Would you help me create a serious Worst President Poll?

I have only come up with five that I would definitely put on the list. However I welcome any challenge to my candidates:

Warren Harding
Ulysses Grant
John Tyler
James Buchanan
Andrew Johnson

I personally wouldn't vote for either of these two but they may deserve a place on the list:

Richard Nixon
Franklin D Roosevelt

Any input would be greatly appreciated.

 

OK, I guess that's reasonable and I certainly don't want to discourage anyone who is being reasonable, they're becoming all too rare on this board.

OTOH I may not have stated my point with clarity before so I will, with you kind permission, state an aspect of it I feel was neglected.

CAN you actually find a worst one? Isn't the answer to the question "who was worse" always, "it depends"? It may be possible that the nature of the Presidency does not allow for finding a best or worst. No one in such a complicated position could ever satisfy all of the shifting demands put on them

Given that, I suppose you could always make a sort of calculus, a "greatest harm to the greatest number" if I may dare such a paraphrase.

I still don't think I could be of any help now but I will monitor this thread with some interest and may post again if I see some way in which I might be helpful. I now believe this is a worthy endeavor and I wish you luck with it.

 

So
1. corruption
2. violating/ignoring Constitution
3. Maintaining peace and safety
4. Dividing country

These, I gather, are your four main criteria.

Andrew Johnson
1. Wasn't actually corrupt.
2. He was impeached largely for political reasons. He stood against Stanton and Grant, leaders during the war. Stanton was a member of the President's cabinet, appointed by the President, and he was primarily impeached for firing the popular Stanton without Congressional approval. It was later actually found that the corruption was in the effort to remove Johnson form office, as Senators were given promises in exchange for voting to remove him.
3. Johnson actually did reasonably well in maintaining the peace and safety.
4. The country wasn't really divided under Johnson, Johnson worked to unite the country, but his party wanted more 'vengeance' against the South, and so he split his party.

So it hardly seems that Johnson is even a real candidate based on these criteria. Now let's look at Buchanan.

1. Buchanan wasn't actually corrupt. There was an investigation into corruption charges, which found members of his cabinet had been corrupt, but failed to find any evidence of any wrongdoing on Buchanan's part.
2. Buchanan actually didn't take the significant action to stop secession that some wanted because of his strict adherence to the Constitution. He did not, as many did, believe that secession was legal, but neither did he believe that the Constitution offered the federal government any authority to stop it. 10th amendment.
3. Maintaining peace: well, technically peace was maintained by Buchanan. He let Southern states secede, and there actually was peace. It was Lincoln who made the first violent stroke in the Civil War. Many say that the South started it by firing on Sumter, but let's be clear. Before that, Lincoln called up troops to 'quell the rebellion', which is what caused the middle Southern states to secede (initial secession attempts in VA, for example, failed). As far as Sumter - it was a fort in the South, and when SC seceded, it was expected that the forts in the state would go with it. Not doing so would be like letting the British keep forts around Boston after the 13 colonies seceded.
4. The country divided, but not because of Buchanan's efforts, but in spite of it. Buchanan actually made many attempts to prevent secession, and his attempts largely succeeded. It was other things out of his control (such as the election) that ended up leading to secession, and Buchanan was faced with the same Constitutional issue as Lincoln: does the federal government have any right to use force to stop states from seceding? He didn't think so.

But I'll offer you another alternative: FDR.

1. FDR had connections with the NY Tammany Hall machine, which was incredibly corrupt (official appointments were bought/sold). His AG also had cleared union PACs supporting Roosevelt of corruption charges [again, I wouldn't blame FDR directly for this]. FDR's New Deal was also atrociously corrupt. And I'm not sure where to put his court-packing attempts, but it seems to belong in corruption. SCOTUS ruled some of FDR's key legislation unconstitutional, so he wanted to expand the number of seats on the court and pack it with people who'd support him. He wanted to expand it to 15 judges, so he could immediately appoint 6 he knew would back his plans entirely. This seems like double corruption, doesn't it? Expanding the court so that your plans aren't ruled unconstitutional, and appointing judges purely based on them supporting all your proposals? That's corruption.
2. a. detaining hundreds of thousands of US citizens without trial, based on race alone [Japanese internment camps]
b. wished to do the same as a to the millions of German US citizens, but was logistically unable
c. used FBI to spy on regular citizens without warrant
d. called for "land redistribution" (but never achieved it - I think this one was stopped by SCOTUS, but can't remember)
e. adjusted taxes by executive decree, was overridden by Congress
f. Not to drag on the court packing, but doesn't that violate the separation of powers?
g. Without any military action from Germany, FDR ordered the US military to attack German ships on sight - I'd consider that a violation of the war powers.
3. Maintaining peace. :/
a.FDR started the war with Germany. Without any offensive action from Germany, he ordered US naval and air forces to attack German ships and planes on sight.
b. FDR's foreign policy actions led to increased Japanese hostilities, culminating in Pearl Harbor.
c. FDR sent war materiel to countries at war, without compensation. The Lend-Lease Act was certainly Constitutional, but it was by no means a measure towards the maintenance of peace.
4. The Wealth Tax Act FDR pushed for was a political shenanigan. It only taxed those with incomes over 5million, which at the time was almost nobody. The only person who paid the top tax rate was a single Rockerfeller. So FDR was heavily engaged in class warfare, race warfare (see splitting off Japanese and Germans from American society), etc. Though, by some stroke, he did unite the country against foreign enemies.

I could go on but I'm just offering a suggestion, I don't wish to belabor the point making the case. Don't you think, by your criteria, FDR was the worst President?

You could of course change your criteria.

Change the titles. Even with a #.

 

I don't think that "greatest harm to the greatest number" would be such a good measure for US Presidents. Such terms often suggest that abiding by the Constitution is a bad thing, though we could just drop that Constitutional measurement if that's how people feel.

Also let me say I appreciate your involvement. This thread seems surprisingly devoid of petty partisanship so far, and I relish it haha.

 

criteria (in no particular order)
1. corruption
2. violating/ignoring Constitution
3. Maintaining peace and safety
4. Dividing country

Based on your criteria, I don't see Johnson or Buchanan as real candidates. There were a lot of corruption charges (and I think real corruption) in the Grant administration, but I think Grant wasn't that bad on 2, and actually did really well on 3&4. Tyler was an odd one - he certainly played a hand in starting the War with Mexico, but he also did a lot to unite the country, and I don't recall with Tyler corruption or violating the Constitution (except as involved with the War with Mexico). I'd appreciate explanation on that. Off hand I'm not familiar where you're coming from with Harding so I'd appreciate the case on that.

Nixon was obviously corrupt, and his corruption violated the Constitution, and that corruption did a lot to split the country. But Nixon did a lot to maintain peace and safety, to include pulling out of Vietnam (even if I think there were problems with how that was done, that's beside your established criteria). It just seems to me that the case against Nixon is primarily based on a single incident, and I don't know how I feel about a single incident qualifying a President for 'worst', but your criteria so far is pretty open on that.

I just laid out a case while FDR is a good candidate, based just on your criteria.

 

A serious analysis of the performances of the Presidents of the United States requires a historical approach. First of all we need to contextualize any President in his own time [we cannot expect from a late 19th century President the speed of reaction to crisis we can expect from a late 20th century President with all the organization and the technology available, just to make a mundane example].

Then we have to limit the parameters of evaluation to the functional ones to the Presidency [to be beautiful doesn't mean to be better, once the President is in the Office ...].

In the US institutional system the President has got all the executive power and can also influence the legislative one, so that such a wide power implies a wide responsibility.

So we can state a first point: to be President of the United States is very difficult and it implies a tremendous responsibility. This should generate a certain stress in the person of the President if he plays his role with real awareness of it and sense of duty towards the country.

This doesn't mean that more activity is equal to a better President, more diligence, loyalty, allegiance are equal to a better President.

An other factor to consider is that to be excellent in a field in not enough [there is who notes that Carter did well about environment, but this has to be put in a comprehensive evaluation of the Presidency].

So, this said, who were the worse ones?

From an external point of view [I'm European] I would make this brief list:

Martin Van Buren [President from 1837 to 1841] for the incredible economical ignorance he showed, causing the first Great Depression in US.
Wilson [President from 1913 to 1921] despite the Peace Nobel Prize, he wasn't able to play his role on the international scene and he still accepted the European conception of World Order [sometime I wonder how would have been the world if the President, after WW I, played different cards, the US were already a power of a certain weight, I mean ...]
Carter [President from 1977 to 1981] He was great with environment, but he didn't realize to be the President of a SuperPower [he simply, in my opinion, wasn't aware of his historical role].
Nixon, [President from 1969 to 1974], even if he wasn't that bad, the office of the President requires also to be able to play on the side of the people, otherwise there's no more a Republic. Nixon's pivotal mistake was that: he interpreted power in the wrong way.
Clinton, [President from 1993 to 2001], I know I'm not popular about this, but his Presidency saw the economical policies which created the bases of the great financial crisis during Bush / Obama administration. And generally he showed to be quite "mindless" about the importance of the office ...

 

A serious poll would NOT include any presidents after George H.W. Bush. Because by all rights a president should be out office at least 20 years before trying to make serious judgments about them.

 

Thanks birddog. I am working on putting together a poll for the 8 worst presidents ever excluding Bush and Obama. I'm going to use some of the criteria that you mentioned to see who would fall in 2nd, 3rd, 4th........... 8th and 9th place. Do you think would be willing to help out a little bit?

QUOTE=onalandline;1064713839]Obama...hands down...no contest...Jimmy Carter smiling.[/QUOTE]

Dear 3link, ArmySoldier, Kreitleinn, onalandline, and Tahuyaman;

Would you be willing to offer some of the criteria that makes Obama the worst president? If not, would you be willing to give us any 2nd, 3rd, 4th...... 8th and 9th place choices for worst president?

I'm trying to put together a poll of the worst 8 presidents which would exclude Bush and Obama. Any help that you could offer would be great.

 

I voted for Obama cause he's black and I'm a republican.

 

Dear dad2three, randlepatrickmcmurphy, yepdone5;

Would you be willing to offer some of the criteria that makes W Bush the worst president? If not, would you be willing to give us any 2nd, 3rd, 4th...... 8th and 9th place choices for worst president?

I'm trying to put together a poll of the worst 8 presidents which would exclude W Bush and Obama. Any help that you could offer would be great.

 

I do appreciate that. If that's your criteria then I suppose you are correct. I suppose Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream hasn't yet been realized. Your input is very little help since we have had no other darker president in US History. Supposedly Clinton was real chummy with the African American population. Supposedly Thomas Jefferson had multiple affairs with black women. Jefferson and Clinton were also Democrats. Based on your criteria, do you think it would be fair to include Clinton and Jefferson as runners up?

Once again. Thanks for the help. If you think of anything else that might have made Obama the worst president then I would appreciate it.

 

This is an interesting part of history. I have heard it said that Indian Reservations used to refuse to accept $20 bills because Andrew Jackson was on the bill. There is probably some truth to that claim. Although I would guess that today's Indian Reservations are a lot less principled and would gladly take your $20 bill.

 

3link is a troll.

 

Some of the names I listed were based upon names that were mentioned in the original thread.

John Tyler was a super (*)(*)(*)(*)(*)(*)bag. He revoked loyalty to the party that elected him. His entire cabinet resigned. Do you know what kind of chaos that could have caused? John Tyler could have been strong at avoiding corruption and strong at upholding the Constitution. I don't have an argument either way but he gave the middle finger to the people who elected him. I'm sure some of the distrust for government that occurred under Tyler's presidency has been passed down from generation to generation and still remains with us today. John Tyler was a great detriment to our nation.

Warren G Harding was a playboy who used his job as president as an opportunity to party like there was no tomorrow. He didn't take the job seriously. Some right wingers could compare Warren G Harding to Obama. Obama isn't quite a playboy but many people think he takes way too many vacations and spends too much time golfing.

You make a strong case for Franklin D Roosevelt. I don't think John Tyler can be taken off of the list. I am willing to back down on Harding if I find a better candidate. I'll consider giving Buchanan a pass as well but I think Andrew Johnson is a solid nominee. Abraham Lincoln pardoned all confederate soldiers for their act of treason. Andrew Johnson decided to arbitrarily punish the entire citizenry of the southern states. These were very divisive actions.

I would think that John Tyler and Andrew Johnson are solid nominees. Franklin D Roosevelt will probably end up on the list as well.

 

Well based on the established criteria the grievances you listed against Tyler don't mean anything, same for Harding. (*)(*)(*)(*)(*)(*)s maybe, but I thought we were trying to avoid popularity-type things for this?

Under different criteria FDR might be a candidate (even if not actually) the best President, but based on the Criteria we have he seems to be the worst.

 

It appears that way but I will take all suggestions seriously. I want to have 8 solid candidates. Nobody will be ignored in my period of data gathering. I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt. If he is serious then it really doesn't help me too much. He is going to have to give me something unrelated in order to help me find the best 8 contenders for the title of Worst President Ever.

 

Divisiveness is a pretty flexible term. In this exercise it is the catch22 for those bad presidents that avoided the smoking gun. Do you really think that John Tyler should get a pass? I'm ok with removing Harding from the running. We do have to have 8 names. I think there have only be 16 names mentioned. Two of those names are Bush and Obama. They will not be evaluated. They will be arbitrarily entered into one poll and arbitrarily removed from the other poll. We have to narrow those 14 names down to 8. Here is the names that I am seeing in this thread and the other thread:

Franklin D Roosevelt
James Buchanan
John Tyler
Warren G Harding
Richard Nixon
Ronald Reagan
Jimmy Carter
Woodrow Wilson
Ulysses G Grant
Andrew Jackson
Andrew Johnson
Herbert Hoover
William Harrison
John F Kennedy

Did I miss any?

 

Sorry. AlpineLuke mentioned Martin Van Buren and Bill Clinton as possible candidates.

 

Oxymoron & Troianii thinks we should consider Franklin D Roosevelt
IfIwasyou & Dayton3 thinks we should consider Richard Nixon
Mrbsct & rwild1967 thinks we should consider James Buchanan
Onemind thinks that we should consider Ronald Reagan
Crawdadr thinks that we should consider John Tyler
Strasser thinks that we should consider Abraham Lincoln
CircleBird thinks that we should consider Warren Harding
Apacherat thinks that we should consider Jimmy Carter

That's 8 names. Coincidence??

 

I was asked to join in.

Obama the worst by far. Carter 2nd worst. His policies led to high inflation, high interest rates, high unemployment, and a crummy economy. LBJ 3rd worst. He turned our country into a welfare state. And like Obama, he was more concerned with blocks of voters than leading the country. He was a racist who referred to African Americans in derogatory terms behind the scenes but pandered to their voting base to win their vote. A fake and a fraud just like Obama.

 

That is the first mention of Lyndon B Johnson. I do appreciate you adding diversity to the discussion. I have heard LBJ referred to in the light but that is the first mention of him in this poll or the poll of Kreitleinn.

 

The Great Society wasn't so great unless you believe in welfare. And his now infamous quote of securing the NI**** vote for the next 200 years is pitiful. He rode others coattails as supposedly being for civil rights yet was only concerned with locking up the African American vote.

Like I said, a fake and a fraud, just like Obama.

 

# 2. Richard Nixon,he was a lying crook as was # 3. R.Reagan,i had a good life till he became President.# 4. Daddy Bush,and # 5 J.Carter was weak Presidents.# 6 L.Johnson was President at the wrong time,the Vietnam war. did him in.# 7. Ike E. They were worst in my life time I remember.

 

I am requesting permission to omit these 23 names from the running:

George Washington
John Adams
Thomas Jefferson
James Madison
James Monroe
John Quincy Adams
James Polk
Zachary Taylor
Millard Fillmore
Franklin Pierce
Rutherford B Hayes
James A Garfield
Chester Arthur
Grover Cleveland
Benjamin Harrison
William McKinley
Theodore Roosevelt
William Taft
Calvin Coolidge
Harry S Truman
Dwight D Eisenhower
Gerald Ford
George H Bush

Does anybody have any objections? Does anybody see a reason why any of these 23 presidents should be considered?

 

If we can exclude those 23 then we are left with 18 candidates. The next step is narrowing it down to 8.

Here is the list of candidates for worst president ever excluding Obama and W Bush:

Andrew Jackson
Martin Van Buren
William Harrison
John Tyler
James Buchanan
Abraham Lincoln
Andrew Johnson
Ulysses S Grant
Woodrow Wilson
Warren Harding
Herbert Hoover
Franklin D Roosevelt
John F Kennedy
Lyndon B Johnson
Richard Nixon
Jimmy Carter
Ronald Reagan
Bill Clinton