Executives Examined
Excerpts from "Presidential Leadership: Rating the Best and the Worst in the White House."

Thursday, June 10, 2004 12:01 A.M. EDT

Four years ago The Wall Street Journal and the Federalist Society collaborated on a survey that asked 78 scholars in history, law and politics to rate 39 presidents. (George W. Bush had yet to be elected, and William Henry Harrison's and James Garfield's tenures were too short to evaluate meaningfully.) The resulting rankings were published on this Web site. Now the survey has been expanded into a book, edited by James Taranto, OpinionJournal.com's editor, and Leonard Leo, executive vice president of the Federalist Society.

In addition to the rankings, "Presidential Leadership: Rating the Best and the Worst in the White House" includes some four dozen essays--one on each president and several thematic chapters on presidential leadership--by authors such as Richard Brookhiser, Forrest McDonald, H.W. Brands, Michael Barone, Fred Barnes, Theodore Olson, Robert Bork, Robert Dallek, Kenneth Starr, Harvey Mansfield and Victor Davis Hanson. Here are some excerpts:

William J. Bennett on presidential character: "Our nation's presidents have their warts, to be sure. But they have far more than warts. Whatever is said of the worst of them, it must also be remembered that, at the very least, they submitted themselves--and their character--to public service. They were men in the arena--a valor outlined by Theodore Roosevelt, a valor worth remembering today as we seem, at times, to be inundated with the study of their faults."

Richard Brookhiser on George Washington: "Americans had fought a revolution against a king, yet they were not completely weaned from royalist yearnings. Washington Irving makes the point comically in 'Rip Van Winkle': Rip sleeps through the American Revolution to find, when he wakes, that the image of George III on the sign outside his favorite tavern has been changed . . .to that of George Washington. Had he been a different man, the American George could easily have been re-elected to a third term and died in office; had he been a very different man, he could have angled to become king or leader for life."

Lynne Cheney on James Madison: "The American Revolution delivered him by involving him in an all-absorbing cause. He became a politician, though a more unlikely one is hard to imagine. He was small, no more than five foot six. He was shy and guarded around strangers. He was not a brilliant orator. But what he lacked in charisma, he made up for in brainpower--and in his willingness to study and prepare."

Douglas Brinkley on James K. Polk: "Although he left the office of president an unpopular man, James Polk was the most successful one-term president the United States has known. He was a brilliant politician and an outstanding commander in chief whose hallmark was setting goals and accomplishing them. He, more than anyone else since Thomas Jefferson, ensured that U.S. interests would be protected from sea to shining sea."

Christopher Buckley on James Buchanan: "It's probably just as well that James Buchanan was our only bachelor president. There are no descendants bracing every morning on opening the paper to find another headline announcing 'Buchanan Once Again Rated Worst President in History.' The only consolation is that political scientists occasionally tire of ranking him last and, just for the heck of it, bump him up to next-to-worst president, with Warren Harding (temporarily) assuming the bottom slot on the greasy pole."

Jay Winik on Abraham Lincoln: "He instinctively understood the moral burdens he had to shoulder; he appreciated the high seriousness of the crisis; he grasped its tragic dimensions while never losing sight of the good that could somehow be made out of this awful conflict. And he did this with both a human empathy and a steely resolve that, even now, history has trouble fully sorting out or explaining."

John McCain on Theodore Roosevelt: "Were he alive today he would denounce both liberal and conservative extremes, for the former's emphasis on wants and the latter's emphasis on rights, and for their mutual disregard for the duties inherent in American citizenship. 'We have duties to others and duties to ourselves,' he avowed, 'and we can shirk neither.' The Roosevelt code gave equal respect to self-interest and common purpose, to rights and duties."

Peggy Noonan on John F. Kennedy: "President Kennedy did not mean to, but he ushered in the age of political weirdness, the age when it became a cliché that to be a president you had to be media-savvy, compelling, stylish. You had to be first an image, then a man. This has not served us well. Since his time we have seen a fairly odd assortment of individuals as president. But in part for just that reason, history is not going to stop being fascinated by him. He was the beginning of the modern age."

Harvey Mansfield on Ronald Reagan: "In everything he was optimistic and radiated optimism: 'America's best days are ahead of her.' He was averse to gloom, malaise (in contrast to President Carter), and sacrifice, yet he demanded greatness from his country. He gave the impression that from the industry and generosity of Americans and from the spontaneous freedom of human nature, greatness would come easy."

Paul Johnson on Bill Clinton: "Most of Clinton's time and energy as president were spent not on policy or executive activity but in defending himself against accusations. . . . This had one outstanding virtue. It turned the Clinton years into one of the longest periods of laissez-faire in U.S. history. If Clinton had been a continent man, and so with time to be an activist president, the consequences would almost certainly have been disastrous for the American economy. As it was, with the president busy elsewhere, the nation thrived mightily, as always when the White House does nothing."

Paul A. Gigot on George W. Bush: "Bush is a political risk-taker whose goals are ambitious enough that the conventional wisdom during his third year has been that he is 'over-reaching.' If he is denied re-election, it won't be because he tried to achieve too little. This Bush trait has surprised many, in particular his critics. When he was running for the job, they described him as an amiable but uncurious and dimwitted scion. Three years later those same critics are describing him as a Machiavelli bent on a 'radical' agenda at home and abroad. Clearly they missed something about Bush's political character."

Robert L. Bartley on presidential leadership in economic policy: "The economy has a natural tendency to grow, and even to right itself. The main job of presidents consists not of hyperactive interventions, but of reducing artificial impediments, largely erected by previous generations of politicians for purposes other than advancing prosperity. When it comes to the economy, we can hope presidents are generally learning that the secret of leadership is getting out of the way."

You can buy "Presidential Leadership: Rating the Best and the Worst in the White House" from the OpinionJournal bookstore.