# Most "radical" U.S. President **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 10, 2010, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605 "2010-04-10T01:51:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2010, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/41 "2010-04-11T13:04:38Z")
> [@2sense](#): > > I think it a diservice to abolitionists to include Lincoln in their midst. Being an abolitionist back then was like being an anarchist or socialist is today. There was an economic, social, and on occasion a physical price to pay. Lincoln never carried that water. But unlike them, he got the job done. ---
**Author:** ![2sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/2/e47774/32.png) [@2sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/2sense)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2010, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/42 "2010-04-11T15:07:41Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Given how frequently and ignorantly and self-servingly the label “socialist” gets slapped on things the speaker disagrees with these days, were politicians of the 19th century calling their opponents “abolitionist” at every opportunity, just to score cheap political points? Of course. (Though one gets the impression that these people fervently believed their own rhetoric.) In fact the term “miscegenation” was invented as a political attack on Lincoln according to Jack Waugh (_Reelecting Lincoln_). > [@Alessan](#): > > But unlike them, he got the job done. You are putting the cart before the horse. Credit for Emancipation goes first to the slaves who originated the resistance to slavery. Then to the abolitionists, black and white, who carried the torch forward and refused to let the question be swept into the background. Then to the American people who (despite omnipresent racism) came around to the view that the time had come to end slavery. To Lincoln’s credit he moved toward Emancipation as quickly as was politically feasible. Certainly he could have dug in his heels and sought to stem the tide rather than ride it to glory. I’d say he has earned his reputation as our greatest president. But without the abolitionists there was no abolition. ---
**Author:** ![Brown\_Eyed\_Girl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/brown_eyed_girl/32/3574_2.png) [@Brown\_Eyed\_Girl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brown_Eyed_Girl)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2010, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/43 "2010-04-11T16:51:52Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > I honestly don’t understand the connection between your post and mine, Frank. Can you please explain? I’m not Frank but your “jest” about staying in his place and shining shoes for a living alludes to Obama being a descendant of slavery, which would be more likely true for a bi-racial child growing up in 1960s Alabama than it is for Obama, the son of a Kenyan citizen. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2010, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/44 "2010-04-11T18:02:51Z")
I can’t see how it is anybody BUT Lincoln. Everyone else is running for second. ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2010, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/45 "2010-04-11T20:19:34Z")
As far as going against prevailing winds, no one is more radical than Lincoln. Obama’s in good company if this attack is actually true. Is there no low Lizard Gingrich will sink to? Apparently not, lying about Obama is probably as normal for him as an afternoon of whores and booze. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2010, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/46 "2010-04-11T21:09:01Z")
What did Lincoln do that was against the prevailing winds? Once the Confederacy pulled out of the Union, the Emancipation Proclamation, effective only in the Confederacy, was a gift-wrapped present for the economies of the Northern and border states. And Lincoln knew that. ---
**Author:** ![Oldeb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ea666f/32.png) [@Oldeb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oldeb)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2010, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/47 "2010-04-11T21:17:36Z")
> [@foolsguinea](#): > > Er, I think the Modoc were nearly exterminated in the 1870’s. The Indian Wars of the 1870’s were explicitly exterminatory, whereas the Cherokee were just repatriated. Doesn’t make the Trail of Tears right, just not the closest we came to genocide. It wasn’t just the Cherokee, and at least we gave the pretext (however transparent) of being at war instead of just marching people off to die at other times. But you are right. We have a long history of working to kill as many Native Americans as possible and got to be very good at it. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2010, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/48 "2010-04-11T22:58:41Z")
> [@Walloon](#): > > What did Lincoln do that was against the prevailing winds? Once the Confederacy pulled out of the Union, the Emancipation Proclamation, effective only in the Confederacy, was a gift-wrapped present for the economies of the Northern and border states. And Lincoln knew that. It was quite a while before Lincoln made the Emancipation Proclamation. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2010, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/49 "2010-04-12T01:16:08Z")
This is radical as in enacting new or innovative policies rather than being politically on the radical side. 1. Franklin D. Roosevelt 2. Abraham Lincoln 3. Thomas Jefferson 4. Lyndon B Johnson 5. Theodore Roosevelt 6. Ronald Reagan 7. George Washington 8. William Clinton 9. Barack Obama (so far) 10. John F Kennedy ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Moto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de0a6/32.png) [@Mr.Moto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Moto)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2010, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/50 "2010-04-12T13:24:54Z")
My vote would be for Wilson - particularly for economic and foreign policy. ---
**Author:** ![puddleglum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puddleglum/32/137_2.png) [@puddleglum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puddleglum)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2010, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/51 "2010-04-12T17:16:04Z")
Wilson, his wartime command of the economy set the precedent for FDR, who LBJ was copying. His intervening in a foreign war with no American interests at stake was a sharp break from past administrations which had sought to concern themselves with this hemisphere. His repression of civil liberties had precedent in the Sedition acts, but those had been repealed a hundred years earlier. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2010, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/52 "2010-04-12T19:23:03Z")
> [@Brown\_Eyed\_Girl](#): > > I’m not Frank but your “jest” about staying in his place and shining shoes for a living alludes to Obama being a descendant of slavery, which would be more likely true for a bi-racial child growing up in 1960s Alabama than it is for Obama, the son of a Kenyan citizen. Ah, gotcha. I missed that because I don’t consider Obama’s father’s citizenship relevant. I don’t think the sort of person who believes that persons of African extraction need to be keep in their place really cares if said persons are but recently emigrated from yonder shores. ---
**Author:** ![MOIDALIZE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2010, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/53 "2010-04-12T19:29:07Z")
President Warchild only lived to get radical. ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2010, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/54 "2010-04-12T20:16:14Z")
> [@Walloon](#): > > What did Lincoln do that was against the prevailing winds? Once the Confederacy pulled out of the Union, the Emancipation Proclamation, effective only in the Confederacy, was a gift-wrapped present for the economies of the Northern and border states. And Lincoln knew that. Doing something for half the states that pissed off the other half enough to have them start a war against you seems to be against the prevailing winds, no matter how much one may want to say the North wanted it or that slavery was winding down to a close There’s no dispute that had Lincoln not been seen as anti-slavery, the South would probably have bided their time, maybe revolted a few presidents down the line ---
**Author:** ![tbook](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/df705f/32.png) [@tbook](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tbook)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2010, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/55 "2010-04-12T20:44:37Z")
Nixon ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2010, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/56 "2010-04-12T22:55:02Z")
Based on Bill 'n Ted, I’d have to say Lincoln. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2010, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/57 "2010-04-13T00:38:11Z")
> [@Curtis LeMay](#): > > This is radical as in enacting new or innovative policies rather than being politically on the radical side. > > 1. Franklin D. Roosevelt > 2. Abraham Lincoln > 3. Thomas Jefferson > 4. Lyndon B Johnson > 5. Theodore Roosevelt > 6. Ronald Reagan > 7. George Washington > 8. William Clinton > 9. Barack Obama (so far) > 10. John F Kennedy Clinton was a right winger in almost all his financial mistakes. He greased the skids to to the financial inequities we enjoy in America today. Obama is just starting, but I know you are far too right wing to control yourself. ---
**Author:** ![Brown\_Eyed\_Girl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/brown_eyed_girl/32/3574_2.png) [@Brown\_Eyed\_Girl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brown_Eyed_Girl)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2010, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/58 "2010-04-13T01:35:05Z")
> [@tbook](#): > > Nixon Yeah. The EPA has got to be a pretty radical departure for a Republican. ---
**Author:** ![Brown\_Eyed\_Girl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/brown_eyed_girl/32/3574_2.png) [@Brown\_Eyed\_Girl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brown_Eyed_Girl)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2010, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/59 "2010-04-13T01:36:34Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Ah, gotcha. I missed that because I don’t consider Obama’s father’s citizenship relevant. I don’t think the sort of person who believes that persons of African extraction need to be keep in their place really cares if said persons are but recently emigrated from yonder shores. I’ll give you that. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2010, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605/60 "2010-04-13T02:54:59Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > Clinton was a right winger in almost all his financial mistakes. He greased the skids to to the financial inequities we enjoy in America today. Obama is just starting, but I know you are far too right wing to control yourself. I know. He was “radical” in the sense that he reformed the welfare system and admirably ended much of it’s problems. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-u-s-president/535605.md?page=4)