The Story of Grover Cleveland
2020 Edition By Corinne Waterstraut
One-hundred and 83 years ago today (March 18), the future 22nd and 24th president of the United States of America was born in New Jersey to his bookkeeper mom, and his minister dad. Stephen Grover Cleveland, who will drop the Stephen in adulthood, was the only president born in New Jersey.
There’s not too much of note from Grover’s childhood. He pulled the occasional prank, but wasn’t very good at it. When he tried to sneak into the school bell tower late at night, hoping to ring the bells and wake everyone up, he accidentally locked himself inside and had to be escorted home by his parents. He pulled fence posts out of the ground with his bare hands, enjoyed fishing and hunting and named his rifle “Death and Destruction”.
Grover Cleveland will amass a lot of nicknames over the years. But let’s start with “Grover the Good”. At just nine years old, Grover the Good is wise beyond his years: “If we expect to become great and good men, and respected and esteemed by our friends, we must improve in our time when we were young.”
Grover’s family moves to New York, and he gets about four years of formal education before his father dies. Grover moves to New York then, and then takes the usual route to the presidency by becoming a lawyer.
It’s now the 1860s, so we’ve arrived at the Civil War. Now you can go ahead and go off to war, or you are totally allowed to hire your own replacement. Grover is going to pay some polish immigrant to go in his place. What’s the going rate to go to war in someone else’s place you ask? Well, just a couple hundred bucks (some books suggest it was $150, others say it was up to $300- either way, it seems like a cheap price to pay not to have to go into war).
“Big Steve” as he’s now called is just living his life, lawyering it up in Buffalo, with his buddy and law partner Oscar Folsom. Here “Big Steve” will become “Uncle Jumbo”. This is a legit nickname. In part, he earns Uncle because the guy is like the fun uncle, especially to Oscar’s daughter Frank, who will drop the Jumbo and instead call Grover “Uncle Cleve”. He buys Frank a baby carriage to ride in and becomes her honorary doting uncle.
Uncle Jumbo’s not having any kids of his own anytime soon. He enjoys bachelorhood too much. The Jumbo comes from all the greasy Buffalo bar food he’s eating up, and all the beers he’s downing at an alarming rate. Before the days of Buffalo wings, the bars in Buffalo intentionally served you free salty food to get you to buy more beer, and that was Grover’s jam.
“Uncle Jumbo” is going to buy a lot of beer, drinking “stein after stein”, after all he needs something to wash down all the sausages, sauerkraut, thick stews and big cuts of meat. Basically, if you can find it in the Germany pavilion in Epcot, it’s one of Grover’s favorites. He likes the male comradery, the thick fog of cigar smoke, the pale lagers, and the high calorie platters. And he likes them so much, he’s going to gain 100 pounds in 15 years.
Uncle Jumbo is going to become Sheriff Jumbo when he is elected Erie County Sheriff.
Grover the Good was a tireless, fair, and even-handed sheriff. He wouldn’t ask any of his guys to do anything he wouldn’t do. In fact, he even pulls the lever and personally hangs two guys who have been sentenced to death, because he doesn’t want to make the executioners do it. He’s very much against the death penalty, and even works to outlaw it. But for now, the law is the law, and honest Grover is going to uphold it, even if he has to hang a couple guys in the process. (Fun fact: Grover will be our only president who personally carried out executions).
After his stint as Sheriff, he goes back to practicing law, he’ll even serve as assistant district attorney. But he won’t be doing any of it with his buddy and partner, Oscar. Oscar has had an unfortunate carriage accident, and he’s dead. Stand-up Grover is going to be named Administrator to Oscar’s Estate, and step in and help Oscar’s wife, Emma, and his 11 year old daughter Frank, with anything they need. In those days, kids had to have a male guardian too, so he’ll go ahead and be Frank’s official guardian too.
Grover is a pretty well off guy by now, so he can provide for them financially and he’s a good guy, so he’s pretty attentive to them. He pays for Frank’s education, sending her to the best private schools and academies money can buy.
Grover is going to start is brief climb up the political ladder after Oscar’s death. In 1881, he is elected Mayor in Buffalo. The Democrat Grover (who became a democrat because he was neither a John C. Fremont, or an Abe Lincoln fan), earned himself another nickname here: “The Veto Mayor”.
As mayor his reform reputation puts him at odds with the powerful Tammany Hall. Tammany Hall isn’t a place, but rather a political society that basically ran things in New York for a couple hundred years. It usually didn’t spell good things for you politically if they weren’t fans.
But that was no problem for Mayor Grover, who doesn’t even spend a whole year as the mayor, because he’s been elected Governor! I told you he climbed the political ladder fast! He continues to take on corruption and dishonesty, and he’s still not worried about the Tammany Hall guys. He’ll veto any bills that benefits them. In fact, guys will come to Albany, whisper favors they’re hoping to cash in to Governor Cleveland, and the Governor will answer them in a loud booming voice so everyone around could hear him. Basically, Grover is on the up and up.
We’re at a time in American politics that Mark Twain dubbed “The Gilded Age”. The Gilded Age has become known as the time between the Civil War and World War I when the economy grew and there was a huge influx of European immigrants. But, for more context, everything was kind of glittering on the surface, but corrupt underneath, and the rich lived some very fancy, over the top lives. The wealthy controlled everything, more than even the politicians.
Grover had the well-fed look, and the stripped pants look that fit into the gilded age, but he didn’t exactly have the refinement. He was rather gassy, used a knife (instead of a fork) to eat, downed corned beef and cabbage instead of fancy expensive food, and he once got made fun of his dancing, or what some called his “waddling” at a fancy gala. (He avoided dancing after that).
He’s also too honest, almost painfully honest. He’s blunt, and quick tempered and stubborn. He’s a poor speaker, and he dislikes the rigors of campaigns, but his hard work as Governor has become pretty famous by now, and he’s caught the eye of the Democrats, who are on the lookout for their candidate for the 1884 election.
Most people were hoping to see Samuel Tilden come back around. They’re still upset he got slighted two presidential elections ago. Sam is no fan of Grover, after all, saying “Cleveland is the kind of man who would rather do something badly for himself than have somebody else do it well.” But Sam’s in poor health, and declines the nomination. The Party is ready to bring in a newbie.
Grover Cleveland doesn’t have that much experience. He’s been governor for less than two years, he didn’t even spend a whole year as mayor. But the Democratic Party is fragmented, with political fissures between urban and rural voters. Outside of the South, there is basically just a few little pocket of state party Democrats, so a guy who is little-know might not be so divisive, a guy with less baggage. So the Democrats are going to go with Cleveland. They love him for his character, but also for the enemies he’s made (i.e. the political machine). This fits in with Grover’s personality, he says “A man is known for the company he keeps- and also by the company which he keeps out”.
Thomas Hendricks, will be chosen for Vice President. He was Tilden’s running mate in 1876, so that’ll excite Tilden supporters, and he’s from Indiana, a swing state, so that’ll help the Democrats there.
Now the Republicans need their guy. Currently, Chester Arthur is sitting in the White House, but he’s not going to run. He didn’t sign up for this job in the first place. He was hoping to enjoy a nice, pleasant, uneventful stint as Vice President getting all the prestige and none of the pressure. But, that dream died with James Garfield.
Chet’s not in the best of health anymore, and he doesn’t even think he’d survive another term. He says: “A man my age has nothing left to do but more to the country and grow big pumpkins. (To be fair, Chet was right. He wouldn’t have even made it halfway through another term, he died in November 1886). But, to be honest, he’s not all that popular, some people are calling him a “Stalled Ox”.
One of those people is James G. Blaine. Blaine is a 54 year old former Speaker of the House and Senator from Maine (the only Maine guy ever to be nominated for president), who first entered Congress in the midst of the Civil War (1863). He’s never been a fan of Arthur, though. Blaine had a few shining months as James Garfield’s Secretary of State, but resigned when Chester Arthur took over.
Blaine is the most popular Republican of his generation. He’s so popular, in fact, his rabid supporters are called Blainiacs, and the Blainiacs are thrilled at the Convention when the Republicans nominate James Blaine for president on the fourth ballot.
Blaine is eloquent, energetic, and wiley. He’s got the late 1800’s presidential look, with a beard that makes him undistiguishable from Hayes and Garfield. He’s been with the Republicans forever, since before they were Republicans in fact. He goes back to the Whig days. Blaine started out as a math teacher, and ended up working at a staunchly Whig newspaper (that Henry Clay read religiously), and then bought the paper. When the party turned from Whigs to Republican, so did the newspaper, promoting the new party all along the way.
His newspaper purchase along with his investments in coal mines in Pennsylvania and Virginia makes him a rich man. Blaine has the resume, and the election is his to lose. After all, no Republican has lost the presidency since the Civil War.
Republicans and Democrats have very different views on Federal Government in 1884. Democrats are the party of limited federal government. They promote localism, and say tariffs threaten the “person rights” and the “reserved rights of the states”. They are the party of individual liberties, at least if you’re a white guy.
The Republicans are the party of Civil War-era reform, big business, and nationalism. America first! They believe tariffs are the foundation for internal improvements and federal control over government program’s.
The major issues in this campaign are going to be the recession of 1884, and the tariff, aka the rates at which the government should tax goods. It comes down to this: Democrats- Tariff bad. Republicans- Tariff good.
On issues alone, Cleveland was done before he even got started, so he made a strategic move to attack the Republican’s vast army of officeholders that were using government for party and person gains, and says it’s time to overhaul the Spoils System. That’s something a lot of people can get behind.
Now, Blaine had his supporters. The Blainiacs deemed him the “Plumed Knight” for his courage, integrity and magnetic personality. He’ll draw very enthusiastic supporters as he tours the country for six weeks giving over 400 speeches.
But not everyone in the GOP loved the guy. His critics were like ‘this duded is insincere, vain, insecure, and corrupt.’ Some of those Republicans who just couldn’t stomach Blaine, split off. Led by Mark Twain (of the Adventures of Tom Sawyer fame) the “Mugwumps”, left the Republican party as soon as Blaine was nominated. Saying he was too corrupt, too under the party bosses thumbs, and that he “wallowed in the spoils like a rhinoceros in an African pool”. Twain would rather vote for Cleveland, after all, he believed at least Grover had good character, calling it “on par with George Washington”, and Mark Twain kind of hates everyone, so this is high praise.
Blaine’s character was less than stellar. He had been around awhile, and had a record of shady business dealings, including the Credit Mobilier Scandal ten years earlier. His questionable business dealings had actually kept him from getting the nomination in previous elections.
His under the table dealings with railroad companies, look even more shady thanks to a letter he wrote to a Boston railroad company attorney, Mr. Fisher, where he ends the letter with “My regards to Mrs. Fisher- Burn this letter!” Democrats would chant “Burn this letter! Burn this letter!” as a dig.
Blaine’s Vice Presidential pick doesn’t help him look any cleaner, either. Illinois Senator John Logan is actually known as “Black Jack” because of all his suspected corruption scandals.
But the Republicans had their own dig on Democrat Grover Cleveland. So it turns out bachelor Cleveland had a skeleton in his closet too. A Buffalo paper reveals the secret with a headline titled “A Terrible Tale: A Dark Chapter in a Public Man’s History- The Pitiful Story of Maria Halpin and Grover Cleveland’s son”. The article alleged Cleveland had an illicit affair with a 36 year old widow, that resulted in a son. A ridiculous thing for honest Grover Cleveland, right?
When Cleveland’s campaign guys bring him the article he instructs them to “tell the truth”, he admits the child is his, and it turns out he’s been supporting the boy all along. But that’s all Grover has to say about that. (Grover doesn’t have much to say about a lot, in does little campaigning, since he’s busy being governor of New York).
History, however, is murky on the ‘illegitimate son’ thing. Maria’s son was named Oscar Folsom Cleveland. Oscar Folsom, as in Grover’s non-dead old law partner and friend. Weird coincidence? Some people think that the boy was actually Oscar’s kid and Cleveland had just been covering for him, since Oscar was married to Emma after all. Some said the child was actually the result of Grover forcing himself on Maria. We don’t really know. Maria, who had spent some time institutionalized and given her son to another couple to raise him, refused to say anything. We do know in private, Grover often doubted if the child was his. But it’s worth noting, a random kid out there could definatly tank a career in politics, and Grover was willing to take that risk.
For the Republicans though, they jumped on the fact that Grover fathered a child out of wedlock, they called him a ‘moral demon’, a ‘lecherous beast’, an ‘obese nincompoop’, a ‘whoremongerer’ and say if elected he’ll ‘bring his harlots to Washington with him.’ They chanted “Ma! Ma! Where’s my Pa!”
They didn’t stop their character assassination there. They also called him a slacker, and bring up the fact that he paid someone to fight for him in the Civil War instead of going himself (even though that was a total legal and legit thing to do). Oh, and they made fun of his weight, calling him “a small man everywhere except on the hay scales”.
But Cleveland wins fans for being honest, especially in his home state of New York. They say their supporting him for four reasons. 1. He’s honest. 2. He’s honest. 3. He’s honest. And 4, you guessed it, he’s honest. I mean, what’s worse a bachelor guy who sleeps around, or a liar and thief?
The Democrats did dig up something on Blaine. Apparently, for a guy who made so much of Grover sleeping around, turns out his first kid was born before he married his wife. Honest Grover, though, refused to let the information get out. He told his guys to tear it up, saying “the other side can have a monopoly on the dirt in the campaign.”
It’s pretty clear as the election nears the whole thing is going to come down to the state of New York, that’s almost equally divided between the parties. Sure, the Tammany Hall guys are not thrilled with Grover as the nominee, but they decide any Democrat is better than Blaine, and they can get behind Grover.
Blaine has a mortal enemy in New York, a still powerful former Senator, Roscoe Conkling, who is still pissed at Blaine from a debate gone wrong in 1866. He gets his county to back Democrat Grover, even though it went hard for Republican James Garfield four years earlier.
But none of this is going to be Blaine’s demise. Instead, the worst blow to Blaine’s campaign is going to come from his own supporters. On October 29, 1884, a day that would come to be known as “Black Wednesday”, Blaine will be sitting at a breakfast for a campaign stop when Presbyterian Minister S.D. Burchard (name not important) announces the Democrats as the party of “Rum, Romanism and Rebellion”. It doesn’t sound terrible now, but it was a huge slur, essentially calling Democrats as Irish-Catholic drunks. Blaine isn’t paying attention, and doesn’t denounce the comment.
Democrats print the slur in pamphlets and Blaine gets painted as a “Catholic-hater” which does not play well in New York, that’s full of Irish Catholic working people. It also didn’t play well with working people that Blaine went to a dinner party with millionaires that night.
In an election that has become more about scandals and mudslinging, voters go to the polls on election day to choose between Cleveland “a model of official integrity, but culpable in his personal relations”, or Blaine “delinquent in office, but blameless in his private life.”
The final tally of votes won’t be known for week, the votes in New York have to be counted and recounted. But Grover wins New York by just 1,149 votes (0.1%). It’s so close a shift of just 575 votes would have thrown New York and the presidency to Blaine.
Blaine will not go off into the sunset, though. Four years will go by, and guys like Teddy Roosevelt will ask Blaine to run again, but Blaine is uninterested. Instead Benjamin Harrison will run, win, and offer Blaine a second shot at his former position of Secretary of State. Blaine accepts and serves for three years before he has to resign because of health issues. He dies in 1893, and the once towering Republican figure fades into obscurity, probably because of the 9 Republican men who ran for president between 1860 and 1912, he’s the only one not to be president.
At age 47, Grover will be the 22nd president. He knows it’s going to be a tough job, Grover says “I am honest and sincere in my desire to do well, but the question is where I know enough to accomplish what I desire.” The first Democratic president since Buchanan, and the south will rejoice with parades and parties and fireworks. Coincidentally, Buchanan was also the last bachelor president we had as well. Grover will ask his sister Rose to serve as the White House hostess.
Now that he’s in office, hungry Democrat office-seekers come to Grover looking for jobs. They obviously don’t know him very well. He wants to get rid of the spoils system, for real, that wasn’t just an empty campaign promise. He’s going to stubbornly refuse to hire anyone for ‘unworthy appointments’. Instead, Grover will hire and fire anyone he sees fit. He says “Public office is Public trust”, and he means it. He works to uphold his image of incorruptibility.
Grover’s priorities in his first term would be Civil Service Reform, and the end of those high import tariffs that Grover said were lining the pockets of the tycoons while making good too expensive for workers. He’ll sign the Interstate Commerce Act, that allows government to regulate the railroads and transportation. He’ll establish the Department of Labor, and accept the statue of liberty as a gift from France.
He’s for limited government, he’s a conservative president. But that innate conservativism made him sometimes look unsympathetic to the cause of working people. He’ll run the country like he were a CEO of a failing company. Anything that even smelled of a handout was vetoed, even if it was supposed to help drought stricken farmers. In his first term, he will veto 413 bills, that’s two times more than all of the presidents before him COMBINED!
Grover works long hours in the White House. It’s not unusual to see him up at 3 or 4 in the morning, several nights in a row. The joke in Washington is that all Grover does is “work and eat… work and eat… and work and eat.” Oh, and he answers the White House phone, personally.
He’s not all fun and no play. He doesn’t give up drinking beer or fishing just because he’s president. (In fact, he’ll be the first president to “leave” the US while in office- he accidentally went out into international waters three miles off the US coast on a fishing trip). He’ll also host some Saturday night poker games.
He’ll entertain some visitors too. He draws a lot of attention when he invites Emma and Frank to the White House. Washington is a buzz that bachelor Grover is finally ready to settle down, and get married to Emma. They were half right.
Frank, who now preferred to go by Frances, had grown up into a gorgeous woman who was tall, with dark hair and blue eyes. She was graceful, intelligent, and musically talented (she could sing and play the piano). She majored in French and German at Well’s College, where she kept in touch by letters with “Uncle Cleve” who had footed the bill for her education.
Somewhere along the way, Uncle Cleve became boyfriend Cleve. Frances was too refined and too smart for those college boys, she was uninterested in them. Instead Grover, 28 years her senior, had caught her eye.
Grover had seemed uninterested in marriage, though in one off the cuff remark he did once say he was “waiting for my wife to grow up” So, gross. But mostly, Grover just seemed like he was never going to get married.
But here they were, 21 year old Frances, and 49 year old Grover engaged, in total secrecy. After accepting his proposal, Grover sends Frances and Emma on an all expenses paid trip to Europe to avoid the press, when they return it’s time for the first ever wedding in the White House!
The attempt to keep the wedding secret failed, and so it is obviously going to attract national media attention. The surprise that the president is going to be marrying Frances and not Emma just seems to heighten the excitement in DC. Grover’s legendary bachelorhood is finally coming to an end, and young, beautiful, well educated, modest, Frances is going to become the youngest first lady (to date).
Everyone wants to be part of Grover and Frances’s big day, so crowds gather outside just to be a part of the wedding. Guests are kept to a minimum, and press was not allowed, so the “pictures” from the event that appeared in newspapers came from descriptions from the guests, though Frances’s dress was given a glowing review in the Washington Post.
Overnight, Frances will become a celebrity. She’s an American goddess, a symbol of domestic bliss. There are few homes that don’t have a framed picture of the First Lady on their mantle. Advertisements feature her likeness on everything from soap to arsenic based medicines, to sell their products. She’s in newspapers and magazines.
But with celebrity comes little privacy. Advertisers are shameless in the use of her image, using her as a gimmick, and Grover doesn’t love it. Sure, it might help him politically, but her worried about the threat to family privacy, and eventually he will even try and pass a law to stop the use of her image (the law fails, by the way- freedom of the press and all that).
Grover’s disdain for the press going after his wife, started when the Cleveland’s go off on their honeymoon, the press will hound them. The press will stop wait staff to see what the couple are having for dinner, they swamp the whole area shamelessly trying to get access to the cottage the Cleveland’s are staying in, using a long camera lens to take pictures. Frances has a sense of humor about the whole thing, but Grover hates it, and has his bodyguards go tell the hotel and tavern owners in the area to refuse service to the press, telling them to move on. This will just solidify Grover’s hatred of the media.
Frances will shine in her new role. She’ll be a well liked, extremely popular first lady, and a natural born hostess. Grover’s Saturday night poker games will become Frances’s Saturday receptions in which she hosts working woman, who weren’t allowed to visit the White House during the week. She was an unofficial champion for women’s education, and sponsored charities that made clothing for the poor. She devotes her time and energy to helping African-Americans, and even accepts a seat on the board of her former college (where she will stay for 50 years).
Add to all her accomplishments: keeping Grover from wearing his ugly orange suit.
Frances is the best hostess the White House has seen since Dolley Madison. Like Dolley, Frances will host the rich and the poor, showing the administrations willingness to reach out to all people. She’ll enthusiastically and sincerely smile and shake hands till her palm turns blue and she has to ice her arm. Grover is so pleased with her after her very first reception, he tells his mother playfully “She’ll do!”
But sometimes Frances’s popularity can be dangerous at times. At an event in Saint Louis a crowd rushes to her podium just to get a closer look at the First Lady and they smash a barricade to pieces. Frances escapes harm, but it didn’t help Grover’s fear of the public mania over her, and he just became more infuriated with the media for whipping up her popularity.
Grover’s relationship with the Senate isn’t much better than his relationship with the media. He gets along well with the House, but he hates the Senate, and he’s constantly arguing with the Senators (Republicans lost four seats in the midterms, but maintained the majority). At one point Frances wakes up in the middle of the night hears something going on and tells Grover “wake up! Wake up! There are burglars in the House”, and he responds with “In the Senate maybe, but not in the House”.
When the Election of 1888 rolls around, Grover Cleveland is still popular enough that he easily sails into the nomination for the Democratic party, in a unanimous vote
A lot of Republicans are clamoring for Blaine, but with Blaine declining, the Republicans will go with their second choice, a Distinguished Civil War Veteran, and former Indiana Senator, Benjamin Harrison. The guy has good blood lines: his great grand-dad was a signer of the Declaration, and his grandpa was the 9th president of the United States.
Grover and Ben have a similar background. Both of them were raised by devout Presbyterian ministers, both of them were lawyers, and both of them were in their early fifties.
The main issue in this campaign is going to circle back around to the tariffs again. Grover and the Democrats still want them lowered, and Grover even doubles down in his Annual Message to Congress (which will later become known as the State of the Union). He is all about lowering the tariffs saying “what is the use of being elected, or re-elected unless you stand for something?” Ben and the Republicans, meanwhile, support the tariffs and say to leave them in place.
It’s kind of a boring issue these days, to run on taxes, but pay attention because this election is going to be close, and it’s going to be dirty. It comes down to is who runs a better campaign, and who has more money. The winner on these accounts (and spoiler alert: the presidency) is the Republicans, hands down.
Ben launches the nations 1st front porch campaign (and future William McKinley- and Ida, thanks him). This isn’t the brain child of Mark Hana, but Matt Quay. Matt is going to be the first Mark Hanna. He’s the National Republican Chairman, and he’s going to manage Ben’s campaign.
Crowds will gather at Bens home in Indiana to hear one brief address from the candidate each day, from his front porch. The campaign would then send out a carefully worded version of remarks to the Associated Press to be distributed nation wide. They were controlling the narrative and had a great handle on spin control. Their message was getting out to the public, and as bonus, Ben got to sleep in his bed every night!
The Democrats pounce on Ben’s strategy calling him “kid glove”, because he doesn’t have the guts to give anything but carefully prepared remarks. Ben obviously doesn’t want to make the same mistake as Blaine and have a ‘black Wednesday’ situation on his hands. He’s a smart, veteran campaigner.
And at least Ben is campaigning, Grover does none. He thinks it’s unseemly for a president to go out on the campaign trail, and to be fair, that’s kind of how it was always done.
Instead Grover sends out his new Vice President pick, Allen Thurman of Ohio. Allen is popular, but he is also a 75 year old inept white guy, who doesn’t really hold up well to the rigors of campaigning. Stop me if you’ve heard this before, but the old white guy makes gaffe after gaffe. He forgets things mid-speech and starts complaining about his rheumatism (pain in his joints). Once, he even collapsed during a speech.
Republicans will go after Grover the Good, hard. The call him an “English Candidate”, which wasn’t great, in the late 19th century there was still a pretty large contingency of the population who were anti-British. They even dupe the British Ambassador into writing a letter that said Grover’s tariff position made him more “England Friendly”.
Republicans also claim Cleveland doesn’t care about our Civil War Veterans. After all, he didn’t even serve, he paid some guy to serve for him. Not like our Benjamin! Plus, veto happy Cleveland had vetoed a bill for a Civil War Vets Pension Fund.
Again, they attack his love life. First of all, Grover knew Frances since she was in diapers, and that’s just weird. But, they know Frances can do no wrong in the public eye, so they’re going to make stuff up about here to cast the administration in a bad light. Republicans say Grover is the “beast of Buffalo” and he was getting drunk and physically assaulting Frances.
Back in those days, a lot of people, including Frances though speaking out in public. But, Frances will not sit idly by while people say Grover is abusing here. So she makes a statement during the campaign that was unprecedented (she never once agreed to an interview about her marriage, which in all accounts was actually a happy, warm marriage).
In her statement she says all the rumors are just a “foolish campaign ploy” and she hopes everyone has a loving, attentive husband like her. She usually takes her status as a White House media star in stride. Fake news stories are not unusual as far as Frances goes. Stories based entirely in fiction are printed just to sell newspapers. At one point a story says she stopped wearing bustles (an undergarment that pooffed out dresses in the 1800s) wasn’t true, but it still spelled demise for the fashion trend that had dominated for years. But this story goes way further than what fashion choices she may or may not be making. Frances is not happy about these accusations, and she’s going to start disliking the press just like Grover, for printing this trash. (And for calling her Frankie, she hates that nickname!)
Republicans should have known better than to go after Frances. She was a celebrity, after all. Democrats know she’s an asset, so they placer her face on everything from plates to buttons to posters to playing cards.
But the Democrats are just less successful in running a coordinated campaign, and they are also less successful in raising money.
The Republicans are going to benefit from lots of money. Three million dollars, in fact, mostly given to the Republicans from Iron and Steel business owners who were profiting from tariffs. These business owners, were also willing to strong arm their employees into voting for Ben. Workers get slip in their paychecks threating job loss if tariffs are abolished. Cheap foreign goods would flood into the country, and American workers would be out of a job.
Republicans will also use that money for “floaters”. Back in those days it was a legit strategy to pay voters to vote for your candidate. People could sell their vote for straight cash money, up to $15 in fact. Both parties used floaters, but in 1888, the Republicans are going to use them much better.
It looks like the whole election is going to come down to New York (again), and Indiana. Indiana, despite being Ben’s home state, looked like it might go to Cleveland, so Republicans spent $400,000 for 20,000 floaters. Freight trains and boats would bring voters in from other states just before the election, and the floaters were marched to the polls to cast their ballots by party operatives, before they got too drunk to vote. Just like that, Indiana’s 15 electoral votes went to Ben.
Over in New York, Matt Quay had a different strategy. He was wheeling and dealing with Tammany Hall and the Democratic candidate for governor making deals to put whoever they wanted in whatever position they wanted if they can deliver New York, and it’s 36 electoral votes to Ben. Matt says Ben will never know how many Republicans “were compelled to approach the gates of the penitentiary to make him president.” Meaning, Republicans had sold their soul for Ben.
But it all worked, at least as far as the electoral college goes. Ben doesn’t win the popular vote. 90,000 less votes are cast for Ben, but it doesn’t matter. He wins the electoral count 233, to 168. Indiana and New York had done their jobs. Ben will be the 23rd president of the United States.
The election of 1888 will be one of the last contests without significant campaigning, and is one of the five (four if you don’t count Jackson) elections where the popular vote winner doesn’t get into office. It’ll be hard for many to see Ben as a legitimate president, though. And Harrison is not going to be thrilled with all the appointments he has to make to pay back the guys who put him in office, saying “I could not name my own cabinet, they had sold out every place to pay the election expenses.” But, we’ll talk about that in August.
Grover has no regrets on running on the tariff issue, saying “It is better to be defeated battling for an honest principle than to win by cowardly subterfuge”. Plus he wasn’t that upset about losing, claiming after his loss “there is no happier man in the United States.” It’s fair to say he didn’t love the job, one day his buddy James Roosevelt brings in his 5 year old son, and Grover tells him “I have a strange wish for you, little man. I wish that you may never be President of the United States.” Grover’s wish doesn’t turn out as well as Frances’s.
After losing, Frances is much more upset than her husband, but she tells the servants to take care of the place, because they’ll be back in four years, a strange prediction, that obviously comes true.
But for now the Cleveland’s are going to go back home to New York, and have a baby! Baby Ruth is born. Some say the candy bar is named for her. Snopes says no, it’s named after baseball player Babe Ruth. But in an effort not to have to pay Babe Ruth anything for using his name, the company claimed it was named after Baby Ruth Cleveland. Anyway, Ruth is going to be just as popular as her mom.
Grover will spend the next four year fishing, working at his law firm, and getting angrier by the minute that President Harrison is increasing the money back by silver. Grover is a gold bug. We’ve arrived at the beginning of the gold vs. silver argument that will continue through the McKinley vs. Bryan elections.
But before we get to McKinley and Bryan, we have one more election, the Election of 1892. It’s a revenge game for Cleveland, and he’ll be back with a vengeance. He’s still popular (Frances and Ruth helped keep in him the spotlight), and even if he didn’t love the job, he’s hungry to run again. He will become the first nominee to make a public speech in acceptance (instead of writing a letter), when he is nominated by the Democrats in 1892. Grover’s VP pick is going to be Adlai E. Stevenson, grandad of the future Democratic presidential candidate (Who spoiler alert: will lose to Eisenhower in 1952 & 1956!)
President Harrison has had a rough first term, controlled by the corrupt bosses who had helped him win in 1888. But the bosses now can’t stand Ben. He’s a prickly, cold, born again Christian with a “holier than thou” attitude. They say he is “as glacial as a Siberian stripped of his furs”, and saying talking to him, even in warm weather, made a person feel like putting on winter gear. He’s called the White House iceberg.
We’re still going to be circling back to that tariff issue. Republicans still say “it’s good for prosperity” and Democrats say it’s “a robbery of the great majority of the American people, for the benefit of the few”. Basically the 1892 equivalent of the top 1 percenters screwing over the rest of us.
But the gold vs. silver argument is also a big one. Remember this one is not a partisan issue. Silverites and Gold Bugs are their own thing. Republican Harrison is a silver guy. Democrat Grover, the gold bug, loves the gold standard.
There have also been major changes in the US over the last four years, with six states being admitted into the Union (North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana, Washington, Idaho, Wyoming). The population of the US has risen by 62 million, and shifted westward. A telephone line now exists between New York City and Chicago. American is moving ahead!
The election of 1892 isn’t going to be a lively election, mostly thanks to Ben’s wife, Caroline. Caroline is seriously sick. She has tuberculosis, and so Harrison isn’t going to campaign at all. Grover the good, of course, can’t campaign under such circumstances either. Out of respect for the first lady, Grover also keeps a low profile, even after the Republicans went after his wife four years ago. Two wrongs don’t make a right in Grover’s book.
The only lively campaigning is going to come from James Weaver of the recently formed Populist Party. The populist party wants to have a more grassroots campaign. They want to take public office out of the hand of party bosses and return it to the people. They are for the advancement in technology (yay for telephone and telegraphs) but also free silver, a graduated income tax and fair wages.
It’s time to “Raise less corn and more hell!” because we “have a government of Wall Street, for Wall Street, by Wall Street.” They’re the Bernie Bros of 1892! Weaver gives fiery speeches attacking wall street and bankers, and he’ll be rewarded with just over one million votes and 22 electoral votes. Not too shabby for a third party.
Workers all over the country are fighting for better wages and working conditions, and that might be what ends up dooming Harrison’s re-election. There’s a scuffle at the Carnegie Steel Company in Pennsylvania, when the company reduces wages by 20% and armed guards gets involved. The whole thing is a bad look for Harrison.
Add insult to injury, for Ben, Caroline dies two weeks before the election.
Workers/laborers go hard for Cleveland on election day, and this time he wins the popular vote by almost 400,000 and crushes Harrison 145 to 277 in the electoral college.
Just like that, Grover becomes the one and only guy to serve two non-consecutive terms. But, Grover probably just should have left it at one. His second term will not go as smooth as his first. The job isn’t quite be what it used to be. The country is different now., there’s an economic depression and a whole lot of labor unrest.
The Second Term for Frances is another case of “be careful what you wish for” situation. She ran the White House the same, with a full social calendar, welcoming the working class as well as the Queen of Spain. But, she isn’t just the young woman without a care in the world anymore, she’s a mom, and she has kids to look after. A second daughter, Esther, was born six months after the Cleveland’s returned to the White House. (The first presidential child born in the White House). A third daughter, Marion, is born in 1895.
The celebrity of their daughters forces Frances to make unpopular choices to protect their safety. The White House grounds are closed to the public after visitors are found holding Baby Ruth and trying to clip a lock of her hair.
The press is kept at arm’s length so when visitors are banned, they start printing stories about how the first family is hiding some medical or mental defect in Baby Ruth. They are starved for stories and will make things up just to sell papers.
If that weren’t all bad enough, now the White House has a rat problem, and Grover has a cancerous tumor in his jaw. Not wanting the press to know about it, he goes out on his friend’s yacht to have the tumor removed in complete secret, a little weird for honest Grover, but he’s over the press at this point. After the surgery was successful, the dentist tried to go public with the news, and the White House calls him a liar. (His doctor will hold the secret for 24 years, telling people about it after Grover was dead).
The crippling economic Panic of 1893 has turned into a world wide recession complete with unemployment, homelessness, and hunger. Some Democrats split with Cleveland, they think the answer to all their problems is silver, while Cleveland stays tied to the gold standard. There’s in-party arguing over the whole thing.
Grover’s limited government, and state fiscal responsibilities that worked four years ago are making things worse, and upsetting poor people. It’s a disaster.
Labor workers are now clinging to the rise of Populism. They are calling for 8 hour workdays, public ownership of railways and free coinage of silver. Uprisings are popping up all over the country by 1894. 100,000 coal workers in Columbus, Ohio go on strike for more money and better working conditions. Then 12,00 New York City garment workers go on strike.
For the most part, Grover just ignores them. He’s for limited government, remember? This stuff is for state and local governments to handle. But, this doesn’t ever work out so well. Think of Herbert Hoover.
Grover’s averse to public scrutiny and still holds a disdain for the press, so he’s not getting favorable coverage. He ends up looking aloof, withdrawn, and insensitive.
And things gets even worse with the Pullman Strike. George Pullman, a rich, insensitive asshole, required all his railway workers live in a model city he designed on the outskirts of Chigao. The model city centered around the factory, but also included a bank, church, library, theater, post office and parks. Everything came at a cost, though- you even had to pay to use the library. Rent was taken right of your check. George Pullman wanted to make sure he had control over his entire workforce.
But after the Panic of 1893, George cut workers pay, and refused to lower their rent. Obviously, his workers were not pleased, and they went on strike, which forced the factory to close and eventually shut down much of the transportation in Chicago, and event the US Postal Service.
Eventually the whole thing turned violent. There were riots and trains were destroyed and derailed. People died, and violence and riots spread across the country. Over 150,000 workers in 27 states joined the protests.
Cleveland eventually sided with Pullman, and said the workers were violating the Sherman Anti-trust Act by impeding trade and commerce. He sent in Federal troops. The workers couldn’t with stand the might of the US military, and the uprising ended. The Pullman Strike was the first national strike in US history.
Not long after the strike ended, President Grover Cleveland tried to heal relations with labor groups by establishing Labor Day as a National and Federal holiday. So we can all thank Grover for our Monday off from work and school in September.
Cleveland’s second term also saw the Supreme Court decision of Plessy vs. Ferguson. The Court rules that segregation is constitutional as long as blacks are given “separate but equal” facilities. And thus begins another battle for black Americans.
President Cleveland had become wildly unpopular in his second term. He gets another nickname added to the pile, and becomes known as “His Obstinacy” for his stubbornness. The Presidency since time around was very different than his first go, but some things never change. Grover still went veto crazy, by the end of his second term he’s now vetoed 584 bills, three times as many as his predecessors combined. 20th century presidents will be grateful for this precedence.
By the time the election of 1896 rolls around, Grover will be happy not to be re-nominated. He’ll let William McKinley and William Jennings Bryan duke it out in the battle of gold verses silver.
Grover’s not sure what he’ll do post-presidency, he says “The question is what shall be done with our ex-presidents? Sometimes I think ‘take them out and shoot them’ deserves some attention.” But, Grover will not be shot, instead he will be happy to retire to their place in the New Jersey countryside, where Grover spends his time hunting, and fishing, and playing pool and cribbage.
They’ll have two more kids, both boys. But, famous Baby Ruth will fall ill and die of diphtheria before she even reaches 13. Ruth’s funeral isn’t the only one Grover is attending, though. He shows up to former President Hayes’s burial at Spiegel Grove in Fremont, Ohio. Grover will ride in a carriage, but nearly be tossed from it when the horses get spooked, grabbing onto a tree to brace his fall. The tree today has a place marker: “The Grover Cleveland Hickory”.
Five years after Ruth dies, Grover’s poor eating habits and weight catch up to him. He has a heart attack, utters his last words of “I have tried so hard to do right”, and dies at the age of 71.
He left Frances with four young kids, but plenty of cash. In 1913, she’ll marry Thomas Preston Jr, a scholar and eventual professor of archeology at Princeton. She’ll work the rest of her life leading the woman’s University club she founded, making speeches during WWI to help the war effort, and showing compassion for the poor. She even begins to lose her eyesight and has books transcribed in Braille to help the blind.
Frances Cleveland has become Frances Preston and the change in name helps her fade into obscurity as time goes on, though. President Truman will invite her to the White House with other notable people to celebrate the end of the war. When Truman introduces Frances Preston to General Dwight Eisenhower, he asks her where she lived in D.C, and Frances replies “In the White House.”
Frances will die peacefully in her sleep at the age of 83, and will be buried next to Grover in Princeton, New Jersey.
Grover is ranked as an average president as best, and he isn’t often remember for much beyond his two non-consecutive terms if he’s remembered at all. You’d think the only Democrat between Buchanan and Wilson would get more attention.
Grover is revered in one surprising state, maybe more than others: Hawaii. Ben has a treaty to annex Hawaii, Grover repealed it, only to have McKinley annex it once again. But, Hawaiians never forgot Cleveland’s efforts. You’ll often find Hawaiian beads on his grave, and every year a group of Hawaiians come to put lei’s on his grave.
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