Chester A. Arthur
Chet Arthur, President of the United States? Good God! That is what many of us were saying when former President Garfield died and Republican Chester A. Arthur took over. However, Chet Arthur has proved us all wrong. We are living in a time of prosperity, well after the Civil War. Arthur, even though he will not go down into the history books as one of our greatest presidents ever, Arthur has done nothing to stop to progress of our great society. Even the recent miniature scandal has been proved wrong. After reports that Arthur has been ordering new flowers for a picture of a woman on his desk every day, speculation rose that Arthur was having an active life. However, the picture turned out to be of the late Nell Arthur, his wife who died years ago. While President, Arthur has completely redecorated and cleaned the White House, something former President Hayes never did. The White House now truly looks like a building fit for a president. Arthur did all of this with his own earnings also, not making the American public pay for this. Arthur has maintained peace with foreign countries, the federal treasury has remained full and there have been no major crises while Arthur has been in office. Arthur vetoed the controversial Chinese Bill which would ban any Chinese immigrants from coming to the United States for the next twenty years. He managed to get the Chinese-hating Congress who probably would have overruled his veto to only limit the number of Chinese and not disallow them to immigrate altogether.
Arthur has made significant with the Navy. Before this term, our U.S. Navy was one of the weakest among major powers. The U.S. had not upgraded to steel ships and hoped to get along with wooden ships. Arthur ordered the construction and purchase of 84 steel ships, and also got rid of the long tradition of putting presidential friends who knew nothing about the Navy in charge of operations. Chet Arthur, President of the...
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