![]() Because of the party’s split between the Stalwarts and the Half-Breeds, it took 36 ballots to choose a nominee. The 1880 presidential convention found Garfield campaigning for his longtime friend and fellow Republican John Sherman (1823-1900). He never took his seat, however, because of the events that transpired at the Republican convention in 1880. Despite his challenges in the House, Garfield was elected to the U.S. This was especially difficult maneuvering when Garfield served on the congressional committee charged with settling the disputed Rutherford B. ![]() In a political period marked by scandal and corruption, Garfield’s ethics were called into question when he was accused (but never found guilty) of accepting bribes in the Crédit Mobilier scandal of 1872.Ī moderate Republican, Garfield had to appease both wings of his own party: the Stalwarts, who were the conservative, old-guard Republicans, and the Half-Breeds, who were moving toward progressivism. However, his career was not without its challenges. During this time, he served on a number of important congressional committees. Garfield began serving in the House in December 1863, and would remain in Congress until 1881. Initially reluctant to resign his post, Garfield was eventually convinced to do so by President Abraham Lincoln (1809-65), and left the military in late 1863, having achieved the rank of major general. In 1862, while still serving in the army, Garfield was elected to represent his home state in the U.S. He also saw action at the Battle of Shiloh (April 1862), the Siege of Corinth (late April-May 1862) and the Battle of Chickamauga (September 1863). In November 1861, his brigade drove Confederate forces out of eastern Kentucky at Paintsville and Prestonsburg. Despite a lack of military experience, he proved to be an effective leader. Civil War (1861-65) broke out, Garfield joined the Union army and served as a lieutenant colonel with the 42nd Ohio Volunteer Infantry. With the threat of an American civil war looming, he used his position as state senator to advocate for forcing seceding Southern states to rejoin the Union. In 1859, Garfield, a member of the Republican Party (which was founded in the 1850s by antislavery leaders) was elected to the Ohio Senate. ![]() In 1858, he married Lucretia Rudolph (1832-1918), who worked as a teacher and had been a classmate of his at the Eclectic Institute. In addition to his duties at the Eclectic Institute, Garfield became an ordained Christian minister and studied law independently (he would be admitted to the Ohio Bar Association in 1860). A year later, in 1857, he was named president of the school. After graduating from Williams in 1856, Garfield returned to the Eclectic Institute and taught Greek and Latin, as well as other subjects. He then spent two years at Williams College in Williamstown, Massachusetts, and proved himself to be a strong student and skilled public speaker. From 1851 to 1853, Garfield attended Western Reserve Eclectic Institute (now Hiram College) in Hiram, Ohio. Instead, as a teen, he settled for a position towing barges up the Ohio Canal to help support his impoverished family. He died on April 4, after just a month in office.Īs an avid reader of adventure novels, Garfield aspired to become a sailor. Several weeks after his March 4, 1841, inauguration, Harrison caught a cold that turned into pneumonia. His father, Abram Garfield, died less than two years later, so his mother, Eliza Ballou Garfield, raised young James and her older children while also managing the family’s small farm.ĭid you know? The only person to serve less time in the White House than James Garfield was William Henry Harrison, America's ninth president. ![]() James Abram Garfield was born on November 19, 1831, in a log cabin in Orange, Ohio, near Cleveland.
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