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- iHaveNet.com: Politics
by Kenneth T. Walsh
Youth has always been a double-edged sword for America'spresidents. It tends to inject the
Born in Point Pleasant, Ohio, in 1822, Ulysses S. Grant graduated from
Grant, age 46 when he took office on March 4, 1869,was the youngest man to hold the office up to that time. He served twoterms. "But his military background was not enough to equip him for thecomplexities of governing a huge and swiftly growing nation, andhistorians have judged him a failure as a president," historianDavid C. Whitney writes in The American Presidents.
Adds Stefan Lorant in TheGlorious Burden: "A general commands by giving orders, thepresident functions by tact, diplomacy, and persuasion. Orders have tobe obeyed, good soldiers can easily be spotted. But politicians cannotbe ordered around, and it is not so easy to find out which one istrustworthy, which one is reliable; thus Grant had a hard time in thepresidency. He had no critical judgment. He was attracted by the suave,the polished, the rich, and the well-mannered; if they were also crooks,he did not notice it. He was a naive soul."
Grant named incompetent or corrupt friends and associates to keyjobs. His lax policies allowed businessmen to make millions. Forexample, investor Jay Gould was able to corner the goldmarket and amass a fortune under Grant's lax administration. Grant wasunable to tame a resurgent
Grant was vilified in the South, not only because he had waged totalwar against the Confederacy as the top Union general but because aspresident he tried to protect the rights of former slaves, including theright to vote. Responding to requests from various governors, he sentfederal forces to support state militias in supervising elections. Hetook aim at the Ku Klux Klan, formed in 1866, when it waged a campaign of terror to suppress black votes and insure black subservience. Hisadministration "brought the worst offenders to trial, often beforeall-black juries," political scientist Alvin Felzenbergwrites in The Leaders We Deserved (and a Few We Didn't). "Inthe face of often brutal intimidation of witnesses and jurors, federalofficials won six hundred convictions." Adds Felzenberg: "Most accountsconclude that Grant had, through these actions, effectively broken theKlan's back," at least for the time being. This won him everlastingenmity from the conservative white leaders of the South.
Grant had a simple explanation for his problems. "It was my fortune,or misfortune, to be called to the office of Chief Executive without anyprevious political training," he wrote apologetically in his last annualmessage to
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