It is quite possible that Dana got even with Cleveland in 1888. His paper gave a nominal support to Cleveland, but did more damage to the Cleveland cause than any other newspaper in the country by subtle and persistent attacks upon the administration and the party, though never exhibiting on the surface a trace of personal hostility to the President. The Sun was then the organ of Tammany, and Tammany certainly defeated Cleveland in 1888 by giving the State to Harrison, when Hill, the Democratic candidate for Governor on the same ticket, was elected by nearly 20,000. It is not a strained conclusion that Dana defeated Cleveland’s re-election in 1888. The estrangement between Dana and Cleveland continued, as they never met or had any intercourse.
Blaine’s nomination was possible in 1888 when Harrison was made the candidate, but after hesitating for three days, during which time he freely conferred by cable with his friends, as he was then in Europe, he finally decided to decline.
His belief that he was fated not to be President was not weakened by advancing age, and his final assent to the use of his name in 1892, at the Minneapolis convention that renominated Harrison, was the first exhibition of decay in one who had been a giant among the giants in the most eventful history of the Republic. He had been a possibly successful candidate in four national conventions; had once been nominated and defeated, and it was a sad spectacle to see him, like a great oak with its green boughs fall and its heart corroding from the storms of many winters, broken in a tempest of political resentments and in a struggle that had not so much as a silver lining to the cloud of despair that hung over him. His nomination was hopeless; his defeat, if nominated, inevitable, and thus ended the life tragedy of one of the ablest, bravest, and most beloved of our public men.
THE HARRISON-CLEVELAND CONTEST
1888
The Democratic National Convention of 1888 met at St. Louis on June 5, and it was the most perfunctory body of the kind I have ever witnessed. I never saw a national political body so entirely devoid of enthusiasm; yet it was entirely fixed in its purpose to renominate President Cleveland. He appealed strongly to the convictions and judgment of the party, but not to its affection or enthusiasm. He was nominated by a unanimous vote without the formality of a ballot, and it had been settled long before the convention met that the sturdy old Roman of Ohio, ex-Senator Thurman, should be the candidate for the second place, as Vice-President Hendricks had died in office.
BENJAMIN HARRISON
Patrick A. Collins, of Massachusetts, was permanent president of the body, and there were no questions of rules or party policy to excite discussion. Cleveland’s nomination was unanimous, and on the single ballot for Vice-President, Allen G. Thurman, of Ohio, had 690 votes to 105 for Isaac B. Gray, of Indiana, and 25 for John C. Black, of Illinois. The following platform was unanimously adopted:
The Democratic party of the United States, in national convention assembled, renews the pledge of its fidelity to Democratic faith, and reaffirms the platform adopted by its representatives in the convention of 1884, and endorses the views expressed by President Cleveland in his last earnest message to Congress as the correct interpretation of that platform upon the question of tariff reduction; and also endorses the efforts of our Democratic representatives in Congress to secure a reduction of excessive taxation.