In 1876, when disputed electoral college returns resulted in uncertainty as to which candidate, Democrat Samuel Tilden or Republican Rutherford Hayes, had won the presidential election, Davis became a major figure in the unfolding drama. Congressional Democrats agreed to establish a bipartisan electoral commission to resolve the dispute, and thus decide the election, because they assumed that Justice Davis would be the deciding vote. Democrats thought that Davis, an independent with Democratic leanings by that time, would be sympathetic to their case. Instead, Davis resigned from the Court and the commission after being elected to the Senate by a coalition of Democrats and Greenbackers in the Illinois legislature (until 1913 state legislatures elected U.S. senators).