Presidential Election of 1892

Harrison and Cleveland

The Republican nominee, Benjamin Harrison, had the advantage as the sitting president. Born in North Bend, Ohio, educated at Miami University, Harrison was the grandson of the 9th President, William Henry Harrison. He built his career as a prominent lawyer and Republican politician in Indianapolis, Indiana. He fought on the Union side in the Civil War, achieving the rank of colonel. In the 1880s, Harrison went to Washington as a senator and was generally seen as a moderate within the party, promoting veterans' issues and the homestead settlement of the West.

As president, however, Harrison is often viewed as less than distinguished. He was not perceived as an effective and dynamic party leader. He supported the Sherman Anti-Trust Act of 1890, and was a protectionist who endorsed the McKinley Tariff of 1890, although with some sugar exemptions. He promoted Pan-American initiatives, allowed silver as a currency, and at the end of his term, submitted a treaty for the annexation of Hawaii. In addition, Harrison pushed to preserve African-American voting rights in the south, which were being eroded by state governments.

Grover Cleveland came to the 1892 election as a former president, serving 1885–89. Although he won the popular vote by approximately 100,000 votes, he lost in 1888 to Harrison in the Electoral College, a situation not repeated until the 2000 presidential election. Cleveland was born in New Jersey, but raised in New York State, and was a lawyer by profession. He came late to politics, becoming mayor of Buffalo in 1881, and New York governor in 1882. He succeeded in the 1884 election by winning over reform-minded Republicans who were dissatisfied with the party candidate, James G. Blaine of Maine. Cleveland went to the White House concerned with the financial abuses of the day, which included corruption in the form of government patronage and fraud. He vetoed numerous Civil War Pension Bills that were subject to fraudulent claims, and generally tried to stem the tide of bad laws. He endorsed the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887, geared to railroad regulation, and opposed the Republican high tariff protectionist policies. He maintained an aggressive Indian policy, especially in terms of subduing Geronimo and the Apaches, and extended the interpretation of the Monroe Doctrine to broaden America's right to intervene in the hemisphere. In 1886, Cleveland, who had come to the White House a bachelor, became only the second president to marry in office when he married 21-year-old Frances Folsom. Although he was financially prudent and respectful, Cleveland's opponents hounded him with rumors that he fathered an illegitimate child, a claim given credit because of his financial support of the child. Some also questioned his values in the Civil War era, for he had hired a substitute to avoid the Lincoln draft.

...