the Pendleton Act in January 1883.
In 1884, sculptor Frank Happersberger completed a monument on the grounds of the San Francisco Conservatory of Flowers.
In 1887, the James A.
stemmed from his prosecution in 1859 of a newspaper editor who had assisted two runaway slaves." Because Matthews was "a professed abolitionist at the time, the case was later framed as political expediency triumphing over moral principle." Matthews served on the Court until his death in 1889. ===Reforms=== Grant and Hayes had both advocated civil service reform, and by 1881 civil service reform associations had organized with renewed energy across the nation.
In Victoria, Australia, Cannibal Creek was renamed Garfield in his honor. On May 19, 1890, Garfield's body was permanently interred, with great solemnity and fanfare, in a mausoleum in Lake View Cemetery in Cleveland.
In the 1890s, Americans became disillusioned with politicians, and looked elsewhere for inspiration, focusing on industrialists, labor leaders, scientists, and others as their heroes.
Another monument, in Philadelphia's Fairmount Park, was erected in 1896.
According to Caldwell, writing in 1931, "If Garfield lives in history, it will be partly on account of the charm of his personality—but also because in life and in death, he struck the first shrewd blows against a dangerous system of boss rule which seemed for a time about to engulf the politics of the nation.
The Awkward Years: American Foreign Relations under Garfield and Arthur (U of Missouri Press, 1962).
Garfield, each member of his cabinet and First Lady from the Miller Center of Public Affairs "Life Portrait of James Garfield", from C-SPAN's Life Portraits, July 26, 1999 Notable alumni of Delta Upsilon fraternity, including Garfield James A.
In today's world, he would have gone home in a matter of two or three days." The conventional narrative regarding Garfield's post-shooting medical condition was challenged by Theodore Pappas and Shahrzad Joharifard in a 2013 article in The American Journal of Surgery.
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