Holders would have the option of accepting cash or new bonds at 3%, closer to the interest rates of the time. Taxpayers were saved an estimated $10 million. By comparison, federal expenditures in 1881 were below $261 million.[176][177]

Supreme Court nomination[edit]
In 1880, President Hayes had nominated Stanley Matthews to the Supreme Court but the Senate declined to act on the nomination. In March 1881, Garfield re-nominated Matthews to the Court and the Senate confirmed Matthews by a vote of 24–23.[178] According to The New York Times, "opposition to Matthews's Supreme Court appointment ... stemmed from his prosecution in 1859 of a newspaper editor who had assisted two runaway slaves."Because Matthews was "a professed abolitionist at the time, the matter was later framed as political expediency triumphing over moral principle."[179] Matthews served on the Court until his death in 1889.[179]

Reforms[edit]
Main article: Star Route scandal
An 1881 Puck cartoon shows Garfield finding a baby at his front door with a tag marked "Civil Service Reform, compliments of R.B. Hayes". Hayes, his predecessor in the presidency, is seen in the background dressed like a woman and holding a bag marked "R.B. Hayes' Savings, Fremont, Ohio".
