After the death of
U.S. Senator Solomon Foot in March 1866,
Governor Paul Dillingham was expected to appoint someone from the west side of the Green Mountains, in keeping with the Republican Party's
Mountain Rule. He first considered former Governor
J. Gregory Smith. having helped pass the
Tenure of Office Act to rebuke Johnson. Although considering himself devoted to the principles of the Republican Party, This was opposed by the
conservative "
Stalwart" faction, who supported maintaining the
spoils system as a way to reward political supporters and punish political enemies. Edmunds was influential in providing for the
electoral commission to decide the disputed
presidential election of 1876 and served as one of the commissioners, voting for
Republicans Rutherford B. Hayes and
William A. Wheeler. He was the author of the
Edmunds Act against
polygamy in
Utah, and the
Sherman Antitrust Act to limit
monopolies. In 1882, President
Chester A. Arthur nominated Senator
Roscoe Conkling to replace the retiring
Ward Hunt as an Associate Justice of the
United States Supreme Court. When Conkling declined, Arthur chose Edmunds, who also declined. He was
President pro tempore of the Senate from 1883 to 1885 and
chairman of the Republican Conference from 1885 to 1891. In 1921, former Senator
Richard F. Pettigrew published an autobiography in which he condemned Edmunds as a "senatorial bribe-taker" and "distinctly dishonest" for having accepted corporate retainers while a senator. An acerbic debater, he often favored the status quo or slow progress. He was known for making his colleagues feel the sting of his criticisms, and some thought him better at merely opposing than offering constructive alternatives.
David Davis joked that he could make Edmunds vote against any measure by simply phrasing the request for votes in the New England town meeting way: "Contrary-minded will say no." One friend trying to interest him in a presidential bid pleaded, "But, Edmunds, think how much fun you would have vetoing bills." Edmunds took special delight in goading Southern senators into blurting out statements that would embarrass the
Democratic Party. To those Southerners opposed to any federal role in protecting blacks' right to vote, Edmunds seemed the epitome of Yankee evil. One Southern correspondent in 1880 wrote, "When I look at that man sitting almost alone in the Senate, isolated in his gloom of hate and bitterness, stern, silent, watchful, suspicious and pitiless, I am reminded of the worst types of Puritan character... You see the impress of the purer persecuting spirit that burned witches, drove out
Roger Williams, hounded
Jonathan Edwards for doing his sacred duty, maligned
Jefferson, and like a toad squatted at the ear of the
Constitution it had failed to pervert."
Friendship with Allen G. Thurman In spite of contempt from many Democratic colleagues, Edmunds formed friendships across the aisle. One Democrat with no reason to appreciate him wrote a colleague that among all the Republicans, "Edmunds made the most impression upon me. I couldn't help admiring his clear and incisive way of putting a question, although it appeared to me that his manner is occasionally very irritating. This manner of his is very much that of a lawyer employed as counsel in a case, who therefore makes ex parte statements, and thinks it fair to make all manner of allegations." His closest friend in the chamber for many years was the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee,
Allen G. Thurman of
Ohio. Edmunds and Thurman shared similar reformist attitudes. When Edmunds ran for president in 1884, the other candidates included the eventual Republican nominee,
James G. Blaine, a
Half-Breed. During the campaign, Edmunds touted his alliance with Thurman, which in turn was cited as a positive quality by cartoonist
Thomas Nast, an anti-Blaine
Mugwump and illustrator for ''
Harper's Weekly''. At Thurman's death in 1895, Edmunds spoke highly of the former Ohio senator as "brave in his convictions". ==Presidential campaigns==