The daily morning journal and courier., 1907-03-20

March 4, 1897. His birthday was March IS. Between March 4 and March IS, 1897, MT. Cleveland went south fishing, and on the morning of the 18th arrived In Princeton, to be driven from the station to hls new home by his wife. The latter had bought and furnished for the family the residence which he then entered for l the first time.
 To-day is a fitting occasion on which to congratulate MT. Cleveland and his family on his birthday, but it is not time to sum p his career. He is still a usefully and congenially busy man in | large affairs, with 8 reasonable pros pect of happy years to his credit. His l friends had intended formally and af- fectionately to celebrate his birthday, but he preferred they should not, and that he should be quietly allowed to l pass into his seyentieth year without 1 special notice being taken of the fact. That is just like him, and what is just | like him is apt to be both sensible and modest.
 As the only livng ex-President. Gro yer Cleveland could not avoid being an object of interest and conspicuity. | Grant. Hayes, Garfield, Arthur, Harri- son and Mckinley have died in the | time since MT. Cleveland first became 1 President, and Vice-Presidents Colfax, Wilson, Hendricks, Wheeler and Ho- bart have also passed away. MT. | Cleveland's solitariness, so to speak, would alone draw notice to him in these circumstances of mortality, had not his administration made him illus trious and in several respects unique | among chief magistrates.
 | Contrasts and comparisons aside, criticism or praise aside, Grover Cleve- land is recognized as great man and as one who made a strong and patrio- tic President. He owed his first office, that of assistant district attorney, to the fairness and ability with which he had contested for the district attorney l ship itself This successful competi- 1 tor appointed him to be his assistant, | if rightly remember. The personal con- fidence and respect, that showed are evident. Years. after. he was elected sheriff, to change conditions of discred- l If, into which that office had fallen. Years after that he was chosen mayor of Buffalo, to raise that position out of discredit into which incumbents of both parties had brought it.
 | Tn the middle of his mayoral term he was overwhelmingly elected governor,
 to start at Albany conditions he had set going In the city by the lake. From the governorship, mid-term, he
 was elevated to the presidency. His l three nominations and two elections to 1 that office were tributes to his charac-
 ter and were proofs of his strength
 which no other American had, or since l has, received. He had large maiori- l ty of the popular vote In 1888, when l Harrison carried the electoral college; bue his defeat was due to trade or l conspiracy of politicians in New York 1 state, that cost those who effected it far more than 1t did their victim at the time. Four years after, Mir Cleveland
 was overwhelmingly reelected, and
 none who consplred against his success
 in 1888 has won public respect since. Conspicous and successful as MT Clevelands canvasses were, strong
 long. honored and exacting as his off
 cial service was, we doubt that he felt even in them the satisfaction he has
 had in private life. He has outllyed 1 the resentment of opponents. Union oi l sentiment on his sincerity, courage, pa 1 triotism and integrity Is absolute. Un- ion of sentiment upon his wisdom and 1 foresight Is becoming absolute More
 democrats, more republicans and more independents unite in admiration. pride
 and confidence regarding him than ir
 the case of any man who, in modern times at least, has completed presi- l dential serviceTof as many years as his I He has had time to review his action I for history. He has vindicated 1t ir
 every respect in which it was misun- | derstood. He has justified confidence
 dan annihilated or, better, corrected
 nlisrepresentations More people to. | day wish that his course had never
 been opposed, and that it could be re-
 stored, than can be said of any Amer.
 leans presidency, except the first tern of Washington or of Lincoln He is q
 very great and a very illustrious man
 not only in the opinion of his country.
 mon, but in that of the people of every
 land of civlzation. Yet his simplicity
 his homeliness, in the right sense oi
 that word, and his neighborllness and
 friendliness are such as mark any re,
 spected villager or countryman in any
 genuine American center.
 The Eagle at times has been charged
 with idealizing this man. We have
 endured the charge without reply, fol
 we knew they who brought 1t would
 share the Eagles estimate in due sea.
 son. That season has come. There is
 no American of reflection, sanity anc
 unselflshness who does not regard Gro.
 yer Cleveland as one who was as Presi-
 dent and who is as citizen entitled tC
 universal admiration and confidence
 Every office he has held was mad'
 greater by his work in 1t. Every new
 record he established, and they were
 noa few, became standard by whicf
 his successors have been judged. Hi
 critics owe any distinction they have
 won, not to their criticisms, but to thu
 fact that they criticised him. The tar
 get, and not the missile, brought tc
 them any notice they won, just as tht
 selfish enmites he made in the genera
 interest endeared and confirmed him 1T
 the general confidence,