Defending President Grant
Okay- it's an ideosyncracy but I am a big defender of President Ulysses Grant, but then the only President in the 19th century to indict Klan leaders and actually work to give African-Americans the chance to vote deserves far more credit than he usually receives. So I'll take some issue with M.J. Rosenberg's political history, at least as far as reducing Grant's Presidency to mere grant-- a standard historical trope that was part of rightwing historical attacks on the Reconstruction era. Politics was hardly pure then, but I'm not sure in the present period where corporate money has such free rein, it's hard to make too broad condemnation.
Garfield was a decent Congressman on racial issues but he readily embraced withdrawing federal troops from the South after 1877 and he was allied with the rightwing economic wing of the Republicans, a "hard money" man who called regulations of railroads "Communism in disguise." This was the era when Rutherford Hayes began the new tradition of using federal troops redeployed from the South to break strikes in the North. Former President Grant acidly remarked at the time that this anti-labor wing of the Republicans were the same people who had resisted using federal troops "to protect the lives of negroes. Now, however, there is no hesitation about exhausting the whole power of the government to suppress a strike on the slightest intimation that danger threatens."
What Garfield would have done in office is unclear, but he was clearly allied with the most anti-labor, hard money faction of the Republican Party. Grant, while hardly perfect, embodied a far more progressive tradition in the Republican Party that was rapidly lost with the end of Reconstruction, as the progressive "free labor" ideology of Lincoln and Grant gave way to a far more rightwing version of laissez-faire and social darwinism.
So while I understand why M.J. would bring up the Garfield comparison, given the dangerous anger directed at Obama and the danger of assassination, it really is a horrible insult to Obama to compare his in any way on substance to Garfield. And a terrible libel to ignore the much more progressive history of Grant and why many Stalwarts were so loyal to him. Yes, many political leaders no doubt saw it merely as a fight over patronage of rival factions, but others saw it as resisting the complete rightwing ideological takeover of the GOP at the time. No doubt it was too late by that point with Guilded Age corporate power rising throughout American politics, but Garfield was allied with the most corporate wing of the GOP and had been a key part of abandoning Reconstruction under Rutherford Hayes.
So no hazy memorials to Garfield as some kind of Obamaesque insurgent. He was merely part of the general upsurge in pro-corporate and laissez-faire ideology in American politics.
Man, we are the only two people on the web arguing about this. I love it.
I'll concede only that Grant was a great general.
I offer this on the Stalwarts. Essentially they came to prominence over the issue of Hayes' firing of Chester Arthur for bribe taking as head of the Port Authorty of New York.
Why were they so concerned about that. Because they were all about graft, so much so that to appease the Stalwarts Garfield allows them to make Arthur VP nominee.
From collector (that was the title) at the Port Authirity to President in a few short years.
That is all the Stalwarts were about. And I'm glad Roscoe Conkling got buried in a snow drift during the blizzard of '88. That was one of my happiest days!
September 11, 2009 11:18 AM | Reply | Permalink
Political divisions are always complicated; there are usually self-interested partisans who care nothing for the substance of disagreements and choose sides only based on opportunistic alliances to feather their own nests. But just because many involved then (as now) were looking out for themselves, that doesn't mean there wasn't substantive differences in viewpoints, however muffled, that led to the divisions in the first place.
And as for Erik Loomis's points below, Grant could have been tougher but it's worth noting that before the 1872 elections, his administration's attacks on the white Klan types was so effective that progressive Republicans were elected across the South. And as noted in one of my links, it was because of court decisions ham-stringing enforcement starting in 1873 that much of the force of Reconstruction began to fade. Yes, Grant could have been tougher but the election of the first black Congressmen and Senators on his watch is a testament to the seismic changes in political life on his watch.
Grant was not as progressive on economic policy and his orthodoxies did reinforce the depression of the 1870s, but he never had the rightwing economics of his GOP rivals (some of who ran against him in 1872 in combination with the Democrats). Hardly perfect but a very unfair denigration by history.
September 11, 2009 5:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
If you concede "only" that Grant was a great General MJ then you announce loudly your lack of knowledge about Grant who was one of the best Presidents we ever had... in addition to being the greatest General we have ever produced. Nathan is absolutely right that rightwing revisionism is responsible for the calumny against Grant's personal character and of his Presidency overall. It is a shame that you, like so many others, have been fooled into believing those lies.
September 11, 2009 8:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
While I understand and agree with your defense of Grant, a comparison of Obama to Garfield is more in line with what is happening today. Obama is definitely proving to be more Garfield than Grant when you look at the following:
Cabinet Members and Close (and very influential advisers): Rahm Emanuel, Geithner, Summers, Bernanke, Volker, et al.
Preferred stimulus recipients: Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, AIG (and thru them, Europe), Bank of America, etc.
BFFs: PhRMA, Insurance Industry, Lobbyists, and, of course, the Blue Dogs.
Closest Political Advisers and Cabinet Members: Rahm Emanuel, Max Baucus, Kent Conrad, Chuck Grassley, Ben and Bill Nelson, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, et al.
People to cave in to: Rep. Joe Wilson (R.SC), Glenn Beck, Fox & Co.
People to Throw under a bus: Van Jones; Yosi Sargent; and, waiting to be pushed, Valerie Jarrett (Rahm is a bit tired and slow from all the partying with his Blue Dog buddies.
Domestic & Foreign Policies: See, George W. Bush, domestic and foreign policies.
So, I do not see Obama as the Progressive Liberal he said he was during the campaign. I do not see him fighting the rebels. Rather he is proving to be a Republican in donkey's clothing and "merely part of the general upsurge in pro-corporate and laissez-faire ideology in American politics".
September 11, 2009 11:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks, you two, for discussing this here.
I have always wondered just how the Republican party lost its way and so quickly morphed from a progressive movement into the corrupt corporatists they still are today.
It never occured to me to think of Grant as the Last Progressive Republican. (I'm sure that's an overstatement.) Perhaps some of his personal failings account for the party going astray so quickly.
I clearly need to read some history from this time. Any specific recommendations?
-- ARg
September 11, 2009 11:30 AM | Reply | Permalink
The memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant is a good place to start. It is recognized as one of, if not the best, memoir ever written.
September 11, 2009 8:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
While I agree with Mr. Rosenberg and Mr. Newman that the vitriol endorsed and promoted by the Republican party is very dangerous and willquite possilbly culminate in some horrific, violent act, I found the following comment of Mr. Rosenberg surprising:
"Grant himself refused to acknowledge that Garfield was the nominee and then President. Even after the inauguration, he personally snubbed Garfield at every opportunity and his supporters spread word of Grant's contempt for Garfield far and wide." But in the June 13, 1880 edition of the NY Times, taken from the June 10 Milwaukee Sentinel,
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9502E6DA1630EE3ABC4B52DFB066838B699FDE
is an account from General Rowley who brought Grant in Galena Illinois the news of Garfield's nomination, remarking on Grant's praise of Garfield as a man of irreproachable character whome "we all can support".
Was this just politician's bull, or is Mr. Rosenberg mistaken?
September 11, 2009 12:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
As a historian of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, I assure the two of you that you are not alone in arguing these questions.
I've followed Nathan's pro-Grant arguments for some time now and I just don't see it--I think you give Grant proper credit for his intentions toward African-Americans, but I don't feel that he held those opinions particularly deeply, nor did he do all he could have to ensure that the ex-slaves would have their rights guaranteed. Appointing Supreme Court justices like Morrison Waite, who did as much as anyone to roll back civil rights legislation, really hurt Grant's legacy in my view. The corruption within his administration isn't just an anti-Reconstruction attack. The Currency Act of 1873 went a long ways to causing the Panic of 1873. I mean, none of this makes him that different from a lot of other leaders during the Gilded Age, but he's hardly a model.
But about Garfield, I think you are generally right. I'm not sure how useful comparing Garfield to Obama is, even when comparing different eras of Republican hate.
September 11, 2009 2:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
The corruption of the Grant years was not significantly worse than those of others at the time. The difference between Grant and most other Presidents of that time was his immense popularity and the intensity of those who hated him.
September 11, 2009 8:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Grant's memoirs are pretty great.
Also: winner of "Saddest Picture of Ex-President Ever"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Grant-1885.jpg
September 11, 2009 4:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
"...Grant as the Last Progressive Republican."
Best evidence..
"Grant's memoirs are pretty great."
I just finished them for the first time, and anyone who wants to know the man can find it. He is particulalry keen on the issue of American Imperialism, and that Texas was, in effect, contrived as a slave state, and taken from Mexico for that purpose specifically, because, in part, the Mexicans had outlawed slavery decades earlier.
He was there. I am humble, in suggesting a reading assignment for the likes of MJ, but I think if he read both Sherman's and Grant's memoirs (in that order, specifically) he would get some insight into the story that historians are so wont to bury in the textbooks they publish these days (mostly in Texas, doncha know, and that is no joke, just a sad fact).
Grant also recognizes in his work that, long before the Civil War, wealthy southerners had mastered the art of owning government in a supposed democracy, and they returned to their patent political hypocrisy and subterfuge immediately after they lost their rebellious war.
Need proof the south took over Washington DC AGAIN AFTER the civil war?
Just check out the Supreme Court they installed over the decade following that war. Jim Crow was born and lynched ten thousand times under that evil judiciary.
Goes to show, while the nation may be of one majority mind, it's greedy rich and the politicians they purchase with campaign contributions and junkets to Scotland still make the laws, regardless of their majority constituents' opinions. And they have a gaggle of 'baggers, like the Southern slavers had "poor white trash" that they called "paupers" (anyone who didn't own a slave) to do their dirty work for them.
For a better idea of how the South and slave power (that is now manifest as corporate power) took back DC
He also suggests that American nationalism was the tool they used to fool the masses into taking Texas for the slavers.
Grant doesn't write between the lines, like Sherman was so good at. Grant says it plainly, all you have to do is read his words and it becomes obvious he knew what was going on, but had no power to stop it.
Just food for thought.
September 11, 2009 4:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Excellent observations and I certainly agree on reading Sherman's memoirs as well.
September 11, 2009 8:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, defending Grant is certainly easier than defending ACORN, isn't it Nathan?
September 12, 2009 9:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
A fine back and forth about an immensely important period. And, one that is, most often, poorly examined, discussed, valued, or understood. More books have been written on our Civil War than any other period in our history. But, what led up to it, and what came after it is the real story. A complex one with major risks involved in what we may dicover about ourselves. The implications tell us who we really are, and they are too grave for most of us to want to deal with. So much easier to simply learn who fought in and who won the battles of the war. Grade A's to both M.J. and Newman for understanding this much and being willing to take the testier stuff on anyway.
M.J. is usually a force. But my reading of History is considerably more in line with N.N. on this. Thanks for the post, Nathan. (BTW. There was a "deal" to end Reconstruction, a deal which put Hayes in the White House. W. Wilson, scholar, president, historian, and cracker, also has some enlightening things to say about this era.)
September 13, 2009 1:32 AM | Reply | Permalink
I agree with you, Nate. As we have discussed in the past, Grant is entitled to a far more nuanced view of his political (and military) life than he is usually given. The central problem of his administration was handling the Reconstruction of the former Confederate states, so as to be fit to rejoin the union. His record in that regard displayed much balance and honestly, he did as well as anyone could have given the circumstances.
October 10, 2009 4:53 AM | Reply | Permalink