The Library of Congress | American Memory
»Lawmaking Home » Special Presentation

Washington, D.C.--the Electoral Commission holding a secret session by candle-light, on the Louisiana question, February 16. 1877. (Reproduction Number: LC-USZ62-97512)

Presidential Elections
and the Electoral College

The Proceedings of the
Electoral Commission of 1877

Congressional Record - Volume 5, Part 4

This presentation highlights volume 5, part 4 of the Congressional Record. A wide variety of materials on presidential elections and the electoral college may be found in A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation. Just a few of the many searches that will produce useful hits include:

• Electoral Votes
• President Elect
• Contested Election
• April 6, 1789
• February 9, 1825
• February 8, 1865
• February 12, 1873

Additional Library of Congress online resources related to presidential elections and the electoral college include the following Today in History Web pages:

• On April 30, 1789, George Washington delivered his first inaugural address to a joint session of Congress, assembled in Federal Hall in the nation's new capital, New York City.
  
  
• On February 17, 1801, presidential candidate Thomas Jefferson won the support of a majority of congressional Representatives, displacing incumbent John Adams.
  
  
• In 1877, Rutherford B. Hayes, who was born on October 4, 1822, became the nineteenth U.S. president after a bitterly-contested election against Democrat Samuel J. Tilden of New York.
  
  
• On November 5, 1844, Democratic candidate James K. Polk defeated Whig party candidate Henry Clay to become the eleventh president of the United States.
  
  
• Americans observed the first uniform election day on November 7, 1848, in accordance with congressional legislation passed earlier that year.
  
  
• On March 19, 1860, William Jennings Bryan, the Democratic Presidential candidate in 1896, was born. He lost the electoral college vote to William McKinley despite his diligent campaigning.
  
  
• On Monday, March 4, 1861, Abraham Lincoln was sworn in as the sixteenth president of the United States by Chief Justice of the United States Roger B. Taney.
  
  
• President Wilson was inaugurated to his second term on March 5, 1917. Until the passage of the Twentieth Amendment in 1933, March 4 was the official day for presidential inaugurations. "I Do Solemnly Swear . . .": Presidential Inaugurations contains items from each of the 54 inaugurations from George Washington's in 1789 to George W. Bush's inauguration of 2001.

---

Related Information

Students and researchers on the subject of the presidential elections and the electoral college may find it useful to consult the Law Library of Congress Research Guide to Election Resources, a resource guide to both electronic and printed materials on the subject.

The National Archives and Records Administration has created the Electoral College Web Site.

The United States Supreme Court offers all the major documents relating to the Florida Election Cases pertaining to the 2000 Presidential election.

The Committee on House Administration of the United States House of Representatives has published a Congressional Research Service memorandum Overview of Electoral College Procedure and the Role of Congress.

Harper's Weekly was a leading weekly newspaper and HarpWeek offers an educational Web site on the Electoral College Controversy of 1876-1877.

»Lawmaking Home » Special Presentation
The Library of Congress | American Memory