C-SPAN's "Historians Survey of Presidential Leadership"
http://www.c-span.org/Pre...fault.aspx

Complete list here:
http://www.c-span.org/Pre...nking.aspx

"The American Presidents," Lyrics by Genevieve Madeline Ryan - score by Leonard Slatkin
http://www.whitehousehist...dents.html

Hal, I am not surprised that Truman made the top ten but the top five?

What specifically do you not like about W. Wilson besides that he was a pompous, prejudice A hole? I do find his philosophy on parliamentary government to be interesting. Especially in light of how much power that modern outside forces have over politicians AKA-lobbyist. I think some historians have a tendency to rank him higher because of his academia more so than his presidency. The criterion specifically states that, it is to be the Presidency that is ranked not what they did before or after.

On C-SPAN they discussed this survey and talked about how U.S. Grant had moved up and many think that is because of all the recent Lincoln debate concerning the civil war. His obvious association with Lincoln and his role in the Civil war boosted his stature.

I was surprised to see Eisenhower ranked so high - personally I would place Polk in his slot and move him down into the teens.

I've always thought of Grant as a sympathetic character - not a great president, but a good man at heart.



Problems with Wilson. It would take pages to go into the specifics of the details, but in broad terms. . . .

- -His management of foreign policy between August of 1914 and our entry into the War in 1917. The very timing of entry into the War. And even to a certain extent, questions whether we should have entered the war at all.

- -Once in the War, his insistence on an "American Peace." His insistence on taking center stage at Versailles.

- -His domestic policies during the War, this would include all the civil rights problems we read about as well as federal intervention in the war-time economy.

- -His choice of Robert Lansing to replace Bryan as Secretary of State. His decision to leave James Watson Gerard in place as ambassador to Germany after August 1914. His decision to leave Walter Hines Page in place as ambassador to England after August 1914. His choice of Newton D Baker as Secretary of War, especially after we entered the war.

- -I'll cut him some slack on his failure to bring the U.S. into the League of Nations, he was a very ill man by then, and I don't believe he could have pulled that one off, even had he been healthy.

Thanks Hal,
Your insights, as usual, are very insightful. It has been awhile since I have read anything on or studied anything about WW. I remember having a political science professor that loved Wilson. However, I have no judgments having not studied him lately.

Yeah, it's been a good 20 years since I've did any serious reading / research on the War or Wilson. I scan the journals once in a while to see what's being debated on the topics, but I don't have the enthusiasm for it that I once did . . . just a lingering distaste for the Wilson Presidency ;-)


I'm interested to see if Jack McRae will happen by and give us his take on the C-Span rankings.