Chester A. Arthur for Time's Man of the Year



Time Magazine should make President Chester A. Arthur its Man of the Year for 2017.  Yes, the award would have to be made posthumously, but why discriminate against the mortally challenged?  Hear me out, and you will agree.
Chester A. Arthur was our 21st President, a New Yorker who had never held elective office.  In fact, he was considered a joke—a buffoon—possibly a criminal—certainly a fool.  He was a last-minute addition to the presidential ticket made to satisfy dubious political machinations.  He was, in short, never once considered either qualified to be President or of having a snowball’s chance to become one.  Sometimes, things fall apart.
Arthur worked for the New York City political machine called Tammany Hall.  He was known as a good sport, an effective worker, a “party” man and a dependable fixer.  What ever Roscoe Conkling and the Tammany machine needed, good ole “Chet” would provide.  Votes.  Favors. Dirt.  Chet delivered.  He was so good at what he did he was eventually appointed to the powerful position of customs collector for the Port of New York. 
A position like customs collector involved skimming off a considerable amount of cash, doling it out to the people who appointed you to the position and keeping a fair amount for yourself.  Arthur was dutiful in all aspects of his work.  He also developed tastes that reflected an income never dreamed of for the son of a Vermont Baptist preacher.
Chester A. Arthur did, however, have a history that pointed to a conscience and innate morality.  His early legal career shows an excellent string of high-profile and winning civil rights cases.  His successful defense of Elizabeth Jennings Graham, a black woman who had been denied a seat on a Manhattan streetcar, led to the desegregation of public transportation in New York City. 
In 1880, it took a confused and battling Republican Party 36 ballots to finally decide on a compromise Presidential candidate, James Garfield of Ohio.  In the meantime, a surprised and bewildered Chester A. Arthur reluctantly obeyed Roscoe Conking, his Tammany Hall boss, to join the ticket as Vice President. 
Everyone involved assumed that this would be the Custom Collector job on steroids.  Nobody counted on Garfield being shot by Charles Guiteau, a crazy, obsessed political job-seeker.  Suddenly, Chester A. Arthur, the least qualified man ever to be elevated to the Presidency (up to that time) was now the first gentleman of the land.
But all of this has just been history.  Here is why I think Chet Arthur should be Time’s Man of the Year: 
It seems that just like the Grinch whose heart grew three sizes under the influence of a real Christmas, Arthur was touched by the awesome solemnity of the Oval Office.  To the consternation and ever-lasting rancor of Tammany Hall, Arthur turned his back on his corrupt friends. Arthur barred the entire Tammany crew from the White House.  The man who had toed every party line drawn for him moved beyond partisan politics.  In 1883 he signed the landmark Pendleton Civil Service Act.  He tried to lower tariffs and vetoed the racist Chinese Exclusion Act of 1883. 
Shortly after taking office, Arthur found out he had a serious kidney ailment, Bright’s Disease.  He chose not to run for office and died in 1886 at age 57. 
So here we have it.  A New Yorker without political experience thrust into the most powerful office in the land.  His response is to rise above the associations and practices who put him there and to become a principled and honest broker of the public trust.  Such a man deserved to be Time’s man of the year. 
Think it through.  Keep the faith. 

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