1858 and 1859 United States House of Representatives elections
Elections to the United States House of Representatives for the 36th Congress were held during President James Buchanan's term at various dates in different states from August 1858 to November 1859.
Winning a plurality for the first time, Republicans benefited from multiple political factors. These included the implosion of the nativist American Party, sectional strife in the Democratic Party, Northern voter discomfort with the infamous March 1857 Dred Scott Supreme Court decision, political exposure of Democrats to chaotic violence in Kansas amid repeated attempts to impose legal slavery against the will of the majority of its settlers, and a decline in President Buchanan's popularity due to his perceived fecklessness. In Pennsylvania, his home state, Republicans made particularly large gains.
The pivotal Dred Scott decision was only the second time the Supreme Court had overturned law on Constitutional grounds. The decision created apprehension in the North, where slavery had ceased to exist, that a ruling in a different case widely expected to be heard by the Supreme Court would strike down any limitations on slavery anywhere in the United States.
Short of a majority, Republicans controlled the House with limited cooperation from smaller parties, which also opposed Democrats. Republicans were united in opposition to slavery in the territories and to fugitive slave laws. Republicans thus rejected the abrogation of the Missouri Compromise, key aspects of the Compromise of 1850, the Kansas-Nebraska Act, and the Dred Scott decision. Though not yet abolitionist, Republicans derived a primary partisan purpose from open hostility to slavery while furnishing a mainstream platform for abolitionism in its membership. None of the party's views or positions was new. However, their mutual catalysis by unification into a cohesive political vehicle, and the bold dismissal of the South, represented a new, disruptive political force.
Democrats remained divided and politically trapped. Fifteen Democratic members publicly defied their party label. Of seven Independent Democrats, six represented districts in Southern states. Eight Northern Anti-Lecompton Democrats favored a ban on slavery in [|Kansas], effectively upholding the Missouri Compromise their party had destroyed several years earlier. The party lacked credible leadership. It continued to drift in a direction favorable to the interests of slavery despite both widening and intensifying opposition of Northern voters to the expansion of those interests. A damaging public perception also existed that President Buchanan had improperly influenced and endorsed the Dred Scott decision, incorrectly believing that it had solved his main political problem. Such influence would violate the separation of powers. The sensational gap between Democratic rhetoric and results was visible to voters. Defeat in the North and intra-party defection combined to make the Democratic Party both more Southern and more radical.
Democrats lost seats in some slave states as the disturbing turn of national events and surge in sectional tensions alarmed a significant minority of Southern voters. Southern politicians opposing both Democrats and extremism, but unwilling to affiliate with Republicans, ran on the Southern Opposition Party ticket.
For 11 states, this was the last full Congressional election until the Reconstruction. Twenty-nine elected members quit near the end of the session following their states' secession from the Union, whose immediate motivation was the result of the election of 1860.
Election summaries
One seat each was added for the new states of [|Oregon] and Kansas.Special elections
There were special elections in 1858 and 1859 to the 35th United States Congress and 36th United States Congress.Special elections are sorted by date then district.
35th Congress
36th Congress
Alabama
Arkansas
California
California held its election September 7, 1859. From statehood to 1864, California's members were elected at-large, with the top finishers winning election.Connecticut
Delaware
Florida
Georgia
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Minnesota became a new state in 1858 having already elected its first two members at-large in October 1857 to finish the current term. The state then held elections to the next term October 4, 1859.Mississippi
Missouri
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New York
North Carolina
Ohio
Ohio elected its members October 12, 1858, netting a 3-seat Republican gain.| District | Incumbent | Party | First elected | Result | Candidates |
| George H. Pendleton | Democratic | 1856 | Incumbent re-elected. | ||
| William S. Groesbeck | Democratic | 1856 | Incumbent lost re-election. New member elected. Republican gain. | ||
| Clement L. Vallandigham | Democratic | 1856 | Incumbent re-elected. | ||
| Matthias H. Nichols | Republican | 1852 | Incumbent lost re-election. New member elected. Democratic gain. | ||
| Richard Mott | Republican | 1854 | Incumbent retired. New member elected. Republican hold. | ||
| Joseph R. Cockerill | Democratic | 1856 | Incumbent retired. New member elected. Democratic hold. | ||
| Aaron Harlan | Republican | 1852 | Incumbent lost renomination. New member elected. Republican hold. | ||
| Benjamin Stanton | Republican | 1854 | Incumbent re-elected. | ||
| Lawrence W. Hall | Democratic | 1856 | Incumbent lost re-election. New member elected. Republican gain. | ||
| Joseph Miller | Democratic | 1856 | Incumbent lost re-election. New member elected. Republican gain. | ||
| Albert C. Thompson | Republican | 1854 | Incumbent retired. New member elected. Democratic gain. | ||
| Samuel S. Cox | Democratic | 1856 | Incumbent re-elected. | ||
| John Sherman | Republican | 1854 | Incumbent re-elected. | ||
| Philemon Bliss | Republican | 1854 | Incumbent retired. New member elected. Republican hold. Successor died May 31, 1859, leading to a special election. | ||
| Joseph Burns | Democratic | 1856 | Incumbent lost re-election. New member elected. Republican gain. | ||
| Cydnor B. Tompkins | Republican | 1856 | Incumbent re-elected. | ||
| William Lawrence | Democratic | 1856 | Incumbent retired. New member elected. Republican gain. | ||
| Benjamin F. Leiter | Republican | 1854 | Incumbent retired. New member elected. Republican hold. | ||
| Edward Wade | Republican | 1852 | Incumbent re-elected. | ||
| Joshua Reed Giddings | Republican | 1843 | Incumbent lost renomination. New member elected. Republican hold. | ||
| John Bingham | Republican | 1854 | Incumbent re-elected. |