ver Commission in 1879. In 1880, as chairman
of the Indiana delegation in the Republican national convention, he cast
nearly the entire vote of the State for James A. Garfield for President.
President Garfield offered him a place in his Cabinet, but he declined
it, preferring the United States Senatorship from Indiana, to which
he had just been chosen, and which he held from 1881 to 1887. In the
Senate he advocated the tariff views of his party, opposed President
Cleveland's vetoes of pension bills, urged the reconstruction and
upbuilding of the Navy, and labored and voted for civil-service reform.
Was a delegate at large to the Republican national convention in 1884,
and in 1888 at Chicago was nominated for the Presidency on the eighth
ballot. The nomination was made unanimous, and in November he was
elected, receiving 233 electoral votes to 168 for Grover Cleveland.
Was inaugurated March 4, 1889. Was again nominated for the Presidency
at the national Republican convention which met at Minneapolis in 1892,
but was defeated at the November election, receiving 145 electoral
votes, against 276 votes for Grover Cleveland. Upon his retiring from
office located at Indianapolis, Ind., where he now resides.

* * * * *

INAUGURAL ADDRESS.

FELLOW CITIZENS: There is no constitutional or legal requirement that
the President shall take the oath of office in the presence of the
people, but there is so manifest an appropriateness in the public
induction to office of the chief executive officer of the nation that
from the beginning of the Government the people, to whose service the
official oath consecrates the officer, have been called to witness the
solemn ceremonial. The oath taken in the presence of the people becomes
a mutual covenant. The officer covenants to serve the whole body of the
people by a faithful execution of the laws, so that they may be the
unfailing defense and security of those who respect and observe them,
and that neither wealth, station, nor the power of combinations shall be
able to evade their just penalties or to wrest them from a beneficent
public purpose to serve the ends of cruelty or selfishness.

My promise is spoken; yours unspoken, but not the less real and solemn.
The people of every State have here their representatives. Surely I do
not misinterpret the spirit of the occasion when I assume that the
whole body of the people covenant with me and with each other