About Candidates

LSpecial Correspondent-e. 1 New York. Jan. 7.- It may be as wel! said of pre.sidential oonventions as it has been said of juries that no one can predict accurately what they will do. With the exception of the great soldiere who have been noniinated and whose selection was indicated unerringly before the conventions whieh nominated them met, and with the exception also of two cases where the renoniination of a president has been inevitable, it may be said that ever sir.ce the national caucus gystem was adopted, some sixty years ago, the actiou of the conventions of all the porties has been in the nature of a surprise. Jt is tho unexpected which appears to be most likely to happen with nationai conventions. Nobody, tor instance. expected that James K. Polk would be noniinated in 1844. He was almost unknown. Martin Van Buren was regarded as the certain candidate, and he did have in tact a majority in the convention, but curiously enough, a rule which he had himself devised to secure his nomination in 1836, which provided that a two-thirds vote must be secured before any candidate should be declared noniinated, prevented his receiving the honor in 1844. In 1848 it was thought for a time that General Scott or possibly Daniel Webster would be chosen by the party they represented, but a single remark by Zachary Taylor, uttered in the heat of battlo in Mexico, as well as certain machinations of the politicians, brought him of a sudden to the front and he captnred the prize, leaving such great men of his party as Scott and Clay and Daniel Webster behind in the race for the honor. Perhaps the most striking case of surprise occurred in 1853. The convention of the Democratie party seemed then unable to agree upon anybody. The Ktrength of all the leadiug men in the Democratie party was tested. The little giant of the west, Stephen A. Douglas. then barely forty years of age, was unable to secure the vote of the convention, although ho was immensely popular with his party, and in despair the managers tunied to tho little delegation from the state of New Hampshire and said to theni, "'Name your man and we vriU take hún," and tims it happened that a peraun so obscure that most of his party liad never heard of him, Frankii ii Fieroe. bocame president of the United States. in 187(3 the i'esult of the Republican convontion va.s a surprise totho country. Blaine had run a noble race; Mortou, Oonkliiig and Bi"istow were splendid competitors, and yet the man who took the prize '.vas so inconspicuous at the 1 beginning of the balloting tfatvt hisnamo attractöd bnt little attention. ïhe noniinatinn of General Garfield in 1880 and that of Benjamin Harrison in 1888 were signal illustrations of the tendency of conventions to do those things which are surprising. Thnrlow Weed used to say that in the race for the presidency the dark norse bas the best chance, and he always feit that Wüliam H. Seward would have received the uomiuation for president in 1860 had he been as obscure as Abraham Lincoln was. National conventions have always been afraid of men of great wealth. Washington was the richest president, as he was the first. The two Adamses and .Madison had a very small property. Jefferson was dependent uponhissalary, left the White House in debt and was obliged to borrow money and sell some of his books to support himself in his oíd age. Martin Van Buren was worth about $60,000 when elected, and he accnmulated property a f ter he left the presidency. William Henry Harrison was so poor that he was dependent upon his trifling earnings as clerk of a little oourt in Ohio for his support while the preaidential canvass was progressing. Henry (Jlïly migbi have earned a large fortune by practico at the bar, but he was an improvident man. He had continually to borrow money on notes, and he was in some pecuniary embarrassment, it is said. whon he became the -canrfidate in 1844. General Pierce had a small property. Buchanan an income of some $4,000 and General Scott was abeolutely dependent upon his salary as a general in the United States army when he was nominated. Lincoln was very poor. In the winter of 1860, some three months bef ore he was noininated, he was in New York city. and he there niet a friend whom j he had known in Illinois. Said Lincoln to this friend, "Well. kow are you gettinjr on in worldly goods since ycm left Illinois?" "Oh, 1 suppose Pin worth $100,000," was his friend's reply. 'WêH, that ought to be enough to keep you handsomely the rest of your Kfe," said Lincoln. "I haven't done so well. l have $3,000 in nioney and my house in Springfield, which is worth about $6,000." Then he added with a merry twinklein his eye: "Some of my friends say they are going to nominate me for vice president with Seward for L president. Well, if they do and I'm elected. 1 ou'cht to save $10,000, and that with what 1 ve got will be enough for rae, I reckon." Lincoln was then fiftyoae years of age, and he seerned to look forward wit i content to the possession oí about $20,000 as enoúgh for him in Míi oíd age. His aggregate salary in the ! four years tl t he served was $100,000, and le was ajle to save about $40,000 of that and counted on saving as mnch j inore during his second term, so that lie thought he wonld be worth about 000 when he left the presidency, a sum which he regarded as a very great I tune. ürant had nothing but nis salary when he was nominated, and only eight years before his nomiaation he had been I j living on $1,000 a year, and two years befotv that had been peddling cord wood in the (reets of St. Louis. Mr. Hayes was comparativoly well off when hewas noniinated, his fortune being estimated at abont $100.000, and he was the wealthiest man, with two exceptions, nominated by either party in more than sixty years, and probably the wealthiest president elected since General Washiü.-ton. General Garfield was a poor man when nominated. He owned a house in Washington, but it was mortgaged, and ho had soino slight investinents. After hia death his property was so well handled that it was said to yield his widow something like $50.000. General Arthur and Grover Cleveland were each worth about $50,000 when they entered the White House. Each of thein had made fortúnate real estáte investments, which in the course of a few years increased their wealth. Arthur 's fortune at the time of hi.i death was estimated to be $150,000, due almost entirely to appreciation of real estáte which he owned in New York city. Cleveland is estimated now to be worth about $300,000. while his wife's fortune is considerably more than that suin. President Harrison had a very small property when he was nominated. and those who Icnew Ms circumstances at that time declared that all bis possessions would not amount to $40,000. ünly twice. perhaps three times, in the past sixty years have men who were rich in the modern meaning of that word been nominated for the presidency. Mr. Tilden at the time of his nomination was called a millionaire, but the greater part of his wealth did not come to kim until a year after the presidential election of 1876. Through certain investments in railway stocks, and especially by the enormous appreciation in the value of the stock of the elevated railway in New York, Mr. Tilden vastly I increased his estáte, and when he died his executors estimated his wealth at about $5,000,000. Another wealthy man noininated for the presidency was Horatio Seymour. He had large possessions in lands and stocks, but he was so charitable in the use of his property, so wise in the administraron of it, that his wealth was not considered a detriment. Moreover, the leading candidato for the nomination against him, George H. Pendleton, was also a wealthy man. He was not so rich as Governor Seymour, but he was one of the few prominent Democrats whose wealth made him conspicuous as well as his abilities. In 1848 the candidato of the Democratie party, Lewis Cass, was a man of wealth. He was, however, so conspicnous as a statesman and leader in his party that but little attention was paid to the fact that he had aecnnmlated great possessions, mainly by the rise in value of property in Detroit, which he had years beforo bought for a very small sum. Alany of those who were eandidates or were promillen tly mentioned in connection with the presidency and two or three who served as president died in poverty. Stephen A. Donglas aft-ar his brilliant career was praetically penniless when he died, although had he lived a few years some land which he owned in the then suburbs of Chicago wonld havu brought him a fair sum. James Monroe died in almost absolute poverty in Kew York city. John Tyler was a poor man after he lef t the presidency. Daniel Webster did not have mncb property, exeept his estáte at Marshiield, and Henry Clay's place, called Ashland, was a bout all he left to his heirs. Jefïerson's stiaiggles with poverty furnish the saddest episode in his carcer, and John C. . Breckinridge struggled hard in his practice at the bar to support his family. A change in the disposition of conventioiis respecting the age of candidatos has been noticed. Formerly the tendency was to select men who were well on in years. Jackson and Buchanan and William Henry Harrison were oíd men wheu thejT were elected to the presidency. The average age np to 1850 of candidates and presidents when elected was about sixty-two years. With the war era, however, the teñdency to choose younger men began to be very marked. Stephen A. Douglas was only fortyseven when he was nominated. Fremont was nominated when only fortythree, but he was the first candidato of a new party. John C. Breckinridge was barely foríy years of age when he was nominated in 1860, and he had scarcely passed the eonstirutional limit when he was nominated and elected vice president in 1856. Gray haira have not been the fule with candidatos whether defeated or elected sint-u 1860. McClellan, who was the youngest candidate ever nominated to the preeir'ency and who was of most yonthful appearance, was associated with another young man, George H. Pendleton, who was only forty-two years of age while McClellan was thirty-nine. Grant was only fortysix when he was first elected, Garfield was forty-eight and Cleveland fortyseven. In the earlier days it wonld have been esteemed a rash thing to think of choosing a president who had not passed fif ty years, although Henry Clay was only forty-six when he was first a, candidate, and Alexander Hamilton might have been a candidate had he permitted it soon after he pa'ssed his thirty-fifth year, for although Hamilton was of foreign birth yet the constitution provided that persons who were of foreign birth at the time of the adoption of the constitution might be eligible for th presidency. and it has always been thought that this clanse was put in for the possible benefit of Hamilton. Blaine was only forty-four when he made his exciting race for the presidential nomination the first time and but forty-eight when he and Grant tested strength for many days before the Chicago convention of 1880. It will be seen, then, from these few illustrations that the tendenoy of conventions is to make an unexpected nomination. and also that men of great wealth, or even of fair fortunes, are not likely to be put in nomination, and, moreover, that in this day of activity convenüons are likely to look for men who have scarcely entered their prime.