I'm John Bachelors, Choi Senec. His new book is A Man of Iron, the turbulent life and

improbable presidency of Grover Cleveland.

Here to four, we've concentrated on what we call domestic politics,

price stability, inflation, inflation, and there's national deflation in that second term that is far more alarming

than the inflation they thought they were dealing with. However, there's also the

contest over what Mark Twain will call imperialism.

Imperialism will show itself again and again in the Spanish war at the end of this decade

under McKinley and Teddy Roosevelt.

But it begins with episodes, as far as I can understand,

in the Cleveland's time,

over three far-flung pieces of real estate. We'll begin with the story of Nicaragua. They're

looking for what will eventually become the Panama Canal. How does Cleveland

acquit himself when it comes to the question of the

adventurism in Nicaragua? He can't bring himself to support it. This is something

that he inherits from the Arthur administration. There's a treaty to build something similar if not precisely the same as what becomes the Panama Canal across Nicaragua.

And it's important to understand why he can't abide it. He actually likes the idea. He understands the inherent value of a transocianic

canal. The reason he can't sign off on it is because the terms of this agreement would lead Nicaragua

to be an American protectorate. And Cleveland

does not think that the wisdom of the founding fathers on foreign policy needs any

updating. So to his mind anything that implicates the United States in a permanent relation with an international power or we would have that kind of responsibility for Nicaragua, he can't abide.

So this is the reason that he leaves that treaty behind and that we end up having to wait a few decades until we get this transocianic canal and of course the huge change that it ends up precipitated.

And the challenge of foreign policy for Cleveland, given that he sees his role as

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