ABSTRACT
Alice was one of the five striking daughters of former Vice President Levi Morton. Morton had served as vice president from 1889 until 1893 under President Benjamin Harrison. In a quirk of fate, Morton might have been president if he had accepted James Garfield’s offer to join his presidential ticket in 1880. Morton, a wealthy banker, refused the position because he preferred the post of secretary of the treasury. Charles J.Guiteau, a disgruntled office seeker, shot Garfield in 1881, and Vice President Chester A.Arthur became president. Morton did not become secretary of the treasury, as Garfield did not complete his cabinet before he died. The Republican Party again considered Morton as a candidate for president in 1896, but McKinley won the top spot with Theodore Roosevelt as his vice president. When the deranged anarchist Leon Czolgosz shot McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt became president in 1901, Morton must have considered how figuratively dodging assassins’ bullets had affected his life.
