Benjamin Harrison Vol. 3: Hoosier President: The White House & After 1889-1901

Benjamin Harrison #3

by Harry J. Sievers, Katherine E. Speirs (Editor), Katherine Speirs (Editor)

This third and final volume in Harry J. Sievers' biography of Indiana's only President completes the map of Benjamin Harrison's life and career. The first two volumes are BENJAMIN HARRISON: HOOSIER WARRIOR (Through the Civil War Years, 1833-1865) and BENJAMIN HARRISON: HOOSIER STATESMAN (From the Civil War to the White House, 1865-1888).

Father Sievers has prepared an exhaustive scholarly biography of a man of character and courage. The twenty-third President of the United States was marked from birth for high office, and the accomplishments of his administration (1889-1893) were many, though so often forgotten today. Harrison, a staunch Republican, defied the party by insisting on civil service reforms in the heyday of the Spoils System. He also attempted, without success, to bring the vote to Southern Negroes. He was an honest, capable President in an era of crooked politics, and this final volume of Father Sievers' biography rounds out the definitive study of the life and work of one of our more neglected political figures.

Genres: Presidents, Biography, American History, History, Us Presidents

320 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1968

About the author

The Rev. Harry J. Sievers was a Jesuit priest who served as dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at Fordham University. The recipient of a BA and an MA from Loyola University in Chicago, he earned his Ph.D. in history from Georgetown University in 1950 and was ordained in St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York City on June 27, 1953. In 1949, he entered into an agreement with the Arthur Jordan Foundation to write a biography of Benjamin Harrison, which was published in three volumes between 1952 and 1968.

Reviews

[Aaron Million · Rating 3 out of 5]

This final (and slimmest) volume in the trilogy by Harry Sievers covers Benjamin Harrison's one-term presidency and the last eight years of his life post-presidency. At slightly less than 300 pages it is a fairly brisk read, although Sievers has a ton of extensive footnotes on pretty much every page that can sometimes slow you down if you choose to read them (I did, as he tended to provide additional comments not included in the main narrative).

There is the usual review of how a President-elect goes about selecting his Cabinet, which seemed to have a much bigger focus back then than it does now, although it is still quite important. Harrison made a point of being independent and did not want to be beholden to any particular groups or individuals, and not just with his Cabinet picks. While a commendable stance, this is the beginning of a problem that would plague him throughout his term, and almost cost him renomination in 1892. The spoils system was still well in effect in those days, and even though there now was a Civil Service Commission (Harrison's appointee was a young Theodore Roosevelt), many higher-ups in the party expected to get their friends, family members, or political/business partners appointed. Naturally even a President who is predisposed to grant such favors will not be able to please everyone, as there are always going to be more applicants than there are job openings. However, Harrison really upset a lot of people in the Republican Party by not engaging in the typical rash of replacements. This Harrison quickly fell out of favor with many in his party.

Sievers does review foreign affairs, although it does not get a lot of attention as there were no American-involved wars during Harrison's term. There were some issues with Chile and Italy, with the Chilean situation potentially becoming explosive but Harrison managing to remain mostly cool and collected. Harrison came close to asking Congress for a declaration of war against Chile due to the killing of some American sailors down there, but managed to avert a conflict.

The campaign of 1892 is covered, although Sievers demotes much more time to the wrangling for the Republican nomination than he does to the general election campaign against former President Grover Cleveland. Blaine had a snake in his own Cabinet, with Secretary of State James Blaine badly wanting the nomination. Blaine even resigned from the Cabinet right when the Republican Convention began, thinking that he would get the nomination, but Harrison's forces managed to get his renomination push through. Blaine would have been a really poor choice anyways because, even had he been the nominee and then went on to beat Cleveland, he still would not have become President as he died before Harrison's term ended.

Harrison's personal life is covered. Well, as much as it probably can be, since even some of his contemporaries referred to him as an "iceberg". His wife, Carrie, became sick with tuberculosis, and died shortly before the 1892 election. In fact Harrison seemed surrounded by death as many people that he knew seemed to pass from the scene during his four years as President. Sievers does add a chapter about Harrison living in the White House, which was a nice break from all of the patronage discussion.

There is also a good final chapter on Harrison's post-presidency. Sievers does not quickly dispatch with Harrison once he leaves office, but rather shows just how busy he was. A lawyer by trade, he went back into practicing law and ended up handling a lot of important cases, arguing several times before the Indiana Supreme Court and the U.S. Supreme Court. He also took on a boundary dispute case on behalf of Venezuela that required extensive preparation and time, and a trip to Paris to argue before a tribunal in arbitration. Harrison kept a busy schedule really up until he suddenly got sick and died in March 1901.

While I did appreciate that Sievers had that final chapter, and did try to humanize Harrison where possible, this just is not an exciting read. I don't necessarily blame Sievers for that as I am not sure there is a lot that could be done to spice up Harrison or a mostly uneventful presidency. Reading about currency wars and patronage disputes just does not make for exciting times. And Harrison was not a larger-than-life personality like TR or Andrew Jackson. He was solid, workmanlike, and a dedicated public servant. Still, I sense that there might have been more that Sievers could have done as oftentimes context was missing, and all of the other characters in the book seemed two-dimensional. Even Harrison, though somewhat bland, sometimes seemed detached from events. There is not a whole lot out there on Harrison, and I doubt that is going to change anytime soon (or ever). So Sievers probably did the best he could with a not very exciting biographical subject.

Grade: C+

[Bryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

The epic conclusion of the 3 volume series starts with Harrison winning the election and finishes with his death in early 1901.

The build-up to the Federal Reserse and the Income Tax continues through this guided age president. A protectionist and silverite, he pushes for higher taxes on imports to protect large businesses. This would become part of his downfall as the rise between the battle of employee and employer continues with mass riots. Some would blame the tycoon Carniage for the mass riots, but that's misleading. It was across the country feeling that was coming upon the country.

Harrison, with the help and hurt of Blaine, "the plumbed knight," starts to expand the United States' role in the world, starting with South America and ending with what would become the US territory of Hawaii. He also does this with a continued expansion of the navy and merchant marines building some of the largest ships in the world at the time.

It should be worth mentioning that Harrison's native American policy was a non- native American policy. At this point, no one seemed to even fake care about the native Americans. The Oklahoma territory is opened, and wounded knee happens early in his admin.

He does, however, continue to make at least a lack luster push for suffrage rights for African american rights.

While he does in the end run into multiple relection issues such as the back stabbing by the ever losing it Blaine, mismanagement of his campagin, indifferent of winning at first and the death of his wife none of these can be blamed for the out right beating he took against Grover Clevland.

President review C
Book Review 4

The final book feels rushed. Granted, there is a tremendous amount of detail, but gone is the spacing that once separated the chapters into different sections when a jump in topic happened.

[Bruce · Rating 4 out of 5]

Father Harry J. Sievers work on Benjamin Harrison our 23rd president concludes with this third volume covering his presidency and post presidential years. All you could ever want to know about
Harrison will be found in these three volumes.

Harrison who as a Senator headed the Committee on Territories in the Senate managed to get six
states admitted to the union, the most of any president. That the six states from the west were
Republican leaning had just about everything to do with it. Still it's a record number for a president.

As a Republican Harrison stood for a high protective tariff and in 1890 he signed the McKinley tariff
into law. When there was a depression the tariff got it's share of the blame and it impacted negatively on Harrison's re-election.

The work of Navy Secretaries in the Harrison and the preceding Arthur and Cleveland administrations came to fruition with the unveiling of a new ironclad fleet that put us in numbers
right up there with naval powers like Great Britain and Germany. Navy Secretary Benjamin F.
Tracy gets a lot of the credit here.

In foreign policy Secretary of State James G. Blaine who wanted a Pan American Conference in his
tenure as Secretary of State in the Garfield and Arthur administrations got a sucessfull one going in
the Harrison administration. Blaine had two problems, he thought he ought to have been in the
White House himself and he did have health issues that eventually killed him. Because of that
Harrison himself was a more activist president in that field.

Arbitration treaties were done with Great Britain over American/Canadian fishing rights. Some
flareups with both Chile and Italy which could have resulted in war were peacefully negotiated
instead. At the very end of his term with the connivance of the American minister, Queen Liliuokolani of Hawaii was overthrown and a protectorate over a Hawaiian Republic was established.

Harrison was renominated in 1892, but in that campaign the First Lady came down with a fatal
tuberculosis that curtailed Harrison's campaign. Quite frankly he didn't care if he was re-elected
or not. Harrison was defeated in 1892 by Grover Cleveland in a rematch from 1888.

After the White House, Harrison resumed his law practice. He also remarried and to his late
wife Caroline Scott's niece Mary Scott Lord Dimmick. In 1897 the wife gave birth to a daughter.
Harrison also served as a member of the international boundary commission to arbitrate the disputed Venezuelan/British Guiana boundary. Harrison died in 1901.

Quite a bit happened in his four years in the White House. Harrison as a personality was not Mr.
Warmth and charm. There is a bit refreshing honesty about him though in a man just doing his
job and not caring about his own popularity.

Father Sievers's work still remains the definitive work on president 23. I think you'll find it so.

[David Oskutis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Of this three volume series, I would say that this last volume was the best. Jumping right in with Harrison's election, this volume takes us through the things that make Harrison a far more worthy President than most people can imagine. He was the great-grandson of a Declaration of Independence signer, the grandson of a President, and a President himself. He fought in the Civil War. He brought several states into the Union, he helped bring about the shift from gold and silver bullion to paper money, he shifted economic powers (and unions) to help America emerge, although slowly, into the global economic market as an equal. Sandwiched between Grover Cleveland's two terms, it's easy to overlook Harrison, but there are several nods to Presidential tradition that are taken for granted that started during the Harrison term. For instance, his first wife is the First Lady who started the Presidential china collection. His campaign biographer was General Lew Wallace, the same man that wrote "Ben-Hur". He had the White House renovated with electricity and had tile and porcelain put into the bathrooms and kitchen. They began the expansions of the White House during his term, eventually leading to the now famous West Wing (although he never got to use it). I think saddest of all for Harrison was that after winning the nomination for re-election, his wife passed. One of the only elections that featured two Presidents (Cleveland vs Harrison) running against each other, and Harrison was taken off the trail to mourn for the passing of his wife. Surprisingly, he remarried, birthed a daughter, and then passed himself only a few short years later. It's odd, a President whose name is probably recognized because there were two of them should be known for the so many more things, worthy things, that he accomplished. But, that's how history works, sometimes. Our 23rd President, sandwiched between the same man for 22nd and 24th President, somehow only vaguely recognized or remembered because of his name and not much else, just goes to show, even an easily forgotten President has something to hang his hat on, otherwise he probably wouldn't have made it to the White House at all.

[Ted · Rating 4 out of 5]

Civil service reform, silver coinage, a protective tariff, creating a modern navy, black suffrage in the south, new states entering the union, and major diplomatic issues with Italy and Chile were a few of the issues he face during his presidency. Few of us know much detail about what happened between the civil war and the turn of the century. These presidential biographies are well-researched and detailed. It is worth it for those who want to did much deeper into our history. You also realize issues of today are not brand new or unprecedented.

[Mark Singer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading my way through presidential biographies in order, Benjamin Harrison presented a challenge. There did not appear to be a good single volume biography out there so I decided to tackle the Sievers 3 volume series.
My limited experience has been that multi-volume books tend to be thick and laden with historical details. But I did not find this to be the case with these 3 books. Mr. Sievers prose style was easy to follow and presents a good comprehensive picture of the life of President Harrison.

[Caleb · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really felt like Sievers was trying to wrap it up here, and seemingly lost interest somewhat.

I would really only recommend this 3 volume biography overall to the hardcore and/or insane. That being said, I enjoyed my time with a forgotten president that, if not couched between some other much more notable examples, may have been better know today .

Benjamin Harrison was a JQA type, a better man than president, and that's his historical downfall

[Nate Lanning · Rating 2 out of 5]

Possibly the most boring president.

[Steve · Rating 3 out of 5]

http://bestpresidentialbios.com/2015/...

“Benjamin Harrison: Hoosier President” is the final book in a three-volume series by Harry J. Sievers. Published between 1952 and 1968, this series provided the first major biographical review of Harrison and remains the most comprehensive and detailed analysis of his life ever published.

In addition to being Harrison’s primary biographer, Sievers was a Jesuit priest and most recently served as Dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at Fordham University. He died in 1977.

This final volume in the series covers the last dozen years of Harrison’s life beginning with his one-term presidency. It also encompasses the death of his first wife, his unsuccessful bid for re-election, his second marriage (to the daughter of his deceased wife’s sister, no less), his return to the practice of law and his death.

Like the two earlier volumes in this series, the final volume is descriptive, easy to read, well organized and extensively documented. Chapters are arranged topically, but only during Harrison’s presidency does the flow break appreciably from chronological order. Even then, the author’s approach is so logical that the break from a strict timeline is rarely confusing.

With 277 pages, “Hoosier President” is the shortest of the three volumes in this 1,000-page series. But only about half of this volume’s pages actually focus on Harrison’s presidency. The balance of the book covers the selection of his Cabinet, his family’s move into the White House, his inauguration, his campaign for re-election and his retirement from politics.

Given the author’s proclivity for following Harrison day-to-day in previous volumes, I was fearful this final volume might become bogged down in the kind of presidential tedium that only Ben Harrison’s administration could offer. Instead, by the book’s end I almost wondered if I had accidentally skipped over one or more of the chapters covering his presidency.

Although I encountered less of the drudgery than I had expected, I also seemed to witness less of his administration, period. The essence of a great presidential biography is the energetic and thorough dissection of a presidency, along with the analysis and judgement that leaves an indelible impression upon the reader. But that spark is missing from this volume.

In hindsight, it feels as though the author completed this volume out of a fatigued sense of obligation rather than with enthusiasm or passion. By the time he completed the series, of course, he had been engaged in this extraordinary effort for nearly twenty years. And unlike most biographers, Sievers had no previous biographical infrastructure on which to build – he was carving a fresh path.

But where biographers Flexner (Washington) and Malone (Jefferson) seemed to relish the last steps on their multi-volume journeys, “Hoosier President” exudes an unusual sense of relief…that the end has finally arrived. I finished this book (and, thus, the series) feeling a personal connection with Harrison himself, but with little sense of his presidency or political legacy. I am left wondering whether Harrison’s presidency can be deemed at all successful, and how history should remember this often-forgotten president.

Overall, “Benjamin Harrison: Hoosier President” is a somewhat disappointing conclusion to an extremely worthy three-volume series on Benjamin Harrison. Harry Sievers deserves enormous credit for crafting the first-ever comprehensive account of Harrison’s life; it is a feat that has never been matched. But while the first two volumes were delightfully interesting and informative, “Hoosier President” feels like the work of an author keen to reach the finish line.

Overall rating: 3¼ stars

[Richard Grebenc · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can confidently say that I have never read a biography this long before. Coming in at over 1000 pages when all three volumes are considered, I was happy to have taken the time to work through it. The work is meticulously researched and well-written. The author keeps the reader engaged for the most part (I say this because I find getting into the policy weeds usually uninteresting although I recognize it as a necessity to adequately cover the subject's life). I even read the footnotes which, as it should be, do not need to be read by the non-scholar, but sometimes offer interesting supplemental facts.

Now that I am in the land of Hoosiers (where Harrison came to fame) but from the Buckeye State (where he, as I, was born), I'm glad to have gotten to know Indiana's famous son better and appreciated him more.

I was inspired to read this after visiting Harrison's Indiana home. Yesterday I visited his grave. Good bookends to this journey.

[Bill Pritchard]

It feels like forever ago when I began this three volume set on the life of our 23rd President. Harry Sievers has delivered the most comprehensive look at this remarkable man. Benjamin Harrison, when judged in comparison with an Andrew Jackson, an Abraham Lincoln, or even a Teddy Roosevelt, seems to emerge greater as a MAN than as a PRESIDENT. President Harrison's theories of the functions of the presidency differed from that of the Jackson or Roosevelt schools where personal appeal and leadership dominated the scene. For his era, however, Benjamin Harrison compiled a strong record of constitutional government which enabled the country to approach the threshold of world power with prudence and caution.

Not for the casual reader - but an excellent series for those who wish to understand the men who have occupied the office, and thus hear the rhyme of history in our modern times. Recommended.

[David Hill · Rating 4 out of 5]

Is this a case where the book is better than the subject? As a man, Benjamin Harrison was quite interesting - intelligent, hard working. His presidency is largely forgotten, though. Of the three volumes, the first is the most compelling - Harrison's civil war service. But all three books are deeply researched and well written.

This volume covers his presidential years, with one chapter afterward.

There are a few flaws. For example, Sievers says something like "Harrison was interested in Hawaii" but up to the Hawaiian putsch Hawaii was never discussed. This happened more than once but does not detract greatly from the book.

Includes notes, index, bibliography, and photos/illustrations.

[David Monroe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Father Harry Sievers' three volume biography of Benjamin Harrison is sometimes stuck too deeply in the historical traditions of the 1950's but still the best resource in getting to know this nearly forgotten, enigmatic and quite pious 23rd President from Indiana.