He defended the Democratic position in the U.S. Senate during the American Civil War and Reconstruction era and voted against the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.

One of Hendricks's lasting legacies during his tenure as governor was initiating discussions to fund construction of the present-day Indiana Statehouse, which was completed after he left office.

Hendricks, a lifelong Democrat, was his party's nominee for vice president as the running mate of New York governor Samuel Tilden in the controversial presidential election of 1876.

Despite his poor health, Hendricks accepted his party's nomination for vice president in the election of 1884 as Grover Cleveland's running mate.

[4][5] Thomas's family first settled on a farm near his uncle's home in Madison, and moved to Shelby County, Indiana, in 1822.

Hendricks's father, a successful farmer who operated a general store, became involved in politics, including appointment from President Andrew Jackson as deputy surveyor of public lands for his district.

[11][17] Hendricks began his political career in 1848, when he served a one-year term in the Indiana House of Representatives after defeating Martin M. Ray, the Whig candidate.

He supported the principle of popular sovereignty and voted in favor of the Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854, which expanded slavery into the western territories of the United States.

Both positions were unpopular in Hendricks's home district in Indiana and led to defeat in his re-election bid to Congress in 1854.

[10][23] In 1855 President Franklin Pierce appointed Hendricks as commissioner of the United States General Land Office in Washington, D.C.[21][10][23] His job supervising 180 clerks and a four-year backlog of work was a demanding one, especially at a time when westward expansion meant that the government was going through one of its largest periods of land sales.

Although Hendricks made thousands of decisions related to disputed land claims, only a few were reversed in court,[23] but he did receive some criticism: "He was the first commissioner who apparently had no background or qualifications for the job.

[2] In 1860 Hendricks, who ran with David Turpie as his running mate, lost to the Republican candidates, Henry S. Lane and Oliver P.

[27] Following his defeat in his second gubernatorial race Hendricks retired from the U.S. Senate in March 1869 and returned to his private law practice in Indianapolis but remained connected to state and national politics.

[28] In addition to his years of service in various political offices in Indiana and Washington, D.C., Hendricks maintained an active law practice, which he first established in Shelbyville in 1843 and continued after his relocation to Indianapolis.

[28] Military reverses in the Civil War, some unpopular decisions in the Lincoln administration, and Democratic control of the Indiana General Assembly helped Hendricks win election to the U.S.

[30] His six years in the Senate covered the Thirty-eighth, Thirty-ninth, and Fortieth Congresses, where Hendricks was a leader of the small Democratic minority and a member of the opposition who was often overruled.

[32][33][34] Hendricks challenged what he thought was radical legislation, including the military draft and issuing greenbacks; however, he supported the Union and prosecution of the war, consistently voting in favor of wartime appropriations.

For example, in a congressional debate with Indiana Senator Oliver P. Morton, Hendricks argued: I am speaking of a race whose history for two thousand years has shown that it cannot elevate itself.

While the white man for two thousand years past has been going upward and onward, the negro race wherever found dependent upon himself has been going downward or standing still. ...

[35] When the Republicans regained a majority in the Indiana General Assembly in 1868, the same year Hendricks's U.S. Senate term expired, he lost reelection to a second term,[28] and was succeeded by Republican Congressman-elect Daniel D. Pratt, who resigned the U.S. House seat to which he had been elected in 1868 in order to accept the Senate seat.

[29][39] An indication of Hendricks's growing national popularity occurred during the presidential election of 1872; the Democrats nominated Horace Greeley, the Liberal Republican candidate.

[41] In 1873 Hendricks signed the Baxter bill, a controversial piece of temperance legislation that established a strict form of local option, even though he personally had favored a licensing law.

[28][40] One of Hendricks's lasting legacies during his tenure as governor began with discussion to fund construction of a new Indiana Statehouse.

The cornerstone for the present-day state capital building was laid in 1880, after Hendricks left office, and he delivered the keynote speech at the ceremony.

[44] Hendricks did not attend the Democratic convention in Saint Louis, but the party was pursuing the strategy of carrying the Solid South along with New York and Indiana.

[47] As chairman of the Indiana delegation, Hendricks attended the Democratic Party's national convention in 1884 in Chicago, where he was again nominated as its vice-presidential candidate by a unanimous vote.

Hendricks, who had been in poor health for several years, served as Cleveland's vice president during the last eight months of his life, from his inauguration on March 4 until his death on November 25, 1885.

Hundreds of dignitaries were in attendance, including President Grover Cleveland, and thousands of people gathered along the city's street to see the 1.2-mile-long funeral cortege as it traveled from downtown Indianapolis to Crown Hill Cemetery, where his remains were interred.