Rating the US Presidents
From George Washington
to George W. Bush
Rating the US Presidents
• In the United States we like to rate a
President. We measure him as ‘weak’
or ‘strong’ and call what we are
measuring his ‘leadership:’ we rate him
from the moment he takes office. We
are quite right to do so.
Richard Neustadt
Presidential Power (1960)
Presidential rating, 1948-2010
• Arthur M. Schlesinger Sr. conducted the first
systematic rating effort for Life magazine in
1948 and did a follow-up in 1962.
• Presidential rating surveys now regularly
engage scholars, the media and think-tanks
The objects of the exercise
Poll findings over time: Top 6
Schlesinger Sr.
1962
1. Abraham Lincoln
Schlesinger Jr.
1996
Abraham Lincoln
2. George Washington
3. Franklin D.
Roosevelt
4. Woodrow Wilson
5. Thomas Jefferson
George Washington
FDR
Thomas Jefferson
Andrew Jackson
6. Andrew Jackson
Theodore Roosevelt
Federalist/WSJ
2000
George
Washington
Abraham Lincoln
FDR
Thomas Jefferson
Theodore
Roosevelt
Andrew Jackson
Ratings over time: Bottom 4
Schlesinger Sr.
1962
Schlesinger Jr.
1996
Franklin Pierce
Richard Nixon
James Buchanan Andrew Johnson
Ulysses S. Grant James Buchanan
Warren Harding Warren Harding
Federalist Society/
WSJ
2000
Andrew Johnson
Franklin Pierce
Warren Harding
James Buchanan
The C-Span Surveys
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Arguably the most systematic surveys that seek to rank
presidents on the basis of scores awarded for ten leadership
qualities
Public Persuasion
Crisis Leadership
Economic management
Moral Authority
International Relations
Administrative Skills
Relations with Congress
Vision/Agenda-Setting
Pursuit of Equal Justice to All
Performance within Context of times
The C-Span Survey of 2009:
Top 10
Bottom 10
1.Abraham Lincoln
2.George Washington
3.Franklin D. Roosevelt
4. Theodore Roosevelt
5. Harry S. Truman
6. John F. Kennedy
7. Thomas Jefferson
8. Dwight D. Eisenhower
9. Woodrow Wilson
10.Ronald Reagan
33.
34.
35.
36.
37.
38.
39.
40.
41.
42.
Rutherford Hayes
Herbert Hoover
John Tyler
G.W. Bush
Millard Fillmore
Warren Harding
William H. Harrison
Franklin Pierce
Andrew Johnson
James Buchanan
The ratings game – the shortcomings
• What is being measured? What is presidential
‘greatness’? How can we compare presidential
leadership over time? Is it justifiable to give equal
weighting to all categories when some are patently
more important to a particular president?
• Are fine distinctions of leadership performance truly
possible – particularly in the middling group of
presidents (13-30)?
• Is there judgement bias in surveys because left-of
centre scholars broadly favour liberal presidents?
• Do ratings favour earlier presidents because they
are less familiar?
An example of rating anomalies
C-Span 2009 survey ranked as follows for economic
management
1. Washington
6.
JFK
2. Lincoln
7.
Wilson
3. Clinton
8.
DDE
4. TR
9.
Jefferson
5. FDR
10. Truman
But Nos. 1, 2, 4, 7 and 9 occupied the presidency
before it acquired its economic management role (&
instruments thereof) ... And where’s LBJ (11) and
Reagan (17 - behind John Quincy Adams at 16)?
But the rating game continues…
• The rating game is here to stay
because the president is the focal point
of the US political system
• We expect presidents to be strong
leaders and to use their leadership
qualities to do good – so rating them in
comparison to each other is one way of
assessing how they measure up to
such expectations
The UK Survey
• The first scholarly UK survey
• Confined to UK and Irish scholars (US
and Canadian scholars based in UK
excluded)
• Historians, political scientists and IR
scholars participated
• Scholarly scepticism but media interest
• BBC News web article on survey
received over 100,000 hits in 24 hours
UK Survey Method
• 47 scholars graded 40 presidents
(William H. Harrison and Garfield
excluded)
• Assessed on: vision/agenda-setting;
domestic leadership; foreign policy
leadership; moral authority; positive
historical significance of their legacy
UK Survey: Best and worst (C-Span 2009 for
comparison)
1. FDR (3)
2. Lincoln (1)
3. Washington (2)
4. Jefferson (7)
5. TR (4)
6. Wilson (9)
7. Truman (5)
8. Reagan (10)
9. Jackson (13)
10.Eisenhower (8)
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
36.
37.
38.
39.
40.
GW Bush (36)
Arthur (32)
Taylor (29)
B. Harrison (30)
Fillmore (37)
A. Johnson (41)
Tyler (35)
Harding (38)
Pierce (40)
Buchanan (42)
The greatest presidents
Their achievement
The near greats
Their achievements
Reagan: Near great, great or ...?
The worst presidents: scandal
The worst presidents: 1850s
Failure to resolve sectional crisis
Worst presidents: Reconstruction
Is there bias against recent presidents?
• No post-1945 president in UK top 5
• Truman (7), Reagan (8), and
Eisenhower (10) make top 10, but
Reagan is the only post-1960 president to
do so
• Does this reflect a decline in the quality of
leadership or failure to allow that the
modern presidency is a much tougher job?
Two surprises: JFK (15), Carter (18)
Nixon: No longer the pits, just average....!
No 23 (between GHW Bush and Ford)
George W. Bush: A lowly rating (31st)
Obama’s Prospects: Will the economy
(and the public debt) decide?
One overview ...
‘… the presidency has been responsible
for less harm and more good, in the
nation and in the world, than perhaps
any other secular institution in history.’
Forrest McDonald
The American Presidency:
An Intellectual History
(1994)
... And a contrary one
• Of the 14 presidents who held office from
1920 to 2009, only three were successful
(FDR, DDE, RR) - Thomas Cronin, On the
Presidency: Teacher, Soldier, Shaman, Pol
(2009)
• “Many scholars continue to attribute to the
presidency highly romantic qualities of
integrity, honesty, and competence rarely
seen in the Oval Office.” - Louis Fisher,
“Teaching the Presidency: Idealizing a
Constitutional Office,” PS, Jan. 2012