United States Army General Ulysses S Grant fulfilled all George Washington required of a soldier in his command of Union forces during the American Civil War, and in his public service during Reconstruction.  If ever there was a Soldier’s Soldier, a General’s General, it was Ulysses S Grant.

Nobody would ever accuse U.S. Grant of being flawless, and his Presidential Administration was racked with corruption at lower levels, but I chalk that up to the naivete of career Army officer who trusted his subordinates to remain in bounds in their conduct.

U.S. Grant’s prosecution of the war against Jefferson’s forces was exemplary, and the surrender he negotiated with General Robert E. Lee was honorable.  Any historian, accredited or armchair, who challenges the long-standing appraisal of U.S. Grants command of Union forces need only consider the public response to the news of Ulysses S. grant’s passing.

U.S. Grant’s health began to fail him after he was diagnosed with throat cancer.  Unfortunately, Ibn Sahl’s invention had not improved to the point anyone understood cancer in the late 19^th Century.  Following Louis Pasteur’s discovery of microbial pathology in the wine and dairy industries, the Agnostic Scholars suspected cancers were a disease process caused by microbial forms of life, while the Atheist Scholars suspected cancers could be evolution occurring at the cellular level.

Classical Scholars chose not to form an opinion on cancer, having already had their fingers burned on the matter of spontaneous generation.  Spontaneous generation was not a major battle in the debate over the origins of Life.  In fact, that battle is not over yet.  But the Classical School had long ago sided with Theologians who have always insisted that all “abominations of the flesh” were Divine Punishments for individual sin.

The true, genetic origins of cancer would not be discovered until the middle of the twentieth century.

Even after one thousand years, Ibn Sahl’s lens was still being perfected.

While science was busy, each year discovering new mysteries of life at the cellular level of existence, Ulysses S. Grant grew increasingly impoverished following his retirement from office.  Grant was not destitute but the family struggled.  When the General learned of his diagnosis he became anxious over his ability to provide a comfortable life for his wife after he passed away.

General Grant began to fight the long retreat.  His goal, to earn enough to secure his wife in her old age, set his affairs in order and greet his maker as a soldier must, front and center.  His only viable option for income was his memoirs.  Grant began working on them immediately but, after approaching publishers about his manuscript, learned the best he could demand was 10% royalties on sales.

Mark Twain learned of this insult and famously intervened, purchasing the publishing rights to Grant’s memoirs for an undisclosed sum and 70% royalties for the General.  Grant retreated to a mountain cottage with his wife where he worked tirelessly on his memoirs.  Five days after completing his manuscript, Ulesses S. Grant, the Conqueror of Appomattox and Guarantor of the Peace died.

The Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant went on to become an international bestseller, and is still required reading in universities, colleges and military institutions throughout the world today.  Grant’s memoirs earned Julia Grant an unprecedented $450,000 in royalties, the equivalent of $14 million in today’s currency.  Julia could mourn the passing of her life’s love, and the blessings of her golden years free of material need.

Mission accomplished, General.

To say that the nation mourned would be an understatement.  President Grover Cleveland ordered a month of national mourning, not just a day.  Every military base in the armed forces dedicated the day of Grant’s funeral procession to honoring the General and former President.  Over a quarter of a million people attended Grant’s funeral train which carried the General from West Point to New York City.  Two dozen black stallions pulled the General’s caisson from the train station to Riverside Park, with dignitaries, attendants and the public forming a seven-mile procession behind the caisson.

The General’s Pall Bearers were Union Generals Sherman and Sheridan, and Confederate Generals Buckner and Johnson, the latter representing all southerners who intended to honor Robert E. Lee’s capitulation and shun Jefferson Davis’s agitation.  The remaining two Pall Bearers were Admiral Porter and Senator John Logan, who was also a General in the Grand Army of the Republic.

Following immediately behind the caisson were President Grover Cleveland, Former President Hayes and former President Arthur, the entire cabinet of the Cleveland Administration, as well as the Justices of the Supreme Court.

One and a half million American citizens followed the dignitaries in mourning the passing of the Hero of the Republic.

Emphasis on the word Republic.  While nearly every American child is taught the United States Constitution describes the Rule of Law of a “republic”, there has always existed a faction in the nation which insists the nation should be, if it is not already, a “democracy”.  

Just as in the biological sciences, the political sciences began to engage in rhetorical combat.  Just as the adjective ‘scientific” was abused in popular discussions on science, so too was the adjective “democratic” abused in popular discussions on politics.  I would be negligent, intellectually bankrupt and possibly judged as hypocritical if I did not confess the Democrat Party is responsible for America’s original sin and civil rights abuses from 1776 to 1964.  I say I could possibly be judged as hypocritical since I ran for office as a Democrat earlier in my adult life.

I assure my fellow Americans that will never happen again.

If the American Civil War was fought to end slavery and secure the republican form of government for all time, Grant recognized just how fragile public perceptions were regarding the nation’s true character in Antebellum America.  Grant, and most of his contemporaries lamented that the public did not recognize the dangers of a populist form of government, that which our Founding Fathers warned us against.

Historians taking a simple count of the population are left wondering how popular democracy threatened the republic if slavery were extended.  Slaves, after all, were not allowed to vote.  And, true though that was, the U.S. Constitution did not exclude slaves, indeed counted slaves as three fifths of a person when calculating each states slate of Congressional Representatives.

Democrats took “property rights” extremely seriously in the Antebellum South.  More than any other factor, it was the three fifths compromise which made the American Civil War inevitable. 

To northerners, as the nation continued to grow westward, and slavery was allowed to continue south of the Missouri Compromise Line, the power balance between free states and slave states would eventually favor the Planters.  In contrast, to the Slavers, if slavery was prohibited in all new states, the power balance between free and slave states would immediately favor Freedom. 

Democrats all pulled for maintaining slavery.  Republicans all pulled for establishing Freedom.  These motifs have been the rallying cry of the two major parties since the American Civil War.  Though these facts are no longer taught in primary education, these are the facts.  Check them for yourself.

Following the Civil War, Ulysses S. Grant was well aware of the explicit dangers of populists who believed a simple majority should decide all matters, especially when they controlled who could vote.  Compounding the fallacies of political science in Grant’s day were the fallacies of human evolution.

Grant, like Oglethorpe, recognized the humanity of African Americans and, yes, Grant promised freed slaves would each receive 40 acres and a U.S. Army mule.  Hundreds of thousands of mules used in the war were otherwise to be destroyed, so there was no expense to the taxpayer, only savings.

Grant decided the nation had to be defended from populists and their specious thinking. 

In mandating Universal Education, Grant went to war against accredited academia to secure the hearts and minds of the people.  To properly inform every United States Citizen on the structure and function of their government, to inform them of their Civil Rights and Civic Duties, and to disavow the racist assumptions being imposed on African Americans, Ulysses S. Grant sent America’s children to school.

In the spectrum of accredited academia, United States Army General, Ulysses S. Grant, was a Classical Scholar through and through.

For the first time in human history, every citizen of a nation would be required to acquire a primary education.  An education, Grant made certain, would no longer be a blessing enjoyed by just a privileged few. 

Grant believed the best way to keep populists and their pseudo-sciences in check was to fill the nation with informed citizens.  Grant’s hope was that truly enlightened citizens could never again enslave or oppress their fellow man, much less raise arms against a just government.

Follow me now into the Twentieth Century to see how General Grant’s battle for the hearts and minds of America’s youth progressed.