As the first president to govern after the Fifteenth Amendment, he had guaranteed the exercise of brand-new black voting rights and opposed the spate of domestic terrorism it engendered. He had been a good steward of the nation’s finances, having slashed taxes, trimmed debt, and watched the trade balance turn from deficit to surplus. He had shown that government could make good on its pledge to repay war debt and restore American credit. Unable to let go of Santo Domingo, he pleaded one last time that by its annexation “the emancipated race of the South would have found there a congenial
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