The
First Democrat elected after the Civil War, Grover Cleveland
was the only President to leave the White House and return for
a second term four years later.
One of
nine children of a Presbyterian minister, Cleveland was born
in New Jersey in 1837. He was raised in upstate New York. As a
lawyer in Buffalo, he became notable for his single-minded
concentration upon whatever task faced him.
At 44,
he emerged into a political prominence that carried him to the
White House in three years. Running as a reformer, he was
elected Mayor of Buffalo in 1881, and later, Governor of New
York.
Cleveland
won the Presidency with the combined support of Democrats and
reform Republicans, the "Mugwumps," who disliked the
record of his opponent James G. Blaine of Maine.
A
bachelor, Cleveland was ill at ease at first with all the
comforts of the White House. "I must go to dinner,"
he wrote a friend, "but I wish it was to eat a pickled
herring a Swiss cheese and a chop at Louis' instead of the
French stuff I shall find." In June 1886 Cleveland
married 21-year-old Frances Folsom; he was the only President
married in the White House.
Cleveland
vigorously pursued a policy barring special favors to any
economic group. Vetoing a bill to appropriate $10,000 to
distribute seed grain among drought-stricken farmers in Texas,
he wrote: "Federal aid in such cases encourages the
expectation of paternal care on the part of the Government and
weakens the sturdiness of our national character. . . . "
He also
vetoed many private pension bills to Civil War veterans whose
claims were fraudulent. When Congress, pressured by the Grand
Army of the Republic, passed a bill granting pensions for
disabilities not caused by military service, Cleveland vetoed
it, too.
He
angered the railroads by ordering an investigation of western
lands they held by Government grant. He forced them to return
81,000,000 acres. He also signed the Interstate Commerce Act,
the first law attempting Federal regulation of the railroads.
In
December 1887 he called on Congress to reduce high protective
tariffs. Told that he had given Republicans an effective issue
for the campaign of 1888, he retorted, "What is the use
of being elected or re-elected unless you stand for
something?" But Cleveland was defeated in 1888; although
he won a larger popular majority than the Republican candidate
Benjamin Harrison, he received fewer electoral votes.
Elected
again in 1892, Cleveland faced an acute depression. He dealt
directly with the Treasury crisis rather than with business
failures, farm mortgage foreclosures, and unemployment. He
obtained repeal of the mildly inflationary Sherman Silver
Purchase Act and, with the aid of Wall Street, maintained the
Treasury's gold reserve.
When
railroad strikers in Chicago violated an injunction, Cleveland
sent Federal troops to enforce it. "If it takes the
entire army and navy of the United States to deliver a post
card in Chicago," he thundered, "that card will be
delivered."
Cleveland's
blunt treatment of the railroad strikers stirred the pride of
many Americans. So did the vigorous way in which he forced
Great Britain to accept arbitration of a disputed boundary in
Venezuela. But his policies during the depression were
generally unpopular. His party deserted him and nominated
William Jennings Bryan in 1896.
After
leaving the White House, Cleveland lived in retirement in
Princeton, New Jersey. He died in 1908.
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Grover
Cleveland