Alphonso Taft

Alphonso Taft (November 5, 1810 to May 21, 1891) was a tutor at Yale University, a judge of the Superior Court of Cincinnati, Secretary of War and then Attorney General under President Ulysses S. Grant, and United States minister to Austria-Hungary and to Russia. He is named as a co-founder of Skull and Bones with William Huntington Russell, and he was the father of William Howard Taft.

Early life and Yale

Taft was born in Townshend, Vermont on November 5, 1810, the only child of Peter Rawson Taft and Sylvia (Howard) Taft, both natives of Worcester County, Massachusetts.¹ The Yale record for William Howard Taft describes the father as a judge of Windham County.² Taft graduated from Yale in 1833 and then taught for two years at the high school in Ellington, Connecticut. He was a tutor at Yale for an equal period, and while a tutor and for a year afterward he gave his leisure to the study of law.¹ Yale conferred the degree of Doctor of Laws on him in 1867.¹

Skull and Bones

Three accounts of the founding of Skull and Bones name Taft, and they differ on the year.

Lyman Bagg wrote in 1871 that "The society was originated in 1832 by fifteen members of the class which graduated the following year. General Russell, the valedictorian of that class, is its reputed founder, and the best known of his associates is Judge Alphonso Taft of Cincinnati."³ Bagg wrote that the founder was then serving as a tutor, and that "Some injustice in the conferring of Phi Beta Kappa elections seems to have led to its establishment."³ He added that the "popular college tradition, that it was transplanted from a German university, is scouted by old neutral graduates as absurd."⁴

David A. Richards wrote in the Yale Alumni Magazine in 2015 that "The society had been founded in 1832." He wrote that "The conception seems to have been that of the 1833 valedictorian, class orator, and secretary of Phi Beta Kappa, William Huntington Russell," and that "He was joined as a founder by Alphonso Taft, future father of US president William Howard Taft, Class of 1878."⁵ Richards also reported that the members first called themselves the Eulogian Club.⁵

Antony C. Sutton dated the founding to 1833. He wrote that "The American chapter of this German order was founded in 1833 at Yale University by General William Huntington Russell and Alphonso Taft who, in 1876, became Secretary of War in the Grant Administration."⁶ He also wrote that "the two founding members, William Huntington Russell and Alphonso Taft, went far," and that Taft "was Secretary of War in 1876 - the first of several members of The Order to hold this post down into the 1950s."⁷

The Connecticut Alpha catalogue of Phi Beta Kappa for August 1838 lists "Alphonso Taft, Esq., C.A.S., Tut. Y. C." and "William Huntington Russell, M.D., C.A.S., Tut. Y. C.," so both men are listed as tutors of Yale College.⁸

Bar and Cincinnati practice

Taft was admitted to the bar at New Haven in August 1838. In January 1840 he settled in Cincinnati, Ohio, where his obituary record says he "gained eventually an extensive practice."¹ He served on the Cincinnati Common Council from 1847 to 1849 and for twenty-five years on the city's Board of Education.¹

Taft was the Republican candidate for Congress in 1856. He ran against George H. Pendleton and lost.¹ He joined the Yale Corporation in 1872, the year members of that body were for the first time elected by the alumni, and held the seat until he declined to stand again in 1882.¹

Superior Court judge and the Bible case

In 1865 Taft was appointed to a vacancy on the Superior Court of Cincinnati, and he was twice elected to the same seat, the second time by a unanimous vote of both parties, according to his obituary record.¹ He resigned in 1871 to return to private practice with two of his sons.¹ Rutherford B. Hayes, then governor of Ohio, received requests for a candidate for the seat that November. Hayes wrote on November 10, 1871 that the letter was "the fourth or fifth letter naming a candidate for Taft's place," and that he would try to select "the choice of the bar."⁹

The Cincinnati Board of Education adopted two resolutions on November 1, 1869. The first read: "Resolved, That religious instruction and the reading of religious books, including the Holy Bible, are prohibited in the common schools of Cincinnati, it being the true object and interest of this rule, to allow the children of the parents of all sects and opinions, in matters of faith and worship, to enjoy alike the benefit of the common school fund." The second repealed the rule requiring the opening exercises in every department to begin with a reading from the Bible and appropriate singing.¹⁰ Taxpayers of the city, with John D. Minor first among the plaintiffs, sued in the Superior Court of Cincinnati to enjoin both resolutions. The General Term heard the case on November 30, 1869, with Judges Storer, Taft and Hagans on the bench.¹¹

Judge Hagans delivered the first opinion for the injunction and closed it with the words "THE INJUNCTION MUST BE PERPETUAL."¹² Judge Storer, whose opinion followed, wrote that "the resolutions prohibiting the Bible and all religious instruction are ultra vires, and therefore void," and that "A majority of the Court are of this opinion, and a perpetual injunction will be therefore decreed, as prayed for in the petition."¹³ The judgment was entered on February 18, 1870.¹⁴

Taft dissented in an opinion that runs from page 390 to page 418 of the printed record. He opened with "I regret to find myself in a minority on this question. Nothing but a sense of duty has induced me to prepare a dissenting opinion."¹⁰ He read the first resolution as the Board's statement that its object was "to allow the children of parents of all sects and opinions in matters of faith and worship, to enjoy alike the benefit of the common school fund," and wrote that the proceeding "evinces no hostility on the part of the Board of Education to the Bible, to religion, or religious teaching, but rather a neutrality toward all the sects, which could not be otherwise maintained, and which had become essential to religious peace."¹⁵

The plaintiffs relied on the clause of the Ohio Bill of Rights that makes it the duty of the General Assembly "to pass suitable laws, to protect every religious denomination in the peaceable enjoyment of its own mode of worship, and to encourage schools and the means of instruction." Taft noted that "It is not claimed that the General Assembly has passed any law requiring religious teaching in the common schools."¹⁶ He wrote that the clause did not designate common schools, that the sixth article of the 1852 constitution barred any sect from "any exclusive right to, or control of, any part of the school fund," and that "The religion of the Bill of Rights, is not sectarian religion."¹⁷ He quoted Thomas M. Cooley's Constitutional Limitations for the propositions that "It is not toleration which is established in our system, but religious equality" and that "all support of religious instruction must be entirely voluntary."¹⁸

His conclusion read: "The Bible is not banished, nor is religion degraded or abused. The Board have simply aimed to free the common schools from any just conscientious objections, by confining them to secular instruction, and moral and intellectual training." He held that the Board "had the power to pass both the first and the second of these Resolutions," and that "this Court has no lawful authority to restrain it from acting under either of them."¹⁸

The case went to the Supreme Court of Ohio. In December 1872 the court reversed the Superior Court judgment. Judge Welch wrote that "We are not called upon as a court, nor are we authorized to say whether the Christian religion is the best and only true religion." He wrote that counsel had "elaborately discussed questions of state policy, morality, and religion, which, in our judgment, do not belong to the case."¹⁹ The opinion concluded that "It follows that the judgment of the Superior Court will be reversed, and the original petition dismissed."¹⁹

The obituary record attributes Taft's failure to win the 1875 Republican nomination for governor of Ohio to the opinion, which he had delivered "while on the bench on the question of the Bible in the schools."¹ Hayes wrote in his diary in early June 1875 that "Judge Taft, of Cincinnati, is an able and good man. But he had such a record on the Bible question in the schools that his nomination was impossible."²⁰ He reported the convention vote as "396 for me, 151 for Taft," and wrote that the nomination was made unanimous "on motion of a friend of Taft, Major Bickham."²¹ Hayes wrote that a dispatch from the secretary of the convention stated that, "on behalf of his father, Charles P. Taft had moved my nomination by acclamation."²¹ Hayes had sent a dispatch to Richard Smith, "a leader in the struggle for Judge Taft," saying: "I cannot allow my name to be used in opposition to Judge Taft. He became a candidate after I declined. He is an able and pure man and a sound Republican. I would not accept a nomination obtained by a contest with him."²¹ On June 5, 1875 Hayes wrote to Alphonso Taft: "I write to thank you in the sincerest and heartiest way for your action on my nomination."²² Hayes's diary entry of the same days sets out the campaign as he saw it: "I think the interesting point is to rebuke the Democracy by a defeat for subserviency to Roman Catholic demands," and his notes for the canvass list "The Bible in the Public Schools" as a topic.²³

Secretary of War, March to May 1876

The House committee on expenditures in the Department of War, chaired by Hiester Clymer, reported on March 2, 1876 that it had found "at the very threshold of their investigation" evidence of malfeasance by William W. Belknap, then Secretary of War. The report stated that the President's letter accepting Belknap's resignation reached the committee at eleven o'clock that morning, and that the President had told the committee the resignation was accepted about twenty minutes past ten.²⁴ The House voted unanimously that day to impeach him.²⁴ The articles were exhibited to the Senate on April 4, 1876. Article I charged that on October 8, 1870 Belknap had promised the post-tradership at Fort Sill to Caleb P. Marsh, and that Marsh and the post-trader John S. Evans then agreed in writing that Evans would pay Marsh $12,000 a year, "payable quarterly in advance," for as long as Marsh controlled the appointment.²⁵

Taft entered the department as Belknap's successor. The Army and Navy Journal reported that he called on the President on Saturday, March 11, 1876, in company with Secretaries Robeson and Chandler, and that Chief Justice Morrison R. Waite administered the oath of office there, after which the new Secretary "proceeded to the War Department and began the duties of his office."²⁶ A written argument printed in the Senate trial record states that "the President has nominated and the Senate confirmed Mr. Taft as successor to an office rendered vacant by Belknap's resignation."²⁷ Belknap's own plea in the trial states that he resigned at "ten o' clock and twenty minutes in the forenoon" of March 2.²⁸ The Adjutant General, Edward D. Townsend, later testified in the trial that he had served under Secretaries Stanton, Rawlins, Grant, Schofield, Belknap, Taft and Cameron.²⁹

On April 6, 1876 the department issued General Orders No. 28 over the signature of the Adjutant General "By order of the Secretary of War": "The Headquarters of the Army are hereby re-established at Washington City, and all orders and instructions relative to military operations, or affecting the military control and discipline of the Army, issued by the President through the Secretary of War, shall be promulgated through the General of the Army, and the Departments of the Adjutant-General and the Inspector-General shall report to him and be under his control in all matters relating thereto." Press dispatches of April 5 printed the order over Taft's name.³⁰

George A. Custer, lieutenant colonel of the 7th Cavalry, appeared before the Clymer committee on March 29, 1876. The Army and Navy Journal's summary of his testimony states that he said it was the common belief among Army officers who had served on the Missouri that Belknap was a silent partner of the traders, that the post trader at Fort Abraham Lincoln told him of annual payments to named generals, and that when Orvil Grant and a man named Bonnafon went up the Missouri to arrange a transfer of Indian posts, Custer furnished them with transportation.³¹ On May 13 the journal printed papers that General Townsend had transmitted to Belknap "in accordance with the instructions of the Secretary of War" concerning the corn transaction at Fort Abraham Lincoln that Custer had mentioned in his testimony, together with a letter of May 2 from Lieutenant General Philip H. Sheridan to Belknap on the transfer of the Sixth Infantry.³² The May 27 issue printed an account, attributed to a New York Tribune correspondent, of Custer's release from the Dakota expedition. It states that Custer, "fearing that the Court of Impeachment would detain him," had sought to be excused from attendance, and that the President "gave his disapproval to it, ordering that another officer be detailed to command the expedition."³³

In the House debate on the Army appropriation bill in June 1876, members said that the original estimates drawn under Belknap had been revised by Taft, who "reduced the amount $5,604,000."³⁴

On May 9, 1876 the engineer James B. Eads, then building the jetties at the South Pass of the Mississippi River, telegraphed Taft from New Orleans: "Please instruct Gen. C. B. Comstock, now at Port Eads, to sound channel between jetties with me," adding that Major Howell of the Engineers "has published a misstatement affecting public confidence in my work." Eads recorded that a dispatch from the Secretary of War four days later said General Cyrus B. Comstock "had previously received authority and instructions for a complete survey of the jetty channel."³⁵ On May 23 Eads wrote to Taft that the Chief of Engineers, General Andrew A. Humphreys, and Major Charles W. Howell had urged the Fort St. Philip canal against the jetty plan before Congress.³⁶

On May 18, 1876, still as Secretary of War, Taft wrote to Hayes about Hayes's prospects for the Republican presidential nomination: "it really seems to me that your chances are stronger than those of any other man."³⁷ J. Donald Cameron succeeded him as Secretary of War.³⁸

Attorney General: opinions

Taft held the Attorney Generalship from May 1876 until the end of the administration in March 1877.³⁹ His opinions are printed in volume 15 of the Official Opinions of the Attorneys General, between those of Edwards Pierrepont and Charles Devens.⁴⁰ His opinion of July 5, 1876 on the claim of John D. Sanborn held that the Treasury circulars offering "a reward for taxes recovered by reason of information furnished by the claimant" were authorized by statute, but that the Commissioner of Internal Revenue's rate of compensation in each case needed the approval of the Secretary of the Treasury, and he wrote that on that point he agreed with the opinion of his predecessor Pierrepont dated March 27, 1876.⁴¹ On July 7, 1876 he declined to give an official opinion on a fee claimed by Vann and Adair from the Osage Indians at the request of a congressional committee, writing that "the Attorney-General has no warrant to act outside of the statutes which define his office."⁴² His opinion of September 1, 1876 held that the two-year limitation of the 103rd Article of War applies to desertion.⁴³ On June 2, 1876 he had held, on a call from the Secretary of War dated May 5, that a quartermaster's clerk is amenable to a court-martial under the 60th Article of War.⁴⁴

On January 17, 1877, in an opinion to Cameron, he held that the first $500,000 installment to Eads and his associates under the act of March 3, 1875 was payable when the channel at the mouth of the South Pass was 20 feet deep and 200 feet wide, although the same depth had not been obtained through the shoal at the head of the pass, and he relied on a report of Army engineers to the Secretary of War dated November 19, 1876 that the channel through the shoal "is a part of that pass."⁴⁵

The election of 1876

A circular of instructions from Taft to United States marshals, printed by the New York Times on September 5, 1876, stated that in elections at which members of the House are chosen, "the United States secure voters against whatever in general hinders or presents them from a free exercise of the elective franchise," and told each marshal that "you will be held responsible for all breaches of the peace of the United States which diligence on your part might have prevented." It advised that the marshal and each deputy had the right to summon "every person in the district above fifteen years of age," including "the military of all denominations," meaning militia, soldiers and marines, who are "alike bound to obey you," and that "They are still the posse comitatus."⁴⁶ In a speech reported by the Times on October 26, 1876, Taft said the order "relates to the election of Federal officers only" and that, as to the recent Supreme Court decision, "there was no conflict."⁴⁷

Correspondence to Taft in the Senate's South Carolina compilation shows the information reaching him. The United States marshal for South Carolina, R. M. Wallace, wrote on July 17, 1876, after the killings of members of a Black militia company at Hamburg, that a detachment of United States soldiers under an officer of known Republican sentiments should be stationed there, and that to insure a peaceful election soldiers would be needed at the court-houses of Edgefield, Laurens, Spartanburg and Union.⁴⁸ The district attorney, D. T. Corbin, asked on August 21 that an experienced detective be sent to South Carolina to investigate conspiracies against Black citizens in several counties.⁴⁹ Wallace wrote on August 25 that rifle and saber clubs "openly declare that they intend to carry the coming election" and that "a liberal supply of United States troops can alone prevent mobocracy and bloodshed."⁵⁰ On October 11 Governor Daniel H. Chamberlain applied for national aid on the ground of "insurrection and domestic violence" in Aiken, Barnwell and Edgefield counties.⁵¹ Grant issued his proclamation on South Carolina on October 17, 1876, and the War Department, under Cameron, ordered General Sherman to concentrate available troops under General Thomas H. Ruger at Columbia.⁵²

After the election, in early December 1876, Taft telegraphed Chamberlain, as Attorney General: "The President thinks that you should exercise your own resources as governor in behalf of the legislature which you have recognized by assisting it to purge itself of unauthorized persons. If you are resisted in this, General Ruger has been instructed to enforce your authority."⁵³ A dispatch from Grant to General Ruger in the same days said: "To be plain, I want to avoid anything like an unlawful use of the military."⁵³

On December 6, 1876 Hayes telegraphed Taft, as Attorney General, that "The whole story referred to in your letter is a fabrication. Nothing of the sort occurred. Assure my friends of this." Taft's letter had reported that the Cincinnati Enquirer was circulating "An absurd story" that Hayes had committed himself at an interview with a man "who was acting for Southern Democracy," and that the story had been "so represented to the President by some person as to annoy him a little." Taft added: "By the way, I think it possible, that that story as to the interview with you, was intended to cool off the zeal of the President in maintaining the cause of the party in the South."⁵⁴

On December 22, 1876 John Sherman wrote to Hayes that he had "joined with Morton in a written request that Judge Taft would stop and speak to you fully the strong feeling of the President in regard to a gentleman high in position in this country, and he has agreed to do so."⁵⁵ Hayes replied to Sherman on December 25 that he had "met Judge Taft and Governor William Dennison" and that "There will not be the slightest difficulty growing out of the matter you refer to."⁵⁶ On December 29 Hayes wrote to Samuel Shellabarger: "in case our adversaries go to law with us, I shall want you to assist the Attorney-General."⁵⁷

The Electoral Commission was created by act of Congress approved January 29, 1877.⁵⁸ In the Commission's Louisiana argument, the Louisiana jurist John A. Campbell, one of the counsel in support of the objection to the first and third certificates, said that "under the opinion of the Attorney-General of the United States, large detachments of the Army were placed in various parts of the States, so that they might be 'bystanders,' I think was the language of the opinion, to serve as a sort of posse comitatus in the event that the marshal should find any use for that sort of assistance." In the same speech he said that the marshal of the district "appointed eight hundred deputies for New Orleans and fifteen hundred deputies for the country, to attend the polls in the country."⁵⁹

Minister to Austria-Hungary

President Chester A. Arthur appointed Taft minister to Austria on April 26, 1882. Taft presented his credentials at Vienna on June 30, 1882, and left the post on August 25, 1884.⁶⁰

His despatches from Vienna concern naturalized Americans. In a despatch of November 20, 1882, Taft reported that persons residing in the Empire were claiming protection as naturalized citizens of the United States.⁶¹ The Department of State replied on January 18, 1883.⁶²

A second cluster concerned American meat. On November 28, 1882, Taft reported a proposal in the Vienna press to extend the prohibition of pork to all kinds of American meats.⁶¹ The Department replied on January 19, 1883 that "The existence of trichinae in beef has never before been suggested."⁶²

In 1884 Taft reported cases of naturalized Americans called up for military service in Hungary. In March 1884 he reported another such case.⁶³ In May 1884 he reported that a man named in the despatch had been released from military service on his application, and wrote that this was "the first case which has arisen where the facts directly involved the point and were acted upon."⁶³

In an August 12, 1884 despatch Taft reported that Count Gustav Kálnoky, the foreign minister, had said that "the laws of the Empire prohibit the going round of agents for the purpose of proselyting to Mormonism and leading people away under that pretext."⁶⁴

Minister to Russia

Arthur appointed Taft minister to Russia on July 4, 1884. His credentials were presented at Saint Petersburg on September 3, 1884, and he presented his recall on July 31, 1885.⁶⁰ The obituary record gives August 1885 as the end of the mission.³⁹

The Russian despatches concern the treatment of foreign Jews. On December 18, 1884, Secretary of State Frederick T. Frelinghuysen wrote that S. S. Cox, a member of the House, had addressed the Department on a report that the Russian minister of the interior had ordered the expulsion of foreign Hebrews holding passports from Odessa and other cities, unless they also held residence permits.⁶⁵ Taft replied on January 17, 1885 that "There is undoubtedly such an order as you describe in force; but it is not limited to Jews."⁶⁶ He wrote that "The difficulty is that the Government, in granting permits and licenses, discriminates against foreign Jews," and that the foreign ministry held that under Article I of the 1832 treaty American citizens had protection only on the "condition that they submit to the laws and ordinances established there."⁶⁶

On March 18, 1885 Taft forwarded the foreign ministry's answer to Secretary of State Thomas F. Bayard.⁶⁷ On March 30, 1885 Bayard wrote about the testimonials Congress had voted to those who had succored the survivors of the Jeannette Expedition.⁶⁸ On May 25, 1885 Bayard wrote about the arrest in Russia of an American citizen.⁶⁹

The Taft family

He delivered a "Historical Address" at the Taft family meeting at Uxbridge, Massachusetts on August 12, 1874.⁷⁰ He said that "The first of our progenitors in this country was Robert Taft," and that "His first appearance in America, as far as we have been able to trace him, was in connection with his house and lot in Braintree, which we find him owning in 1678." He went on to say that "In the year 1679, he made arrangements to move to Mendon." Robert Taft died in February 1725, at an age that Taft thought was "not less than eighty-five years."⁷⁰

Sutton's chart places "TAFT FAMILY (1679, Braintree, Mass.)" among the old-line families of "THE ORDER."⁷¹ Taft's address dates the Braintree holding to 1678 and the move to Mendon to 1679.⁷⁰

Taft's first wife was Fanny (Phelps) Taft, the daughter of Charles Phelps of Townshend, Vermont.² They married on August 29, 1841, and she died on June 2, 1852.³⁹ Their sons included Peter Rawson Taft, Yale 1867, born in Cincinnati and died at his father's residence on June 3, 1889.⁷² Their surviving son Charles Phelps Taft, Yale 1864, was born in Cincinnati on December 21, 1843 and died there on December 31, 1929. He practiced in the firm of A. Taft & Sons with his father and his brother Peter from 1871 to 1879, then edited the Cincinnati Times, which became the Cincinnati Times-Star, and served in Congress from 1895 to 1897.²

Taft married Louisa Maria Torrey, the daughter of Samuel D. Torrey of Millbury, Massachusetts, on December 26, 1853.³⁹ Their children included William Howard Taft, born in Cincinnati on September 15, 1857 and Yale 1878, who died March 8, 1930.² Henry Waters Taft, Yale 1880, was living in New York City in 1943.⁷³ Horace Dutton Taft was born in Cincinnati on December 28, 1861 and graduated from Yale in 1883. His obituary record lists Skull and Bones among his Yale societies and says that he studied in Vienna in 1883 and 1884, the years his father was minister to Austria-Hungary.⁷³ Horace founded the Taft School in 1890 and was its headmaster until 1936. He died in Watertown, Connecticut on January 28, 1943.⁷³ A daughter by the second marriage was living in El Cajon, California in 1943.⁷³

Antioch College

G. Stanley Hall, the psychologist, wrote of his years teaching at Antioch that he sometimes had to preach in the Unitarian church in Cincinnati, where he met Dr. Mayo, Dr. Vickers and Judge Stallo, and "occasionally spent a Sunday with the Tafts." He wrote that "Ex-President Taft was then a boy and his father, Judge Alonzo Taft, was a trustee of Antioch College."⁷⁴

Antony C. Sutton wrote that Horace Mann was the first president of Antioch, from 1853 to 1860, and that "The most prominent trustee of Antioch College was none other than the co-founder of The Order, Alphonso Taft."⁷⁵ He also wrote that "the Tafts (The Order) were the most powerful trustees of Antioch."⁷⁶ In his discussion of Mann's promotion of the look-say method of reading, Sutton offered two possible reasons and gave the first as Mann's 1853 appointment to Antioch, adding that "The most influential Trustee of Antioch College was the co-founder of The Order," and naming Alphonso Taft.⁷⁷ Hall's name for the judge is "Alonzo," which Sutton quotes with "(sic)."⁷⁴⁷⁵

Death

Taft spent the last months of his life in San Diego, California, where he died on May 21, 1891, in his eighty-first year.³⁹ His obituary record states that "The integrity and purity of his character were universally acknowledged in all his connection with the public service" and describes his reputation at the bar and on the bench as that of "a sound, learned, and upright lawyer."³⁹