Presidential rankings emerged in 1948 when Life Magazine published an article by the prominent historian, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Sr., who had selected 55 experts on the presidency and asked them to rank the presidents. He asked his respondents to rank presidents into categories of “Great,” “Near Great,” “Average,” “Below Average” and “Failure.” The result was a substantial article that attracted wide public attention. His work and similar studies have not escaped criticism, however.
Many general works on the presidency have discussed presidential greatness and identified presidents who stood out for good or ill. There are likely unavoidable inadequacies in all ranking schemes, regardless of the complicated measures that many authors employ in their attempts to be “scientific.” This book provides useful criticism of these presidential rankings. It is arranged chronologically, and discusses each presidential performance and each ranking study in detail. Perhaps it would be sufficient to say that most who held the office were right for their time.

Max J. Skidmore is the Curators’ Professor of Political Science at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. He lives in Overland Park, Kansas.

Max J. Skidmore
Format: softcover (6 x 9)
Pages: 421
Bibliographic Info: notes, bibliography, index
Copyright Date: 2004
pISBN: 978-0-7864-1820-6
eISBN: 978-0-7864-8176-7
Imprint: McFarland

Introduction      1

1. George Washington      9

2. John Adams      19

3. Thomas Jefferson      31

4. James Madison      45

5. James Monroe      56

6. John Quincy Adams      63

7. Andrew Jackson      68

8. Martin Van Buren      80

9. William Henry Harrison      87

10. John Tyler      90

11. James K. Polk      98

12. Zachary Taylor      103

13. Millard Fillmore      110

14. Franklin Pierce      116

15. James Buchanan      122

16. Abraham Lincoln      128

17. Andrew Johnson      135

18. Ulysses S. Grant      143

19. Rutherford B. Hayes      152

20. James A. Garfield      157

21. Chester Alan Arthur      159

22. Grover Cleveland (1885–1889)      163

23. Benjamin Harrison      171

24. Grover Cleveland (1893–1897)      176

25. William Mckinley      177

26. Theodore Roosevelt      182

27. William Howard Taft      196

28. Woodrow Wilson      201

29. Warren G. Harding      210

30. Calvin Coolidge      217

31. Herbert C. Hoover      223

32. Franklin D. Roosevelt      231

33. Harry S Truman      243

34. Dwight D. Eisenhower      256

35. John F. Kennedy      267

36. Lyndon B. Johnson      277

37. Richard M. Nixon      286

38. Gerald R. Ford      299

39. James Earl (Jimmy) Carter      308

40. Ronald W. Reagan      317

41. George Herbert Walker Bush      332

42. William Jefferson Clinton      341

43. George W. Bush      355

Notes      365

Bibliography      387

Index      395