America’s Gilded Age was preoccupied with many of the same controversies as our own time. During the late 19th century, fierce political polarization, ethnoreligious tensions, a partisan journalistic corps, antitrust feeling, large-scale migration into the United States, trade policy disputes, and possibilities for U.S. intervention overseas were the concerns of the day — then as now. It was also an age made famous for its supposed political corruption. And yet arguably the most important U.S. president during the height of the Gilded Age was the personally incorruptible Grover Cleveland.
Troy Senik’s new biography of Cleveland, A Man of Iron, is a thoroughly engaging and enjoyable journey through the life and career of the ox-like man who became the only U.S. president to serve two nonconsecutive terms. The book is above all a character study, just as Senik intends it to be.
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