I'm John Batchew, Troy Sennick. 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, deflation.

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 trans-oceanic 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 trans-oceanic 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 delimited

from what we understand today, does he believe that he has a free hand in it without

Congress interfering.

Does he follow the idea of the Monroe Doctrine is his to enforce?

Well, it depends on which issue you're talking about.

He definitely thinks he has a freer hand on foreign policy than he does on domestic issues.

But there are instances in his presidency where he comes up to a line,

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