Wheeler, William A(lmon)

He was nominated as vice president in order to lend sectional balance to the ticket, and in his acceptance letter he alluded to the need to end Reconstruction, as Hayes subsequently did. Wheeler ran on a platform favouring administrative integrity, civil service reform, and aid to education in the South. Distracted by health and personal problems—his wife died just prior to the Republican convention in 1876—he retired from public life after his term in office was over.