President Rutherford B. Hayes’ Impressions of His Landmark Trip to the Western States

The first sitting president to visit the west coast writes, “We have been west, had a big time and have returned…I have numerous large size stories to tell you about that trip. They would look so large on paper that I will not write them down for fear of not being believed.”

President Rutherford B. Hayes and First Lady Lucy Webb Hayes, along with ten others (including Gen. William T. Sherman), left Chicago, Illinois, in September 1880 and began an extended tour through the western United States. It was the first time a sitting president had ever traveled to the West Coast. They traveled via the transcontinental railroad in the presidential car of the Central Railroad, stopping first in Wyoming and then on through Utah and Nevada, reaching Sacramento and San Francisco.

From there they went by rail to Northern California and up into Oregon. After a swing through Washington state and the Puget Sound area, Hayes and his entourage boarded the steamship Columbia for the return to San Francisco. From there, Hayes toured Southern California and several southwestern states before returning to Washington on November 7.

Hayes took the trip because he wanted to unify the nation in a demonstrable way, and also hoped to mend fences and build support for his Native American and Chinese exclusion policies. The west was then pressing to exclude Chinese immigrants altogether, and Hayes had vetoed a bill that would do so, both to avoid diplomatic troubles with China and because he believed that race prejudice was involved and was jeopardizing international trade with China. Many in the west were furious. Hayes and his Interior Secretary Carl Schurz were also carrying out a Native American policy that included assimilation into white culture, educational training, and dividing Indian land into individual household allotments. Hayes believed that his policies would lead to self-sufficiency and peace between Indians and whites. The idea of bringing Native Americans from the reservations into white communities had met with a very mixed reception. On the trip, the touring party were stunned by the scenery in the west, and had lavish and enthusiastic welcomes and events everywhere. They visited agricultural fairs, colleges, military installments, a government-run Indian Industrial and Training School, and much more. When they returned, the presidential party was brimming with excitement.

Lucy Hayes Cook was a cousin of the First Lady, her father, Matthew Scott Cook being a brother of Lucy Hayes’ mother, Maria Cook Webb.  Her nickname was Lute or Flute. Lucy Cook was frequently with the Hayes family for long visits, and when she was married on April 3, 1888, in Chillicothe, the former President and Mrs. Hayes were present. The Hayes children called her Aunt Lucy. In 1880 she was 29 years old.

In 1880 additional conservatories were added to the White House, including rose houses, a camellia house, orchid houses and a house for bedding plants. Isaiah Lancaster, the President’s long-time valet, was one of four black domestic servants the Hayeses had brought with them to Washington from Ohio.

No sooner had the President arrived back at the White House than he wrote Lucy Cook, insisting that she come to Washington, and still manifesting the excitement of the trip. Autograph letter signed as President, Executive Mansion letterhead, November 16, 1880, to Lucy whom he addresses as “My dear Flute”, not only gushing about his trip west, but mentioning the White House expansion, and inviting her to Isaiah’s wedding. “We have been west, had a big time and have returned. The election is over and we have now settled down to the ordinary humdrum of life. The time which was to have arrived has arrived. You will please put in your appearance here in short order. We all pine for you, the fellows are all inquiring for you. Polo and the rest and the girls are all fearing your return. Large offers have been made to me by some ladies if I should succeed in keeping that horrid Miss Cook away from here this winter, but I rejected them all with scorn. I have numerous large size stories to tell you about that trip. They would look so large on paper that I will not write them down for fear of not being believed. When will you come! You must come this week, do not make any silly little excuses about dress. I will lend you some of mine, if you need any more than you have. This place is in many respects similar to what it was last winter only there is no billiard room. It is now a part of the greenhouse, windows from the State guest room open into it. We have some new show china, new sideboard and table and myself here instead of Webb. Isaiah is soon to be married and you must come on and attend it. R.B. Hayes.”

Lucy was at the Executive Mansion by January 1881 and was still there in late February. Likely she remained until the Hayeses left the building on March 4.

The day after writing this letter, the United States and China signed a treaty which gave the U.S. the power to “regulate, limit or suspend” but not completely prohibit Chinese immigration. The treaty also includes a clause banning the opium trade. In return, the United States grants China trading privileges. So Hayes continued to stand in the way of Chinese exclusion.