When the Democratic candidate for President was announced, and the strong names of Hancock and English were pitted against those of Garfield and Arthur, a close contest was anticipated. And the hot campaign that followed will long be remembered in the annals of our country. Some of the states that had been securely counted upon by the Republicans, went over to the Democrats; but, when the final returns were given on the second day of November, 1880, it was found that Garfield had carried twenty of the thirty-eight states, receiving two hundred and fourteen of the electoral votes, while Hancock had but one hundred and fifty-five. One of Garfield's old pupils, upon hearing the news, wrote to a friend in New York as follows:-- "We of 'old Portage County,' where his ability was first recognized, and from which no delegate to any convention where his name has been presented ever voted against him, knowing him well and trusting him fully, rejoice with exceeding joy in the results of Tuesday's election.... We believe no manlier man ever headed a ticket for the office. He is as pure as Washington, as brave as Jackson, as humane as Lincoln, and as grand and able as Daniel Webster. He is broad enough for the whole country, and sectionalism will find no sympathy in him." The editor of a leading Boston paper wrote the following fine review of Garfield's congressional life:-- "The election of General Garfield to the office of President is, in some sense, a departure from the custom of the country. He is the first man who has had long and thorough experience in the legislative branch of the government, holding for many years the position of a leader of a party both while in power and while out of power, and, consequently, thoroughly familiar with all the business of the nation, who has been raised to the Presidential office. It had almost come to be thought that no man could go directly from Congress to the Presidency. "It is not unreasonable to expect that the administration of General Garfield will be marked by some peculiar features dependent upon these conditions. For eighteen years he has been a member of the House of Representatives, all the time a conspicuously active member, and a large part of the time a recognized leader. He has served on all the more important committees, and been chairman of several. He has been a close and eager student of the theory and the practice of our form of government, at once a philosophical statesman, a shrewd, practical politician, and an accomplished debater of legislative measures. His character, his accomplishments, his position, his tastes, have favored and compelled him to form personal acquaintance with all classes of influential men, so that probably there is not in the country another who has so extensive a circle of acquaintances among men who are potent in forming and directing public opinion.