Rand Paul’s favorite Democratic president: Grover Cleveland
Grover Cleveland is Rand Paul’s favorite Democratic president.
The Kentucky Republican heaped praise on Cleveland for opposing “special interests,” supporting limited government and vetoing much of the legislation that reached his desk.Continue Reading
“Some would call him a populist, and part of me feels that way,” Paul told reporters Wednesday at a breakfast sponsored by The Christian Science Monitor.
The pick is telling of how someone likely to seek the 2016 GOP nomination views the presidency. His father, Ron Paul, has previously praised Cleveland, as well.
Partly because of his devotion to the gold standard, Cleveland is a libertarian heartthrob. The Independent Institute think tank has called him “the last U.S. president with a valid claim to be known as a classical liberal.”
Cleveland was mayor of Buffalo and governor of New York before becoming, in 1884, the first Democrat elected to the White House after the Civil War. He actually won the popular vote in 1888 but lost the Electoral College. He ran again and won in 1892, making him both the 22nd and 24th president.
In his first four years, Cleveland vetoed 414 bills passed by the Republican-controlled Congress. That was more than twice as many as all of his predecessors combined.
His most famous veto was of the Texas Seed Bill, which appropriated a small amount of money to distribute seeds to farmers wiped out by drought. He believed it was not the role of government to help.
Paul, born in 1963, picked John F. Kennedy as the best Democratic president of his lifetime. He cited the tax cuts Kennedy pushed, which Paul credited with growing the economy.
When asked about Abraham Lincoln, the senator offered a somewhat nuanced take. He recommended a controversial book titled, “Forced Into Glory: Abraham Lincoln’s White Dream,” by Lerone Bennett Jr. and published in 2000. The author, a historian, argues that the 16th president had little real interest in abolition and was a racist at heart. Lincoln is portrayed as reluctantly acquiescing to pressure from his base.
“He came into his glory because of people who were even greater than he was,” Paul said.
The senator, who came under fire for questioning the constitutionality of a provision in the Civil Rights Act during his 2010 Senate campaign, declared William Lloyd Garrison an unsung hero in the narrative of how slavery came to an end.
“The abolitionists deserve more credit than they’re getting,” Paul said.