Volume 18 , Issue 41

1884 - The Men Who Have Filled the Presidential Chair

In the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, St. Louis, Missouri, dated 19 July 1884, Saturday, page 9, we found this headlines concerning our Nation's Rulers: "The Men Who Have Filled the Presidential Chair" and "Sketch of the Electoral College and its Operations." It was a bit of political history that would prove interesting. It also included portraits of presidents since the organization of the republic.

Found on Newspapers.com

Both political parties having concluded their convention and placed their candidates in the filed it was not unfitting that some of the history connected with the formation and growth of the Electoral College should be given, coupled with the portrait of every President of the Untied States since the foundation of our Republic.

There had been but two instances where the unanimous vote of the Electoral College was given to a candidate - in 1789 and 1793, when Washington and Adams were elected. The Electoral College which chose Gen. Washington as the first President was composed of the States of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, South Carolina and Georgia, with a total of 69 votes.

Adams, who was elected Vice-President, received 34 of those votes, the custom then being that the man receiving the highest number of votes should be elected president, the man receiving the next highest being declared Vice-President. In 1793 Washington came before the Electoral College a second time and received the votes of all the states, the total vote then being, by the acceptance of the compact by other States, increased to 132. Adams carried all the States with the exception New York, Virginia, Kentucky, North Carolina and Georgia, with a total of 77 votes.
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