U.S. presidential election, 1868

The U.S. presidential election of 1868 was the first presidential election to take place during Reconstruction. Three of the former Confederate states (Texas, Mississippi, and Virginia) were not yet readmitted to the Union and therefore could not vote in the election. The incumbent President, Andrew Johnson, was despised by Democrats for running as Abraham Lincoln's Vice President and by Republicans for obstructing their plans for Reconstruction, and so he was not a candidate. Instead the Democrats nominated Horatio Seymour to take on the Republican candidate, Civil War hero General Ulysses S. Grant. With freed blacks voting in much of the South (with the help of Union soldiers), and with massive popularity in the North as the man who won the Civil War, Grant won a solid victory.

Related Topics:
Reconstruction - Texas - Mississippi - Virginia - President - Andrew Johnson - Abraham Lincoln - Vice President - Democrats - Horatio Seymour - Republican - Civil War - Hero - Ulysses S. Grant - Blacks - South

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