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| USA Coinage: 1885 - 1888 and 1893 - 1896 | ||||
| under President: Stephen Grover Cleveland | ||||
| Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837 – June 24, 1908) was an American politician and lawyer who was the 22nd and 24th President of the United States, the only President in American history to serve two non-consecutive terms in office (March 04, 1885 – March 04, 1889 and March 04, 1893 – March 04, 1897). He won the popular vote for three presidential elections – in 1884, 1888, and 1892 – and was one of two Democrats (with Woodrow Wilson) to be elected president during the era of Republican political domination dating from 1861 to 1933. | ||||
| Cleveland was the leader of the pro-business Bourbon Democrats who opposed high tariffs, Free Silver, inflation, imperialism, and subsidies to business, farmers, or veterans on libertarian philosophical grounds. His crusade for political reform and fiscal conservatism made him an icon for American conservatives of the era. Cleveland won praise for his honesty, self-reliance, integrity, and commitment to the principles of classical liberalism. 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. | ||||
| The United States presidential election of 1884 was the 25th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 04, 1884. It saw the first election of a Democrat as President of the United States since the election of 1856. The campaign was marred by exceptional political acrimony and personal invective. New York Governor Stephen Grover Cleveland narrowly defeated Republican former United States Senator James Gillespie Blaine of Maine to break the longest losing streak for any major party in American political history: six consecutive presidential elections. Grover Cleveland got 48.9% (Electoral vote: 219) while James G. Blaine got 48.3% (Electoral vote: 182). | ||||
| It was during this period that Cleveland began a relationship with a widow, Maria Crofts Halpin, and later assumed responsibility for supporting her and a child born at the time. The matter became a campaign issue for the GOP in his first presidential campaign. | ||||
| Cleveland entered the White House as a bachelor, and his sister Rose Cleveland joined him, to act as hostess for the first two years of his administration. However, unlike the previous bachelor president James Buchanan, Cleveland did not remain a bachelor for very long. In 1885 the daughter of Cleveland's friend Oscar Folsom visited him in Washington. Frances Folsom was a student at Wells College. When she returned to school, President Cleveland received her mother's permission to correspond with her, and they were soon engaged to be married. On June 02, 1886, Cleveland married Frances Folsom in the Blue Room at the White House. He was the second President to wed while in office, and has been the only President married in the White House. This marriage was unusual, since Cleveland was the executor of Oscar Folsom's estate and had supervised Frances's upbringing after her father's death; nevertheless, the public took no exception to the match. At 21 years, Frances Folsom Cleveland was the youngest First Lady in history, and the public soon warmed to her beauty and warm personality. The Clevelands had five children: Ruth (1891–1904), Esther (1893–1980), Marion (1895–1977), Richard (1897–1974), and Francis Grover (1903–1995). British philosopher Philippa Foot was their granddaughter. | ||||
| Currency: Dollar = 100 cents | ||||
| Monetary System: Penny = Cent, Trime = 3 Cents, Nickel = 5 Cents, Dime = 10 Cents, Quarter = 25 Cents, Half Dollar = 50, Cents, Dollar = 100 Cents, Quarter Eagle = $2.50 Gold, Stella = $4.00 Gold, Half Eagle = $5.00 Gold, Eagle = $10.00 Gold and Double Eagle = $20.00 Gold. | ||||
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Mint Marks: C – Charlotte, N.C., 1838-1861. CC – Carson City, NV, 1870-1893. D – Dahlonega, GA, 1838-1861. D – Denver, CO, 1906-present. O – New Orleans, LA, 1838-1909. P – Philadelphia, PA, 1793-present (coins without mintmark also belongs to Philadelphia). S – San Francisco, CA, 1854-present. W – West Point, NY, 1984-present. |
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| 1888 | ||||
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| The United States presidential election of 1888 was the 26th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 06, 1888. It saw Grover Cleveland of New York, the incumbent president and a Democrat, try to secure a second term against the Republican nominee Benjamin Harrison, a former U.S. Senator from Indiana. The economy was prosperous and the nation was at peace, but Cleveland lost re-election in the Electoral College, even though he won a plurality of the popular vote by a narrow margin (48.6% against 47.8%). | ||||
| As of 1892, Cleveland was one of only two people (the other being Andrew Jackson) to win the popular vote in three U.S. presidential elections. In the 20th century Franklin D. Roosevelt eventually exceeded this distinction by winning the popular vote in four consecutive elections. Cleveland also became the first Democrat to be nominated by his party three times, a distinction matched later only by William Jennings Bryan and exceeded by Franklin D. Roosevelt. | ||||
| As his second administration began, disaster hit the nation when the Panic of 1893 produced a severe national depression, which Cleveland was unable to reverse. 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. | ||||
| Cleveland's health had been declining for several years, and in the autumn of 1907 he fell seriously ill. In 1908, he suffered a heart attack and died on June 24 at age 71. His last words were, "I have tried so hard to do right." He is buried in the Princeton Cemetery of the Nassau Presbyterian Church. | ||||
| 1894 | ||||
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| 1895 | ||||
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| 1896 | ||||
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| The first U.S. postage stamp to honor Cleveland appeared in 1923. This twelve-cent issue accompanied a thirteen-cent stamp in the same definitive series that depicted his old rival Benjamin Harrison. Cleveland's only two subsequent stamp appearances have been in issues devoted to the full roster of U.S. Presidents, released, respectively, in 1938 and 1986. Cleveland's portrait was on the U.S. $1000 bill of series 1928 and series 1934. He also appeared on the first few issues of the $20 Federal Reserve Notes from 1914. Since he was both the 22nd and 24th president, he was featured on two separate dollar coins released in 2012 as part of the Presidential $1 Coin Act of 2005. | ||||
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