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Donald Trump has long seen himself as a president of enormous historical significance — to the point that he inquired about being added to Mt. Rushmore just six months into his term.
Evidently, scholars studying the American president agree that the Republican was historically significant, but not in the way he hoped. NPR reported:
The 2024 edition of the Presidential Greatness Project Expert Survey has [incumbent President Joe] Biden in 14th place, just ahead of Woodrow Wilson and Ronald Reagan. Trump comes in 45th, behind fellow impeachee Andrew Johnson and James Buchanan, the perennial cellar-dweller in such ratings due to his pre-Civil War leadership.
Here’s the top 10 from the survey:
1. Abraham Lincoln
2. Franklin D. Roosevelt
3. George Washington
4. Theodore Roosevelt
5. Thomas Jefferson
6. Harry S. Truman
7. Barack Obama
8. Dwight D. Eisenhower
9. Lyndon Baines Johnson
10. John F. Kennedy
And here’s the bottom 10:
36. Herbert Hoover
37. John Tyler
38. Zachary Taylor
39. Millard Fillmore
40. Warren G. Harding
41. William Henry Harrison
42. Franklin Pierce
43. Andrew Johnson
44. James Buchanan
45. Donald Trump
While I’m mindful of the fact that these arbitrary rankings — one of many — should be seen more as fun conversation pieces than important scholarly work, consider some more-or-less random observations:
* While some related studies have separated Grover Cleveland’s non-consecutive terms, I’m glad this one combined them.
* I suspect plenty of observers on the right will be outraged to see Obama ranked so highly, but (a) this wasn’t the first to put him in the top seven; and (b) I’m of the opinion that the Democrat’s position is perfectly fair.
* There have been some dreadfully bad presidents, but it’s heartening to see Trump rank dead last. He’s earned it.
* Including William Henry Harrison in rankings like these continues to seem unfair. The guy only served a month in office before dying.
* Similarly, while Biden has reason to be pleased with his position — at #14, he's in the top third — I’m generally of the opinion that ranking presidents while their terms are underway isn’t altogether wise.
* I’ve argued that the rehabilitation of George W. Bush’s reputation is problematic, and this survey reinforces my concerns: He’s #32 in these rankings, which seems unreasonably high.
* Ulysses S. Grant has now climbed all the way up to #17. I have a hunch he can thank Ron Chernow.
* The political scientists responsible for the rankings, Coastal Carolina University’s Justin Vaughn and the University of Houston’s Brandon Rottinghaus, wrote an analysis of the findings for the Los Angeles Times, which highlighted the “decline in esteem for two important presidents, Andrew Jackson and Woodrow Wilson. Their reputations have consistently suffered in recent years as modern politics lead scholars to assess their early 19th and 20th century presidencies ever more harshly, especially their unacceptable treatment of marginalized people.”
Of course, if recent history is any guide, we’ll soon see a Trump on his social media platform, insisting that the results were rigged, and the scholars secretly agreed that he was tied with Lincoln at the top of the list.
This post updates our related earlier coverage.