Pendleton?"[1154] Many agreed with Greeley. Indeed, a majority of the
Radicals, deeming Grant unsound on reconstruction and the negro,
preferred Chief Justice Chase.

[Footnote 1152: New York _World_, July 25, 1867.]

[Footnote 1153: New York _Tribune_, October 15, 1867.]

[Footnote 1154: New York _Tribune_, November 7, 1867.]

Very unexpectedly, however, conditions changed. Stanton's suspension
in August, 1867, led to Grant's appointment as secretary of war, but
when the Senate, early in the following January, refused to concur in
Johnson's action, Grant locked the door of the War Office and resumed
his post at army headquarters. The President expressed surprise that
he did not hold the office until the question of Stanton's
constitutional right to resume it could be judicially determined. This
criticism, delivered in Johnson's positive style, provoked a long and
heated controversy, involving the veracity of each and leaving them
enemies for life. The quarrel delighted the Radicals. It put Grant
into sympathy with Congress, and Republicans into sympathy with Grant.
Until then it was not clear to what party he belonged. Before the war
he acted with the Democrats, and very recently the successors of the
old Albany Regency had been quietly preparing for his nomination.[1155]
Now, however, he was in cordial relation with Republicans, whose
convention, held at Syracuse on February 5, 1868, to select delegates
to the National convention, indorsed his candidacy by acclamation. The
Conservatives welcomed this action as their victory. Moreover, it was
the first formal expression of a State convention. Republicans of
other Commonwealths had indicated their readiness to accept Grant as a
candidate, but New York, endorsing him before the termination of his
controversy with the President, anticipated their action and set the
party aflame. Indeed, it looked to Republicans as if this nomination
assured success at a moment when their chances had seemed hopeless.

[Footnote 1155: T.W. Barnes, _Life of Thurlow Weed_, Vol. 2, p. 458.]

In like manner the convention recommended Reuben E. Fenton for
Vice-President. Fenton had made an acceptable governor. Under his
administration projects for lengthening the locks on the Erie Canal
and other plans for extending the facilities of transportation were
presented. Another memorable work was the establishment of Cornell
University, which has aptly been called "the youngest, the largest,
an