Grover Cleveland

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Cleveland.

Grover Cleveland

22nd and 24th President of the United States

In office

March 4, 1893 – March 4, 1897

Vice President Adlai Stevenson

Preceded by Benjamin Harrison

Succeeded by William McKinley

In office

March 4, 1885 – March 4, 1889

 Thomas A. Hendricks (Mar–Nov 1885)

Vice President
 None (1885–1889)[a]
Preceded by Chester A. Arthur

Succeeded by Benjamin Harrison

28th Governor of New York

In office

January 1, 1883 – January 6, 1885

Lieutenant David B. Hill

Preceded by Alonzo B. Cornell

Succeeded by David B. Hill

35th Mayor of Buffalo

In office

January 2, 1882 – November 20, 1882

Preceded by Alexander Brush

Succeeded by Marcus M. Drake

17th Sheriff of Erie County

In office

January 1, 1871 – December 31, 1873

Preceded by Charles Darcy

Succeeded by John B. Weber

Personal details

Born Stephen Grover Cleveland

March 18, 1837

Caldwell, New Jersey, U.S.

Died June 24, 1908 (aged 71)

Princeton, New Jersey, U.S.

Resting place Princeton Cemetery,

Princeton, New Jersey, U.S.

Political party Democratic

Frances Folsom
Spouse(s)
 

(m. 1886)
 Children 6, including Ruth, Esther, and Richard

Parent(s)  Richard Falley Cleveland

 Ann Neal

Relatives  Rose Cleveland (sister)

 Philippa Foot (granddaughter)

Occupation  Politician

 lawyer

Signature

Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837 – June 24, 1908) was an American lawyer
and politician who served as the 22nd and 24th president of the United States from
1885 to 1889 and again from 1893 to 1897. Cleveland is the only president in American
history to serve two non-consecutive terms in office. [b] He won the popular vote for three
presidential elections—in 1884, 1888, and 1892—and was one of
two Democrats (followed by Woodrow Wilson in 1912) to be elected president during
the era of Republican presidential domination dating from 1861 to 1933.
In 1881, Cleveland was elected mayor of Buffalo and later, governor of New York. He
was the leader of the pro-business Bourbon Democrats who opposed high tariffs, Free
Silver, inflation, imperialism, and subsidies to business, farmers, or veterans. His
crusade for political reform and fiscal conservatism made him an icon for American
conservatives of the era.[1] Cleveland won praise for his honesty, self-reliance, integrity,
and commitment to the principles of classical liberalism.[2] He fought political corruption,
patronage, and bossism. As a reformer, Cleveland had such prestige that the like-
minded wing of the Republican Party, called "Mugwumps", largely bolted the GOP
presidential ticket and swung to his support in the 1884 election. [3] As his second
administration began, disaster hit the nation when the Panic of 1893 produced a severe
national depression. It ruined his Democratic Party, opening the way for a Republican
landslide in 1894 and for the agrarian and silverite seizure of the Democratic Party in
1896. The result was a political realignment that ended the Third Party System and
launched the Fourth Party System and the Progressive Era.[4]
Cleveland was a formidable policymaker, and he also drew corresponding criticism. His
intervention in the Pullman Strike of 1894 to keep the railroads moving angered labor
unions nationwide in addition to the party in Illinois; his support of the gold standard and
opposition to Free Silver alienated the agrarian wing of the Democratic Party.[5] Critics
complained that Cleveland had little imagination and seemed overwhelmed by the
nation's economic disasters—depressions and strikes—in his second term.[5] Even so,
his reputation for probity and good character survived the troubles of his second term.
Biographer Allan Nevins wrote, "[I]n Grover Cleveland, the greatness lies in typical
rather than unusual qualities. He had no endowments that thousands of men do not
have. He possessed honesty, courage, firmness, independence, and common sense.
But he possessed them to a degree other men do not." [6] By the end of his second term,
public perception showed him to be one of the most unpopular U.S. presidents, and he
was by then rejected even by most Democrats. [7] Today, Cleveland is considered by
most historians to have been a successful leader, and has been praised for honesty,
integrity, adherence to his morals and defying party boundaries, and effective
leadership.

Contents

Early life
Childhood and family history

Caldwell Presbyterian parsonage, birthplace of Grover Cleveland in Caldwell, New Jersey

Stephen Grover Cleveland was born on March 18, 1837, in Caldwell, New Jersey, to
Ann (née Neal) and Richard Falley Cleveland.[8] Cleveland's father was
a Congregational and Presbyterian minister who was originally from Connecticut.[9] His
mother was from Baltimore and was the daughter of a bookseller.[10] On his father's side,
Cleveland was descended from English ancestors, the first of the family having
emigrated to Massachusetts from Cleveland, England, in 1635.[11] His father's maternal
grandfather, Richard Falley Jr., fought at the Battle of Bunker Hill, and was the son of an
immigrant from Guernsey. On his mother's side, Cleveland was descended from Anglo-
Irish Protestants and German Quakers from Philadelphia.[12] Cleveland was distantly
related to General Moses Cleaveland, after whom the city of Cleveland, Ohio, was
named.[13]
Cleveland, the fifth of nine children, was named Stephen Grover in honor of the first
pastor of the First Presbyterian Church of Caldwell, where his father was pastor at the
time. He became known as Grover in his adult life.[14] In 1841, the Cleveland family
moved to Fayetteville, New York, where Grover spent much of his childhood.
[15]
 Neighbors later described him as "full of fun and inclined to play pranks," [16] and fond of
outdoor sports.[17]
In 1850, Cleveland's father Richard moved his family to Clinton, New York, to work as
district secretary for the American Home Missionary Society.[18] Despite his father's
dedication to his missionary work, his income was insufficient for the large family.
Financial conditions forced him to remove Grover from school and place him in a two-
year mercantile apprenticeship in Fayetteville. The experience was valuable and brief,
and the living conditions quite austere. Grover returned to Clinton and his schooling at
the completion of the apprentice contract. [19] In 1853, when missionary work began to
take a toll on the health of Cleveland's father, he took an assignment in Holland Patent,
New York (near Utica) and moved his family again.[20] Shortly after, he died from
a gastric ulcer. The younger Cleveland was said to have learned about his father's
death from a boy selling newspapers.[20]
Education and moving west

An early, undated photograph of Grover Cleveland

Cleveland received his elementary education at the Fayetteville Academy and the
Clinton Liberal Academy.[21] After his father died in 1853, he again left school to help
support his family. Later that year, Cleveland's brother William was hired as a teacher at
the New York Institute for the Blind in New York City, and William obtained a place for
Cleveland as an assistant teacher. Cleveland returned home to Holland Patent at the
end of 1854, where an elder in his church offered to pay for his college education if he
would promise to become a minister. Cleveland declined, and in 1855 he decided to
move west.[22]
He stopped first in Buffalo, New York, where his uncle, Lewis F. Allen, gave him a
clerical job.[23] Allen was an important man in Buffalo, and he introduced his nephew to
influential men there, including the partners in the law firm of Rogers, Bowen, and
Rogers.[24] Millard Fillmore, the 13th president of the United States, had previously
worked for the partnership.[25] Cleveland later took a clerkship with the firm, began
to read the law with them, and was admitted to the New York bar in 1859.[26]
Early career and the Civil War
Cleveland worked for the Rogers firm for three years before leaving in 1862 to start his
own practice.[27] In January 1863, he was appointed assistant district attorney of Erie
County.[28] With the American Civil War raging, Congress passed the Conscription Act of
1863, requiring able-bodied men to serve in the army if called upon, or else to hire a
substitute.[26] Cleveland chose the latter course, paying $150 (equivalent to $3,301 in
2021) to George Benninsky, a thirty-two-year-old Polish immigrant, to serve in his place.
[29]
 Benninsky survived the war.[26]
As a lawyer, Cleveland became known for his single-minded concentration and
dedication to hard work.[30] In 1866, he successfully defended some participants in
the Fenian raid, working on a pro bono basis (free of charge).[31] In 1868, Cleveland
attracted professional attention for his winning defense of a libel suit against the editor
of Buffalo's Commercial Advertiser.[32] During this time, Cleveland assumed a lifestyle of
simplicity, taking residence in a plain boarding house. He devoted his growing income
instead to the support of his mother and younger sisters. [33] While his personal quarters
were austere, Cleveland enjoyed an active social life and "the easy-going sociability of
hotel-lobbies and saloons."[34] He shunned the circles of higher society of Buffalo in
which his uncle's family traveled.[35]

Political career in New York