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Chronicling America is a searchable digital collection of historic newspaper pages through 1963 sponsored jointly by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Library of Congress.
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Also, see the Directory of U.S. Newspapers in American Libraries, a searchable index to newspapers published in the United States since 1690, which helps researchers identify what titles exist for a specific place and time, and how to access them.
Elected in one of the closest Presidential elections in United States history, Benjamin Harrison (1833-1901) took the oath of office in 1889. President Harrison presented an ambitious agenda of Pan-American cooperation and increased federal spending, however, opposition to the “billion dollar Congress” and high tariff rates ultimately led to his defeat in the 1892 election. Read more about it!
The information in this guide focuses on primary source materials found in the digitized historic newspapers from the digital collection Chronicling America.
The timeline below highlights important dates related to this topic and a section of this guide provides some suggested search strategies for further research in the collection.
| November 1888 | Benjamin Harrison defeats incumbent Grover Cleveland to become the 23rd President of the United States. |
|---|---|
| 1889 | First Pan-American Congress meets in Washington, DC. |
| 1889- 1891 |
The 51st Congress and Harrison appropriate $1,000,000,000 as the federal budget, earning the nickname “Billion-Dollar Congress” and scorn from Democrats October. |
| 1892 | Mrs. Harrison dies November. |
| 1892 | President Harrison is defeated by Grover Cleveland. |
