Samuel Jones Tilden (February 9, 1814 – August 4, 1886) was an American politician who served as the 25th governor of New York and was the Democratic nominee in the disputed 1876 United States presidential election.

Tilden initially cooperated with the state party's Tammany Hall faction, but he broke with them in 1871 due to boss William M. Tweed's rampant corruption.

His battle against public corruption, along with his personal fortune and electoral success in New York, made him the leading candidate for the Democratic nomination for president in 1876.

[4] His father and other family members were the makers of patent medicines including Tilden's Extract, a popular concoction of the 1800s and early 1900s that was derived from cannabis.

[7] Tilden's health troubles prevented him from regularly attending school, and he dropped out of Williams Academy after three months and Yale College after a single term in 1834–1835.

[8] Likely motivated by a family friendship with Benjamin Franklin Butler, then serving as a professor at New York University School of Law, Tilden enrolled there to resume his studies and continued to attend intermittently from 1838 to 1841.

[15] He became a key ally to Wright and helped end the Anti-Rent War by passing a compromise land bill that defused tensions between tenant farmers and their landlords.

[16] After serving as a delegate to the 1846 New York State Constitutional Convention, Tilden left public office to focus on his legal practice, where he gained a national reputation as a "financial physician" for struggling railroads.

[23] In 1855, Tilden was the unsuccessful state attorney general candidate of the "Soft" faction of Barnburners, which favored compromise and reconciliation with the Democratic Party.

[26] Tilden served as the manager of Horatio Seymour's successful 1862 campaign for governor, and played a key role in securing the presidential nomination for George B. McClellan at the 1864 Democratic National Convention.

"[35][b] The anti-Tammany Democrats, including Tilden, won a major victory in the 1871 state elections, and Tweed was indicted on 120 counts of fraud and other violations.

[39] Tilden gained a national reputation as a reform governor, a valuable asset given the number of scandals that had come into public view during the presidency of Ulysses S.

[43] He was also a skilled organizer whose canvassing system and field knowledge were so thorough that, months before the 1874 election, he had predicted his own winning margin accurately to within 300 votes.

[47] Like most Republicans and "hard money" members of the conservative business establishment, Tilden believed that the termination of greenback circulation (which would return the country to the gold standard) was the best way to solve the ongoing economic crisis.

[50] Though the Republicans had nominated a ticket led by Rutherford B. Hayes of Ohio, another governor who had established a reputation for honest governance, Tilden was widely regarded as the favorite in the general election.

[54] Tilden blamed high taxes and the Grant administration for the economic downturn, and, like Hayes, promised civil service reform and hard money policies.

[54] Rebutting Republican charges, Tilden categorically denied that he had any intention of compensating the South for any slaves emancipated or losses suffered during the Civil War.

[58] Tilden worked to distance himself from violent encounters like the Hamburg massacre, in which disgruntled Southern whites clashed with the Republican-led government of South Carolina.

[62] Hayes refused to formally concede, but told members of the press that he was "of the opinion that the Democrats have carried the country and elected Tilden.

"[63] Tilden, meanwhile, urged his alarmed followers, many of whom believed that the Republicans were attempting to steal the election, to remain calm and refrain from violence.

[64] Both parties feared the possibility that a dispute over the election would lead to armed conflict; Tilden discussed appointing General George B. McClellan as his military assistant, while President Grant ordered army and naval units to reinforce Washington.

[72] Early on the morning of December 6, the day the Electoral College was scheduled to convene, the Florida canvassing board announced that Hayes had won the state by a margin of 924 votes.

He delivered the study to every sitting member of Congress, but congressional Republicans were not swayed by Tilden's argument that history supported the Democratic position on the election returns.

[82] During the proceedings of the Electoral Commission, high-ranking members of both parties had discussed the possibility of declaring Hayes the winner in exchange for the removal of all federal troops from the South.

On March 3, the House passed a resolution declaring Tilden the "duly elected President of the United States," but this had no legal effect.

[88] Tilden himself stated that, "I can retire to private life with the consciousness that I shall receive from posterity the credit of having been elected to the highest position in the gift of the people, without any of the cares and responsibilities of the office.

[91] In 1878, Democratic Congressman Clarkson Nott Potter convinced the House of Representatives to create a committee to investigate allegations of fraud and corruption in the 1876 election.

New York Herald Tribune editor Whitelaw Reid obtained and deciphered many of the telegrams and, in October 1878, he published the story of the Democratic efforts to sway election officials through bribery and other means.

[98] As the New York delegation left for the national convention in Cincinnati, Tilden gave a letter to one of his chief supporters, Daniel Manning, suggesting that his health might force him to decline the nomination.

[100]: 110  He endorsed New York Governor Grover Cleveland, who won the Democratic nomination and went on to defeat James G. Blaine in the general election.