James A. Garfield

Civil War general and appropriations expert who rose from the House to the presidency in 1880.

Overview

Garfield drove Ohio volunteers at Shiloh and Chickamauga before Lincoln urged him to Congress, where he served from 1863 to 1880. He became the House's leading student of finance and taxation, chaired Appropriations, handled the 1877 electoral count crisis on the floor, and led the Republican minority after the 1874 wave. Nominated for president in 1880 as a compromise choice on the 36th ballot while senator-elect, he won a narrow victory over Winfield Hancock. Shot by an assassin months after taking office, he died in September 1881.