Kieran+Ohliger

In Office: 1885-1889; 1893-1897 (Democrat) Vice President: Thomas Andrew Hendricks (1st term), then Adlai Ewing Stevenson (2nd term) Rating: **C**
 * Kieran Ohliger**
 * Stephen Grover Cleveland (1837-1908)**


 * Culture:** Grover Cleveland was a great contributor to America. In his efforts to build onto America’s prosperity he both preserved and damaged world culture. (This is not to say that he was a bad president; it is the president’s job to do the best that they can do to support the country and that is what he did.) President Cleveland instituted the Dawes Severalty Act of 1887 in his first term. This bribed Native Americans to renounce their culture to gain full citizenship. This can be seen as an ideal opportunity to modernize the Native Americans and quickly spread the American way, however from a cultural perspective this is a disaster. Such recklessness in American government caused the extinction of American Indian culture. On the other side of the issue of cultural preservation, Cleveland argued against the annexation of Hawaii. He believed that it was not America’s place to be involved in overthrowing Queen Liliuokalani and annexing the future state. Cleveland certainly affected culture in both positive and negative ways.


 * Analysis:** Due to his outstanding honesty, patriotism, and reform, Grover Cleveland deserves a C for his split terms as president of the United States of America. He had a decent first term and a progressive second term with one major drawback-the depression.

In his first Inaugural Address, Cleveland promises democracy for the people. He also expressed his belief in the need for reform in America. He specifically planned to reduce the crime rate in American cities. Grover Cleveland was a man of his word and followed through on his promises to the best of his abilities. The chief concern of the 1983 election was the growing instability in the economy, so naturally that was his focus in his second Inaugural Address. He did try to fix the economy, but slowed his concerns on the topic after he thought it was fixed, although the American people might have disagreed.

Cleveland’s congressional relationship was better than many other presidents. He had several laws passed during his time in office due to the fact that he had a mostly Democratic Congress. He got democratic laws passed such as the Dawes Severalty Act and the Interstate Commerce Act. His Congress did suggest several laws that he disagreed with and had to veto. He vetoed the Pension and Private Relief Bills that he would have said drained the treasury with unneeded spending. Overall, His relationship with Congress was better than most of his predecessors.

The most successful outcome of Cleveland’s work as president was repeal of the Sherman Silver Purchase Act of 1893. Even though this was one of the few things he did in order to fix the economy during the panic, at least he focused in on the problem. He believed that the main cause of the Panic of 1893 was the problem with the silver market. The act required the government to keep a steady rate in purchasing silver. Cleveland was crazy about saving the government money and with the failing silver trade he decided that this was a waste of money. Cleveland’s main goal in his time in office was to save the government as much money as possible and stop unnecessary spending. He believed that this was the root of the economy’s issues during the panic of 1893.

Despite all of his success, Cleveland slipped up during his second term. The nation was in a depression, however he did little to stop this. He was a penny pincher when it came to government money and it would not have flown well with him if Congress were to suggest fixing the economy with federal dollars. The Panic of 1893 was caused by bank failures and railroad collapses. To make matters worse, there was a boom in silver and farmers rode the wave all the way to the bank to pay off debts at a cheaper rate throwing off the economy even more. Even more difficulty was added because Cleveland had been left with the Treasury crisis by the resentful previous president Harrison. Throughout this crisis, the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad went bankrupt along with several other railroads. This was catastrophic to the transportation system during the time, yet Cleveland still did not do much to correct these issues past repealing the Sherman Silver Act.

In 1886 Grover Cleveland revised the Presidential Succession Act. Although this revision did not come into effect many times it was crucial to the nation when it did. This revision added an order to the chain of command for when a president was killed or impeached. This was fantastic foresight from the president because a sudden death of a future leader would be chaos if there was not a specific and designated second(, third and so on) in command. Thanks to the preparation from Cleveland, when McKinley (the president to immediately follow Cleveland) was assassinated. His version of the act was still in effect when Kennedy was in office as well. This affected the United States in a positive way because it prepared the nation for disaster and kept America prepared and with a level head during unexpected events in the future.

Thanks to his “cheap dad” money saving tactics, Cleveland led America through the worst depression up to the 1900’s-albeit not to perfection, but the country was better off with him as president. He also used his power to pass and veto many bills to enhance the country of America to the best of his ability. Grover Cleveland has earned a plain C because he helped America through the depression, saved the US money, and did a decent job of getting America through four years on two separate occasions.