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Benjamin Harrison (1889-1893)

Benjamin Harrison, 23rd president of the United States and grandson of William Henry Harrison, the ninth president, ran against Democrat Grover Cleveland twice. In 1888, he conducted a successful “front porch” campaign from his home in Indianapolis, losing in the popular vote, but winning in the Electoral College. Four years later, he lost the 1892 election. Harrison generally followed his party’s leadership in domestic matters, but his middle-of-the-road positions on the controversial issues of civil service reform, the tariff, and monetary policy pleased neither reformers nor party regulars. He was more successful with foreign policy.

Twenty-third President of the United States. Born at North Bend, Ohio, Aug. 20, 1833. Died at Indianapolis March 13, 1901. Grandson of President W. H. Harrison. Graduated at Miami University 1852. Lawyer, Indianapolis. Elected Republican Reporter Indiana Supreme Court i860. Commanded a regiment and brigade in the Civil War 1862-65. Brevetted Brigadier-General 1864. Was an unsuccessful Republican candidate for Governor of Indiana 1876. United States Senator 1881-87. As Republican Candidate for the Presidency, with Levi P. Morton as Vice-President, was elected President of the United States 1888, serving until 1893. Was unsuccessful candidate for re-election 1892, with Whitelaw Reid as Vice-Presidential candidate, being defeated by Grover Cleveland. Buried Crown Hill cemetery, Indianapolis, Ind.

Born in 1833 at his grandfather’s estate in North Bend, Ohio, Benjamin Harrison was the great-grandson and namesake of a signer of the Declaration of Independence. Harrison graduated from Miami University, in Oxford, Ohio, in 1852 with distinction. The next year, he married Caroline L. Scott. From 1852 until 1854 Harrison read law with a prestigious Cincinnati firm. He soon became involved in local politics as a Republican. After being admitted to the bar, in 1854 he moved to Indianapolis and established a practice. The next year, he was appointed as commissioner for the Federal district court of claims. By 1856 he was one of the city's leading attorneys.

Harrison's aversion to slavery guided him to the Republican Party. In 1858 he took over the secretaryship of its State central committee. From 1857 until 1861, he held the elective position of Indianapolis city attorney, and in 1860 won the office of reporter of decisions of the State supreme court (1861-62). Eventually, he compiled Indiana Reports, a multivolume collection of State court proceedings.

Harrison organized and commanded a regiment of volunteers during the Civil War. In 1862, the year after the Civil War began, Harrison helped raise a regiment of volunteer infantry, and quickly rose to the rank of colonel. His strict discipline made him an unpopular brigade commander. For 18 months, his unit guarded sections of the Louisville and Nashville and Nashville and Chattanooga Railroads in Kentucky and Tennessee. In 1864 he ably led his men during Sherman's Atlanta campaign.

After the city's capture, Harrison took leave and returned to Indiana at Gov. Oliver P. Morton's bidding to counter Copperhead, or antiwar, sentiment in the 1864 election. Harrison was also again elected as reporter of the State supreme court (1864-68). He nevertheless returned to service in 1865, was promoted to brevet brigadier general, and rejoined his brigade in the Carolinas after its march through Georgia. After the war, Harrison resumed his law practice in Indianapolis and adopted Radical Republicanism. In the 1870's he fought against his party's adoption of greenback ideas. He also participated in philanthropic and religious activities. In 1872 he failed to win the nomination for Governor. Four years later, however, because of his excellent reputation, he replaced the party's nominee, who had left the campaign amid charges of corruption, but narrowly lost the race.

His law practice prospered, and he moved to a series of residences, each larger and more spacious than the last. In 1867, Harrison purchased a double lot on North Delaware Street, then on the outskirts of the town. In the 1870s, he built a two-story Italianate house with 16 rooms. The large elegant home, a symbol of his success as a lawyer, would be his home for the rest of his life.

He lost his bid for governor, but won election to the United States Senate in 1879, serving until 1887. In 1888, Harrison lost the popular vote in his presidential campaign against incumbent Grover Cleveland by a narrow margin but became president by winning in the Electoral College. Conducted from his Indianapolis home, his successful “front porch” campaign helped him win the key states of Indiana and New York.

President Harrison was able to get legislation he wanted passed by Congress and accomplished a number of things during his single term in office. He was proudest of his foreign policy achievements. He presided over the first Pan-American Conference in Washington in 1889, which led to the formation of the Pan-American Union. He helped negotiate international agreements over the status of Samoa and seal hunting in the Bering Sea. He strongly exerted rights of the United States in a bitter dispute with Chile and received an official apology.

Harrison believed in civil service reform but made many patronage appointments, removing some of Cleveland’s reform guidelines to do so. At the same time, he increased the number of jobs under the Civil Service Act and appointed a very active Theodore Roosevelt to the Civil Service Commission.

Intense disputes over monetary policy and tariffs dominated his administration. In response to demands by farmers and other groups burdened by high debts, the Harrison administration passed the controversial Sherman Silver Purchase Act of 1890, which allowed the Treasury to buy more silver. The Sherman Silver Purchase Act of 1890 attempted to placate the calls of inflationist debtor groups, like the Farmers' Alliances, for free and unlimited silver coinage. Debtors hoped that issuing new silver coins would expand the money supply and make it easier for them to pay their debts. But the bill's compromise requirement for modest monthly Treasury purchases of silver proved to be only mildly inflationary. Although creating business and financial apprehension that the weakened gold standard would be abandoned, the bill also did not satisfy those who urged a bimetallic system to check deflation. In fact, restrictions enacted as part of the legislation prevented any substantial growth in the supply of money.

The McKinley Tariff, which raised duties on imports an average of 48 percent, led to a large Treasury surplus and the first billion dollar budget. When critics attacked "the billion-dollar Congress," Speaker Thomas B. Reed replied, "This is a billion-dollar country." Harrison signed substantial appropriation bills, using the money for veterans’ pensions, naval expansion, seacoast fortifications, and a variety of politically popular river and harbor improvements. The high tariff was not popular among farmers and many westerners, who were already turning towards Populism. It contributed to the Republican loss of control of Congress in the elections of 1890.

President Harrison also signed the Sherman Anti-Trust Act "to protect trade and commerce against unlawful restraints and monopolies," the first Federal act attempting to regulate trusts. Although created partially in response to growing grievances of farmers and laborers, the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, more often used against organized labor than against monopolies during this period, did little to protect the working class.

Heralding the modern conservation movement, the next year he approved legislation creating several national parks, and the following year set aside more than 13 million acres of public domain for national forest preserves. During his administration, a record number of six States were admitted to the Union.

The Republicans nominated Harrison again in 1892, but Cleveland easily defeated him and the Populist Party candidate, James B. Weaver. Harrison returned to his home in Indianapolis and resumed his law career. Widowed in 1892, only two weeks before the election, he married Mary Dimmick, his first wife’s niece, in 1896. He died in 1901 and lies buried in the city's Crown Hill Cemetery.