1879 seemed to show that the conservative opposition was insignificant.
But these figures do not tell the whole story. Even in 1864, when
Lincoln won by nearly half a million, the popular vote was as eighteen
to twenty-two, and four years later Grant, the most popular man in
the United States, had a majority of only three hundred thousand over
Seymour, and this majority and more came from the new Negro voters.
Four years later with about a million Negro voters available and an
opposition not pleased with its own candidate, Grant's majority reached
only seven hundred thousand. At no one time in elections did the North
pronounce itself in favor of all the reconstruction policies. The break,
signs of which were visible as early as 1869, came in 1874 when the
Republicans lost control of the House of Representatives.

Strength was given to the opposition because of the dissatisfaction with
President Grant, who knew little about politics and politicians. He felt
that his Cabinet should be made up of personal friends, not of strong
advisers, and that the military ideal of administration was the proper
one. He was faithful but undiscriminating in his friendships and
frequently chose as his associates men of vulgar tastes and low motives;
and he showed a naive love of money and an undisguised admiration for
rich men such as Gould and Fisk. His appointees were often incompetent
friends or relatives, and his cynical attitude toward civil service
reform lost him the support of influential men. When forced by party
exigencies to select first-class men for his Cabinet, he still preferred
to go for advice to practical politicians. On the Southern question he
easily fell under control of the radicals, who in order to retain their
influence had only to convince his military mind that the South was
again in rebellion, and who found it easy to distract public opinion
from political corruption by "waving the bloody shirt." Dissatisfaction
with his Administration, it is true, was confined to the intellectuals,
the reformers, and the Democrats, but they were strong enough to defeat
him for a second term if they could only be organized.

The Liberal Republican movement began in the West about 1869 with
demands for amnesty and for reform, particularly in the civil service,
and it soon spread rapidly over the North. When it became certain that
the "machine" would renominate Grant, the liberal movement became
an anti-Grant party. The "New Depar