Here you go: The American Presidents, ranked, officially, from best to worst.
Top
Quartile
1. Abraham Lincoln.
He kept
the Union together through a brutal civil war, and then freed the enslaved
people of America. That said, he frequently suspended the Constitution to
preserve the nation.
2. Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
He got
America out of the Depression, and then went on to win World War II, fighting on
two separate fronts. That said, he was responsible for the Japanese internment
camps.
3. George Washington.
He set
the standard for the Presidency, from having a Cabinet, to only serving two
terms, to being the Commander-in-Chief. That said, he lead the U.S. military
against its own people in the Whiskey Rebellion.
4. Theodore Roosevelt.
He
busted trusts, made our food safe, was the first President to support organized
labor, conserved our wild spaces, oversaw the Panama Canal, and expanded our
global influence, all while ushering in the 20th century. That said,
he began the policy of America actively meddling in Latin American politics beyond
our borders to secure “American interests”.
5. Thomas Jefferson.
He
vastly expanded America’s territory and power, won our first international war,
and showed how to achieve a peaceful transfer of power between two opposing
parties. That said, his policies against native peoples and slavery have
tarnished his legacy.
6. Harry S. Truman.
He had
to make peace after the Second World War, helping rebuild Europe with the
Marshall Plan, and making sure the U.S. took the lead on international issues
like the IMF and the U.N. That said, using nuclear weapons in war remains a
lasting controversy.
7. John F. Kennedy.
He
helped prevent nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis, got NASA ready to
go to the moon, and pivoted the Democratic Party away from segregation and
towards Civil Rights. That said, as President his management of Congress was
fairly ineffectual.
8. Lyndon Johnson.
He
passed landmark Civil Rights legislation, and launched Medicare and Medicaid
while fighting against poverty. That said, he also escalated the Vietnam
conflict.
9. Dwight Eisenhower.
He
developed America’s badly needed interstate highways, desegregated our schools,
and incorporated our first overseas states. That said, he also oversaw mutually
assured destruction.
10. Woodrow Wilson.
He got
America through World War I, granted women the right to vote, and helped
develop a 20th century blueprint for international cooperation. That
said, race relations took a turn for the worse, as did political freedoms.
11. James Madison.
He held
the nation together during the War of 1812, when the British-Canadians invaded,
in what was deemed the ‘Second War of Independence’, and then presided over a
period of bipartisanship. That said, he began aggressively expanding into
indigenous territory, in Tecumseh’s War.
Second
Quartile
12. James Polk.
He
vastly expanded the nation’s western territory, from Texas to Oregon. That
said, the grounds for doing so in the Mexican-American War were shaky, at best.
13. William McKinley.
He
began promoting America as a global, not just a regional, superpower, notably
in the Spanish-American War. That said, Hawaii was questionably annexed, the
U.S. used concentration camps in the Philippines, and race relations with Jim
Crow laws continued to steadily decline.
14. James Monroe.
He began
the policy of telling Europe to stay out of meddling in the Western
Hemisphere’s business. That said, the Missouri compromise on slavery was
well-intentioned but didn’t solve the problem, and he oversaw America’s first
economic crisis.
15. John Adams.
He had
the first transfer of power, and set the standard to keep neutral in European wars
when possible, avoiding a war with France. That said, his Alien and Sedition
Acts were very unconstitutional.
16. Ulysses S. Grant.
He got
the 14th and 15th Amendments passed, vastly expanding the
citizenship rights of Americans. That said, his Cabinet was full of scandals,
and tarnished the office.
17. Barrack Obama.
He was
our first black President, restored international prestige, oversaw LGBT gains,
killed Osama bin Laden, and helped shift America towards better healthcare.
That said, he continued noxious surveillance policies on American citizens, and
had his more progressive executive orders overturned as soon as he left office.
18. Grover Cleveland.
He
oversaw a period of limiting corruption and political favoritism. That said,
his second term was hit with an economic crisis, he used the government to
fight against organized labor, killing strikers, and made it harder to vote.
19. George HW Bush.
He
navigated the complicated end of the Cold War, collapse of the Soviet Union,
and reunification of Germany, raised a global coalition against Saddam Hussein,
and got rights for disabled Americans. That said, the Gulf War kept Hussein in
power, he raised taxes after promising not to, and got involved in a debacle in
Panama.
20. Joe Biden.
He got
ambitious infrastructure and climate change bills passed, and restored normalcy
after the pandemic and insurrection. That said, the withdrawal from Afghanistan
was terrible, and inflation came roaring back after forty years, during an economy that was recovering from Covid.
21. William Taft.
He did even
more trust-busting in one term than Roosevelt in two, and saw the start of the
income tax. That said, he reversed the civil rights gains made under Teddy
Roosevelt.
22. John Quincy Adams.
He
helped launch American infrastructure, had generally decent policies regarding
native peoples, and tried to reign in partisanship. That said, he was not very
successful, and thereby accomplished relatively little as partisanship
worsened.
Third
Quartile
23. Jimmy Carter.
He
brought decency back to a scandalized Washington, and tried to restore American
faith in government. That said, he struggled to handle stagflation, promoted
deregulation, and America’s role in the Middle East began to deteriorate with
Iran and the Energy Crisis.
24. Calvin Coolidge.
He finally
made Indigenous Peoples American citizens, supported labor reform, and helped
ease European tension with the Dawes Plan. That said, he also oversaw the policies
that led to the Great Depression, and began limiting legal immigration.
25. Chester Arthur.
He
finally enacted civil service reform, to promote competency in government, and
modernized the Navy. That said, he oversaw the noxious Chinese Exclusion Act,
and ineffectual racial and indigenous policies.
26. Gerald Ford.
He
tried to restore normalcy after prolonged scandal, supported the ERA, and
pardoned Vietnam draft dodgers. That said, he also pardoned Nixon, couldn’t
tame inflation, and oversaw the messy withdrawal from Vietnam during the Fall
of Saigon.
27. James Garfield.
He tried
to resurrect elements of Reconstruction, prior to his assassination. That said,
having only three months as President he was, of course, generally ineffectual.
28. Bill Clinton.
He
oversaw a period of Pax Americana. That said, he was impeached, oversaw a loss
of American jobs overseas, and presided over criminal laws that worsened civil
rights.
29. Benjamin Harrison.
He
passed the first law against monopolies. That said, he oversaw some of the
worst phases of the Reservation Era, including the massacre at Wounded Knee.
30. Martin Van Buren.
He
tried to manage an economic crisis and affairs with other countries. That said,
he was not very effectual, and oversaw much of the Trail of Tears.
31. Andrew Jackson.
He
helped bring greater populism to the Presidency. That said, he began a vicious
policy against native peoples, treated the Presidency like a monarchy, and
tried to dismantle Washington’s economic power.
32. William Henry Harrison.
He did
nothing, dying a month into office.
33. Zachary Taylor.
He
supported California’s statehood as a free state. That said, the integration of
territory from Mexico was generally a messy process, and then he died a year
into office, not to mention being the last slave owning President.
Fourth
Quartile
34. Herbert Hoover.
He
tried, a bit, to help the Great Depression. That said, he didn’t do nearly
enough, and the country started to fall apart as Americans starved to death.
35. John Tyler.
He had
to oversee the first transition from VP to President, due to death, and annexed
Texas. That said, the accession was a mess, dividing his own party and creating
a worsened political situation, including the first Senate veto of a President,
and nearly getting impeached.
36. Warren Harding.
He
oversaw an era of scandal and poor economic decisions. Furthermore, his Cabinet
scandals hampered any effectual attempts at governing, and he had lousy views
on organized labor.
37. Millard Fillmore.
He
oversaw a worsening state of race relations, fervently enforcing the Fugitive
Slave Act. Furthermore, he opened all land from the Mexican American War to be
slave territory (except California), and continued to not handle the issue with
the Compromise of 1850.
38. Franklin Pierce.
He
oversaw even worse race relations, and continually vetoed any progressive
bills, like trying to improve conditions in mental asylums. Furthermore, he
oversaw Americans starting to kill each other over the issue of slavery with
Bleeding Kansas.
39. Andrew Johnson.
He
mishandled the reintegration of the Union, and was impeached. Furthermore, his
policies focused on poor Southern whites more than the legally tenuous
ex-slaves, and set Reconstruction up for failure.
40. Richard Nixon.
He was
responsible for Watergate, and had to resign in disgrace. Furthermore, he
cozied up to the dictatorships in the Soviet Union and China, abandoning our
democratic ally in Taiwan, actively prolonged the Vietnam War by scuttling
peace negotiations, and pivoted the Republican party to be aligned with the
segregationist white voters, notably launching the “War on Drugs”. He
admittedly was the first modern President to have decent environmental
policies. Administration: 78 convictions, 24 prison sentences.
41. Ronald Reagan.
He
began reversing thirty years of progress and economic gains due to trickle-down
economics and deregulation, and told Americans to not trust their government.
Furthermore, he oversaw a pivot away from Government support of organized
labor, a worsening of civil rights with mass incarceration, took a do-nothing
attitude towards the AIDS epidemic, and oversaw military debacles like Granada,
the ‘Star Wars’ defense system, and the Iran-Contra scandal. Administration: 21
convictions, 7 prison sentences.
42. George W. Bush.
He totally
mishandled the response to 9/11 by launching two costly, largely pointless
wars, and the economy suffered the worst crash since the Great Depression due
to deregulation, while giving tax cuts to the wealthy. Furthermore, he
devastated America’s prestige with the use of secret torture sites and
Guantanamo Bay as well as lying to the U.N., ruined our public education system
for a generation, reversed environmental protections to handle climate change,
mishandled Katrina, and began unconstitutionally spying and collecting data on
American citizens. Administration: 13 convictions, 7 prison sentences.
43. James Buchanan.
He
watched as the nation fell apart on his watch – and did nothing to stop it.
Furthermore, he oversaw the total erosion of civil rights under Dred Scott, and
violence continue to escalate towards the outbreak of the Civil War, from John
Brown’s raid to the Utah War, to Fort Sumter. Lincoln had to build everything
from scratch, inheriting nothing to help save the Union.
44. Donald Trump.
He
acted too slowly to prevent a deadly pandemic, and was impeached for both
political corruption and inciting an insurrection after refusing a peaceful
transition of power. Furthermore, he undid environmental and progressive
reforms, targeted LGBT citizens, worsened immigration including child
separation, cut taxes for the wealthy, encouraged violence at his rallies,
reintroduced immigration bans, supported white nationalists, supported voter
suppression, supported Putin and North Korea, attempted to collude with Russia
to win an election, appointed arch-conservative Justices who rolled back
citizen’s rights, oversaw an era of democracy backsliding around the world due
to supporting strongmen, employed incompetent people to his administration and
family members, and violated several ethics policies of the Executive branch.
Administration: indictments, convictions and prison sentences ongoing,
indictments include Trump himself.
