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Grover Cleveland

March 4, 1885, to March 4, 1889

Grover Cleveland

Grover Cleveland was born in Caldwell, Essex County, N.J., March 18,1837. On the paternal side he is of English origin. Moses Clevelandemigrated from Ipswich, County of Suffolk, England, in 1635, and settledat Woburn, Mass., where he died in 1701. His descendant WilliamCleveland was a silversmith and watchmaker at Norwich, Conn. RichardFalley Cleveland, son of the latter named, was graduated at Yale in1824, was ordained to the Presbyterian ministry in 1829, and in the sameyear married Ann Neal, daughter of a Baltimore merchant of Irish birth.These two were the parents of Grover Cleveland. The Presbyterianparsonage at Caldwell, where he was born, was first occupied by theRev. Stephen Grover, in whose honor he was named; but the first name wasearly dropped, and he has been since known as Grover Cleveland. Whenhe was 4 years old his father accepted a call to Fayetteville, nearSyracuse, N.Y., where the son had common and academic schooling, andafterwards was a clerk in a country store. The removal of the familyto Clinton, Oneida County, gave him additional educational advantagesin the academy there. In his seventeenth year he became a clerk and anassistant teacher in the New York Institution for the Blind, in New YorkCity, in which his elder brother, William, a Presbyterian clergyman,was then a teacher. In 1855 he left Holland Patent, in Oneida County,where his mother at that time resided, to go to the West in search ofemployment. On his way he stopped at Black Rock, now a part of Buffalo,and called on his uncle, Lewis F. Allen, who induced him to remain andaid him in the compilation of a volume of the American Herd Book,receiving for six weeks' service $60. He afterwards, and while studyinglaw, assisted in the preparation of several other volumes of this work,and the preface to the fifth volume (1861) acknowledges his services.In August, 1855, he secured a place as clerk and copyist for the lawfirm of Rogers, Bowen & Rogers, in Buffalo, began to read Blackstone,and in the autumn of that year was receiving $4 per week for his work.He was admitted to the bar in 1859, but for three years longer remainedwith the firm that first employed him, acting as managing clerk at asalary of $600, a part of which he devoted to the support of his widowedmother, who died in 1882. Was appointed assistant district attorney ofErie County January 1, 1863, and held the office for three years. Atthis time the Civil War was raging. Two of his brothers were in theArmy, and his mother and sisters were largely dependent upon him forsupport. Unable himself to enlist, he borrowed money and sent asubstitute to the war, and it was not till long after the war thathe was able to repay the loan. In 1865, at the age of 28, he was theDemocratic candidate for district attorney, but was defeated by theRepublican candidate, his intimate friend, Lyman K. Bass. He then becamethe law partner of Isaac V. Vanderpool, and in 1869 became a member ofthe firm of Lanning, Cleveland & Folsom. He continued a successfulpractice till 1870, when he was elected sheriff of Erie County. At theexpiration of his three years' term he formed a law partnership withhis personal friend and political antagonist, Lyman K. Bass, the firmbeing Bass, Cleveland & Bissell, and, after the forced retirement,from failing health, of Mr. Bass, Cleveland & Bissell. In 1881 he wasnominated the Democratic candidate for mayor of Buffalo, and was electedby a majority of 3,530, the largest ever given to a candidate in thatcity. In the same election the Republican State ticket was carried inBuffalo by an average majority of over 1,600. He entered upon the officeJanuary 1, 1882, and soon became known as the "Veto Mayor," using thatprerogative fearlessly in checking unwise, illegal, and extravagantexpenditures. By his vetoes he saved the city nearly $1,000,000 in thefirst half year of his administration. He opposed giving $500 of thetaxpayers' money to the Firemen's Benevolent Society on the groundthat such appropriation was not permissible under the terms of theState constitution and the charter of the city. He vetoed a resolutiondiverting $500 from the Fourth of July appropriations to the observanceof Decoration Day for the same reason, and immediately subscribedone-tenth of the sum wanted for the purpose. His administration of theoffice won tributes to his integrity and ability from the press and thepeople irrespective of party. On the second day of the Democratic Stateconvention at Syracuse, September 22, 1882, on the third ballot, wasnominated for governor in opposition to the Republican candidate,Charles J. Folger, then Secretary of the United States Treasury. He hadthe united support of his own party, while the Republicans were notunited on his opponent, and at the election in November he received aplurality over Mr. Folger of 192,854. His State administration was onlyan expansion of the fundamental principles that controlled his official