With the country apparently on the verge of civil war, Congress finally created by law an Electoral Commission to which were to be referred all disputes about the counting of votes and the decision of which was to be final unless both Houses concurred in rejecting it. The act provided that the commission should consist of five senators, five representatives, four designated associate justices of the Supreme Court, and a fifth associate justice to be chosen by these four. While nothing was said in the act about the political affiliations of the members of the commission, every one understood that the House would select three Democrats and two Republicans, and that the Senate would name two Democrats and three Republicans. It was also well known that of the four justices designated two were Republicans and two Democrats, and it was tacitly agreed that the fifth would be Justice David Davis, an "independent." But at the last moment Davis was elected Senator by the Illinois Legislature and declined to serve on the Commission. Justice Bradley, a Republican, was then named as the fifth justice, and in this way the Republicans obtained a majority on the Commission. The Democrats deserve the credit for the Electoral Commission. The Republicans did not favor it, even after they were sure of a party majority on it. They were conscious that they had a weak case, and they were afraid to trust it to judges of the Supreme Court. Their fears were groundless, however, since all important questions were decided by an 8 to 7 vote, Bradley voting with his fellow Republicans. Every contested vote was given to Hayes, and with 185 electoral votes he was declared elected on March 2, 1877. Ten years before, Senator Morton of Indiana had said: "I would have been in favor of having the colored people of the South wait a few years until they were prepared for the suffrage, until they were to some extent educated, but the necessities of the times forbade that; the conditions of things required that they should be brought to the polls at once." Now the condition of things required that some arrangement be made with the Southern whites which would involve a complete reversal of the situation of 1867. In order to secure the unopposed succession of Hayes, to defeat filibustering which might endanger the decision of the Electoral Commission, politicians who could speak with authority for Hayes assured influential Southern politicians, who wanted no more civil war but who did want home rule, that an arrangement might be made which would be satisfactory to both sides.