Chester Alan Arthur: The President Who Didn't Want to Be President

Chester Alan Arthur loved being vice president: parties galore, and no responsibilities. But after the death of James Garfield, Arthur had to face the music. How did he react? Daily Wire Host Michael Knowles tells Arthur’s unique story.

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Script:

When a New York Times reporter sought out Vice President Chester Alan Arthur to get a statement following the death of President James Garfield, Arthur’s valet turned the reporter away. “He is sitting alone in his room,” the valet explained, “sobbing like a child.”

To be President of the United States was the last thing Arthur wanted. Vice President, a position with limitless privileges and almost no responsibilities, that was the job for him. And he was having a grand time of it until an assassin’s bullet changed everything.

Garfield did not die immediately. There were days when it looked like he would recover, but then he would fade again. It didn’t help that his doctors used their unwashed hands to try to recover bullet fragments.

When Garfield finally succumbed on September 19, 1881, Arthur had to face the music.

He was now the twenty-first President of the United States.

At least he looked the part. A fastidious dresser (he was known to try on twenty pairs of pants before choosing one), he cut an imposing figure. He was heavy set with a thick mustache and mutton chop sideburns.

Born in Fairfield, Vermont on October 5, 1829, he was the fifth of nine children. His father was a preacher and committed abolitionist whose strong views on this subject forced him to move the family from town to town. Despite never being in one place for long, Arthur made friends easily. A conscientious student, he attended Union College, became president of the debate society, and pursued a law degree.

As a lawyer, Arthur took a lead role in major civil rights cases, including one that led to the desegregation of the New York City streetcar lines.

After the Civil War where he rose to the rank of brigadier general and distinguished himself as a quartermaster—the person responsible for getting supplies to the troops—he abandoned the law for politics. This pulled him into the orbit of notorious political boss New York Senator Roscoe Conkling. Arthur’s loyalty to Conkling paid off when he was awarded the post of Collector at the New York Customs House, a position that paid over $50,000 per year—more money than any federal officeholder, including the President.

Becoming Vice President was, from a financial point of view, a step down. But it was a step up in prestige. He couldn’t resist the temptation. Access to federal patronage—the chance to give cushy government jobs to his political friends—didn’t hurt either.

But suddenly Arthur wasn’t Vice President anymore. He had the top job now.

And the job changed him.

In one of the least expected and most remarkable turnabouts in presidential history, the quintessential machine politician, a man who once bragged about vote buying, became the President who enacted the most sweeping civil service reform in fifty years. Much to the chagrin of his friends, most especially Conkling, he became an apostle of clean government and set the tone for future reforms that occurred after he left office.

The weight of the office had a deep effect on Arthur, but so did a remarkable correspondence he had with a young Manhattan invalid by the name of Julia Sand. For reasons that aren’t entirely clear, she assiduously tracked Arthur’s every move. Even more amazing, Arthur read her letters and took her advice to heart.

“Great emergencies awaken generous traits, which have lain dormant…” she wrote him in one letter. “If there is a spark of true nobility in you, now is the occasion to let it shine…”

And it did.

But civil service reform was only one of Arthur’s achievements. Another was his passion to rebuild the American Navy which had been woefully neglected since the Civil War. If the nation wanted to be a major player on the world stage, it needed a modern Navy. Arthur asked for eleven new, state-of-art steel ships. Congress gave him four. It was a start.

Arthur also worked to protect the rights of Chinese immigrants. And true to his abolitionist upbringing, his policy toward blacks—he appointed a number of them to important government posts—was among the best of the post-Civil War presidents.

One aspect of Arthur’s personality that did not change was his love of entertaining. The White House, which he insisted on redecorating (it was too drab), was party central. The menus were specially prepared by an imported French chef. Wine and spirits flowed freely. Nobody out-drank or out-ate the host.

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