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Should Mt. Rushmore Be Recarved? New book says we should reconsider how we rate our presidents.
Who were the best and worst U.S. presidents, and what criteria should be used to make a meaningful comparison? Presidents are often judged by their personal charisma, intellect, oratory skills or management style-but are these traits the most important ones for a president to possess? Couldn't a very intelligent, well-spoken, charming taskmaster, who served during a time of national crisis, also be a lousy president if his policies undermined freedom, hampered economic progress, and made the country less safe? Conversely, couldn't a boring president with average intellect and unexceptional skills excel in the Oval Office if he also possessed other qualities in abundance, such as a firm commitment to the principles behind the Constitution?
RECARVING RUSHMORE: RANKING THE PRESIDENTS ON PEACE, PROSPERITY, AND LIBERTY (The Independent Institute, January 2009, hardcover) takes a distinctly new approach to evaluating the presidents. While academics and pundits have often paid natural respect to "war heroes" and to those who have expanded presidential power, Ivan Eland, Senior Fellow at The Independent Institute, cuts through bias and political rhetoric to deliver the first no-nonsense presidential ranking system based purely on what they did. Profiling every president from George Washington to George W. Bush, Eland analyzes each man's policy decisions and ranks them based on the core principles of peace, prosperity, liberty, and adherence to the Constitution's limitations on presidential powers.
Eland is available for interview. Here's just some of what he can discuss:
· THE PEACE, PROSPERITY & LIBERTY RANKING Eland does a thorough investigation into each of the forty presidents' contribution to peace, prosperity and liberty and assigns each man a ranking from 1 to 40 with 1 reflecting the most positive contribution.
· THE SURPRISING TRUTH ABOUT SOME OF OUR MOST BELOVED PRESIDENTS Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt are some of our most revered presidents, yet according to Eland their reputations are less than deserved. Jefferson rates a PPL ranking of 26, putting him the category of bad presidents. "...as president, Jefferson often used the government to do just what he railed against: abscond with people's rights," says Eland. Lincoln, whose PPL ranking is 29, "managed the civil war in an incompetent, brutal, and dictatorial way." While the war ended slavery, for many decades African Americans still suffered unremitting oppression. Eland suggests that peaceful alternatives to Lincoln's policies might have achieved better results more quickly. With a PPL ranking of 31 FDR too falls within the bad president category. Eland charges that he lied the U.S. into World War II and did too little to protect Jews from Hitler's genocide. Eland also has a surprising take on John F. Kennedy (PPL: 35; "Almost incinerated the world so as not to appear weak"); Harry S. Truman (PPL: 39; "The first imperial president"); and Woodrow Wilson (PPL: 40, "Made the world safe for war, autocracy, and colonialism").
· "GEORGE W. BUSH'S PRESIDENCY WAS ONE OF THE WORST OF ALL TIME.". "Bush's presidency was one of the worst of all time. The most obvious reason is that he invaded another country for no legitimate reason and enmeshed the U.S. in a costly militaristic quagmire and civil war," says Eland. Yet, in Eland's estimation George W. Bush's failures extend beyond the disastrous war in Iraq. "...Bush tried to expand the powers of an already imperial presidency to a breathtaking extent- severely undermining the balance of power among the branches of government enshrined in the Constitution and riding roughshod over the civil liberties of American citizens and foreign nationals alike." According to Eland federal spending also ballooned under George W. Bush, whose PPL ranking is 36.
· WHY BILL CLINTON WAS MORE CONSERVATIVE THAN RONALD REAGAN OR GEORGE W. BUSH "In economic and even some social policies, Clinton's actual policies were more conservative than those of George W. Bush," says Eland. He points to Clinton's much-touted welfare reform and the passing of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, which scrapped the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933, allowing brokerage firms, banks, and insurance companies to merge, and dramatically loosened financial industry regulations. In addition, Clinton, whose PPL ranking is 11, supported international trade policies that were "more conservative and less protectionist than those of Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush." On the peace front Clinton's military debacles may not have been on the scale of some other presidents, but they're distinctive nonetheless. "Clinton is the post-World War II champion for getting the United States enmeshed in the greatest number of ill-advised foreign military adventures- although Truman, LBJ, and George W. Bush share an even bigger trophy for entrapping the Unites Stages in the largest military foreign quagmires..." says Eland.
· BORING PRESIDENTS WANTED John Tyler wasn't known for his charisma. No one ever said Martin Van Buren could electrify a crowed. Calvin Coolidge was far from a great communicator and Jimmy Carter, whom Eland calls "our best modern president," wasn't a commanding figure. Yet, these are the very presidents who did the most for peace, prosperity, and liberty and strayed the least from the mandates of the Constitution, according to Eland. "Most of the 'excellent' presidents are remembered as bland men with gray personalities, but they largely respected the Constitution's intention of limiting government and restraining executive power, especially in regard to making war," he says. He continues, "They realized that America is great not because of its government's activism at home and abroad, but because of the hard work and great ideas of private American citizens living in freedom. In other words, they realized that peace, prosperity, and liberty are best achieved by the framers' notion of restricting government power."
ABOUT IVAN ELAND & PRAISE FOR HIS BOOK Ivan Eland is Senior Fellow and Director of the Center on Peace & Liberty at The Independent Institute. Dr. Eland is a graduate of Iowa State University and received an M.B.A. in applied economics and a Ph.D. in Public Policy from George Washington University. He has been Director of Defense Policy Studies at the Cato Institute, and he spent 15 years working for Congress on national security issues, including stints as an investigator for the House Foreign Affairs Committee and Principal Defense Analyst at the Congressional Budget Office. He also has served as Evaluator-in-Charge (national security and intelligence) for the U.S. General Accounting Office (now the Government Accountability Office), and has testified on the military and financial aspects of NATO expansion before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, on CIA oversight before the House Government Reform Committee, and on the creation of the Department of Homeland Security before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Dr. Eland is the author of Recarving Rushmore: Ranking the Presidents on Peace, Prosperity, and Liberty, The Empire Has No Clothes: U.S. Foreign Policy Exposed and Putting "Defense" Back into U.S. Defense Policy, as well as The Efficacy of Economic Sanctions as a Foreign Policy Tool. He is a contributor to numerous volumes and the author of 45 in-depth studies on national security issues.
"In the intriguing book, Recarving Rushmore, Ivan Eland reassesses the record of all U.S. Presidents based on the constitutional principles that each swore to uphold. While conventional accounts glorify the flagrant misdeeds of the 'Imperial Presidency,' this insightful and crucial book provides an inspiring vision for both conservatives and liberals on the crucial need to rein in White House power and restore peace, prosperity and liberty." -Ron Paul, U. S. Congressman
"Recarving Rushmore is colorful, entertaining, and profound. Ivan Eland shatters the grand illusion that great presidents are those who wage war or deprive people of their liberty, either here or abroad. The new 'gold standard' for measuring presidential performance, this book upends what we 'know' about 'Great' presidents and will challenge your view of political history, one president at a time." -Jonathan Bean, Professor of History, Southern Illinois University
"Eland engagingly shows why the conventional wisdom on the American presidency is all wrong and why presidents like Van Buren, Arthur, and Harding in fact ably advanced the nation's interest, while iconic names like Lincoln, the two Roosevelts, and Wilson caused serious harm. Recarving Rushmore is must reading." -Richard K. Vedder, Distinguished Professor of Economics and Faculty Associate, Contemporary History Institute, Ohio University
"Judging presidents by a deceptively simple metric-their impact on peace, prosperity, and liberty-leads Ivan Eland in to reach radical conclusions about the rankings of presidents. Whether you agree that Coolidge was a good president and FDR a bad one, you'll never again glibly think to yourself that it's obvious which presidents are good and bad. It isn't-and Eland shows us why." -Richard Shenkman, Editor, History News Network; author, Presidential Ambition and Legends, Lies, and Cherished Myths of American History