50
4 votes
May 14, 2015

I'm a history professor and wrote my third book, Presidents' Body Counts': The Twelve Worst and Four Best American Presidents Based on How Many Lived or Died Because of Their Actions.

Too often, rankings of presidents become popularity contests based on ideology, or who fits closest to their own belief system. Thus we have absurd rankings like a poll by the Wall Street Journal who ranked GW Bush the 6th best president of all time.

I rank presidents based on humanitarian standards. Who caused the most deaths? If the deaths were by mass murder, that obviously counts far more than incompetence. Thus the worst president in US history was Nixon, who ordered the carpet bombing of neutral Cambodia, outright genocide that killed 600,000. Reagan was the second worst, killing 325,000 in Central America by terrorism in Nicaragua and El Salvador and support for outright genocide in Guatemala.

The best president in US history was Lincoln. Defeating the Confederacy ended slavery, and slaves had an infant mortality twice that of free people. The Confederacy also planned wars vs Cuba, Dominican Republic, and Mexico. Lincoln saved hundreds of thousands.

But since the question is about the 20th century, the best US president was Jimmy Carter. The Camp David Peace Accords prevented perhaps as many as 100,000 future deaths in wars. Carter's human rights policy saved at least 50,000 dissidents and aided democracy in at least 25 nations, and ended the Cold War sooner. (Reagan prolonged the Cold War by his rigid anti Communism.)

Raphael's answer of FDR is partly true. He accomplished much good. But FDR also ignored the Holocaust, targeted German and Japanese civilians, and imprisoned Japanese-Americans for racist reasons.

John's answer has some problems. TR was a warmonger, invading nations in Latin America. He broke Panama away from Colombia. The building of the canal killed thousands of Panamanian Black workers, who were denied the disease free quarters of US white workers by US segregation. TR's progressivism, like other progressives of the time, was based on racism and class warfare beliefs that both nonwhites and poor people whether white or not were incapable of running their own lives or knowing what was best for themselves. Thus he hated socialists and populists, though both parties did much good for the US, giving us direct election of senators, referendums, the Pledge of Allegiance, and social security (much later.)

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100
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1 vote,
May 14, 2015

"Reagan was the second worst... The best president in US history was Lincoln. Defeating the Confederacy ended slavery, and slaves had an infant mortality twice that of free people."

If only Reagan had also freed people from a philosophy that produced a high mortality rate. Imagine how great that would've been.

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100
main reply
2 votes,
May 14, 2015

Direct election of Senators is not a good thing, and makes them nothing more than longer-term-serving Representatives. The whole idea of the Senate is to have a body in Congress that does NOT have to worry about being re-elected in popular elections, and instead represents the States they came from, and is chosen by the State legislatures. Look how much liberals are complaining today about "money in politics", and how politicians just work for lobbyists (which is all true). The idea of the Senate was to avoid populism in one chamber, while having it in the other, so they balance each other; it was really a copy of the English parliament, which has a House of Lords (unelected politicians, at least that's the way it was in the past) and a House of Commons (popularly-elected politicians).

Of course, there's allegations the Senate was highly corrupt before the 17th Amendment which is why that Amendment was passed. In that case, this seems like a bad way to patch the problem, and doesn't seem to be having the intended effect, since Congress as a whole is hopelessly corrupt these days. Maybe we should just throw the whole thing out and start over.

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67
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3 votes,
May 14, 2015

It appears to me that I will be the antithesis answer: Ronald Reagan due to the fact that he was the one who made us proud to be American again AFTER Carter, who had high ideals that the world may never be ready for; he was never grounded in reality and was too apologetic for the US. My other choice would be JFK but not because of anything he did do but what he may have but whose life was tragically cut short before it could be realized. I disagree with your choice of Lincoln based on your own parameters of "lives taken" since the Civil War, while necessary, was our bloodiest.

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67
3 votes,
May 14, 2015

Rob, you provide a good example of what I described as ranking based on ideology, not accomplishments, and certainly not a president's basic human decency.

Does it bother you that Reagan killed over 325,000 civilians?
That Reagan was so fanatically anti Communist he even accused Barry Goldwater of being a Communist dupe?
That Reagan created terrorists, the Contras, that murdered civilians based on the crazy notion that Nicaragua could invade the US?
That Reagan supported genocide in Guatemala with weapons, money, and even US troops that trained Guatemalan troops how to massacre Indian villages?

Is pride that important to you? Will it also let you ignore that Carter saved 50,000 dissidents' lives, saved many Jewish and Arab lives by preventing wars, and also rescued Soviet Jews and Cubans fleeing Communism?

It is quite possible that you are hearing all this for the first time. Both schools and the media do a terrible job covering these topics. They focus on the political horse race far more.

Still, I'd think you would know this basic fact about the Civil War:
It was begun entirely by the Confederacy. They fired the first shot at Ft. Sumter. Even middle school kids are taught that. Confederates began the war even before that by committing treason, taking up arms against the US, seizing federal forts, buildings, and US Army weapons.

As for Kennedy, if we judge by someone's life being cut short, why not also Lincoln?

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50
2 votes,
May 14, 2015

The Civil War wasn't begun entirely by the Confederacy, it was in part the North policy toward the south that sparked the Civil war. Along with state rights issue (which could be seen as the slavery issue) given that the US Constitution at the time was silent on the issue it should have been a state issue. In fact slavery wasn't that big of an issue until the war proved to be unpopular.

Also given that the Constitution is silent on how a state can leave the Union, it's possible that Lincoln violated the Constitution by trying to force states to remain in the union. It's one of the reasons given when people ask why they didn't try Jefferson Davis.Had the court ruled the state had the right (after all The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.) to leave, the war would have been pointless and the South may have been in a position to sue the North for damages.

Don't forget Lincoln didn't free the slaves nor was it his goal.

" My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. "

Lincoln in a Letter to Horace Greeley

And only freed the slaves in the waring states the Emancipation Proclamation didn’t apply to border slave states like Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri.

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33
3 votes,
May 14, 2015

"Does it bother you that Reagan killed over 325,000 civilians?
That Reagan was so fanatically anti Communist he even accused Barry Goldwater of being a Communist dupe?
That Reagan created terrorists, the Contras, that murdered civilians based on the crazy notion that Nicaragua could invade the US?
That Reagan supported genocide in Guatemala with weapons, money, and even US troops that trained Guatemalan troops how to massacre Indian villages?"

NO it does not "bother me" any more than "Hitler" bothers me your assertions are historical in nature and not present day NO this is NOT the "first time" (except the Goldwater one) I have heard this line of attack. If we are going to wage a war of "atrocities", I can find enough ammunition with our current President but then every President has some kind of "dirt" thrown at them from both left or right depending on their political party. I have no idea what you age is but I was alive and working during those times and all I remember is how basically "depressed" the country was post-Vietnam and how Reagan made it both psychologically and economically better; all this is arguable of course so grant me my opinion as I have granted yours. Look back and see that I actually gave carter "kudos" for "intentions" albeit not for actual accomplishment; people indeed did die in the world when he was office so this concept of a "Carter Utopia" is a fallacy! Insofar as the "media not covering this"... are you kidding me? Iran-Contra was on the tube every day for years and that when there was only three true channels to watch! My retort to these allegations could be also given for Bush's accusations of "killing hundreds of thousands": "why isn't/wasn't he impeached/jailed?" YOU KNOW the press would, do, and would crucify a Republican President. And those schools would be teaching the kids what a "killer" Reagan is!

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50
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2 votes,
May 14, 2015

As a history professor you better than anyone should know that Lincoln didn't end slavery, and in fact would have kept slavery if it would have kept the union together. You say FDR ignored the Holocaust, and yet Carter, who you say was the best in the 20th century, all but ignored Pol Pot.

You state that Carter ended the cold war sooner and that Regan prolonged it, but wasn't Carter in office from January 12, 1971 – January 14, 1975 and Regan in office January 20, 1981 – January 20, 1989 and didn't the cold war end under Regan? The cold war ended in part because of the hard stand Regan took and the fact that the USSR couldn't afford to keep up with the US spending.

All I can say is I'm glad I don't take history under you.

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100
1 vote,
May 14, 2015

Richard Wee, I'm not sure who you did take history from, but you've got your dates wrong. Jimmy Carter was in office from January 20, 1977 to January 20, 1981 when Reagan was inaugurated. Richard Nixon was in office from January, 1969 until he resigned in August of 1974. Vice President Gerald Ford took over the Presidency from Nixon and held office until January of 1977 when Jimmy Carter was inaugurated.

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