After his return from France, Morton tried to revive his political career. He ran for a senate seat in 1885, but lost. He ran again in 1887 with the same result. It seems that Morton was not an exciting candidate on the campaign trail. His favorite subject was international banking and finance, which was not a crowd-pleasing subject.
In 1888, the Republicans wanted to defeat President Cleveland who was running for re-election, and nominated Benjamin Harrison for President. To win, they would need a bulging war chest full of money. They turned to Morton, hoping he would serve as their chief fund-raiser as he had in 1880. They again offered him the Vice Presidential nomination, and this time he accepted immediately, having learned his lesson the last time.
Morton performed his duties with great efficiency. At one point in the campaign, he sent a letter to his friends in the banking business saying simply, “We want money and we want it quick!” Morton and another Republican fund-raiser, John Wanamaker, raised three million dollars, mostly from wealthy industrialists who were afraid that the Democrats would lower tariffs and allow “foreign free trade.”
Of course, selling positions in the new administration raised some of the money. President Harrison later complained, “I could not name my own cabinet. They had sold out every place to pay the election expenses.” Four hundred thousand dollars was raised at the last moment to help swing twenty thousand crucial votes in the swing state of Indiana. One Republican leader later said that the President had no idea how many “were compelled to approach the gates of the penitentiary” to win the election.
The result of the 1888 election was that Harrison and Morton lost the popular vote by over 100,000 votes, but won the vote in the Electoral College. That was the last time this happened until Bush defeated Gore the same way this year.
Morton bought a large home in Washington, D.C. and had it extensively remodeled. He entertained lavishly and often, trying to influence Congress in favor of the Republican program. When his term ended, members of both parties threw a farewell reception in his honor.
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