A Man of Iron

June 20, 2022
The only president to serve two nonconsecutive terms in office, Grover Cleveland (1837–1908) was more than the answer to a trivia question, according to this entertaining biography. Senik, a former speechwriter for George W. Bush, characterizes Cleveland as a fierce opponent of corruption who was willing “to follow principle regardless of the political consequences.” Though this integrity sparked Cleveland’s meteoric rise from mayor of Buffalo, N.Y., to governor to president within the span of three years, it backfired politically when he was in the White House and opposed factions of his Democratic Party on such issues as tariff reform, the Pullman labor strike, and the gold standard. After winning the popular vote but losing in the electoral college to Benjamin Harrison in 1888, Cleveland reclaimed the presidency in 1892. Senik details Cleveland’s personal scandals—including allegations that he fathered a child out of wedlock and institutionalized the child’s mother; his marriage, while president, to a 21-year-old woman who had once been his ward; and the “massive cover-up” over his secret surgery to remove a cancerous tumor during the financial panic of 1893—but never seriously challenges his subject’s “moral probity.” Well-researched if biased, this is an enjoyable reconsideration of an underappreciated American president. Agents: Matt Latimer and Keith Urbahn, Javelin.