okay
I wondered what was going on in Cleveland's life at the time, and there really wasn't anything too exciting going on. He had just submitted his first nominee to the Supreme Court, nominated Donald Dickinson to be Postmaster General and submitted a treaty to the Senate for ratification (on the subject of fishing in Canadian waters). In his biography of Cleveland called An Honest President: The Life and Presidencies of Grover Cleveland, author H. Paul Jeffers describes what was happening for Cleveland in the beginning of 1888 at pages 211-2:
The day after the nomination of Dickinson, February 21, Grover and Frances departed Washington for three days in the Florida sun. When he returned he clearly had the forthcoming campaign on his mind in a letter to James Shanahan, whom Governor Cleveland had appointed Superintendent of Public Works in New York. Always a staunch political friend, Shanahan had written on the subject of Grover's going for a second term. Grover reverted to a familiar position on the subject of holding public office. If he were to exercise personal desires, he said "I would insist that my public life should end on the fourth of March next... and be a very happy man." He continued, "But I am daily and hourly told that the conditions are such that such a course is not open without endangering the supremacy of the party and the good of the country. Occupying the position I do on this subject, having no personal ambition, willing to obey the command of my party and by my own act being in no man's way, I confess I cannot keep my temper when I learn of the mean and low attempts that are made by underhand means to endanger the results to which I am devoted. And when I see good staunch friends as you with their coats off and sleeves rolled up, I feel like taking a hand with them."
The letter ended with, "My position is this: I should personally like better than anything else to be let alone and let out; but although I often get quite discouraged and feel like insisting upon following my inclinations I shall neither go counter to the wishes of the party that I love and which has honored me, nor to the wishes of my friends..."
Okay, but I would have found it more interesting to know what the president and former governor of the New York State felt about the natural disaster which struck his state. I suspect that in those days, the federal government had more of an attitude of "you're on your own states" whenever Mother Nature struck.