Timeless Wisdom - Learn History with Dennis Prager - Part 2

Welcome to Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager. Hear thousands of hours of Dennis's lectures, courses, and classic radio programs. And to purchase Dennis Prager's Rational Bibles, go to DennisPrager.com. Hi everybody, this is a history hour on the Dennis Prager Show. Periodically, just as I have set times for male-female hour, happiness hour, Ultimate Issues Hour. We have a non-set time for a history hour, but history is everything. You don't know history, you don't know where you come from, you don't know why we're here, you don't know where we're going. And we're trying to remedy that in our little way with a history hour on the Dennis Prager Show. So welcome indeed. One of my beliefs is that a great way, perhaps the most I guess entertaining way, and entertaining is a very important thing because if you're not entertained you lose interest, to learn history is through biography. And I therefore have a bias toward the biographers. I also love biographies of presidents who we don't know much about, or for that matter anything about. I used to ask waiters or waitresses before they were known as servers, I used to ask them, hey, just out of curiosity, ever hear of Franklin Pierce? Forgive me, but I never got anybody, you know, somebody thought, you know, he played third base for the local team or something, you know, but nobody knew he was a president, which is a humbling thing if you become president. You know, how long will it take till you become a a Trivial Pursuit question at a restaurant. But, uh, I, I'm trying to resurrect some of these people, and some of them are truly significant. And I think I have one here with Grover Cleveland, uh, who was a president in the 18th— he has a lot of unique aspects to Grover Cleveland, including the only president who lost and then won again. So he served two terms, but not consecutive terms. And how about this? The reason he didn't serve consecutive terms is that he lost the electoral vote, but he won the popular vote. See, there's— but there's a lot to be said about him, and I'm not the one to say it, but my distinguished guest is. He is Professor John Pafford, and John Pafford is a professor of history and philosophy at Northwood University in Midland, Michigan. The book is published by Regnery, and it is titled The Forgotten Conservative. Rediscovering Grover Cleveland. Professor Paffert, welcome to The Dennis Prager Show.

Thank you very much, my pleasure to be here.

I'm delighted that you are. The Forgotten Conservative reminds me of all that I have been learning recently about another forgotten conservative who came later, and that, and that is Calvin Coolidge.

There are a lot of similarities between the two of them.

Yeah, well, that's what— it's one of the things we want to talk about. First, let's get a little biography of the man. Has anybody risen to the presidency from, from mayor of a small or middling city as he did?

With the rapidity—

the rapidity, I meant rapidity. Yes, the rapidity.

In 1881, he was elected mayor of Buffalo, New York. In 1882, he was elected governor of the state of New York. In 1884, elected president of the United States.

Right. So from 3— yeah, so from 3 years from mayor of Buffalo to president of the United States. I know you can't answer this, but was he shocked?

Uh, so, well, no, no, yes and no. Now I hate to— that sounds awfully academic to say yes and no, but, um, He did run for these offices. I mean, he didn't have to be dragooned into running. He was a man who always put principle ahead of his personal ambition. His personal ambition was not the controlling factor in his life. But, you know, it's fascinating to look at what was happening, first in New York and then in the country, to permit this to happen. And as I look back on those years and as I study them, I conclude that you've really got divine providence at work here. Now, if somebody doesn't believe in divine providence, you can say that the stars were aligned or he lucked out, because each time when he ran for office, there was a miscalculation of how powerful he was, how capable he was, and the opposition was split. But I won't go into— I don't want to get into too much detail right now. Let you ask the questions as we go on.

That's fine.

But again, the opposition was split and everything just worked out beautifully for him to become mayor of Buffalo, governor of New York, and then president.

And he was the first Democrat president elected after the Civil War.

Yes, in fact, before the Civil War, uh, James Buchanan was elected in 1856, and from 1856 until Cleveland was elected in 1884, solidly Republican.

How do you explain his success?

All right, for President of the United States, uh, the Democratic Party, uh, was still strong. I mean, they were losing the elections, but they weren't being annihilated. So there was a degree of Democratic strength. Also, the Democratic Party nationally was looking for somebody who could possibly bring them the victory in the presidential sweepstakes. Grover Cleveland had been elected governor of New York in 1882, as I mentioned. That's the biggest state in the country at the time, so that immediately catapulted him up to the top. The Democrats, again, were very much looking for somebody. Grover Cleveland had a good reputation as an administrator, as a man of strength and integrity. And the Republican Party in 1884 was split. They nominated a candidate who had a shaky track record in terms of ethics and morality, and the Republicans had quite a few people who wanted honest reform government shift over and vote Democratic that year.

So if you had to characterize the basic philosophical difference or differences between the Republican Party in, in the 1880s and the Democratic Party, what would they be?

Not much, first of all.

That's why I asked it. I couldn't figure out the answer because this guy's a conservative, a small government president, and he's Democrat.

Exactly right. Sounds like quite a paradox, or as if somebody has made some kind of a mistake. But yes, both the major parties actually favored limited government. The difference between the Republicans and the Democrats at this time on policy would be primarily over the tariff, that the Republicans favored a higher tariff in order to protect industry, and the Democrats were more free trade oriented. The key thing that was hurting the Democrats in these years, of course, was still the stigma of the Civil War, and that the people who broke away from the Union in 1861 were Southern Democrats. So the Democrats still carried that stigma, but both parties overall were conservative. It got so bad in 1892 when Cleveland was elected to a second term, that the liberals had to go off and form a third party for themselves. Benjamin Harrison, the Republican, running against Grover Cleveland, the Democrat, both were conservatives. If anything, Cleveland was more conservative, actually, than Harrison.

Was he the last, if one could say this, the last small government Democrat to be president?

Yes, absolutely. Wow. And almost the last one to even get to run. For the presidential nomination. The Democrats would have a couple of occasions in the 1900s, 1904 and 1924, when they would nominate relatively conservative people to run for president, but then the party would slip back into its old ways, and very definitely the Democratic Party after Cleveland moved sharply to the left, first nominating William Jennings Bryan in 1896. So I think it would be safe to say that if any one of your listeners is today a liberal, then he or she would feel very much at home with William Jennings Bryan philosophically. And any one of your listeners who is a conservative would feel very much at home with Grover Cleveland. The difference really was that the conservatives in the latter part of the 19th century had more overall strength than they have today. I'm not a pessimist. I think conservatives can still come back and win today.

Well, that's good to hear, but we're going to get back to this. This is just so fascinating. The Forgotten Conservative: Rediscovering Grover Cleveland, powerful brief book by Professor John Pafford, P-A-F-F-O-R-D, It is up at DennisPrager.com. This is a History Hour on The Dennis Prager Show. Hello, my friends. Dennis Prager here. This is a History Hour. Nothing, nothing like history. Nothing. I get so excited, you could tell, because what happened before is so important and it's so It's just so riveting. I mean, I think to anybody who doesn't find history interesting, that means that you're saying that people living 50, 100 years from now would have no interest in our time. But isn't that absurd? Is our time insignificant? All right, anyway, uh, the, uh, the featured book, because I tend to focus on recently, or brand new books of history. The Forgotten Conservative: Rediscovering Grover Cleveland. Professor John Pafford is the author of the book, and I want, in case you're just coming into the show, Grover Cleveland was the last conservative Democrat, small government Democrat, to serve as President of the United States. He is a lot of unique things about him. He's also the only president to serve two terms, but they weren't consecutive. And not only that, the reason they weren't consecutive was that he was one of the few presidents who lost the presidency even though he won the popular vote. By the way, how did he take that? Because Al Gore was traumatized by that. How did Grover Cleveland take that?

Well, he, he didn't like it at all, but he accepted the constitutional way of doing things. So he did later write about how we should choose a president, and he did do some grumbling about the fact that he did win the popular vote but lost the Electoral College vote. But he was honest enough to say that although he didn't like what happened to him, he really did not have a good alternative to present to the people. He didn't suggest that we should do away with the— He didn't.

That's very interesting. He didn't.

No, he did not.

Yeah, well, that would be his temperament. You mentioned, and every time I've ever read about him it's been mentioned, that he had particularly, uh, he was known for great integrity. Tell us about that.

Yes, that's absolutely— this is an intriguing thing about him. His father was a clergyman, Presbyterian clergyman, who died when Grover was in his mid-teens, and Grover then in his mid-teens had to go to work Uh, the family did not have money. The clergyman father was not well-to-do, and so he had to put aside his own hopes for going to college and go to work. He later did study for the law privately, which one could do in those days, and passed the bar examination.

Too bad they can't do it today.

I know. And became an attorney.

And by the way, did he grow up— did he grow up in Buffalo?

Say that it was just his upbringing because there are plenty of moral people who have rotten kids, and there are plenty of rotten people—

oh, is that true?

Great kids.

That is true.

But Grover Cleveland was definitely a man of integrity and a man of hard work. Those were combined with him.

I was asking— forgive me, Professor— I was asking, was he raised in Buffalo?

No, no, he was in upstate New York, but he ended up in Buffalo as a man in his late teens, he was looking for an opportunity. He had an uncle who lived in Buffalo, and he traveled to Buffalo, stayed with the uncle, and talked with the uncle about his looking for something to do with his life. And the uncle had good contacts with law firms in Buffalo and put young Grover in touch with a prominent law firm. So he went to work as a law clerk, studied for the law, and then, of course, went into the law practice and rose up through the ranks of the legal profession in Buffalo, establishing a reputation for ability, for guts, for integrity.

Well, apparently so, because everybody acknowledged that. And as you say, they needed to clean up at the time, but there's always a need for cleanup. I want to go back to a point you made earlier that he and the Republican— he and the, and the, uh, let's see, he and the Democrats were opposed to tariffs and the Republicans were for them. Is that correct?

Yes, in general.

I mean, yeah, yeah, right, that's fine.

In general, the Democrats were low, right?

Now, which is interesting because Hoover, later the Republican, signs the, uh, the major tariff bill of his day. Smoot-Hawley. Yeah, Smoot-Hawley, exactly. I always think of Hoot Smoley, and I know I'm wrong. It's unbelievable. It's a problem in my brain. But yeah, Smoot-Hawley. And so it is a sad part of the Republican history to have gone for this because I assume it's because big business wanted tariffs and the Republicans listened to them.

Yes, and the country was still developing, and so It was a plank which sold to people that this would help build business and make it a stronger economy in the country. That was the main thing that separated them, really, because as we talked earlier, both parties at that time were for small government.

Yeah, exactly. But the tariff is already a big government issue, needless to say, and business loves it, and it's always bad ultimately for the economy. Talking about the economy, what was the economy like during the Cleveland era?

Up and down, because you did have, first of all, that during the latter part of the 19th century, say from the end of the Civil War in 1865 right on through, in general the economy was growing. People were coming into the country as immigrants. Our industry was building. We were exporting more. We were developing. Both internal trade and foreign trade more and more. We did have in the second Cleveland administration a major depression, what is referred to as the Panic of 1893. And then we did start to come out of that Panic of '93, but that has a major implication for American politics because it's during that second term Cleveland now is a lame duck. There is this two-term tradition, and Cleveland was going to live up to that. The president, therefore, was weaker, and you had William Jennings Bryan rising in the Democratic Party as a silver-tongued orator, somebody who could charm people tremendously, and he was preaching the mantra of more government, that we are having rough times now in this country and the government's got to do more for people.

He was one of these progressive Christians?

Yes, very definitely. In fact, I'd call him a liberal politically. He was a Bible-believing Christian.

That's what I'm saying. And he—

and that's a paradox there.

Well, well, yeah, there— that's— I know, I know. I wish it were a paradox. Don't get me started. Oh, there's so much, including we're going to talk about the question of his having an illegitimate child this man of integrity. And I don't say that at all sarcastically, but how do— how are those reconciled? The Forgotten Conservative: Rediscovering Grover Cleveland. The book is up at DennisPrager.com. You are listening to A History Hour on The Dennis Prager Show. Hi everybody, Dennis Prager here. This is A History Hour. We don't have a set time each week like my other dedicated hours, but We periodically do have an hour devoted to a new book on history, and I so enjoy this that I'm afraid to say how much because then my employer may pay me less. You know, Prager, you really enjoy yourself too much. Maybe you should slip us a couple of bucks. But I really am, and Professor, you're just delightful to have. John Paffert is the professor. He's a professor of history at a small university, Northwood University in Midland, Michigan, and the book is The Forgotten Conservative: Rediscovering Grover Cleveland, easily the last small government Democrat to serve in the White House, and he had two terms but they weren't consecutive, and the one that he lost in the middle, he only lost in the Electoral College, not in the popular vote. And, uh, it's just a fascinating life. Tell us, because the time goes so fast on these hours, what is the issue of the illegitimate child?

That's an interesting, uh, what might seem as a paradox. Cleveland, first of all, was unmarried at the time.

So at the time of what? At the time of what? I'm sorry, pardon? At the time of what?

Oh, I'm sorry, at the time of this involvement with the lady who had the illegitimate child. Her name was Maria Halpin, H-A-L-P-I-N. She had moved to Buffalo, was working in business in Buffalo. She was 33 when she moved into the city, and Cleveland was a bit older than she. He was born in 1837. He's in his mid-30s. And there was an affair. He did acknowledge that. And there was a child who was born to Maria Halpin. The question is, whose child was it? Because knowing you don't want to have this any worse than a PG-rated show, Maria had the lifestyle where there could have been a real question as to whether she knew who the father was.

Was she a married woman? I forgot that. Okay, so it's okay today. That would be almost a non-issue. Yeah, well, yes, two unmarried people, and you have DNA today. Yeah, well, certainly that would obviously— so to this day we don't know whose child it was?

Not for sure, no. The other men with whom Maria was involved were married men. One of them was a man named Oscar Folsom, who was Cleveland's law partner in Buffalo. Uh, there are arguments that Cleveland took responsibility for being the parent, the father, and paid for the child in order to spare married men the burden of having this potentially ruin their reputations or wreck their marriages. This came up during Cleveland's second presidential race, and it was something which was talked about, it was brought up during the race. He simply said to his— sorry, it was during the first race— but he simply said to his supporters when it came came out, whatever you do, tell the truth. Tell the truth. Uh, he admitted that he had paid for the child, that he did support the child. He admitted that he did accept parentage, but he never said that, I know I'm the father, and he never said, I know I'm not the father.

What do you believe?

Uh, I don't— I honestly don't know. I mean, uh, People who don't like Grover Cleveland would like to assume that he seduced this innocent girl.

And well, it sounds like she was very seducible. I mean, from what you're describing. Yeah.

And those who don't, uh, who do like Cleveland like to think that he was innocent. I honestly don't know, and I— but I don't really have a take. He very well could have been.

But do you believe that he could have been so noble as to have spared these husbands who slept with this woman, uh, the indignity of, of having a child with another woman?

I think he could have, particularly since he did not know that he really wasn't the father.

No, no, I understand, of course, but they were all— but those married men were denying it, right?

They would deny it, but it wasn't going to be such a burden for Cleveland.

Yeah, because he was a single man.

A single man.

Yeah. When did he— was he married? Was he married when he ran for office?

Uh, when he ran? No, he was, he was married after he was elected president the first time. So during, during, after he took office, he was married then. There are no scandals, nothing at all.

All right, we'll talk about those. All right, we'll talk about that too in a moment. It's a very interesting man and a very interesting era. The Forgotten Conservative: Rediscovering Grover Cleveland. John Pafford, the author. I'm Dennis Prager. This is a history A History Hour. Hi everybody, Dennis Prager. This is A History Hour, periodically an hour devoted to a recent book on some aspect of history. This is The Forgotten Conservative: Rediscovering Grover Cleveland. Professor John Paffert is the author, and I for one have been riveted, and I have a feeling that many have. You learn so much from these biographies, and he has a fascinating presidency. I'm just curious again about the charge. And for those just tuning in, a reminder, the man went from mayor of Buffalo to president within 3 years. I mean, that's as dramatic as state senator from Illinois to president that some president that comes to mind happened to have achieved. This man was the last Democrat to be a small government Democrat as president. He was president in— he was elected in '84, 1884, and then in 1892. In 1888, he won the popular vote but lost the Electoral College to Benjamin Harrison, the Republican, whom I want to ask about in a moment. He also took responsibility for a child born out of wedlock, and but nobody including Cleveland knows whether real or not that child really was his. Now, did that child regard him as daddy?

No, no, there, there, he wasn't really raised by Cleveland. He was adopted by another family, and the best evidence, yeah, he went on, became a medical doctor. But there, there are no other scandals in Cleveland's life at all. And you can certainly count on the fact that if there had been any dirt to be dug up, it would have been dug up by his opponents. Because you can't go back to the 19th century and say this was some time of all gentlemanly politics at all. Politicians could get very dirty, and if there were any dirt at all, it would be dug up.

Right.

Again, nobody could find anything on Cleveland later in his life.

Now Cleveland married while in office?

Yes, he was, um, he was in office during his first term.

So he was elected as a bachelor?

Yes, he was.

So he and Buchanan, I guess, were the only two?

Yes, uh, though, so there he was.

Huh, because usually Americans prefer a man to be married when, uh, when electing him. So it's an interesting thing. What, did he have a good marriage?

Oh yes, a very, very good marriage. Uh, they, they seem to be very happy. She was substantially younger, about 27 years younger than he.

That helps.

They—

I'm just kidding, guys. There's a lot of laughter in the studio. Okay, go on.

Uh, they had, uh, 5 children.

They did.

The children all turned out well.

Well, if you want 5 children, then it does help to have a 27-year-old. So how old was he? Well, what was he? He was in his 40s when he married?

Well, 47. Yes. Yeah, he was— again, he's born in 1837. And so they were married in 1884.

Right, okay. Now tell us for a moment a little bit about the man who lost the popular vote, the Republican, but won the election in between Cleveland's two terms, Benjamin Harrison.

Right, Benjamin Harrison was the grandson of William Henry Harrison.

Oh, that's great shakes. The man was in office for 30 days.

I know, right? Harrison had a very good war record during the Civil War as a general in the Army and had a good electoral record. He benefited from the fact that, again, this is normally a Republican era. He was not an exciting figure, a charismatic figure. He was an effective speaker but tended to be a rather cold personality. I don't think there's any chance he would get elected due to the personality presidency today. And he did benefit from the fact, as I said, that this was overall normally a Republican era. And Harrison, though, lost his second round because his administration was not that distinguished, and people listened to Grover Cleveland in his second run. These were all very close races, though. As you mentioned, Cleveland did win the popular vote all 3 times that he ran, and he carried the Electoral College twice and only narrowly lost in the middle.

Why did the Democrats leave the belief in small government?

It's a very interesting point, and I think it's got to be that a lot of them were simply looking for a way to win. Now, that's part of it. They're looking for a way to win. Grover Cleveland isn't going to be able to run another time. and there is a depression in the country, and now you have people like, again, William Jennings Bryan talking about a new way to handle this depression— government involvement now. Get away from the gold standard, print more money, have more benefit programs, tax the wealthy more. As I mentioned earlier on, today's liberals would find themselves very much at home and very familiar with William Jennings Bryan. And so there were those in the Democratic Party who listened to what Bryan was talking about. It seemed to make sense to them. "I'm suffering, and it's got to be the fault of the system, so let's raise taxes on the rich more. Let's get rid of this specie-backed money. Let's get rid of the gold standard. Let's just get the government printing paper money." About a third, roughly a third of the Democratic Party, though, did not go this Bryan route. And these people shifted over in 1896 and voted for William McKinley. And this is going to hurt the Democratic Party very badly for years, that they're going to get identified as this party of the left, and that the Cleveland-type Democrats, in general gravitated into the Republican Party. So the Republicans are going to have a run of success, 1896 until 1912, when Woodrow Wilson got elected because the Republicans split. That's when Theodore Roosevelt ran on a third-party ticket, and Woodrow Wilson got in. Then in 1916, with World War I ravaging Europe, people listen to Wilson's statement, "Don't change horses in the middle of a stream," and Wilson very narrowly got reelected in 1916. Then the country is going to go back solidly Republican until FDR in 1932.

Right, but Republican didn't mean necessarily small government, which—

Not by the time that you've got Franklin Roosevelt getting elected, right.

That is a very big deal. We just have one more segment to go, and it's too bad because it's a great way to grasp American history. Back in a moment, The Forgotten Conservative, Grover Cleveland. Hello everybody, last segment unfortunately because it's been so interesting of a history hour, a periodic exploration of new books on history. This one is The Forgotten Conservative. Rediscovering Grover Cleveland, and boy is it worth rediscovering him. The more you know about him and his era, the only president to have two terms but not successive, and the only reason he didn't was because he didn't win the Electoral College. He did win the popular vote. He was the last small government Democrat. There is so much about him. He was married in office. I don't know, was any other president married while in office? I can't think of—

Well, Woodrow Wilson had his second marriage. His first wife died, and he's married in office.

Uh-huh. Yeah, but not a first.

It is unusual, right?

Right. So, uh, I'll tell you, the more I, I learned through you about him, the more I actually think of Ronald Reagan, uh, interestingly. And I'll give you one more example aside from small government. Uh, and, and, and the integrity issue is the Chicago railroad workers' strike and, and his action against them. Could you, could you tell us about that?

Well, yes, he was very definitely, uh, an advocate of law and order, and so did definitely, uh, take strong action to maintain order when there would be any breakout of violence, say Haymarket Square. So he would take action and would maintain order and keep the economy running. He did believe in the freedom for people to organize and to be able to express themselves, but not in their freedom to close down the economy of the country and hurt everyone.

Like the air traffic controller strike, that's the parallel that I was thinking of.

Right, very definitely.

Yeah.

And as we talked about— well, go ahead.

Well, no, I, I want to ask one more thing before the time is up. I want to ask about his religiosity, being the child of a pastor.

He did have a very definite, definite, uh, Christian profession. He's not known essentially for that, but he did make some statements that are very clear and he talked about the United States saying it would not be in existence and could not hope to live if it were not Christian in every fiber. He did go on to quote from the book of Proverbs, chapter 14, that he said, while slavery remained, we could not hope fully to work out our Christian ideals, and whenever we overlook the fact that righteousness exalteth a nation. Again, that's from Proverbs chapter 14. We pay the penalty.

We could—

he welcomed people of every land and from every form of faith.

Well, look, we gotta go, but I gotta tell you, you have really whetted the appetite of my listeners to read your book and to read about this remarkable president. Professor Paffert, it has been a joy.

Thank you very much.

Thank you very much. The Forgotten Conservative Grover Cleveland, up at DennisPrager.com. This has been a History Hour. This has been Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager. Visit DennisPrager.com for thousands of hours of Dennis's lectures, courses, and classic radio programs, and to purchase Dennis Prager's Rational Bibles.