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Chester A. Arthur

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   Chester Alan Arthur
   Chester A. Arthur
     __________________________________________________________________

   21st President of the United States
   In office
   September 19, 1881 –  March 4, 1885
   Vice President(s)   None
   Preceded by James A. Garfield
   Succeeded by Grover Cleveland
     __________________________________________________________________

   20th Vice President of the United States
   In office
   March 4, 1881 –  September 19, 1881
   President James Garfield
   Preceded by William A. Wheeler
   Succeeded by Thomas Hendricks
     __________________________________________________________________

   Born October 5, 1830
   Fairfield, Vermont
   Died November 18, 1886
   New York City, New York
   Political party Republican
   Spouse Ellen Lewis Herndon Arthur, niece of Matthew Fontaine Maury
   Religion Episcopal
   Signature

   Chester Alan Arthur ( October 5, 1829 – November 18, 1886) was an
   American politician who served as the twenty-first President of the
   United States. Arthur was a member of the Republican Party and worked
   as a lawyer before becoming the 20th vice president under James
   Garfield. While Garfield was mortally wounded by Charles Guiteau on
   July 2, 1881, he did not die until September 19, at which time Arthur
   was sworn in as president, serving until March 4, 1885.

   Before entering national politics, Arthur had been Collector of Customs
   for the Port of New York. He was appointed by Ulysses S. Grant but was
   fired by Rutherford B. Hayes under false suspicion of bribery and
   corruption. A political protégé of Roscoe Conkling, his notable
   achievements in office as President included civil service reform and
   the passage of the Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act. The passage of
   this legislation earned Arthur the moniker "The Father of Civil
   Service."

Early life and education

   Arthur was born in the town of Fairfield in Franklin County, Vermont,
   on October 5, 1829, although he sometimes claimed to be born in 1830
   (even his grave inscription says the latter). His parents were William
   Arthur and Malvina Stone. Political rivals long circulated the rumor
   that he had been born across the International Boundary in Canada in
   hopes of creating doubts as to his eligibility for the presidency
   (under Article II of the U.S. Constitution the president must be a
   natural-born citizen). The rumor is accepted as untrue.

   Arthur spent some of his childhood years living in Perry, New York. One
   of Arthur's boyhood friends remembers Arthur's political abilities
   emerging at an early age: "When Chester was a boy, you might see him in
   the village street after a shower, watching the boys building a mud dam
   across the rivulet in the roadway. Pretty soon, he would be ordering
   this one to bring stones, another sticks, and others sod and mud to
   finish the dam; and they would all do his bidding without question. But
   he took good care not to get any of the dirt on his hands." (New York
   Evening Post, April 2, 1900)

   Arthur attended public schools and later attended Union College in
   Schenectady, New York. There he became a member of Psi Upsilon, North
   America's fifth oldest college fraternity, and graduated in 1848.

Pre-political career

   Arthur became principal of North Pownal Academy in North Pownal,
   Vermont, in 1851; later he studied law and was admitted to the bar in
   1854. Arthur commenced practice in New York City, where he supported
   equal rights for blacks who objected to the racial segregation of city
   transportation. He also took an active part in the reorganization of
   the state militia.

   Arthur married Ellen "Nell" Lewis Herndon on October 25, 1859. She was
   the only child of Elizabeth Hansbrough and Captain William Lewis
   Herndon USN. She was a favorite niece of Commander Matthew Fontaine
   Maury, USN of the United States Naval Observatory where her father had
   worked.

   In 1860, Chester Arthur and "Nell" had a son, William Lewis Herndon
   Arthur, who was named after Ellen's father. This son died at age two of
   a brain disease. Another son, Chester Alan Arthur II, was born in 1864,
   and a girl, named Ellen Hansbrough Herndon after her mother, in 1871.
   Ellen "Nell" Arthur died of pneumonia on January 12, 1880, at the age
   of 42, only twenty months before Arthur became President. While in the
   White House, Arthur would not give anyone the place that would have
   been his wife's. He asked his sister Mary, the wife of John E. McElroy,
   to assume certain social duties and help care for his daughter.
   President Arthur also had a memorial to his beloved "Nell"—a stained
   glass window was installed in St. John's Episcopal Church within view
   of his office and had the church light it at night so he could look at
   it. The memorial remains to this day.

   During the American Civil War, Arthur served as acting quartermaster
   general of the state in 1861 and was widely praised for his service. He
   was later commissioned as inspector general, and appointed
   quartermaster general with the rank of brigadier general and served
   until 1862. After the war, he resumed the practice of law in New York
   City. With the help of Arthur's patron and political boss Roscoe
   Conkling, Arthur was appointed by President Ulysses Grant as Collector
   of the Port of New York from 1871 to 1878.

   This was an extremely lucrative and powerful position at the time, and
   several of Arthur's predecessors had run afoul of the law while serving
   as collector. Honorable in his personal life and his public career,
   Arthur nevertheless sided with the Stalwarts in the Republican Party,
   which firmly believed in the spoils system even as it was coming under
   vehement attack from reformers. He insisted upon honest administration
   of the Customs House but staffed it with more employees than it really
   needed, retaining some for their loyalty as party workers rather than
   for their skill as public servants.

The 1880 Election and Vice Presidency

   In 1878, Grant's successor, Rutherford Hayes attempted to reform the
   Customs House. He ousted Arthur, who resumed the practice of law in New
   York City. Conkling and his followers tried to win back power by the
   renomination of Grant for a third term at the 1880 Republican National
   Convention, but it was not to be. Grant and James G. Blaine deadlocked,
   and after 36 ballots, the convention turned to dark horse James A.
   Garfield, a long time Congressman and General in the Civil War.

   Knowing the election would be close, Garfield's people began asking a
   number of Stalwarts if they would accept the second spot. Levi P.
   Morton, on Conkling's advice, refused, but Arthur accepted, telling his
   furious leader, "This is a higher honour than I have ever dreamt of
   attaining. I shall accept!"

   Conkling and his Stalwart supporters reluctantly accepted the
   nomination of Arthur as vice president.

   Arthur worked hard raising money for his and Garfield's election, but
   it was still a close thing, with the Garfield-Arthur ticket receiving a
   nationwide plurality of less than ten thousand votes.

   After the election, Conkling began making demands of Garfield as to
   appointments, and the Vice President-elect supported his longtime
   patron against his new boss. According to Ira Rukow's recent biography
   of Garfield, the new President quickly grew to hate Arthur, and
   wouldn't even let him into the White House.

   After a very nasty political battle between Garfield and Conkling
   resulted in the latter's resigation, Arthur went back to New York City
   to wait out the time before Congress resumed in December. Then, on July
   2, 1881, President Garfield was shot in the back by Charles Guiteau,
   who famously screamed at the top of his lungs: "I am a Stalwart and
   ARTHUR IS PRESIDENT!!" Chet Arthur, who knew nothing of this in
   advance, was naturally mortified.(Barzman's "Madmen and Geniuses"
   Barzman 1974)

The Eighty Day Crisis

   The Vice President was in a major bind. He knew that there were a great
   number of people in the country who thought that he had something to do
   with the attempted murder of the President, and didn't want anything to
   do with succession until it was actually necessary, so for two months
   and 19 days, the country drifted, leaderless. On September 19, Garfield
   died and Arthur succeeded to the Presidency.

Presidency 1881-1885

Assumption of office

   President Arthur took the oath of office twice. The first time was just
   past midnight at his posh Lexington Avenue townhouse on September 20th,
   the second time was upon his return to Washington two days later.

Policies

   Avoiding old political cronies, Arthur determined to go his own way
   once in the White House. He became a man of fashion in his garb and
   associates and was often seen with the elite of Washington, D.C., New
   York, and Newport. To the indignation of the Stalwart Republicans, the
   onetime Collector of the Port of New York became, as President, a
   champion of civil service reform. Public pressure, heightened by the
   assassination of Garfield, forced an unwieldy Congress to heed the
   President.

   In 1883, Congress passed the Pendleton Act, which established a
   bipartisan Civil Service Commission, forbade levying political
   assessments against officeholders, and provided for a "classified
   system" that made certain government positions obtainable only through
   competitive written examinations. The system protected employees
   against removal for political reasons.

   Acting independently of party dogma, Arthur also tried to lower tariff
   rates so the government would not be embarrassed by annual surpluses of
   revenue. Congress raised about as many rates as it trimmed, but Arthur
   signed the Tariff Act of 1883 anyway. Aggrieved Westerners and
   Southerners looked to the Democratic Party for redress, and the tariff
   began to emerge as a major political issue between the two parties.

   The Arthur Administration enacted the first general Federal immigration
   law. Arthur approved a measure in 1882 excluding paupers, criminals,
   and the mentally ill. Congress also suspended Chinese immigration for
   ten years, later making the restriction permanent.

   In 1884, the International Meridian Conference was held in Washington
   at President Arthur's behest. This established the Greenwich Meridian
   which is still in use today.

   President Arthur demonstrated that he was above factions within the
   Republican Party, if indeed not above the party itself. Perhaps, in
   part, his reason was the well-kept secret he had known since a year
   after he succeeded to the Presidency, that he was suffering from
   Bright's Disease, a fatal kidney disease.

   Arthur ran in the Republican Presidential Primary in 1884 but lost the
   party's nomination to former Speaker of the House, James G. Blaine of
   Maine.

   Publisher Alexander K. McClure wrote, "No man ever entered the
   Presidency so profoundly and widely distrusted, and no one ever
   retired… more generally respected." Author Mark Twain, deeply cynical
   about politicians, conceded, "It would be hard indeed to better
   President Arthur's administration."

Significant events during presidency

     * Standard Oil founded (1882)
     * Chinese Exclusion Act (1882)
     * Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act (1883)
     * Civil Rights Cases (1883)

Administration and Cabinet

   Chester A. Arthur
   Enlarge
   Chester A. Arthur
   OFFICE                    NAME                 TERM
   President                 Chester A. Arthur    1881–1885
   Vice President            None                 1881–1885
   Secretary of State        F. T. Frelinghuysen  1881–1885
   Secretary of the Treasury Charles J. Folger    1881–1884
                             Walter Q. Gresham    1884
                             Hugh McCulloch       1884–1885
   Secretary of War          Robert T. Lincoln    1881–1885
   Attorney General          Benjamin H. Brewster 1881–1885
   Postmaster General        Timothy O. Howe      1881–1883
                             Walter Q. Gresham    1883–1884
                             Frank Hatton         1884–1885
   Secretary of the Navy     William H. Hunt      1881–1882
                             William E. Chandler  1882–1885
   Secretary of the Interior Samuel J. Kirkwood   1881–1882
                             Henry M. Teller      1882–1885

Supreme Court appointments

     * Samuel Blatchford - 1882
     * Horace Gray - 1882
     * Roscoe Conkling - 1882 (Appointment confirmed, but declined the
       office)

States admitted to the Union

   None

Social and personal life

   Arthur is remembered as one of the most society-conscious presidents,
   earning the nickname "the Gentleman Boss" for his style of dress and
   courtly manner.

   Upon taking office, Arthur did not move into the White House
   immediately. He insisted upon its redecoration and had 24 wagonloads of
   furniture, some including pieces dating back to John Adams' term,
   carted away and sold at public auction, and Arthur commissioned Louis
   Comfort Tiffany to replace them with new pieces. A famous designer now
   best-known for his stained glass, Tiffany was among the foremost
   designers of the day.

   Arthur was a fisherman who belonged to the Restigouche Salmon Club and
   once reportedly caught an 80-pound bass off the coast of Rhode Island.

   Widely popular by the end of his presidency, four young women (ignorant
   of Arthur's pronouncement that he would never marry again) proposed to
   him on the day he left office. He was sometimes called "Elegant Arthur"
   for his commitment to fashionable attire and was said to have "looked
   like a president." He reportedly kept 80 pairs of pants in his wardrobe
   and changed pants several times a day. He was called "Chet" by family
   and friends, and by his middle name, with the stress on the second
   syllable ("Al-AN").

Post presidency

   Arthur's grave at Albany Rural Cemetery
   Enlarge
   Arthur's grave at Albany Rural Cemetery

   Arthur served as President through March 4, 1885. Upon leaving office,
   he returned to New York City where he died of a massive cerebral
   hemorrhage at 5:10 a.m. on Thursday November 18, 1886, at the age of
   57. Arthur suffered from Bright's disease, and his death was most
   likely related to a history of hypertension.

   His post presidency was the second shortest, longer only than that of
   James Polk (excluding presidents who died in office).

   Chester was buried next to Ellen in the Arthur family plot in the
   Albany Rural Cemetery in Menands, New York, in a large sarcophagus on a
   large corner plot that contains the graves of many of his family
   members and ancestors.
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