Grover Cleveland

Grover Cleveland was and remains an important figure in the history of the Democratic Party. He was the first Democrat elected to the White House since James Buchanan in 1856, a full 28 years before Cleveland was elected in 1884. In fact, at the time of Buchanan's inauguration, Cleveland hadn't even started his political career yet. Andrew Johnson, who served from Abraham Lincoln's murder in 1865 to the inauguration of Ulysses S. Grant in 1869, was the last Democrat to serve as president before Cleveland, but even he wasn't elected. He was propelled to the executive branch by the death of another president. Cleveland was the first Democrat to enter the White House with a true mandate since the Dred Scott decision and ensuing civil war. He was also important in that he was the first president to embrace progressivism since Martin Van Buren. When Van Buren and Andrew Jackson founded the Democratic Party in 1828, it began as a left-wing group that supported broader democracy, increased economic opportunity for the poor, and neo-Jeffersonian liberalism. However, after James K. Polk, the Democratic Party became increasingly conservative. Although Cleveland maintained the right-wing domestic policy of his predecessors, he had the courage to be liberal in regards to foreign policy. He began the Democratic Party's shift toward the left.

I consider Cleveland's role in the history of the Democratic Party a positive one, since I myself am a leftist. However, much of his presidency was very flawed. For instance, he had numerous faults in regards to civil rights. Chester A. Arthur signed the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1882, which banned all immigration from China to the US for 10 years (Arthur had convinced Congress to decrease the amount from 20 years) and said that while Chinese immigrants already in America would not be deported, they would have to secure a "certificate of re-entry" if they ever left the US. In 1888, Cleveland signed the Scotts Act, which prohibited all Chinese immigrants from returning to the United States if they ever left for any reason. Cleveland also encouraged Native American tribes to assimilate into white society and signed the Dawes Act, which neutered the remaining sovereignty indigenous communities by giving the federal government control over reservations. He did have two strengths regarding civil rights: He used federal troops to crush several Sinophobic race riots and vetoed a bill that banned illiterate foreigners from moving to the US. Those two accomplishments help his score.

Economic policy was also mixed for Cleveland. Cleveland established the Interstate Commerce Commission, a government agency that created and enforced regulations on the railroad industry. While I consider this a positive, I feel much less enthusiastic about Cleveland's dramatic reductions in tariff rates. Not only do I oppose this on principle as a protectionist, but historians - even those who support free trade - largely agree that Cleveland's war against tariffs caused jobs to flood out of the US and into overseas markets. The resulting unemployment crisis is actually what caused Cleveland to lose his reelection bid in 1888 to Benjamin Harrison. Cleveland defeated Harrison in 1892, making him famously the only president to serve non-consecutive terms. To address the unemployment crisis Cleveland caused, Harrison signed the largest tariffs in US history up until that point.

Harrison's increase in tariffs did succeed in reigning back unemployment rates, but it devastated the profits of American sugar farmers living in Hawaii. As a result, on January 17, 1893 - as Cleveland was preparing for his second term - these farmers rebelled, toppling Hawaii's actual government (led by Queen Lilukalani) and creating a shell government in its place that demanded annexation by the US. The farmers' logic was centered around the fact that if Hawaii was part of the US, then sugar shipments would no longer be considered an import and so wouldn't be impacted by the tariff. The ensuing crisis contains one of Cleveland's brightest moments: He had the courage and integrity to resist these farmers' demands. He never annexed Hawaii and in fact asked the farmers to cede power back to Queen Liliukalani on several occasions. His demands were never heeded, however, and William McKinley annexed Hawaii in 1898, unwilling to factor in what actual Hawaiians desired.

Anti-imperialism was a focal point of Cleveland's foreign policy and so elevates his ranking. Were it not for his determined crusade against expansionism and colonialism, Cleveland would be much lower on my list! The aforementioned Chester A. Arthur brokered the Frelinghuysen-Zavala Treaty, in which Nicaragua gave some of its land to the US in exchange for a pledge that a canal would be built by American workers on that land. Cleveland saw how immoral this document was, since the residents of the canal zone were never consulted about what they wanted. Thus, he withdrew from the treaty during his tenure. During Cleveland's presidency, Germany also established designs on Samoa, both so that German sailors could have a place to stop when traveling in Oceania and so that Germany could exploit the country's coconut trade. For this reason, when Samoa became embroiled in a civil war, Germany supported the side led by a warlord named Tamasese in exchange for Tamasese's pledge to implement policies that would align Samoa with Germany upon winning the war and becoming ruler.

In 1887, German authorities sent a trio of ships to Samoa to aid Tamasese. Cleveland quickly realized what was going on. He then deployed his own trinity of American ships to scare off the German vessels. The resulting standoff became known as the Samaoan Crisis and put Cleveland's virtues on display. He saw imperialism for what it was: An awful violation of everything the United States stood for. If the US is going to have any influence at all, it should base that influence in the liberty our Union was predicated on. It should never be used solely to make the US stronger for the sake of the US being stronger. Cleveland realized this and so used America's naval power to oppose German imperialism in Samoa. Unfortunately, upon replacing Cleveland in 1889, Harrison tossed out his predecessor's real goals amidst the Samoan Crisis and instead split Samoa into a German half and an American half.

Returning to domestic policy, Cleveland's second term was soon mired in one of the worst recessions in history: The Panic of 1893. Cleveland acted horribly during this new crisis. If Cleveland's handling of the Samoan Crisis was like a loving, able parent supplying their child with all the support, advice, assistance, and (occasionally) punishments they need to become a well-rounded, successful, happy adult, then Cleveland's handling of the Panic of 1893 is like a small child letting their goldfish starve to death because they think the fish is capable of photosynthesis and will produce its own food. Cleveland blamed the Sherman Silver Purchase Act for the recession. Signed by Harrison in 1890, the Sherman Silver Purchase Act required that the federal government, among other things, buy 4,500,000 ounces of silver each month. Because he held Harrison and the Sherman Silver Purchase Act responsible for the recession, Cleveland repealed the law in the autumn of 1893. In the long term, repealing this policy was actually a very bad idea.

When the government is always purchasing silver, then it can wait for the price of that silver to increase and then sell it once the prices become high enough. As a result, an alluring, coercion-free source of revenue is established. Taxes will always be necessary and would be even if the Sherman Silver Purchase Act was never repealed. However, if the Sherman Silver Purchase Act stayed in effect, then the steady sale of silver and the resulting income would allow the federal government to both maintain a somewhat-low tax rate (tolls would still be needed to finance the silver purchases and public projects not covered by the silver sales) and create welfare programs by which it can help ordinary Americans.

After repealing the Sherman Silver Purchase Act, Cleveland's response to the Panic of 1893 still failed to improve or become anymore effective in mitigating the recession. In fact, Cleveland seemed to swiftly lose interest in even trying. Very, very little was done by the Cleveland Administration in pursuit of a better economy. Instead, Cleveland focused his energy on repealing Harrison's tariffs. This actually leads into another one of Cleveland's genuine accomplishments: To replace the loss in revenue caused by the tariff reductions and reversal of the Sherman Silver Purchase Act, Cleveland created the first permanent income tax. During the civil war, Abraham Lincoln had created an emergency income tax to garner additional revenue to fund the fight against the Confederacy. In fact, Lincoln created the IRS (Internal Revenue Service)  to enforce this income tax and the tariff increases he also presided over to finance the war.  Lincoln, however, repealed the income tax once the war ended. Cleveland created the first permanent, peacetime income tax.

Some may consider a peacetime income tax to be a negative. I do not. Income taxes can help alleviate the tax burden on average Americans, as a greater rate of taxation can be applied to the richest and most prosperous members of society. Thus, ordinary people can stop being as much in taxes because the government can just resort to the excess money of the rich minority. Additionally, an income tax incentivizes the government to act responsibly in regards to the financial world and to preserve a healthy economy. If there is a recession, depression, or even just a generally-poor or unimpressive economy, then people will have less money on average and so, when an income tax exists, can't give the government as much revenue as they could in a more prosperous economy. For these two reasons, I support an income tax and think of Cleveland's support for income taxes as a positive.

Furthermore, Cleveland's economic policy also included attempts to repeal the Bland-Allison Act. Passed in 1878 over the veto of then-President Rutherford B. Hayes, the Bland-Allison Act required the federal government to buy anywhere from $2,000,000 to $4,000,000 in silver from southern and western mines each month and then to mint it into coins. I oppose the Bland-Allison Act and share Cleveland's opposition. This seems paradoxical since I support the Sherman Silver Purchase Act, but the difference between those two is a crucial one: The Sherman Silver Purchase Act never required the federal government to mint the silver into coins. The Bland-Allison Act did. For this reason, the Bland-Allison Act necessarily resulted in an increase in the money supply and so higher prices, while the Sherman Silver Purchase Act did not. The rest of Cleveland's economic policy was very poor. He vetoed numerous pensions for civil war veterans, which was just heartless and callous. He also refused to help struggling farmers during a Texas drought by vetoing a bill that would have permitted the federal government to provide seeds to the farmers living in the effected area.

Many people praise Cleveland because they think he advanced states' rights and a small executive branch. These things would deserve praise if Cleveland actually supported them, but he did not. For example, he repealed the Tenure of Office Act. Passed in 1867, the Tenure of Office Act required the president to seek the Senate's approval before firing a federal official. This was a great law, as it prevented the president from dismissing competent, intelligent officers solely because of political differences or because that officer stood up to corrupt actions within the administration. The Senate would check the president to make sure that didn't happen. But because Cleveland repealed the Tenure of Office Act, he prevented that from being the case. Cleveland also used federal troops to crush the Pullman Strike of 1894 despite the desires of the governor of Illinois, who presided over the state where the strikes took place!

Ultimately, Grover Cleveland was a fascinating president. His legacy is obscure, yet alive with influence and strength in a world where the Democrats have wisely discarded the conservatism of James K. Polk, Franklin Pierce, James Buchanan, and Andrew Johnson. Grover Cleveland - alongside William Jennings Bryan and Woodrow Wilson - helped the Democratic Party begin its decades-long journey back to its progressive underpinnings, when Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren carried the sword of the working class and the shield of the forward-thinker. However, as president, he had many flaws. He refused to act on the Panic of 1893, vetoed bills that wouldn't have helped poor veterans and famine-struck farmers, facilitated corruption by repealing the Tenure of Office Act, and hurt Native Americans, among other things. But he also fought an unwise economic status quo through the ICC and opposition to the Bland-Allison Act, created the first peacetime income tax, and carried the sword of the anti-imperialist and the shield of the colonized. His presidency was one of tremendous failures and inspiring successes.