Grover Cleveland, who served as both the twenty-second and the twenty-fourth president of the United States, dominated the American political scene from 1884 to 1896. Viewed at one time as a monument of presidential courage, Cleveland has over the past generation been dismissed by historians as a "Bourbon Democrat," the symbol of that wing of the Democratic party devoted to preserving the status quo and protecting the interests of the propertied. In this revisionist study, Richard Welch takes a fresh look at the Cleveland administrations and discovers a man whose assertive temperament was...

In this book Elbert B. Smith disagrees sharply with traditional interpretations of Taylor and Fillmore, the twelfth and thirteenth presidents (from 1848 to 1853). He argues persuasively that the slaveholding Taylor--and not John C. Calhoun--was the realistic defender of southern slaveholding interests, and that Taylor did nothing to impede the Compromise of 1850. While Taylor opposed the combination of the issues into a single compromise bill that could not be passed without amendments to suit the extremists, he would have approved the different parts of the Compromise that were ultimately...

Franklin Pierce was one of the least known, least liked, and least successful presidents in American history. In this new study of his administration, historian Larry Gara makes no attempt to revive Pierce's reputation. Instead he provides a clear analysis of Pierce's shortcomings as well as his few successes.

Franklin Pierce's administration (1853-1857) spanned a turbulent period in the life of the nation: North-South polarization reached new extremes due, in part, to Pierce's failure to understand the depth of Free Soil sentiment in the North; the Kansas-Nebraska Act and its aftermath...

The best of presidents seem to serve in the worst of times, and Woodrow Wilson is no exception. Like Lincoln, Wilson was charged with leading the United States through a war of unprecedented scale. And like Lincoln, he is considered one of the half-dozen best presidents the country has ever had.

From 1913-1921, Wilson grappled with momentous issues: domestic reform, war, and peace. His administration did much to shape twentieth century America--from establishing the U.S. as the preeminent world power to reforming banking practices, from lowering trade barriers to establishing the federal...

In 1829 Andrew Jackson arrived in Washington in a carriage. Eight years and two turbulent presidential terms later, he left on a train. Those years, among the most prosperous in American history, saw America transformed not only by growth in transportation but by the expansion of the market economy and the formation of the mass political party. Jackson's ambivalence--and that of his followers--toward the new politics and the new economy is the story of this book.

Historians have often depicted the Old Hero (or Old Hickory) as bigger than life--so prominent that his name was wed to an era....

Filled with new insights and fresh interpretations, this is the richest study yet published on the presidency of James Monroe, the last Revolutionary War hero to ascend to that august office.

Noble Cunningham's history of the fifth presidency (1817-25) shows a young nation beset by growing pains and led by a cautious politician who had neither the learning nor the intellect of Jefferson or Madison, but whose actions strengthened both the United States and the presidency itself.

Cunningham makes clear that the mislabelled "era of good feelings" had more than its share of crises,...

Perhaps no American president has seemed less suited to his office or his times than Calvin Coolidge. The taciturn New Englander became a vice presidential candidate by chance, then with the death of Warren G. Harding was thrust into the White House to preside dourly over the Roaring Twenties.

Robert Ferrell, one of America's most distinguished historians, offers the first book-length account of the Coolidge presidency in thirty years, drawing on the recently opened papers of White House physician Joel T. Boone to provide a more personal appraisal of the thirtieth president than has...