For greatest I am in the Lincoln camp.
as to the OP I somewhat agree that Nixon did far more positive than people give him credit for.
However he is forever tainted by getting caught doing what other Presidents both before and after have done with impunity.
Poverty, both worldwide and domestically, had been declining at far more rapid rates before the warmonger LBJ got involved. In fact by hindering voluntary exchange he could only have had a negative impact. To state that the war on poverty, that took place simultaneously with capitalism, is the cause of gains against poverty is NPR level analysis.
Greatest President: William Henry Harrison
Worst Presidents: FDR, Lincoln
Dwight Eisenhower - When Khrushchev was touring the U.S. he ended it by meeting with Eisenhower. After lunch, Eisenhower went and took a nap, letting Krushchev kill time by wondering around Camp David.
Billy Carter - By far the most intelligent of any U.S. president. Many complain he didn’t do much while in office. What more can you ask of a politician than one who doesn’t try to muck thinks up.
Bill Clinton - The most entertaining of all. (The whole Monica Lewinsky thing). The only thing he missed was at his inauguration to declare “And now for something completely different”, then have the band strike up Sousa’s “Liberty Bell”.
Indeed, Billy Carter did even less in office than WillFarnaby’s choice of William Henry Harrison.
Indeed, Billy did next to nothing while in the White House except maybe get drunk, piss on the White House lawn and goose all the young interns. That’s why they tried to get him to stay down in Georgia during his brother Jimmy’s term as US president from 1977-81.
Another vote for the new Cincinnatus, Washington. Turning down lifelong power rates high in my book.
Thomas Jefferson
I don’t think Washington was on a collision course with Napoleonic Emperor style power. The only monarchical forms of government proposed in the (technically secret–so our record is not complete) sessions debating the Constitution posited a sort of figure who would be very similar to the British monarch of that era. Which meant they’d have some genuine power. To explain, I oft argue George III was the last British monarch to have real, regularly exercised “political power”, several of his successors including Victoria had some degree of power just due to their prominent position but it was a very “soft” power–the present monarch has no meaningful power.
King George I of the U.S.A. would basically be able to exercise a “negative”, would be commander-in-chief (of the world’s least well funded and smallest military) but would probably by convention not exercise a lot of day to day involvement in the government.
I rank Washington highly nonetheless, though, probably #2 or #3 after Lincoln–who is my #1.
To me the reason Lincoln has to rate #1 is he literally saved the country, no President has faced such a threat and no President has ever risen to such a challenge. Further, the closest comparison Presidents, men like FDR, were not indispensable. Even Hoover who history has unfairly categorized as “doing nothing” while the country went to ruin had started unprecedented government involvement in the economy and unprecedented relief efforts for the poor. It was far too little for the public’s appetite, but when even Republican Hoover is doing that stuff I think it’s a safe bet if FDR had stroked out shortly after being elected there were probably several other politicians who would have done much similar to what FDR did.
FDR gets credit for doing what he did without making America an unredeemable socialist hell hole, but honestly our system has always been structured in such a way that doesn’t bode well for sweeping radicalists so even a more radical man in FDR’s shoes would have been probably constrained more along the path FDR actually took.
Lincoln on the other hand, almost anyone else who had a real shot of being President was either sympathetic to the South or wholly unwilling to shed a drop of blood to bring them back into the fold. Lincoln was the only serious national figure who was willing to fight that war, and if by some stroke of history he didn’t get in the White House I believe the country would have been allowed to fracture and that’d be that. I also would predict that eventually other parts would splinter off as well (the nascent West for example might see little reason to stick with Washington long term.) Continental North America would look a lot different today without Lincoln.
John Charles Fremont was the anti-slavery candidate for the Republicans in 1856. Democrats and Republicans merged by 1860 and put forth a far less divisive candidate in Lincoln.
The Billy Carter thing… aaaarrggghhhhhh. I meant Jimmy.
I’m so embarrassed.
I agree with almost everything you said about Lincoln, but you contradict yourself a bit. You say our system doesn’t bode well for radicalists, yet you say Lincoln was the only one wiling to shed blood to conquer the South. He was the most radical person to ever hold the office, period. He didn’t save the country, he fundamentally transformed it into an empire. He saved the government. The country and American society would have continued just fine without him.
You also mention how the Constitution didn’t allow for a Napoleon. Lincoln’s presidency is proof that G. Washington is to be commended for at least attempting to pay deference to the Constitution. Lincoln was a dictator, not a constitutional president. William Henry Harrison may well be the closest any president has come to staying within the limits of the constitution. Maybe John Tyler.
This is why modern conservatives are mostly not to be taken seriously. They go on about rule of law and the Constitution yet they idolize Lincoln as a god among men. The leftists’ idolatry of Lincoln is somewhat more logical. “The all powerful government is needed to bring evil men to heel” and all that. They turn a blind eye to Lincoln’s abuse of religious rhetoric ( unmatched by even G. W. Bush) when speaking of war, because it is only half-removed from their own Christian- progressive roots. Today’s conservatives eat that shit up. Neither leftists nor modern conservatives realize they spring from the same Yankee Puritanism that swept Lincoln into office and embraced him until his martyrdom.
(Pertinent parts pulled out.)
This is why I have a hard time taking hard-core libertarians seriously despite having some empathy for libertarianism. No American did more to free slaves than Lincoln. No one. He ended the most egregious sin of our country and it is fitting to idolize him.
We have a fundamental different view of Lincoln, that I doubt can be resolved.
That is actually not what I said. I said that in the closed sessions in Philadelphia we know that various different forms of potential government were bandied about. We don’t know all of the specifics because the sessions were closed to the public, and they deliberately didn’t keep rigorous records because they wanted all of the attendees to be able to speak freely and not be tarred & feathered for outlandish suggestions after the fact. But, a few of the FFs kept personal notes and we know some of what went on based on those.
We know that one of the proposed plans of government would have had a “Governor” that basically was monarch in all but name and fulfilled precisely the same role as King George did over in the United Kingdom. This role was clearly intended for Washington (much as the Presidency was intended for him as well), and it was a limited type position (elected but for a life term) and would not presumably have turned into an Emperorship. I speculate it’d probably end up like the current British monarch or the German Presidency, and would have probably either been amended eventually to not be a lifetime appointment or if left as such it’d be given to some very elder statesman who offends no one and has no political power.
I think most reasonable people feel that if the house is on fire, literally on fire, sometimes you can do whatever the fuck is necessary to save lives and put the fire out, and to stop it from spreading. This is very dangerous ground, I strongly oppose the restrictions on civil liberties in most wars, examples being WWI, WWII and any modern conflict where civil liberties were restricted in the name of security. But I don’t reject the concept, just its implementation when it is unnecessary. In Lincoln’s case, his extralegal actions were necessary and proper–and many of them weren’t actually extralegal, though some were. There was broad unused powers of the Presidency in the text of the constitution to quell insurrection and lead the military and suspend habeas corpus, it just hadn’t been utilized prior to the ACW.
Trying to stack the Supreme Court because they kept striking down your Unconstitutional legislation is single greatest shame in our country’s history.
FDR would have accepted the crown denied by Washington.
I wonder if you would be writing this had the Judicial Procedures Reform Bill of 1937 become law. By now, passage of time would have made fifteen seem a fitting size for the nation’s highest court.
As for the greatest shame, um, really? Greater than failure to pass the DREAM Act? Greater than having the world’s highest incarceration rate? Greater than broken treaties with native American tribes? Greater than the Fugitive Slave Act? Greater than slavery?
History rewards the victors. Even when they were wrong. THat’s why our “greatest Presidents” were often the most lawless ones.
IMO, a great President is one who achieves great things without ever having to bend the Constitution or the law. Which is why Coolidge and Clinton rank up there with the best for me. They just did their jobs, weren’t glory hounds, didn’t try to transform America. Just did good things and got good results and moved America forward.
One thing I’ll give FDR credit for, especially in light of the current guy, and one reason that Reagan admired him so, was his relentless optimism and ready smile, even when things were going against him. Whereas some Presidents would have sulked when they didn’t get their way, FDR happily left his losing battles behind and moved on. Another President I’m thinking of could learn from that. He just seems miserable these days and has nothing new to say.
You mean, Hamilton’s?
Coolidge pushed for the “General Treaty for Renunciation of War,” despite the US constitution giving Congress the power to declare war. Giving up the biggest power granted the US government under said constitution, without amending the constitution, hardly shows respect for it.
So ruh-roh is in effect saying “Ruh-roh”?
How about Millard Fillmore? Didn’t he install indoor plumbing in the White House? That at least deserves a mention.
THe Senate would have had to approve the treaty. And despite that approval, no treaty can amend the Constitution. So in the case of the US, it would amount only to an “I promise”. Which was pretty much what it meant to everyone who signed it.