Andrew Jackson's stock is falling. New Deal historians loved Jackson, which makes sense in the same way that it makes sense that they loved Woodrow Wilson. As the Democratic Party moved away from its traditional defense of bigotry, however, loving Wilson and Jackson has become far more problematic for newer generations of historians. Jackson used to be a great president, finishing comfortably in the top ten in these sorts of surveys; Siena College now has him in the next tier down, at #14, which is consistent with where others have placed him recently. In Siena's categories, Jackson scores very high on Leadership (#5), Party Leadership (#2), and Executive Ability (#6); he's at the low end on Ability to Compromise (#38), the economy (#28), and low on Integrity and Intelligence (#23, on each).
Lyndon Johnson has settled in more or less in the same area. He's 16th in Siena's survey;.in the fourteen such surveys in wikipedia's entry, he's as high as 10th and as low as 18th. Within the rankings, however, Johnson is like Jackson, with plenty of extremes. Siena has him the very best at Relationship with Congress, and third at Party Leadership. He's 5th in Domestic Accomplishments. On the other hand...he's dead last in Foreign Policy Accomplishments, 37th in "Avoid Crucial Mistakes," 34th in Integrity.
Let's see...first of all, on LBJ, I think the party leadership score is way too high; they don't (at least in their release) define what "Relationship with Congress" means but it deteriorated pretty badly by the end, so I'm not sure that I'd put it in the top ten -- although he obviously had as much legislative success as any other president. Again, it's how you define the terms, and how you count things.
Which is sort of my overall point in this post. Granted, this is just a parlor game to begin with, but even as a parlor game it basically breaks down when you try to deal with these two presidents. How do you average out Civil Rights, Voting Rights, Immigration...and Vietnam? How do you average out the achievement of, well, Jacksonian democracy, with all that that implies, positive and negative? Yes, Siena includes a category for "integrity," but there's no category for "Actions of a Moral Monster" -- and if there were, how would you weigh it?
So I can't say that either Jackson or Johnson is overrated, or underrated...they just don't work in the Rating the Presidents Game, as far as I can tell.
Lyndon Johnson has settled in more or less in the same area. He's 16th in Siena's survey;.in the fourteen such surveys in wikipedia's entry, he's as high as 10th and as low as 18th. Within the rankings, however, Johnson is like Jackson, with plenty of extremes. Siena has him the very best at Relationship with Congress, and third at Party Leadership. He's 5th in Domestic Accomplishments. On the other hand...he's dead last in Foreign Policy Accomplishments, 37th in "Avoid Crucial Mistakes," 34th in Integrity.
Let's see...first of all, on LBJ, I think the party leadership score is way too high; they don't (at least in their release) define what "Relationship with Congress" means but it deteriorated pretty badly by the end, so I'm not sure that I'd put it in the top ten -- although he obviously had as much legislative success as any other president. Again, it's how you define the terms, and how you count things.
Which is sort of my overall point in this post. Granted, this is just a parlor game to begin with, but even as a parlor game it basically breaks down when you try to deal with these two presidents. How do you average out Civil Rights, Voting Rights, Immigration...and Vietnam? How do you average out the achievement of, well, Jacksonian democracy, with all that that implies, positive and negative? Yes, Siena includes a category for "integrity," but there's no category for "Actions of a Moral Monster" -- and if there were, how would you weigh it?
So I can't say that either Jackson or Johnson is overrated, or underrated...they just don't work in the Rating the Presidents Game, as far as I can tell.
