Schuyler Colfax – 1823-1885

Colfax was an Indiana newspaper publisher who became a Republican congressman and was in the forefront of Radical Reconstruction after the Civil War, favoring harsh treatment of the former Confederacy. He served as vice president during the first term (1869-1873) of Ulysses S. Grant, but in 1872 (while still sitting as vice president) was implicated in the massive Crédit Mobilier scandal, involving the financing of the transcontinental (Union Pacific-Central Pacific) railroad. Although never prosecuted, Colfax became a symbol of corruption during the era popularly known as “The Gilded Age.”