Matthew Quay

Matthew Stanley Quay was born in Dillsburg, Pennsylvania, on September 30, 1833. His father was Anderson Beaton Quay, a Presbyterian minister; Matthew's mother's last name at her birth was Catherine McCain.[4] The Quay family was of Scottish and Manx descent;[5][6] Matthew Quay had a Native American great-grandmother.[7] Matthew was named for General Matthew Stanley, who raised McCain after her parents died; he was one of eight children and the oldest son to reach adulthood.[8]

The Quay family lived in several towns in central and western Pennsylvania during Matthew's childhood as Reverend Quay accepted new positions, before they finally settled in Beaver in 1850, where the family had previously lived in the early 1840s. Despite the itinerant nature of the family's existence, the education of the children, including the girls, was not neglected.[9] Matthew attended Beaver and Indiana academies, then enrolled at Jefferson College (now Washington & Jefferson College), where he became a member of Beta Theta Pi.[10]

After graduating in 1850, Quay visited Mississippi, where one of his classmates lived on a plantation. They had plans to go into business giving stereopticon lectures, but the equipment broke. Unable to find suitable employment in the South, he returned to Pennsylvania, where he read law in the Pittsburgh firm of Penney and Starrett. James C. Penney, a partner in the firm, stated that he "had never known a man of his age whose mind was so well disciplined and mature".[11] In late 1852, uncertain that he was suited to the law, Quay embarked on another tour of the South but was again unable to find profitable employment and returned to complete his legal studies[12] under the tutelage of Colonel Richard Roberts of Beaver.[5] He was admitted to the bar in Beaver County on October 13, 1854.[13]

In 1856, Governor James Pollock appointed Quay as prothonotary of Beaver County, to fill an unexpired term. The appointment came because the governor and his advisors respected Reverend Quay, and the young lawyer was elected to three-year terms in 1856 and 1859.[14] At this time, the Republican Party was being formed; Quay became a member[4] and was the Beaver County manager of that party's candidate for governor in 1860, Andrew Curtin.[15] Quay's success in getting delegates to the state convention from western Pennsylvania to support Curtin was crucial to his getting the nomination.[16] In October 1860, Curtin was elected, and won Beaver County by a large margin, causing him to admire Quay's political skill.[17]

When Curtin became governor in January 1861, he made Quay his private secretary[18]—a considerable advancement for a rural lawyer. At the start of the Civil War, Quay was among the earliest from Beaver County to volunteer. During May 1861, he was commissioned as a first lieutenant in the 19th Division Pennsylvania Uniformed Militia, but did not take up that place. Instead, Governor Curtin made him assistant commissary general of Pennsylvania, with the rank of lieutenant colonel. After the functions of the state commissariat were transferred to Washington, Curtin continued Quay as his private secretary. Curtin sought to be a friend of and advocate for Pennsylvania's soldiers, and hundreds of letters poured in each day, letters that the governor had decreed must be individually answered, no matter how petty the grievance. This task was delegated to Quay, and he performed it flawlessly, even reproducing Curtin's signature so perfectly even the governor could not tell the difference.[19][20]

Other tasks Quay performed for Curtin included being liaison to the legislature. The Republicans lost their majority in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives in the 1861 election, but Quay was able to forge an alliance between the Republican minority and the War Democrats, assuring a legislature that would work with Curtin on war matters. Curtin found Quay's services valuable, and was reluctant to lose him, but Quay wanted a combat assignment, which in August 1862 he got, as colonel of the 134th Pennsylvania Infantry. He and his troops joined General George McClellan's Army of the Potomac in late September 1862, as it pursued General Robert E. Lee's Confederate Army of Northern Virginia after the Battle of Antietam. He did not see combat at that time, as McClellan was content to let Lee retreat into Virginia without a battle. Shortly thereafter, Quay fell ill of typhoid fever, and on medical advice, and because Curtin wanted him to serve as Pennsylvania's military agent in Washington, he submitted his resignation on December 5, 1862, though there were delays in accepting it.[21][22]

In late 1862, Union forces, Quay's among them, prepared for an attack on Fredericksburg, Virginia, on the road to Richmond, the Confederate capital. The acceptance of Quay's resignation was received on the eve of the Battle of Fredericksburg, and he refused to leave his men, persuading commanders to accept him as a voluntary aide-de-camp.[23][24] Quay was warned by the chief surgeon not to join in the battle because of his health, and was told he would die like a fool. He replied, "I'd rather die like a fool than live like a coward."[25] The attack was a disaster for Union forces, as the Confederate soldiers were well-emplaced, and could not be dislodged. Quay's troops were sent to attack the Confederate positions on Marye's Heights; hidden behind a stone wall, Confederate forces were able to unleash a torrent of fire against the attackers. Astride a horse, Quay urged his men forward, and they were able to get within 25 or 30 yards (23 to 28 meters) of the wall before retreating, with half the soldiers dead or wounded. Quay was not wounded, and his conduct earned him the Medal of Honor.[23][24]

Quay then served as Pennsylvania's military agent in Washington.[24] Although the federal government took a predominant role over the states in the Civil War, state governors appointed agents to liaise with federal officials, to see to the well-being of the state's soldiers, and to answer letters and complaints from troops. Unhappy in the role, in 1863, he secured a transfer back to Harrisburg as Curtin's military secretary, where he did similar work, and where he could help with the governor's successful re-election campaign that year.[26]

In 1864, Quay was elected to the state House of Representatives for Beaver and Washington counties, he was re-elected in 1865 and 1866.[27] In 1866, he became the leader of the Republican majority in the House and the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. Rarely participating in debate, he sought efficiency, causing the appropriations bills to be brought forward early in the session, rather than late, as was customary.[28][29]

In 1867, the legislature was to elect a United States Senator, since senators before 1913 were chosen by legislators, not the people. Curtin sought the seat, as did former senator and U.S. Secretary of War Simon Cameron. As well as supporting Curtin, Quay wanted to be Speaker of the Pennsylvania House, but Curtin's senatorial rivals believed that granting Quay the powers of the speakership would lead to the election of Curtin. Thus, they combined to defeat him. Cameron gained the party legislative caucus's nomination for senator, and Quay healed relations by moving to make the nomination unanimous. Cameron was thereafter elected by the full legislature.[30][31] Senator Cameron took full control of the state Republican Party over the next years, as Curtin lost power, especially when he was appointed Minister to Russia by President Ulysses S. Grant in 1869, leading to his extended absence from the state, and rising Republicans had to choose between alliance with Cameron or political oblivion. Quay chose the former. Nevertheless, not wanting to be seen as a traitor to Curtin, Quay's change of loyalty was so gradual it was not until 1872 that it was complete.[32][33]

Quay did not seek re-election to the legislature in 1867, instead returning to his hometown and founding a weekly newspaper, the Beaver Radical, which began publication in January 1868. Quay, the editor, declared it to be Republican in outlook but not devoted to any faction. Circulation grew rapidly, and by 1872, the Radical claimed to be the most-distributed weekly in western Pennsylvania. The Radical opposed President Andrew Johnson, but decried the Tenure of Office Act, that Johnson was impeached for violating, as plainly unconstitutional. The Radical also urged Northern states to support African Americans by giving full force to the Fifteenth Amendment's promise of universal male suffrage.[34][35] According to Frank Bernard Evans in his thesis on Pennsylvania politics of the 1870s, Quay made the Radical to be among "the best-known and most widely-quoted journals in the state".[36]

Beginning shortly after the Civil War, Simon Cameron had begun to build a powerful Republican political machine in Pennsylvania.[37] The statewide machine was effectively an alliance of municipal and county Republican machines whose interests had to be harmonized by its leader, the most important being the organizations of strongly Republican Philadelphia County and Allegheny County (Pittsburgh).[38] The Pennsylvania Manufacturers Association was closely aligned with the machine, which followed a conservative course over several decades.[37] Beyond personal leadership by the boss, success required efficient party organization, a political program that could unify the party, and a failure of the Democratic Party, deemed the party of treason after the Civil War, to regain the trust of the Pennsylvania electorate.[39]

Senator Simon Cameron in 1874

After his return from Russia, Curtin in 1872 destroyed his remaining influence in the Pennsylvania Republican Party by supporting the Liberal Republican Party, made up of those Republicans opposed to the policies of President Grant, or alienated by the corruption in his administration. Quay fully broke with Curtin, strongly supporting the regular Republican ticket.[40][41] Quay backed Grant for re-election over the Liberal Republican/Democratic candidate, Horace Greeley of New York, as well as the Republican nominee for governor, Pennsylvania Auditor General (and former Union General) John F. Hartranft. Both Republican candidates were successful, and Quay was rewarded for his efforts for Hartranft with the post of Secretary of the Commonwealth. Returning to the center of Republican politics, he gave up the Radical, selling it to James S. Rutan, his lieutenant in the Cameron machine.[42] In January 1873, Quay managed Cameron's campaign for re-election to the Senate. The Republicans had a majority of 31 overall in the legislature, but dissident Republicans were promoting the industrialist Charlemagne Tower, a political novice, for the seat. Quay disposed of the challenge by calling an early caucus of the Republicans in the legislature, which Tower was unprepared for, and Cameron won easy re-election.[43]

With Cameron re-elected to the Senate and Quay as Governor Hartranft's chief advisor, the Cameron machine was much more deeply entrenched than it had been before the Liberal Republican challenge.[44] When not in Washington, Cameron, by now in his mid-seventies, spent time traveling, increasingly leaving day-to-day administration of the machine to his son Don Cameron, Quay, and Robert Mackey,[45] a Cameron lieutenant who served five one-year terms as state treasurer in the 1860s and 1870s.[46]

Quay was a delegate to the 1876 Republican National Convention, and with Don Cameron helped frustrate the ambitions of Senator James G. Blaine of Maine in favor of those of Ohio Governor Rutherford B. Hayes.[47] Don Cameron and Quay offered Blaine's managers the state's votes in exchange for a promise to appoint a Pennsylvanian to the Cabinet but Blaine refused. The following year Quay would write to Hayes, "I am immediately responsible for the action of the Pennsylvania delegation which resulted in your nomination. Mr. Blaine will tell you this ..."[48] Quay was chairman of the state Republican Party, and helped win the state for Hayes over Samuel Tilden by fewer than 10,000 votes despite a frosty relationship with the nominee. This was the state in which Hayes won the most electoral votes. With the presidential election disputed, Quay was among the Republicans invited by President Grant to go to Louisiana, one of the states at issue, and investigate the situation there, which he did, acting as a partisan for the Republicans. An electoral commission ruled for Hayes. Grant had made Don Cameron Secretary of War; Hayes refused to retain him or appoint anyone else from Pennsylvania. Angered, Simon Cameron resigned from the Senate, though he engineered the election of his son Don by the legislature as his replacement.[49][50]

The Democrats did well in Pennsylvania's 1877 elections, making the following year's elections important, especially since Hartranft's successor was to be elected and Don Cameron's Senate seat would be filled by the 1879 legislature. With Quay and Mackey from western Pennsylvania and the Camerons based in Harrisburg, Philadelphia had no representation at the high levels of the Republican machine. They decided that Quay should relocate to Philadelphia to take on a new, and lucrative, position as County Recorder. The legislature duly created the position, and Hartranft appointed Quay, who resigned as Secretary of the Commonwealth, to it; Quay relocated to Philadelphia, taking a large double house at 11th and Spruce Streets. The maneuver backfired, as Philadelphians were resentful it was not filled by one of their own. Quay worked to elect a Republican governor and legislature, persuading out of staters like House Minority Leader James A. Garfield of Ohio to give speeches in Pennsylvania. Before returning to his home in Beaver, he stayed in Philadelphia long enough to see out the elections, in which Republican Henry M. Hoyt was narrowly elected by a plurality, and the Republicans gained a majority in both houses of the legislature. Though Mackey died on New Year's Day 1879, Don Cameron was re-elected to a full term. Quay resigned, and was re-appointed as Secretary of the Commonwealth by Governor Hoyt.[51][52] According to McClure, "It was in this campaign that Quay made himself the acknowledged Republican master in the State, as Mackey died a few weeks after the election, and Quay, green with the laurels of his great victory, became the supreme leader of the party."[53]

Quay was involved in a financial scandal in 1880. J. Blake Walters, cashier of the Pennsylvania Treasury, made deposits in favored banks using worthless securities, retaining the actual money for stock speculation with Quay and others. Amos C. Noyes was the treasurer, and with Walters gave assurances that the money would not be required from the banks until Quay and his associates had time to restore it. The speculation went badly, and when Samuel Butler, an anti-boss Republican, took office as treasurer in 1880, he demanded a full accounting of state funds. There was a deficit of about $250,000, (equivalent to $7,581,034 in 2022) for which Quay accepted responsibility and sold much of his property, with a gap of about $100,000 filled with a loan from Don Cameron, repaid in 1886 with, according to McClure, a legacy Quay had received. Quay's acceptance of responsibility satisfied the public, as did his statement that Walters (who killed himself) had acted without his instructions.[54][55] Another source of money for Quay was Standard Oil; he had come to terms with John D. Rockefeller's company in 1879 and requested a "loan" of $15,000 in 1880, something Rockefeller thought was worth it. Quay continued to deal with Standard Oil financially until his death in 1904, throughout his time in the Senate.[56]

To avoid sending a delegation supportive of Blaine to the 1880 Republican National Convention in Chicago, Don Cameron and Quay called a state convention early in the year, before the Blaine supporters could organize, and got the selected delegation to agree to vote as a unit for former president Grant, who was seeking a third term.[57] While Quay and Cameron would likely have made peace with a President Blaine to keep control of Pennsylvania, Grant was more amenable to the bosses' demands.[58] Quay and Cameron acted in spite of the fact that Blaine was widely popular in Pennsylvania.[59] The national convention deadlocked and the nomination fell to Garfield. Cameron and Quay were among the "Immortal 306", the delegates who voted for Grant on the 36th and final ballot. Although Garfield narrowly won both in Pennsylvania and nationwide, Quay's support for Grant meant that he and Cameron would not be in the president-elect's inner circle. This showed when the machine's candidate for Senate in early 1881, Henry W. Oliver, was blocked by the combined strength of the Democrats and independent Republicans; Garfield was asked by Quay to intervene, but he would not do so. The senatorship eventually fell to an independent Republican, Congressman John I. Mitchell.[60] Later in 1881, the assassination of Garfield brought Chester A. Arthur, who was more aligned with the bosses, to the White House.[61]

Senator Don Cameron, whom Quay eclipsed in the Pennsylvania Republican Party.

In 1882, a replacement for Governor Hoyt was to be elected, and the Republican Party divided. The Cameron-Quay machine backed James A. Beaver, and the independent Republicans, who backed the views of the Republican Party, but abhorred the bossism, supported John Stewart. When Hoyt endorsed Stewart, Quay resigned as Secretary of the Commonwealth in protest. Democrat Robert E. Pattison was elected.[62] Part of the reason for the defeat was because Quay had insisted that Hoyt pardon legislators convicted of taking bribes to pass a bill reimbursing the Pennsylvania Railroad for losses incurred in the Railroad strike of 1877.[63] Don Cameron had backed Beaver early in the campaign; his brusque style also helped prompt the reaction which defeated the candidate, who was himself well-liked in the Republican Party.[64]

While Cameron demanded absolute loyalty to the party machine, in the years after Pattison's victory in 1882, Quay worked to reunite the party and conciliate the independent Republicans. When Blaine again sought the presidential nomination in 1884, Quay surrendered some party offices to the independents in exchange for the state party chairmanship going to his nominee, Thomas V. Cooper. Blaine was nominated, with Quay and Senator Cameron absent from the national convention, but was defeated by Democrat Grover Cleveland. With the White House in the hands of the other party, and with federal offices becoming less political due to the 1883 Pendleton Civil Service Act, Quay sought to dominate at the state level.[65] Appointed state employees, of whatever parties, were dunned a percentage of their salaries, and would lose office if they did not pay.[66] Businesses compensated Quay in cash because of his influence over members of the key committees of the state legislature. Pliable legislators were rewarded by Quay with money for themselves and their campaigns; those unwilling to deal faced well-financed candidates as they sought re-election. Friend and foe had their transactions recorded in files that became known as "Quay's coffins", along with any incidents that might embarrass them, to be brought forth as necessary. In doing so, Quay achieved a level of control over the state government that the Camerons had never reached.[65] This was aided by a sense that Quay was different from Don Cameron, according to Frank W. Leach, Quay's personal secretary, "There was a general feeling that Colonel Quay was nearer the people [than Cameron]".[67]

Quay had long wanted to become a U.S. senator, if only to place himself on the same footing as Don Cameron, and McClure related that Quay had confided that he had considered taking Curtin's place in the 1867 senatorial battle. Quay wanted Senator Mitchell's seat, that would be filled by the legislature in early 1887.[69] In 1885, he sought election as state treasurer. This would allow him tremendous control over the party apparatus,[70] and a strong position from which to fight the battle to gain the Senate seat in 1887.[71] Quay, who stated the race for treasurer was one for "self-protection and self-preservation" as others maneuvered within the party, faced some criticism at his attempt to gain the office of treasurer, but had no serious opposition at the Republican convention, and was easily elected.[70] James K. Pollock, in his article on Quay for the Dictionary of American Biography, stated that Quay ran for the office of treasurer to gain vindication after the 1880 treasury scandal.[72] Possession of this office would always be critical to the Quay machine; he once stated, "I don't mind losing the governorship or a legislature now and then, but I always need the state treasuryship."[73]

In his new office, Quay had the funds of the state at his command. His ability to deposit state moneys in friendly banks led to an income of some $150,000 per year to the machine. Loans could be granted to favored individuals, with interest or security not required.[74] To gain the senatorship, Quay needed the Republicans to have a successful 1886 election. As part of the deal to become state treasurer, he had agreed to support the party's 1882 candidate, Beaver, who was now acceptable to both machine and independent Republicans. Quay became the power behind the Beaver campaign. When one reporter asked Quay to arrange an interview with Beaver, Quay agreed and handed the reporter an unsealed envelope with a note inside, "Dear Beaver: Don't talk. M.S. Quay."[70] With a united party at his back, Beaver was elected along with the entire Republican statewide ticket, and the Republicans had nearly a two-thirds majority in each house of the legislature.[75]

Determined to be elected by as near a unanimous vote as possible, Quay arranged conferences in each congressional district to which the legislators of that district were invited and told to support the majority sentiment, that is for Quay. On January 4, 1887, the Republican legislative caucus nominated Quay with 154 votes to 9 for the runner-up, Galusha Grow. When the two houses of the legislature voted, Quay received two-thirds majorities in each, and was declared elected a senator.[75] According to John W. Oliver in his journal article on Quay, "By this time Quay had become the undisputed political leader of Pennsylvania. More than that, he was rapidly becoming one of the recognized leaders of the Republican party throughout the nation."[34]

Agnes Barclay Quay

In 1855, Quay married Agnes Barclay (1831–1911); they had five children; the eldest, Richard Rogers Quay, served in the Pennsylvania legislature. The others were named Andrew Gregg Curtin Quay (a career army officer), Mary Agnew Quay, Coral Quay, and Susan Willard Quay.[162]

In 1905, Hanover Square in Beaver was renamed Quay Square.[163] A historical marker to Quay stands at 3rd and Insurance streets there.[63] The Matthew S. Quay House in Beaver has been designated as a National Historic Landmark. Another of his residences, the Roberts-Quay House in Philadelphia, was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1976.[164]

In recognition of his efforts towards New Mexico statehood, there is a Quay County in New Mexico, named for him in 1903 when it was established, as well as a small unincorporated community known as Quay.[165] The former town of Quay, Oklahoma, was also named for him.[166] A statue of Quay stands in the rotunda of the Pennsylvania Capitol in Harrisburg.[167]

Quay spent much time in Florida over the last fifteen years of his life, both for his health and for the fishing; local historian Jean Ellen Wilson dubbed him "St. Lucie County's first snowbird."[168] Called "Florida's Third Senator" by Judge Minor Jones, he supported federal projects along the Indian River, where he owned property. Two of the houses he owned still stood as of 2010.[168] In his honor, the municipality of Woodley, Florida was named Quay in 1902, but in 1925, amid the Florida land boom, it was renamed Winter Beach.[169]

Quay's death sparked renewed debate about him,[170] though McClure stated that upon his death, "friend and foe bowed regretfully over the grave of Pennsylvania's ablest and most chivalrous political gladiator".[171] The North American of Philadelphia wrote that though Quay's career was "a record of sustained victory", his death "has removed from Pennsylvania a malign influence which for a generation has been the curse and shame of the Commonwealth [of Pennsylvania]".[172] President Roosevelt sent his condolences,[5] and Governor Pennypacker stated that, "now that he is gone, the people of this state will know what they have lost and what they never quite appreciated."[173]

By taking power from the Camerons in the mid-1880s, Quay restored the Pennsylvania Republican Party to power there at a time it was divided and out of office at both the state and federal levels, and continued the state as one of the largest and most loyal to the Republican Party. He was able to work with and conciliate many of those whom Don Cameron had alienated.[174] Blair wrote that Quay's techniques were to "work one-on-one; keep quiet; maneuver behind the scenes".[175] According to Pollock, Quay "is chiefly to be remembered for his brilliant and consummate genius as a politician. Never in the history of Pennsylvania, with all of its great politicians, has there been a man with such great powers of leadership in political organization. His whole life was a constant fight."[72] Nevertheless, "many of his contemporaries believed him to be an utterly corrupt man, and yet his methods were no worse than those of his adversaries. He was certainly one of the best-hated men in politics."[72] Wilson stated of Quay that from the time of his election as senator, "various combinations of avowed foes and turncoat friends fought to topple him; reformers attempted to wrest power from his grasp and destroy his political machine. Often his political survival was in doubt; there were times he survived by a very slim margin. He was indicted, arrested, beaten at the polls, attacked from the pulpit, criticized in the press. He endured to make two presidents and to serve three terms in the Senate."[7] Oliver deemed Quay, "the most colorful leader in Pennsylvania's history ... No man in all political history ever excelled him as a leader, a strategist, or an organizer".[176]

Quay rarely addressed the Senate; his power was behind the scenes, exercised over dinner and in committee rooms. He authored no major legislation, his interest was in being able to control the flow of legislation. He chaired no major committees, but led the Committee on Public Buildings and Grounds. Almost every member of Congress needed a post office or other building to be constructed in his state or district, and his road to that goal lay through Quay, who could exact a price.[4] According to Wendy J. Schiller and Charles Stewart in their book on the legislative election of senators, "for Quay, holding a Senate seat was merely another means of keeping control over his political empire; he was far better known for keeping his eyes peeled on Pennsylvania politics than on the business conducted on the Senate floor."[177]

Patronage in the hands of Quay was profitable: although Wanamaker's 1898 estimate that Quay controlled 14,705 government positions was possibly an exaggeration, the many positions available in a large state like Pennsylvania, where the holders or would-be holders could be dunned for contributions, raised large sums of money that Quay controlled.[178] Such money was key to Quay's power. While state treasurer, he detected loopholes in the laws governing the office, and used them to his advantage, not only during his term of office, but over the next two decades as a series of loyalists occupied that office.[4] Quay kept close control of the purse strings, deciding where money should be doled out.[179] His successor as Pennsylvania's Republican boss, Penrose, stated, "Mr. Quay made it his policy to keep at least one hand on the public purse."[73] He used state money and contributions from industrialists to benefit himself and elect favored candidates. This helped make participation in politics expensive since it required any candidate not acceptable to Quay to raise large sums of money to be successful.[172] Nevertheless, by the close of Quay's career, the power of patronage was becoming an embarrassment, as he had too many friends and allies expecting preferment. In one case, Quay avoided making nineteen enemies by submitting twenty candidates for an office to Governor Stone, and got him to reject them all. Stone then announced his own selection: someone acceptable to Quay.[180]

By the turn of the 20th century, progressive reformers sought to eliminate the boss system, and saw Quay as a prime target, resulting in the re-election deadlock of 1899.[4] After Quay died, the Pennsylvania Republican Party fell into factions, first squabbling over the Senate seat (which fell to the state attorney general, Philander C. Knox) and then losing the election for treasurer in 1905 in a state Roosevelt had carried with two-thirds of the vote the previous year.[181] Pennypacker responded by calling the legislature into special session to pass reform legislation.[182] In controlling the machine after Quay's death (which he did until his own death in 1921), Penrose allowed reform measures such as the direct primary and a requirement of examinations for civil service jobs in Philadelphia.[183][184]

Kehl suggested that Quay, by the nature of his position as boss and senator, concerned himself more with the welfare of Pennsylvania than that of the nation:

Quay was even more committed to the status quo than most legislators were. Serving Pennsylvania rather than the United States, he contributed little to the national legislative program of his party. He was content to sit in silence while senatorial discussion resounded on all sides; he never championed any principle, not even the Republican doctrine of protection[ism]. Although he did speak on the tariff, he pronounced no theory, but merely demanded specific schedules for the iron and steel producers of his state. Once local appetites were appeased, he lapsed into legislative indifference until another issue important to his constituents arose. At the end of his career, such self-interest was disturbing to Republican leadership in the Senate. With his passing, many colleagues tacitly hoped for a successor more committed to issues national in scope and substantive in character.[185]

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• Berman, David R. (2019). Governors and the Progressive Movement. University Press of Colorado. ISBN 978-1-60732-915-2.
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• Bourdon, Jeffrey Normand (September 2014). "Trains, Canes, and Replica Log Cabins: Benjamin Harrison's 1888 Front-Porch Campaign for the Presidency". Indiana Magazine of History. 110 (3): 246–269. doi:10.5378/indimagahist.110.3.0246. JSTOR 10.5378.
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• McClure, Alexander Kelly (1905). Old Time Notes of Pennsylvania: A Connected and Chronological Record of the Commercial, Industrial and Educational Advancement of Pennsylvania, and the Inner History of All Political Movements Since the Adoption of the Constitution of 1838. Vol. 2. John C. Winston.
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• Samuel W. Pennypacker (1910). "Matthew Stanley Quay". Pennsylvania in American History. pp. 280–305.
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• Chapman, Elizabeth Ann (1924). Matthew S. Quay and the Republican Machine in Pennsylvania (Master of Arts). University of Wisconsin.

• Works by or about Matthew Quay at Wikisource
• Media related to Matthew S. Quay at Wikimedia Commons