Best President of the Gilded Age, and Why?

[Frodo]

The Gilded Age covers the period from 1869 (with the opening of the first transcontinental railroad) to 1896 when the Progressive Era begins.  It was the post-war period when the United States was in the throes of industrialization, when bosses and corporations dominated the political landscape with little opposition.  It also overlaps with the Third Party System that became established somewhat earlier with the birth of the Republican Party.    

[Senator Ben]

Arthur ran an administration that modernized the Navy while also implementing Civil Service Reform.  He is one of our most underrated Presidents.

[CathKhan]

Not sure. I'm tempted to either vote Cleveland or Arthur. Despite ideology, I think I'll do Arthur though.

[Rooney]

I voted for Cleveland but I now regret not voting for Grant.

[The Mikado]

Grant.  It's a shame his successors gave up on his worthwhile projects like Reconstruction.

[oakvale]

Grant was the most underrated of the Gilded Age peasant Presidents.

[Governor Maxwell]

A lot of great choices, but I ultimately went with Grover Cleveland. Looks like a list of underrated presidents here.

[TNF]

1. Ulysses S. Grant
2. Chester A. Arthur
3. James A. Garfield
4. Benjamin Harrison
5. Rutherford B. Hayes
6. Grover Cleveland

[Mikestone8]

Grant.  It's a shame his successors gave up on his worthwhile projects like Reconstruction.

By the time he left the White House it was already on life support, with Republicans hanging on by their fingernails in just two states. It was only a question of who turned of the respirator and when.

[ChairmanSanchez]

Grover Cleveland, the greatest President this country has ever had!

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

Grover Cleveland, the greatest President this country has ever had!

Only if murdering strikers, and having a panic so bad that your party loses over half its seats in Congress seems good to you. I'm glad that Byran moved the Democratic party leftward from the Bourbons

[True Federalist]

The Panic of 1893 was so bad largely because of the mess Harrison and the Silver Republicans had left Cleveland.  The idiots who tried to force bimetallism upon the economy at the wrong ratio caused a bad situation to be worse.

That said, Cleveland's inflexibility on economic issues was also a contributing factor.

[TNF]

Grover Cleveland, the greatest President this country has ever had!

...if you were rich in the 1890s, maybe.

[Rooney]

Grover Cleveland, the greatest President this country has ever had!

...if you were rich in the 1890s, maybe.

That is not entirely true. Grover Cleveland did sign into existence the Interstate Commerce Commission, suggested the creation of a Fair Labor Standards Committee, established the Department of Labor in 1888, established the Department of Agriculture and increased corporate taxes through the Wilson-Gorman Act. Cleveland also vetoed a measure that would have excluded illiterate people from immigration to the United States, which was a fairly progressive thing to do.President Cleveland did try to hold back business and the wealthy but not to the extreme measures of an FDR.

These facts coupled with ignoring the will of the governor of Illinois in the Pullman Strike and also intervening in the Venezuela boundary dispute really makes me wonder why Grover the Good is such a libertarian icon.