Grover Cleveland

I

Introduction

Grover Cleveland (1837-1908), 22nd and 24th president of the United States (1885-1889, 1893-1897), the only chief executive to be reelected after defeat. Cleveland adopted the credo “a public office is a public trust,” and in his two nonconsecutive terms, he spent much of his energy resisting political influences and the party favoritism characteristic of that era. As a result, he managed to offend almost every political faction and to win the anger of many private organizations and individuals as well. It is for his stubborn courage and integrity, rather than for any outstanding achievement as president, that Cleveland is remembered.

II

Early Life

Stephen Grover Cleveland was born on March 18, 1837, in Caldwell, New Jersey. He was the fifth child of Richard Falley Cleveland, a Presbyterian minister, and Ann Neal Cleveland. Four years later the family moved to Fayetteville, near Syracuse, New York, where his father became pastor of the Presbyterian church. The young Cleveland attended the local school, and when he was 13 entered an academy in nearby Clinton. The death of his father in 1853 removed any hope Cleveland may have had of attending college. To earn his own way and contribute to his mother’s support, he went to New York City, where he worked for a year teaching at the state institution for the blind.

In 1855 Cleveland decided to go to Cleveland, Ohio, to look for work, but he got no farther than Buffalo, New York. There his uncle, a wealthy and nationally famous cattle-breeder, hired him to look after the herdbooks of his cattle company. After a year of this, Cleveland studied law in the offices of friends of his uncle and in 1859 was licensed to practice law.

III

Early Political Career

Cleveland soon showed the political independence that characterized his future career. His uncle, the best-known citizen of Buffalo except for former President Millard Fillmore (1850-1853), had organized Erie County’s Republican Party, but Cleveland joined the Democratic Party. In later years, Cleveland said that he became a Democrat in 1856 because that party represented solid, conservative thought. On the other hand, he said, Republican presidential candidate John Charles Frémont struck him as flamboyant and theatrical.

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During the Civil War (1861-1865), when other men of his age were in the Union Army, Cleveland borrowed money to hire a substitute to serve in his place. This was a practice permitted under the Federal Conscription Act and was widely used in the North. Cleveland defended his action, saying that he had to earn enough money to support his mother and sisters.

In 1863 Cleveland was appointed assistant district attorney of Erie County, New York. During the next three years he earned a name as a crusader against crime and corruption. In 1871 he became county sheriff. Between terms of public office he continued to practice law and became the most successful attorney in Buffalo. His success was generally attributed to hard work rather than brilliant legal talent.

A

Mayor of Buffalo

In 1881 Cleveland was a 44-year-old, moderately wealthy bachelor. The Democrats of Buffalo, hoping to appeal to respectable citizens, nominated Cleveland for mayor because of his work against corruption. He declared, “Public officials are the trustees of the people,” the basis for the slogan later credited to him, “Public office is a public trust.” A coalition of Democrats, reform Republicans, and independents elected him mayor.

Mayor Cleveland fought the Buffalo aldermen, a corrupt circle of politicians from both parties. In his single year at city hall he stopped an attempt to defraud the city of $200,000 on a street-cleaning contract and vetoed numerous bills passed by the aldermen. Cleveland felt these bills were examples of political graft, a form of fraud in which a legislator passed laws that increased the value of his own private investments. Cleveland thus became known as the “veto mayor.”

Cleveland probably would have advanced no further in politics but for the deadlock in 1882 between two men wanting the Democratic nomination for governor of New York. The party leaders then decided that a new face was needed to reconcile quarreling factions and chose to nominate Cleveland. He went on to victory over his Republican opponent, who had been the choice of President Chester A. Arthur.

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