The
1880 Republican National Convention convened from
June 2 to
June 8,
1880 at the Interstate Exposition Building in
Chicago,
Illinois,
United States, and nominated
James A. Garfield and
Chester A. Arthur as the official candidates of the
Republican Party for
President and
Vice President of the United States, respectively, in the
1880 presidential election.Of the 14 people nominated for the Republican nomination, the three strongest candidates leading up to the convention were
Ulysses S. Grant,
James G. Blaine and
John Sherman. Grant had served two terms as President from 1869 to 1877, and was seeking an unprecedented third term in office. He was backed by the
Stalwart faction of the Republican Party, which supported
political machines and
patronage. Blaine was a
senator and former
representative from
Maine who was backed by the
Half-Breed faction of the Republican Party. Sherman, the brother of
Civil War General William Tecumseh Sherman, was the then
Secretary of the Treasury under President
Rutherford B. Hayes. On the first ballot, Sherman received 93 votes, while Grant and Blaine had 304 and 285, respectively. None of the candidates were close to victory, and the balloting continued to determine a winner. Many more ballots were taken, but no candidate prevailed. After the thirty-fifth ballot, Blaine and Sherman switched their support to the new "
dark horse" candidate, James Garfield. On the next ballot, Garfield won the nomination by receiving 399 votes, 93 higher than Grant's total.
