I have a hunch that Grover Cleveland is about to make a comeback, and will find himself as America’s most talked about ex-President.
In the 1888 Presidential election, Cleveland wound up with 95,713 more votes than Benjamin Harrison. But losing the Electoral College vote moved him out of the White House.
Andrew Jackson, Rutherford Hayes, and Al Gore also won the popular vote while losing the electoral vote.
But Cleveland ran again and won. Granted, the 1892 election was rather muted. President Harrison, whose wife was dying of tuberculosis, did not campaign, and out of respect, neither did Cleveland.
So we can’t help but wonder, given the polling numbers of 2012, if a similar scenario might unfold. President Obama loses the electoral vote in 2012, runs again and wins in 2016.
If indeed Grover Cleveland finds himself enmeshed in the news cycle in 2016, let us make sure we remember one of his more challenging moments.
It came during his 1870 campaign for district attorney in Erie County, New York. Cleveland and his opponent each agreed to limit their beer drinking to four glasses a day.
It didn’t take long for the two to agree that this was not working, and their pledge was abandoned.
