Colorado, admitted in August of this year, raised the number of States to thirty-eight, with a total electoral vote of 369, making 185 votes necessary for an election. The October States did not indicate anything decisive for either side; Ohio going Republican and Indiana Democratic by small majorities. The election was held on Nevember 7th, and a few hours after the polls were closed it was found that Tilden and Hendricks had carried Connecticut, New York, New Jersey and Indiana, and if they had received the vote of the solid South it would give them 203 of the electoral votes and consequently the election. But Mr. Chandler, on information received, sent out a telegram from headquarters in Washington saying that the Republicans had been successful in South Carolina, Louisiana and Florida, and that Hayes and Wheeler were elected by a majority of one. A general outline of the remarkable contest that now followed, and its decision, must suffice for these pages. Each party sent a number of its prominent members to the capitals of the disputed States to witness the count. The legal canvassing boards in all of these States decided in favor of Hayes and Wheeler. Then followed, as it was afterwards discovered, many attempts to bribe an elector in the disputed States to vote for Mr. Tilden, but when the electors met in the various States on December 6th, the vote was 185 for Hayes and Wheeler and 184 for Tilden and Hendricks. As hostile sets of electors were present in four States--Florida, South Carolina, Louisiana and Oregon--it was therefore of the highest importance to know who would count the votes when Congress jointly assembled for that purpose. The Senate and its presiding officer were Republicans, the House was Democratic, and it was apparent that with so much at stake neither would make any concession to the other. This was a state of affairs unprovided for in the Constitution or in any laws that had been passed, and the result was that for four months after the election nobody knew who would be inaugurated as President in March, 1877. The difficulty was temporarily solved by the Electoral Commission Law, which became effective January 29, 1877. It provided that any electoral votes from any State from which but one return had been received should not be rejected except by the affirmative vote of the two Houses, but if more than one return was received from any State it should be referred to a Commission, to be composed of five members of the Senate, five members of the House and five Supreme Court Justices, and the decision of a majority of this Commission was to decide unless otherwise ordered by a concurrent vote of both Houses. Senators Oliver P. Morton, George F. Edmunds, F. T. Frelinghuysen, Republicans, and Allan G. Thurman and Thomas F. Bayard, Democrats, were chosen to represent the Senate; Josiah G. Abbott, Eppa Hunton and H. B. Payne, Democrats, and James A. Garfield and George F.