We love lists. Humans are obsessed with them. Especially when it comes to the most powerful job on the planet, we have this weird, almost compulsive need to lump the presidents of the United States into neat little buckets of "great," "mediocre," or "absolute disaster." You see it every year around Presidents' Day. C-SPAN releases a poll, historians bicker on Twitter, and your uncle insists that everything started going downhill in 1913.
But honestly? Most of these rankings are basically high-stakes popularity contests. They’re skewed by whoever is holding the pen. When you try to lump the presidents of the United States together, you're usually ignoring the messiness of history. Context matters. A lot.
The Problem With the Greatness Metric
Ranking a guy like Abraham Lincoln against someone like James K. Polk is sort of like comparing an emergency room surgeon to a steady-handed architect. They are doing completely different things. Lincoln was trying to keep the patient from bleeding out on the floor; Polk was just trying to build a bigger house.
Historians usually use a few specific criteria when they lump the presidents of the United States into tiers. They look at "Public Persuasion," "Crisis Leadership," and "Moral Authority." It sounds scientific. It isn't. Take Ulysses S. Grant. For almost a century, he was dumped into the "failure" bin because of his cabinet's corruption. But lately? He’s seen a massive surge in the rankings because people are finally valuing his genuine efforts to protect the civil rights of formerly enslaved people during Reconstruction. Our values changed, so his ranking changed.
That's the kicker. "Greatness" is a moving target.
It's All About the Timing
Some guys get lucky. Some get dealt a hand so bad it’s almost comical. If you look at the "failed" presidents—people like James Buchanan or Andrew Johnson—they were usually the ones standing at the intersection of a national nervous breakdown. Buchanan basically sat on his hands while the country drifted toward Civil War. He’s almost always at the bottom when people lump the presidents of the United States by effectiveness.
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But then you have the "Standard Setters." George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. They had the luxury of a blank slate. Well, mostly. Washington had to figure out how to be a "President" without looking like a "King," which is harder than it sounds. If he had failed, the whole experiment would have folded by 1795.
The Forgotten Middle
Then there are the "Beige" presidents. The Gilded Age guys. Rutherford B. Hayes, James A. Garfield, Chester A. Arthur, Benjamin Harrison. Can you honestly tell me one thing Benjamin Harrison did without looking it up? Probably not.
When we lump the presidents of the United States for casual conversation, these men are almost always ignored. They weren't necessarily bad; they just presided over a time when Congress held all the real power. The presidency was a much smaller job back then. It didn't have the "Imperial" weight it has today. These men were more like Chief Operating Officers than Global Leaders.
How the Pros Actually Rank Them
If you look at the Sienna College Research Institute or the C-SPAN Presidential Historian Survey, you'll see a pattern. The top three are almost always Lincoln, Washington, and Franklin D. Roosevelt. They are the "Big Three." They are the ones who faced existential threats—Civil War, the birth of a nation, and the Great Depression/WWII.
It seems the secret to being "Great" is having a terrible crisis to manage. It's a grim reality. If you want to be at the top when people lump the presidents of the United States, you basically need a war or a total economic collapse on your watch. Peace and prosperity? That usually gets you a "B-" and a one-sentence mention in a high school textbook.
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- The Transformative Leaders: Lincoln, FDR, Washington, Jefferson, Teddy Roosevelt.
- The Effective Managers: Eisenhower, Polk, LBJ (though Vietnam complicates this), Truman.
- The Transitionals: Monroe, Madison, McKinley.
- The Bottom Tier: Buchanan, Andrew Johnson, Franklin Pierce, Warren G. Harding.
The "Great Man" Myth vs. Reality
We tend to think these guys were all-powerful. They weren't. A president’s success is often tied to their "Political Time"—a concept developed by Yale political scientist Stephen Skowronek. He argues that it's not just about the person; it's about whether the existing political order is falling apart or holding strong when they take office.
Franklin Roosevelt didn't just happen to be a genius; he arrived exactly when the old Republican-led economic order had shattered. He had the "permission" from the public to rebuild it. Contrast that with someone like Jimmy Carter. Carter was a smart guy, maybe one of the smartest to ever hold the office, but he was a "disjunctive" president. He was trying to lead a party that was already breaking into factions, during an energy crisis he didn't create. When people lump the presidents of the United States into tiers, Carter often gets the short end of the stick because we blame the leader for the era.
Breaking the Mold: The Modern Era
It gets even messier once you hit the 1980s. Ronald Reagan is a polarizing figure in these rankings. To some, he's the guy who won the Cold War and restored American confidence. To others, he’s the architect of modern inequality. When you lump the presidents of the United States from the last 40 years, the rankings start to look more like a map of our current political divide than an objective historical analysis.
Bill Clinton gets high marks for the economy but hits the floor on "Moral Authority." George W. Bush’s ranking is still being fought over because of the Iraq War. Barack Obama and Donald Trump are too "new" for many historians to rank with any real distance. It usually takes about 30 to 40 years for the dust to settle. We need time to see the long-term consequences of their policies.
Why You Should Be Skeptical of "Best President" Lists
Whenever you see a new article trying to lump the presidents of the United States into a definitive ranking, look at the sources. Are they looking at economic growth? Civil rights? Judicial appointments?
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A president might be "Great" at foreign policy but a "Failure" at domestic issues. Richard Nixon is the ultimate example. He opened China and started the EPA, but he also... you know, Watergate. Do you rank him based on his strategic brilliance or his criminal conduct? There is no right answer.
What You Can Do With This Information
The next time you’re in a debate about who the "best" or "worst" president was, stop looking at the person in a vacuum. Start looking at the context. History isn't a scoreboard; it's a messy, interconnected web of cause and effect.
If you want to actually understand how to lump the presidents of the United States in a way that makes sense, try these steps:
- Check the "Political Time": Was the country in a period of stability or upheaval when they took office?
- Look at the Opposition: Did they have a cooperative Congress or a hostile one? Success is a team sport in D.C.
- Wait for the 30-Year Mark: Don't judge a president until at least three decades have passed. The "hot takes" are usually wrong.
- Read Multiple Perspectives: If you’re reading a biography of Andrew Jackson, read one written in the 1950s and one written in the 2020s. The difference will tell you more about us than it does about him.
Stop looking for a perfect list. It doesn't exist. Instead, look for the patterns in how we choose our heroes and our villains. It’s way more interesting than a simple 1 to 46 ranking.