Historical rankings of United States Presidents

Political science

Political Science is a social science discipline concerned with the study of the state, government and politics. Aristotle defined it as the study of the state. It deals extensively with the theory and practice of politics, and the analysis of political systems and political behavior...

, historical rankings of Presidents of the United States are surveys conducted in order to construct rankings of the success of individuals who have served as President of the United States

President of the United States

The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....

. Ranking systems are usually based on surveys of academic historian

Historian

A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all history in time. If the individual is...

s and political scientists or popular opinion. The rankings focus on the presidential achievements, leadership qualities, failures and faults.

General findings

George Washington

George Washington was the dominant military and political leader of the new United States of America from 1775 to 1799. He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783, and presided over the writing of...

, Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...

, and Franklin D. Roosevelt

Franklin D. Roosevelt

Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...

are consistently ranked at the top of the lists. Often ranked just below those three are Presidents Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...

and Theodore Roosevelt

Theodore Roosevelt

Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt was the 26th President of the United States . He is noted for his exuberant personality, range of interests and achievements, and his leadership of the Progressive Movement, as well as his "cowboy" persona and robust masculinity...

. The remaining places in the top 10 are often rounded out by Harry S. Truman

Harry S. Truman

Harry S. Truman was the 33rd President of the United States . As President Franklin D. Roosevelt's third vice president and the 34th Vice President of the United States , he succeeded to the presidency on April 12, 1945, when President Roosevelt died less than three months after beginning his...

, Woodrow Wilson

Woodrow Wilson

Thomas Woodrow Wilson was the 28th President of the United States, from 1913 to 1921. A leader of the Progressive Movement, he served as President of Princeton University from 1902 to 1910, and then as the Governor of New Jersey from 1911 to 1913...

, Dwight Eisenhower, and Andrew Jackson

Andrew Jackson

Andrew Jackson was the seventh President of the United States . Based in frontier Tennessee, Jackson was a politician and army general who defeated the Creek Indians at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend , and the British at the Battle of New Orleans...

. The bottom ten often include Warren G. Harding

Warren G. Harding

Warren Gamaliel Harding was the 29th President of the United States . A Republican from Ohio, Harding was an influential self-made newspaper publisher. He served in the Ohio Senate , as the 28th Lieutenant Governor of Ohio and as a U.S. Senator...

, James Buchanan

James Buchanan

James Buchanan, Jr. was the 15th President of the United States . He is the only president from Pennsylvania, the only president who remained a lifelong bachelor and the last to be born in the 18th century....

, Andrew Johnson

Andrew Johnson

Andrew Johnson was the 17th President of the United States . As Vice-President of the United States in 1865, he succeeded Abraham Lincoln following the latter's assassination. Johnson then presided over the initial and contentious Reconstruction era of the United States following the American...

, Franklin Pierce

Franklin Pierce

Franklin Pierce was the 14th President of the United States and is the only President from New Hampshire. Pierce was a Democrat and a "doughface" who served in the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate. Pierce took part in the Mexican-American War and became a brigadier general in the Army...

, William Henry Harrison

William Henry Harrison

William Henry Harrison was the ninth President of the United States , an American military officer and politician, and the first president to die in office. He was 68 years, 23 days old when elected, the oldest president elected until Ronald Reagan in 1980, and last President to be born before the...

, Millard Fillmore

Millard Fillmore

Millard Fillmore was the 13th President of the United States and the last member of the Whig Party to hold the office of president...

, Ulysses Grant, John Tyler

John Tyler

John Tyler was the tenth President of the United States . A native of Virginia, Tyler served as a state legislator, governor, U.S. representative, and U.S. senator before being elected Vice President . He was the first to succeed to the office of President following the death of a predecessor...

, Zachary Taylor

Zachary Taylor

Zachary Taylor was the 12th President of the United States and an American military leader. Initially uninterested in politics, Taylor nonetheless ran as a Whig in the 1848 presidential election, defeating Lewis Cass...

and Richard Nixon

Richard Nixon

Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...

. Both William Henry Harrison

William Henry Harrison

(32 days) and James A. Garfield (incapacitated after 119 days) died shortly after taking office, and are therefore sometimes omitted from the rankings as a result. It is not clear if their lower quartile rankings are meant to show that they are considered "poor" performers or rather that they have no record by which to rank them any higher.

Political scientist Walter Dean Burnham

Walter Dean Burnham

Walter Dean Burnham is a leading expert on American elections and voting patterns. He is best known for quantitative analysis of national trends and patterns in the popular vote, in developing the "Party Systems" model, and for assembling county election returns for the whole...

noted the "dichotomous or schizoid profiles" of presidents, which can make some hard to classify. Historian Alan Brinkley

Alan Brinkley

Alan Brinkley is the Allan Nevins Professor of History at Columbia University, where he was also Provost 2003–2009. He was denied tenure at Harvard University in 1986 despite being an award-winning teacher. He lives in New York City with his wife, Evangeline, daughter Elly, and dog Jessie...

said, "There are presidents who could be considered both failures and great or near great (for example, Nixon

Richard Nixon

)". James MacGregor Burns observed of Nixon, "How can one evaluate such an idiosyncratic president, so brilliant and so morally lacking?"

David H. Donald

David Herbert Donald

- Career :Majoring in history and sociology, Donald earned his bachelor degree from Millsaps College in Jackson, Mississippi. He earned his PhD in 1946 under the eminent, leading Lincoln scholar, James G. Randall at the University of Illinois...

, noted biographer of Lincoln, relates that when he met John F. Kennedy

John F. Kennedy

John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....

in 1962, Kennedy voiced his deep dissatisfaction and resentment with historians who had rated some of his predecessors. Kennedy said, "No one has a right to grade a President—even poor James Buchanan—who has not sat in his chair, examined the mail and information that came across his desk, and learned why he made his decisions."

Notable scholar surveys

The 1948 poll was conducted by historian Arthur M. Schlesinger, Sr.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Sr.

Arthur Meier Schlesinger, Sr. was an American historian. His son, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. was also a noted historian.-Life and career:...

of Harvard University

Harvard University

Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...

. The 1962 survey was also conducted by Schlesinger, who surveyed 75 historians. Schlesinger's son Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. conducted another poll in 1996.

The Complete Book of U.S. Presidents also gives the results of the 1982 survey, a poll of 49 historians conducted by the Chicago Tribune
Chicago Tribune
The Chicago Tribune is a major daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, and the flagship publication of the Tribune Company. Formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" , it remains the most read daily newspaper of the Chicago metropolitan area and the Great Lakes region and is...

. A notable difference from the 1962 Schlesinger poll was the ranking of President Dwight D. Eisenhower

Dwight D. Eisenhower

Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower was the 34th President of the United States, from 1953 until 1961. He was a five-star general in the United States Army...

, who was ranked #22 in 1962, but was ranked #9 in the 1982 survey.

The Siena Research Institute

Siena Research Institute

Siena Research Institute is an affiliate of Siena College, located originally in Friars Hall and now in Hines Hall on the college's campus, in Loudonville, New York, in suburban Albany. It was founded in 1980....

of Siena College

Siena College

Siena College is an independent Roman Catholic liberal arts college in Loudonville, in the town of Colonie, New York, United States. Siena is a four-year, coeducational, independent college in the Franciscan tradition, founded by the Franciscan Friars in 1937. It has 3,000 full-time students and...

conducted surveys in 1982, 1990, 1994, 2002, and 2010. The 1994 survey placed only two Presidents, Franklin Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln

, above 80 points, and placed two Presidents, Andrew Johnson

Andrew Johnson

and Warren G. Harding

Warren G. Harding

, below 50 points.

The 1996 column shows the results from a poll conducted from 1989 to 1996 by William J. Ridings, Jr. and Stuart B. McIver, and published in the book Rating the Presidents: A Ranking of U.S. leaders, from the Great and Honorable to the Dishonest and Incompetent. More than 719 people took part in the poll, primarily academic historians and political scientists, although some politicians and celebrities also took part. Participants from every state were included, and emphasis was placed upon getting input from female historians and "specialists in African-American studies", as well as a few non-American historians. Poll respondents rated the Presidents in five categories (leadership qualities, accomplishments & crisis management, political skill, appointments, character & integrity), and the results were tabulated to create the overall ranking.

A 2000 survey by The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal is an American English-language international daily newspaper. It is published in New York City by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corporation, along with the Asian and European editions of the Journal....

consisted of an "ideologically balanced group of 132 prominent professors of history, law, and political science". This poll sought to include an equal number of liberals and conservatives in the survey, as the editors argued that previous polls were dominated by either one group or the other, but never balanced. According to the editors, this poll included responses from more women, minorities, and young professors than the 1996 Schlesinger poll. The editors noted that the results of their poll were "remarkably similar" to the 1996 Schlesinger poll, with the main difference in the 2000 poll being the lower rankings for the 1960s presidents Lyndon B. Johnson

Lyndon B. Johnson

Lyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...

and John F. Kennedy

John F. Kennedy

John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....

, and higher ranking of President Ronald Reagan

Ronald Reagan

Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....

at #8. Franklin Roosevelt still ranked in the top three.

Another presidential poll was conducted by The Wall Street Journal in 2005, with James Lindgren

James Lindgren

James Lindgren is a professor of law at Northwestern University. Born in 1952 in Rockford, Illinois, Lindgren graduated from Yale College and the University of Chicago Law School , where he was an editor of the University of Chicago Law Review. He received his Ph.D...

of Northwestern University Law School for the Federalist Society

Federalist Society

The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies, most frequently called simply the Federalist Society, is an organization of conservatives seeking reform of the current American legal system in accordance with a textualist and/or originalist interpretation of the U.S. Constitution...

. As in the 2000 survey, the editors sought to balance the opinions of liberals and conservatives, adjusting the results "to give Democratic- and Republican-leaning scholars equal weight." Franklin D. Roosevelt

Franklin D. Roosevelt

still ranked in the top-three, but editor James Taranto

James Taranto

James Taranto is an American columnist for The Wall Street Journal, editor of its online editorial page OpinionJournal.com and a member of the newspaper's editorial board. He is best known for his daily online column Best of the Web Today...

noted that Democratic-leaning scholars rated George W. Bush

George W. Bush

George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....

the sixth-worst president of all time, while Republican scholars rated him the sixth-best, giving him a split-decision rating of "average".

A 2006 Siena College

Siena College

poll of 744 professors reported the following results:

"George W. Bush has just finished five years as President. If today were the last day of his presidency, how would you rank him? The responses were: Great: 2%; Near Great: 5%; Average: 11%; Below Average: 24%; Failure: 58%."
"In your judgment, do you think he has a realistic chance of improving his rating?” Two-thirds (67%) responded no; less than a quarter (23%) responded yes; and 10% chose no opinion or not applicable."

Thomas Kelly, professor emeritus of American studies at Siena College, said: "President Bush would seem to have small hope for high marks from the current generation of practicing historians and political scientists. In this case, current public opinion polls actually seem to cut the President more slack than the experts do." Dr. Douglas Lonnstrom, Siena College
professor of statistics and director of the Siena Research Institute, stated: "In our 2002 presidential rating, with a group of experts comparable to this current poll, President Bush ranked 23rd of 42 presidents. That was shortly after 9/11. Clearly, the professors do not think things have gone well for him in the past few years. These are the experts that teach college students today and will write the history of this era tomorrow."

A 2010 Siena poll of 238 Presidential scholars found that former president George W. Bush was ranked 39th out of 43, with poor ratings in handling of the economy, communication, ability to compromise, foreign policy accomplishments and intelligence. Meanwhile, the current president, Barack Obama

Barack Obama

Barack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...

was ranked 15th out of 43, with high ratings for imagination, communication ability and intelligence and a low rating for background (family, education and experience).

The C-SPAN

C-SPAN

C-SPAN , an acronym for Cable-Satellite Public Affairs Network, is an American cable television network that offers coverage of federal government proceedings and other public affairs programming via its three television channels , one radio station and a group of websites that provide streaming...

Survey of Presidential Leadership consists of rankings from a group of presidential historians and "professional observers of the presidency" who ranked presidents in a number of categories initially in 2000 and more recently in 2009. With some minor variation, both surveys found that historians consider Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln

, George Washington

George Washington

, and Franklin D. Roosevelt

Franklin D. Roosevelt

the three best presidents by a wide margin and William Henry Harrison

William Henry Harrison

(to a lesser extent), Warren G. Harding

Warren G. Harding

, Andrew Johnson

Andrew Johnson

, Franklin Pierce

Franklin Pierce

, and James Buchanan

James Buchanan

the worst.

In 2008, The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...

newspaper asked eight of its own "top international and political commentators" to rank all 42 US presidents "in order of greatness".

In 2011, through the agency of its United States Presidency Centre [USPC], the Institute for the Study of the Americas (located in the University of London’s School of Advanced Study) released the first ever U.K. academic survey to rate U.S. presidents. This polled the opinion of U.K. specialists in U.S. history and political studies to assess presidential performance and produced an overall rating on the basis of the responses. They also gave an interim assessment of Barack Obama, but his unfinished presidency was not included in the survey (had he been included, he would have attained eighth place overall).

Scholar survey results

Blue backgrounds indicate first quartile.
Green backgrounds indicate second quartile.
Orange backgrounds indicate third quartile.
Red backgrounds indicate fourth quartile.

Note: Click the "sort" icon at the head of each column to view the rankings for each survey in numerical order.

No	President	Political party	Schlesinger 1948 poll rank	Schlesinger 1962 poll rank	1982 Murray-Blessing survey	Chicago Tribune 1982 poll rank	Siena 1982 poll rank	Siena 1990 poll rank	Siena 1994 poll rank	Ridings- McIver 1996 poll rank	Schlesinger 1996 poll rank	CSPAN 1999 poll rank	Wall Street Journal 2000 poll rank	Siena 2002 poll rank	Wall Street Journal 2005 poll rank !! Times 2008 poll rank !! CSPAN 2009 poll rank !! Siena 2010 poll rank !! USPC 2011 poll rank !! Aggregate ranking
01		None	02	02	03	03	04	04	04	03	02	03	01	04	01	02	02	04	03	03
02		Federalist	09	10	09	14 (tie)	10	14	12	14	11	16	13	12	13	13	17	17	12	12
03		Dem-Repub	05	05	04	05	02	03	05	04	04	07	04	05	04	04	07	05	04	04
04		Dem-Repub	14	12	14	17	09	08	09	10	17	18	15	09	17	15	20	06	14	13
05		Dem-Repub	12	18	15	16	15	11	15	13	15	14	16	08	16	21	14	07	13	14 (tie)
06		Dem-Repub	11	13	16	19	17	16	17	18	18	19	20	17	25	16	19	19	20	18
07		Democratic Democratic Party (United States) The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...	06	06	07	06	13	09	11	08	05	13	06	13	10	14	13	14	09	08 (tie)
08		Democratic	15	17	20	18	21	21	22	21	21	30	23	24	27	40	31	23	27	24
09		Whig Whig Party (United States) The Whig Party was a political party of the United States during the era of Jacksonian democracy. Considered integral to the Second Party System and operating from the early 1830s to the mid-1850s, the party was formed in opposition to the policies of President Andrew Jackson and his Democratic...	–	–	–	38	26	35	28	35	–	37	–	36	–	39	39	35	–	38 (tie)
10		Whig	22	25	28	29	34	33	34	34	32	36	34	37	35	31	35	37	37	36
11		Democratic	10	08	12	11	12	13	14	11	09	12	10	11	09	09	12	12	16	10
12		Whig	25	24	27	28	29	34	33	29	29	28	31	34	33	28	29	33	33	35
13		Whig	24	26	29	31	32	32	35	36	31	35	35	38	36	33	37	38	35	38 (tie)
14		Democratic	27	28	31	35	35	36	37	37	33	39	37	39	38	41	40	40	39	40
15		Democratic	26	29	33	36	37	38	39	40	38	41	39	41	40	42	42	42	40	42
16		Republican Republican Party (United States) The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S... /National Union National Union Party (United States) The National Union Party was the name used by the Republican Party for the national ticket in the 1864 presidential election, held during the Civil War. State Republican parties did not usually change their name....	01	01	01	01	03	02	02	01	01	01	02	02	02	01	01	03	02	01
17		Democratic/National Union	19	23	32	32	38	39	40	39	37	40	36	42	37	24	41	43	36	41
18		Republican	28	30	35	30	36	37	38	38	34	33	32	35	29	18	23	26	29	37
19		Republican	13	14	22	22	22	23	24	25	23	26	22	27	24	27	33	31	30	25
20		Republican	–	–	–	33	25	30	26	30	–	29	–	33	–	34	28	27	–	29 (tie)
21		Republican	17	21	26	24	24	26	27	28	26	32	26	30	26	22	32	25	32	28
22/24		Democratic	08	11	17	13	18	17	19	16	13	17	12	20	12	19	21	20	21	19
23		Republican	21	20	23	25	31	29	30	31	19	31	27	32	30	30	30	34	34	33
25		Republican	18	15	18	10	19	19	18	17	16	15	14	19	14	17	16	21	17	20 (tie)
26		Republican	07	07	05	04	05	05	03	05	06	04	05	03	05	05	04	02	05	05
27		Republican	16	16	19	20	20	20	21	20	22	24	19	21	20	29	24	24	25	22 (tie)
28		Democratic	04	04	06	07	06	06	06	06	07	06	11	06	11	10	09	08	06	06
29		Republican	29	31	36	37	39	40	41	41	39	38	37	40	39	35	38	41	38	43
30		Republican	23	27	30	27	30	31	36	33	30	27	25	29	23	26	26	29	28	31
31		Republican	20	19	21	21	27	28	29	24	35	34	29	31	31	36	34	36	26	29 (tie)
32		Democratic	03	03	02	02	01	01	01	02	03	02	03	01	03	03	03	01	01	02
33		Democratic	–	09	08	08	07	07	07	07	08	05	07	07	07	07	05	09	07	07
34		Republican	–	22	11	09	11	12	08	09	10	09	09	10	08	06	08	10	10	08 (tie)
35		Democratic	–	–	13	14 (tie)	08	10	10	15	12	08	18	14	15	11	06	11	15	11
36		Democratic	–	–	10	12	14	15	13	12	14	10	17	15	18	12	11	16	11	14 (tie)
37		Republican	–	–	34	34	28	25	23	32	36	25	33	26	32	38	27	30	23	32
38		Republican	–	–	24	23	23	27	32	27	28	23	28	28	28	25	22	28	24	26
39		Democratic	–	–	25	26	33	24	25	19	27	22	30	25	34	32	25	32	18	27
40		Republican	–	–	–	–	16 *	22	20	26	25	11	08	16	06	08	10	18	08	17
41		Republican	–	–	–	–	–	18 *	31	22	24	20	21	22	21	20	18	22	22	22 (tie)
42		Democratic	–	–	–	–	–	–	16 *	23 *	20 *	21 *	24 *	18	22	23	15	13	19	20 (tie)
43		Republican	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	23 *	19 *	37 *	36	39	31	34
44		Democratic	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	15 *	–	14 (tie) *
	Total in survey		29	31	36	38	39	40	41	41	39	41	39	42	40	42	42	43	40	43

* Ranking calculated before President had completed his term in office

Because Grover Cleveland

Grover Cleveland

Stephen Grover Cleveland was the 22nd and 24th president of the United States. Cleveland is the only president to serve two non-consecutive terms and therefore is the only individual to be counted twice in the numbering of the presidents...

served two non-consecutive terms as both the 22nd and 24th President, the total number of Presidents in each poll is at least one less than the number of the most recently serving President in the poll. Because of their short time in office, Presidents William Henry Harrison

William Henry Harrison

(32 days) and James A. Garfield (incapacitated after 119 days) are sometimes omitted from these polls. It is not clear if their lower quartile rankings are meant to show that they are considered "poor" performers or rather that they have no record by which to rank them any higher.

The surveys have been criticized for the way they have been organized. At times, the surveys have had low responses. The issue of the validity of the rankings has been of special interest to historians and political scientists, who have tried to specify the relative importance of personality, leadership, issues and partisanship. It has also been argued that those surveyed have tended to select their choices from personal preference rather than from a neutral perspective. Quantitative ranking by groups of scholars has been in favor in recent decades, displacing the traditional methods of evaluation by individual writers as typified by Bailey (1966) and most biographers.

Liberal and conservative raters

The Murray-Blessing 1982 survey asked historians whether they were liberal or conservative on domestic, social and economic issues. The table below shows that the two groups had only small differences in ranking the best and worst presidents. Both groups agreed on the composition of nine of the top ten Presidents (and were split over the inclusion of either Lyndon B. Johnson

Lyndon B. Johnson

Lyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...

or Dwight D. Eisenhower

Dwight D. Eisenhower

Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower was the 34th President of the United States, from 1953 until 1961. He was a five-star general in the United States Army...

), and six of the worst seven (split over Jimmy Carter

Jimmy Carter

James Earl "Jimmy" Carter, Jr. is an American politician who served as the 39th President of the United States and was the recipient of the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize, the only U.S. President to have received the Prize after leaving office...

or Calvin Coolidge

Calvin Coolidge

John Calvin Coolidge, Jr. was the 30th President of the United States . A Republican lawyer from Vermont, Coolidge worked his way up the ladder of Massachusetts state politics, eventually becoming governor of that state...

). Conservatives placed Democrat

Democratic Party (United States)

The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...

Harry S. Truman

at a higher ranking.

Rankings by Liberals and Conservatives
Rank	Liberals (n=190)	Conservatives (n=50)
1	Abraham Lincoln	Abraham Lincoln
2	Franklin D. Roosevelt	Washington
3	Washington	Franklin D. Roosevelt
4	Jefferson	Jefferson
5	Theodore Roosevelt	Theodore Roosevelt
6	Wilson	Jackson
7	Jackson	Truman
8	Truman	Wilson
9	Lyndon B. Johnson	Eisenhower
10	John Adams	John Adams
...
30	Coolidge	Carter
31	Pierce	Nixon
32	Buchanan	Pierce
33	Andrew Johnson	Andrew Johnson
34	Grant	Buchanan
35	Nixon	Grant
36	Harding	Harding

Excluded groups ratings approach

In 2002, Ronald Walters, former director of the University of Maryland

University of Maryland

When the term "University of Maryland" is used without any qualification, it generally refers to the University of Maryland, College Park.University of Maryland may refer to the following:...

's African American Leadership Institute, stated that Presidents rated by how each President balanced the interests of majority interests and the interests of excluded groups was practical in respect to American debate on racial politics. Presidents have traditionally been rated on personal qualities and their leadership ability to solve problems that move the nation in a positive direction. Walters stated there was a qualitative difference between white and African American

African American

African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...

intellectuals in evaluating Presidents. In the 1996 New York Times Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.

Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.

Arthur Meier Schlesinger, Jr. was an American historian and social critic whose work explored the American liberalism of political leaders including Franklin D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, and Robert F. Kennedy. A Pulitzer Prize winner, Schlesinger served as special assistant and "court historian"...

poll, 31 white historians and one black historian rated Presidents on differing categories of greatness. In a survey done by Professor Hanes Walton, Jr., and Professor Robert Smith, in their text book American Politics And The African American Quest For Universal Freedom, 44 African American

African American

political scientists and historians rated Presidents in terms of racial attitudes and racial legislation proposed.

C-SPAN poll

In addition to conducting a historian survey, C-Span also conducted a presidential leadership survey for viewers, taken in December 1999, which 1145 people participated in.

Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...
George Washington
George Washington
George Washington was the dominant military and political leader of the new United States of America from 1775 to 1799. He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783, and presided over the writing of...
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt was the 26th President of the United States . He is noted for his exuberant personality, range of interests and achievements, and his leadership of the Progressive Movement, as well as his "cowboy" persona and robust masculinity...
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
Harry S. Truman
Harry S. Truman
Harry S. Truman was the 33rd President of the United States . As President Franklin D. Roosevelt's third vice president and the 34th Vice President of the United States , he succeeded to the presidency on April 12, 1945, when President Roosevelt died less than three months after beginning his...
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower was the 34th President of the United States, from 1953 until 1961. He was a five-star general in the United States Army...
James Monroe
James Monroe
James Monroe was the fifth President of the United States . Monroe was the last president who was a Founding Father of the United States, and the last president from the Virginia dynasty and the Republican Generation...
James Madison
James Madison
James Madison, Jr. was an American statesman and political theorist. He was the fourth President of the United States and is hailed as the “Father of the Constitution” for being the primary author of the United States Constitution and at first an opponent of, and then a key author of the United...
John Adams
John Adams
John Adams was an American lawyer, statesman, diplomat and political theorist. A leading champion of independence in 1776, he was the second President of the United States...
John F. Kennedy
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....
Woodrow Wilson
Woodrow Wilson
Thomas Woodrow Wilson was the 28th President of the United States, from 1913 to 1921. A leader of the Progressive Movement, he served as President of Princeton University from 1902 to 1910, and then as the Governor of New Jersey from 1911 to 1913...
Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson was the seventh President of the United States . Based in frontier Tennessee, Jackson was a politician and army general who defeated the Creek Indians at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend , and the British at the Battle of New Orleans...
John Quincy Adams
John Quincy Adams
John Quincy Adams was the sixth President of the United States . He served as an American diplomat, Senator, and Congressional representative. He was a member of the Federalist, Democratic-Republican, National Republican, and later Anti-Masonic and Whig parties. Adams was the son of former...
George H.W. Bush
James K. Polk
James K. Polk
James Knox Polk was the 11th President of the United States . Polk was born in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina. He later lived in and represented Tennessee. A Democrat, Polk served as the 17th Speaker of the House of Representatives and the 12th Governor of Tennessee...
William McKinley
William McKinley
William McKinley, Jr. was the 25th President of the United States . He is best known for winning fiercely fought elections, while supporting the gold standard and high tariffs; he succeeded in forging a Republican coalition that for the most part dominated national politics until the 1930s...
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...
Richard Nixon
Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...
Grover Cleveland
Grover Cleveland
Stephen Grover Cleveland was the 22nd and 24th president of the United States. Cleveland is the only president to serve two non-consecutive terms and therefore is the only individual to be counted twice in the numbering of the presidents...
Calvin Coolidge
Calvin Coolidge
John Calvin Coolidge, Jr. was the 30th President of the United States . A Republican lawyer from Vermont, Coolidge worked his way up the ladder of Massachusetts state politics, eventually becoming governor of that state...
Gerald Ford
Gerald Ford
Gerald Rudolph "Jerry" Ford, Jr. was the 38th President of the United States, serving from 1974 to 1977, and the 40th Vice President of the United States serving from 1973 to 1974...
William Howard Taft
William Howard Taft
William Howard Taft was the 27th President of the United States and later the tenth Chief Justice of the United States...
Zachary Taylor
Zachary Taylor
Zachary Taylor was the 12th President of the United States and an American military leader. Initially uninterested in politics, Taylor nonetheless ran as a Whig in the 1848 presidential election, defeating Lewis Cass...
Rutherford B. Hayes
Rutherford B. Hayes
Rutherford Birchard Hayes was the 19th President of the United States . As president, he oversaw the end of Reconstruction and the United States' entry into the Second Industrial Revolution...
Jimmy Carter
Jimmy Carter
James Earl "Jimmy" Carter, Jr. is an American politician who served as the 39th President of the United States and was the recipient of the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize, the only U.S. President to have received the Prize after leaving office...
James A. Garfield
Ulysses S. Grant
Ulysses S. Grant
Ulysses S. Grant was the 18th President of the United States as well as military commander during the Civil War and post-war Reconstruction periods. Under Grant's command, the Union Army defeated the Confederate military and ended the Confederate States of America...
Martin Van Buren
Martin Van Buren
Martin Van Buren was the eighth President of the United States . Before his presidency, he was the eighth Vice President and the tenth Secretary of State, under Andrew Jackson ....
Benjamin Harrison
Benjamin Harrison
Benjamin Harrison was the 23rd President of the United States . Harrison, a grandson of President William Henry Harrison, was born in North Bend, Ohio, and moved to Indianapolis, Indiana at age 21, eventually becoming a prominent politician there...
John Tyler
John Tyler
John Tyler was the tenth President of the United States . A native of Virginia, Tyler served as a state legislator, governor, U.S. representative, and U.S. senator before being elected Vice President . He was the first to succeed to the office of President following the death of a predecessor...
Herbert Hoover
Herbert Hoover
Herbert Clark Hoover was the 31st President of the United States . Hoover was originally a professional mining engineer and author. As the United States Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s under Presidents Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge, he promoted partnerships between government and business...
Chester A. Arthur
Chester A. Arthur
Chester Alan Arthur was the 21st President of the United States . Becoming President after the assassination of President James A. Garfield, Arthur struggled to overcome suspicions of his beginnings as a politician from the New York City Republican machine, succeeding at that task by embracing...
William Henry Harrison
William Henry Harrison
William Henry Harrison was the ninth President of the United States , an American military officer and politician, and the first president to die in office. He was 68 years, 23 days old when elected, the oldest president elected until Ronald Reagan in 1980, and last President to be born before the...
Bill Clinton
Bill Clinton
William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...
Millard Fillmore
Millard Fillmore
Millard Fillmore was the 13th President of the United States and the last member of the Whig Party to hold the office of president...
Andrew Johnson
Andrew Johnson
Andrew Johnson was the 17th President of the United States . As Vice-President of the United States in 1865, he succeeded Abraham Lincoln following the latter's assassination. Johnson then presided over the initial and contentious Reconstruction era of the United States following the American...
Franklin Pierce
Franklin Pierce
Franklin Pierce was the 14th President of the United States and is the only President from New Hampshire. Pierce was a Democrat and a "doughface" who served in the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate. Pierce took part in the Mexican-American War and became a brigadier general in the Army...
Warren G. Harding
Warren G. Harding
Warren Gamaliel Harding was the 29th President of the United States . A Republican from Ohio, Harding was an influential self-made newspaper publisher. He served in the Ohio Senate , as the 28th Lieutenant Governor of Ohio and as a U.S. Senator...
James Buchanan
James Buchanan
James Buchanan, Jr. was the 15th President of the United States . He is the only president from Pennsylvania, the only president who remained a lifelong bachelor and the last to be born in the 18th century....

ABC poll

An ABC

American Broadcasting Company

The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...

News poll about presidential greatness, taken 16–20 February 2000, asked 1,012 adults in the US, "Who do you think was the greatest American president?"

Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...

(19%)
John F. Kennedy
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....

(17%)
Franklin Roosevelt (11%)
No opinion (10%)
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....

(9%)
George Washington
George Washington
George Washington was the dominant military and political leader of the new United States of America from 1775 to 1799. He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783, and presided over the writing of...

(8%)
Bill Clinton
Bill Clinton
William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...

(7%)
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt was the 26th President of the United States . He is noted for his exuberant personality, range of interests and achievements, and his leadership of the Progressive Movement, as well as his "cowboy" persona and robust masculinity...

(4%)
George H.W. Bush (4%)
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...

(3%)
Harry Truman (2%)
Richard Nixon
Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...

(2%)
Jimmy Carter
Jimmy Carter
James Earl "Jimmy" Carter, Jr. is an American politician who served as the 39th President of the United States and was the recipient of the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize, the only U.S. President to have received the Prize after leaving office...

(1%)
Dwight Eisenhower (1%)

Washington College poll

A Washington College

Washington College

Washington College is a private, independent liberal arts college located on a campus in Chestertown, Maryland, on the Eastern Shore. Maryland granted Washington College its charter in 1782...

poll about presidential greatness, taken February 11, 2005, asked 800 adults in the US, "Thinking about all the presidents of the United States throughout history to the present, who would you say was America's greatest president?"

Abraham Lincoln (20%)
Ronald Reagan (15%)
Franklin D. Roosevelt (12%)
John F. Kennedy (11%)
Bill Clinton (10%)
Other/Don't Know (9%)
George W. Bush (8%)
George Washington (6%)
Theodore Roosevelt (3%)
Dwight Eisenhower (3%)
Jimmy Carter (2%)
Thomas Jefferson (2%)
Richard Nixon (1%)
John Adams (<1%)
Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson was the seventh President of the United States . Based in frontier Tennessee, Jackson was a politician and army general who defeated the Creek Indians at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend , and the British at the Battle of New Orleans...

(<1%)
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...

(<1%)

Gallup poll

A Gallup poll about presidential greatness, taken February 2–5, 2011, asked 1015 adults in the US, "Who do you regard as the greatest United States president?"

Ronald Reagan (19%)
Abraham Lincoln (14%)
Bill Clinton (13%)
John F. Kennedy (11%)
George Washington (10%)
Franklin Roosevelt (8%)
Barack Obama (5%)
No opinion (5%)
Theodore Roosevelt (3%)
Harry Truman (3%)
George W. Bush (2%)
Thomas Jefferson (2%)
Jimmy Carter (1%)
Dwight Eisenhower (1%)
George H. W. Bush (1%)
Other(1%)
None (1%)
Andrew Jackson (0%)
Lyndon Johnson (0%)
Richard Nixon (0%)

Rasmussen Reports poll

A Rasmussen Reports

Rasmussen Reports

Rasmussen Reports is an American media company that publishes and distributes information based on public opinion polling. Founded by pollster Scott Rasmussen in 2003, the company updates daily indexes including the President's job approval rating, and provides public opinion data, analysis, and...

poll taken June 13–24 of 2007 asked 1,000 randomly selected adults to rate America's presidents. Six presidents—George Washington

George Washington

, Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln

, Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson

, Theodore Roosevelt

Theodore Roosevelt

, Franklin D. Roosevelt

Franklin D. Roosevelt

, and John F. Kennedy

John F. Kennedy

John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....

—were rated favorably by at least 80% of respondents.

President	Favorable	Unfavorable
George Washington George Washington George Washington was the dominant military and political leader of the new United States of America from 1775 to 1799. He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783, and presided over the writing of...	94	2
Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...	92	4
Thomas Jefferson Thomas Jefferson Thomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...	89	4
Theodore Roosevelt Theodore Roosevelt Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt was the 26th President of the United States . He is noted for his exuberant personality, range of interests and achievements, and his leadership of the Progressive Movement, as well as his "cowboy" persona and robust masculinity...	84	8
Franklin D. Roosevelt Franklin D. Roosevelt Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...	81	12
John F. Kennedy John F. Kennedy John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....	80	13
John Adams John Adams John Adams was an American lawyer, statesman, diplomat and political theorist. A leading champion of independence in 1776, he was the second President of the United States...	74	9
James Madison James Madison James Madison, Jr. was an American statesman and political theorist. He was the fourth President of the United States and is hailed as the “Father of the Constitution” for being the primary author of the United States Constitution and at first an opponent of, and then a key author of the United...	73	8
Ronald Reagan Ronald Reagan Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....	72	22
Dwight D. Eisenhower Dwight D. Eisenhower Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower was the 34th President of the United States, from 1953 until 1961. He was a five-star general in the United States Army...	72	15
Harry S. Truman Harry S. Truman Harry S. Truman was the 33rd President of the United States . As President Franklin D. Roosevelt's third vice president and the 34th Vice President of the United States , he succeeded to the presidency on April 12, 1945, when President Roosevelt died less than three months after beginning his...	70	14
Andrew Jackson Andrew Jackson Andrew Jackson was the seventh President of the United States . Based in frontier Tennessee, Jackson was a politician and army general who defeated the Creek Indians at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend , and the British at the Battle of New Orleans...	69	14
Gerald Ford Gerald Ford Gerald Rudolph "Jerry" Ford, Jr. was the 38th President of the United States, serving from 1974 to 1977, and the 40th Vice President of the United States serving from 1973 to 1974...	62	26
John Quincy Adams John Quincy Adams John Quincy Adams was the sixth President of the United States . He served as an American diplomat, Senator, and Congressional representative. He was a member of the Federalist, Democratic-Republican, National Republican, and later Anti-Masonic and Whig parties. Adams was the son of former...	59	7
Ulysses S. Grant Ulysses S. Grant Ulysses S. Grant was the 18th President of the United States as well as military commander during the Civil War and post-war Reconstruction periods. Under Grant's command, the Union Army defeated the Confederate military and ended the Confederate States of America...	58	24
George H.W. Bush	57	41
Jimmy Carter Jimmy Carter James Earl "Jimmy" Carter, Jr. is an American politician who served as the 39th President of the United States and was the recipient of the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize, the only U.S. President to have received the Prize after leaving office...	57	34
William Taft	57	15
Woodrow Wilson Woodrow Wilson Thomas Woodrow Wilson was the 28th President of the United States, from 1913 to 1921. A leader of the Progressive Movement, he served as President of Princeton University from 1902 to 1910, and then as the Governor of New Jersey from 1911 to 1913...	56	19
Bill Clinton Bill Clinton William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...	55	41
James Monroe James Monroe James Monroe was the fifth President of the United States . Monroe was the last president who was a Founding Father of the United States, and the last president from the Virginia dynasty and the Republican Generation...	49	10
Herbert Hoover Herbert Hoover Herbert Clark Hoover was the 31st President of the United States . Hoover was originally a professional mining engineer and author. As the United States Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s under Presidents Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge, he promoted partnerships between government and business...	48	34
Lyndon B. Johnson Lyndon B. Johnson Lyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...	45	42
Andrew Johnson Andrew Johnson Andrew Johnson was the 17th President of the United States . As Vice-President of the United States in 1865, he succeeded Abraham Lincoln following the latter's assassination. Johnson then presided over the initial and contentious Reconstruction era of the United States following the American...	45	26
Chester Arthur	43	17
James A. Garfield	42	16
William McKinley William McKinley William McKinley, Jr. was the 25th President of the United States . He is best known for winning fiercely fought elections, while supporting the gold standard and high tariffs; he succeeded in forging a Republican coalition that for the most part dominated national politics until the 1930s...	42	24
George W. Bush George W. Bush George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....	41	59
Grover Cleveland Grover Cleveland Stephen Grover Cleveland was the 22nd and 24th president of the United States. Cleveland is the only president to serve two non-consecutive terms and therefore is the only individual to be counted twice in the numbering of the presidents...	40	26
Calvin Coolidge Calvin Coolidge John Calvin Coolidge, Jr. was the 30th President of the United States . A Republican lawyer from Vermont, Coolidge worked his way up the ladder of Massachusetts state politics, eventually becoming governor of that state...	38	31
Rutherford B. Hayes Rutherford B. Hayes Rutherford Birchard Hayes was the 19th President of the United States . As president, he oversaw the end of Reconstruction and the United States' entry into the Second Industrial Revolution...	38	19
Richard Nixon Richard Nixon Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...	32	60
Benjamin Harrison Benjamin Harrison Benjamin Harrison was the 23rd President of the United States . Harrison, a grandson of President William Henry Harrison, was born in North Bend, Ohio, and moved to Indianapolis, Indiana at age 21, eventually becoming a prominent politician there...	30	35
Warren Harding	29	33
James Buchanan James Buchanan James Buchanan, Jr. was the 15th President of the United States . He is the only president from Pennsylvania, the only president who remained a lifelong bachelor and the last to be born in the 18th century....	28	32
James Polk	27	21
Zachary Taylor Zachary Taylor Zachary Taylor was the 12th President of the United States and an American military leader. Initially uninterested in politics, Taylor nonetheless ran as a Whig in the 1848 presidential election, defeating Lewis Cass...	26	18
Martin Van Buren Martin Van Buren Martin Van Buren was the eighth President of the United States . Before his presidency, he was the eighth Vice President and the tenth Secretary of State, under Andrew Jackson ....	23	19
William Henry Harrison William Henry Harrison William Henry Harrison was the ninth President of the United States , an American military officer and politician, and the first president to die in office. He was 68 years, 23 days old when elected, the oldest president elected until Ronald Reagan in 1980, and last President to be born before the...	21	16
Franklin Pierce Franklin Pierce Franklin Pierce was the 14th President of the United States and is the only President from New Hampshire. Pierce was a Democrat and a "doughface" who served in the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate. Pierce took part in the Mexican-American War and became a brigadier general in the Army...	17	25
Millard Fillmore Millard Fillmore Millard Fillmore was the 13th President of the United States and the last member of the Whig Party to hold the office of president...	17	25
John Tyler John Tyler John Tyler was the tenth President of the United States . A native of Virginia, Tyler served as a state legislator, governor, U.S. representative, and U.S. senator before being elected Vice President . He was the first to succeed to the office of President following the death of a predecessor...	9	15

Recent president polls

These polls evaluate Presidents from Dwight D. Eisenhower and later succession.

Quinnipiac University poll

A Quinnipiac University poll

Quinnipiac University Poll

The Quinnipiac University Poll is an opinion poll research operated by the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute at Quinnipiac University in Connecticut...

, taken May 23–30, 2006, asked 1,534 registered American voters to pick the worst U.S. President of the last 61 years.

"Which of these eleven presidents we have had since World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

would you consider the worst president — Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, John Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon

Richard Nixon

, Gerald Ford

Gerald Ford

Gerald Rudolph "Jerry" Ford, Jr. was the 38th President of the United States, serving from 1974 to 1977, and the 40th Vice President of the United States serving from 1973 to 1974...

, Jimmy Carter

Jimmy Carter

, Ronald Reagan

Ronald Reagan

Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....

, George Bush Senior, Bill Clinton

Bill Clinton

William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...

, and George W. Bush

George W. Bush

George W. Bush (34%)
Richard Nixon (17%)
Bill Clinton (16%)
Jimmy Carter (13%)
Don't Know/No Answer (5%)
Lyndon B. Johnson (4%)
George H. W. Bush (3%)
Ronald Reagan (3%)
Gerald Ford (2%)
Harry S. Truman (1%)
John F. Kennedy (1%)
Dwight D. Eisenhower (<1%)

USA Today/Gallup poll

A USA Today

USA Today

USA Today is a national American daily newspaper published by the Gannett Company. It was founded by Al Neuharth. The newspaper vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003...

/Gallup Poll, taken December 8–10, 2006, asked 1009 adults in the US, "How do you think each of the following presidents will go down in history—as an outstanding president, above average, average, below average, or poor?"

USA Today/Gallup poll 2006
Result	George W. Bush	Bill Clinton	George H.W. Bush	Ronald Reagan	Jimmy Carter	Gerald Ford
1. outstanding	4%	12%	5%	24%	11%	6%
2. above average	15%	33%	27%	40%	27%	17%
3. average	27%	29%	50%	26%	38%	60%
4. below average	25%	15%	10%	6%	13%	9%
5. poor	29%	10%	8%	4%	9%	3%
unsure	-	-	-	1%	3%	5%

Gallup poll

A Gallup poll, taken on November 19–21, 2010, asked Americans to say, based on what they know or remember about the nine most recent former presidents, whether they approve or disapprove of how each handled his job in office.

John F. Kennedy (85% approval/10% disapproval)
Ronald Reagan (74% approval/24% disapproval)
Bill Clinton (69% approval/30% disapproval)
George H. W. Bush (64% approval/34% disapproval)
Gerald Ford (61% approval/26% disapproval)
Jimmy Carter (52% approval/42% disapproval)
Lyndon B. Johnson (49% approval/36% disapproval)
George W. Bush (47% approval/51% disapproval)
Richard Nixon (29% approval/65% disapproval)

Vision Critical/Angus Reid poll

A Vision Critical/Angus Reid poll, taken on February 18–19, 2011, asked respondents about 12 former and current presidents and whether they were a good or bad president.

John F. Kennedy (80% approval/6% disapproval)
Ronald Reagan (72% approval/16% disapproval)
Bill Clinton (65% approval/24% disapproval)
Dwight D. Eisenhower (61% approval/6% disapproval)
Harry S. Truman (57% approval/7% disapproval)
Jimmy Carter (47% approval/28% disapproval)
George H.W. Bush (44% approval/38% disapproval)
Barack Obama (41% approval/33% disapproval)
Gerald Ford (37% approval/25% disapproval)
Lyndon B. Johnson (33% approval/27% disapproval)
George W. Bush (30% approval/55% disapproval)
Richard Nixon (24% approval/54% disapproval)

External links

"Ranking Presidents: Utter Nonsense Or Useful Analysis?, 2001 column by John Dean
John Dean
John Wesley Dean III is an American lawyer who served as White House Counsel to United States President Richard Nixon from July 1970 until April 1973. In this position, he became deeply involved in events leading up to the Watergate burglaries and the subsequent Watergate scandal cover-up...
Top 10 Worst US Presidents - The List Universe
List of presidential rankings Historians rank the 42 men who have held the office. AP via MSNBC. Feb. 16, 2009 Poll

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

General findings

Notable scholar surveys

Scholar survey results

Liberal and conservative raters

Excluded groups ratings approach

C-SPAN poll

ABC poll

Washington College poll

Gallup poll

Rasmussen Reports poll

Recent president polls

Quinnipiac University poll

USA Today/Gallup poll

Gallup poll

Vision Critical/Angus Reid poll

See also

Further reading

External links