C-Span today released a survey of American historians that ranks all the U.S. presidents in history based on merit/leadership. C-Span conducted its first ranking of this kind in 2000. In both this year’s ranking and the 2000 ranking, Abraham Lincoln is ranked as the best President. James Buchanan is ranked worst this year, replacing Andrew Johnson in the lowest spot.
James Buchanan: Worst President Ever
C-Span has completed its second survey of American historians to rank all the U.S. Presidents in history from best to worst. This year, Republican Abraham Lincoln has been ranked as the best president yet again. He was ranked #1 in the survey C-Span conducted in 2000 as well. For his role in preserving the country’s union and ending slavery, Abraham Lincoln’s presidency is nearly universally recognized as the best in American history.
James Buchanan ranked as the worst U.S. president. His ineptitude from 1856 to 1860 is blamed for leading to the Civil War. He was ranked second-worst in 2000, when only Andrew Johnson was declared worse than Buchanan. Andrew Johnson and James Buchanan traded places in the 2009 ranking. Historians blame Andrew Johnson for botching the Reconstruction of the U.S. South, destroying the national unity Lincoln tried to create.
A complete view of the C-Span survey, with rankings based on multiple categories, is available here.
Interestingly, as pointed out in the Huffington Post, present day politics is driving the rankings. Bill Clinton rose in the rankings from 21 to 15. Right after his presidency was over in 2000, historians thought he was merely average. In retrospect, he seems to have grown in stature. George W. Bush came in at #36, the worst showing for a two-term President. It remains to be seen how he’ll rank with some historical perspective.
2009 C-Span President Survery
1. Abraham Lincoln
2. George Washington
3. Franklin D. Roosevelt
4. Theodore Roosevelt
5. Harry S. Truman
6. John F. Kennedy
7. Thomas Jefferson
8. Dwight D. Eisenhower
9. Woodrow Wilson
10. Ronald Reagan
11. Lyndon B. Johnson
12. James K. Polk
13. Andrew Jackson
14. James Monroe
15. Bill Clinton
16. William McKinley
17. John Adams
18. George H. W. Bush
19. John Quincy Adams
20. James Madison
21. Grover Cleveland
22. Gerald R. Ford
23. Ulysses S. Grant
24. William Howard Taft
25. Jimmy Carter
26. Calvin Coolidge
27. Richard M. Nixon
28. James A. Garfield
29. Zachary Taylor
30. Benjamin Harrison
31. Martin Van Buren
32. Chester A. Arthur
33. Rutherford B. Hayes
34. Herbert Hoover
35. John Tyler
36. George W. Bush
37. Millard Fillmore
38. Warren G. Harding
39. William Henry Harrison
40. Franklin D. Pierce
41. Andrew Johnson
42. James Buchanan
Where will Barack Obama rank in the 2018 ranking?
#36. 
#15. 
#1.
President Rankings - Photos
February 16th, 2009 at 11:35 am
Six Presidents were worse than Bush? How many quagmire occupations did they begin?
Also, Buchanan couldn’t have been that bad if he was Pres from 1856 to 1960.
February 16th, 2009 at 11:44 am
Left, the Civil War was slightly worse than Iraq.
Your ability to point out typos might be your best quality and will lead you to a fine minimum wage position later in life.
February 16th, 2009 at 11:46 am
Wow - you really can see modern day political views impacted that list.
Jimmy Carter at #25?? That’s laughable.
J.F.K. at #6? I know JFK was given sainthood because he was young and attractive and then assassinated. But if you remove those factors, what did he do? The Bay of Pigs and Vietnam come to mind. He did muster up the courage to stare down the Russians, but he didn’t really have a choice in that. What did he do to rank #6?
In another generation Bush will be judged in light of his actual Presidency as opposed through the lens of Bush Derangement Syndrome.
February 16th, 2009 at 11:47 am
Ignat! lol
February 16th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
I have to agree with Beth on JFK. But more importantly, why are the presidents in the last 50 years even on there? We have no idea of the lasting consequences they had. We cannot look at them objectively. People love JFK because he was young, Catholic, and charismatic. However, he had some giant blunders. Clinton may be seen as a decent president because of NAFTA. He may be crucified later too because of some of his public policy. Reagan is seen as a success by the Conservatives. However, we will see how he is judged in the future.
Personally, both 6 and 9 are way too high…Wilson, though fighting for an idea, could have prevented WWII and didn’t…but at the same time I don’t think it could have been foreseen because the Great Depression had such a global impact…but another failure was his League of Nations and the US’s failure to participate.
February 16th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
This list is laughable.
Wilson ranking higher than Reagan?!?!? Someone needs to up their meds.
Carter not ranking dead last, or at least near to it? Preposterous!
FDR ranking #3? He is the primary reason the Depression became “Great” and lasted for years and years!
Kennedy? I’ll never for the life of me figure out the Left’s mindless fetishization of the man. His presidency would probably have been an abysmal failure as the aforementioned Bay of Pigs and Vietnam failures came to their full fruition on his watch.
This list is nothing but a joke.
February 16th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
Any survey that ranks Jim-ah Carter in the middle of the pack has no credibility, and thus, deserves zero discussion.
February 16th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
There was never a president named “Franklin D. Pierce”.
February 16th, 2009 at 12:21 pm
Only meaningful criterion is “results”, i.e., “performance in context of the times”.
That also makes the results consistent with the rankings by the historians of the 60s and 80s.
Norm
February 16th, 2009 at 12:42 pm
I see that theres 9 comments listed under this post yet only two are showing at present.
I get this feeling that the majority of them, when they do appear, will be in awe that Bush was not listed as the worst ever.
February 16th, 2009 at 12:49 pm
Oh well, guess I was wrong.
If you goggle “worst president ever” you are inandated with left wing blogs and publications calling him exactly that when actually I think its way too early for him to even be considered for the list.
Interested individual, you took the words right out of my head.
Carters CRA along with Clintons bolstering of the act leaves no doubt in my mind that the list should be revised to include them at the bottom.
Not to mention Clintons total dereliction of duty in dealing with radical Islam, the farce at Camp David and letting Saddam violate every sanction and resolution set down after his surrender.
February 16th, 2009 at 1:07 pm
I’m surprised Bush did so well! The damage he has caused in every arena…politically, socially, economically, morally… both internationally and nationally. The scope of damage is so great, I don’t think those bottom six even had the opportunity to cause that much mayham. I agree JFK is too high, but so is Reagan. Thomas Jefferson should be ahead of JFK no doubt. But maybe this list was constructed by including the grand and the small contributions. JFK’s wife did a nice job of fixing up the White House.
February 16th, 2009 at 1:41 pm
I agree that recent presidents should not be on the list, maybe they should have a period of say 20 years or so after they have left office to be rated.
But let’s get real, this is a setup, this is to show just what a GREAT president Obama will be, the loony left already have him in the top 5, let’s not kid ourselves.
February 16th, 2009 at 2:26 pm
What the list shows us is that the liberal college professor historians who rank these things don’t know their subject very well.
Presidential rankings tend to be based on
1)who is able to increase executive power (eg Washington, Jackson, FDR)
2)who increases US power abroad, generally measured by fighting wars successfully (FDR) or avoiding them successfully (eg Eisenhower and Reagan).
3)who gets country-changing legislation thru congress (eg FDR, LBJ, even Clinton)
4)who makes a lasting change in the country’s direction by having ideological successors follow him into leadership (Jefferson, Jackson, Lincoln/Grant, McKinley).
Washington, Jackson, FDR, Lincoln, and Reagan ought to be at the top. Carter near the bottom.
February 16th, 2009 at 2:36 pm
Soon we will no longer honor any of them on Presidents Day. It will be renamed President Obama Day.
He will change this list forever with all of Gods work that he is doing.
Liberal base it on notion not on actions. I was surprised that Lincoln was number 1. I mean he was for slavery before he was against it and he started a war.
And why do you lefties find it necessary to point out mistakes. Perhaps you should fix your before you point out others.
Frankly, I am surprised liberals can read or spell.
February 16th, 2009 at 2:38 pm
Oh I forgot. Where is Al Gore on this list? He won a Noble Surprise so that makes him the real 43th president don’t you know! He cares so much about the world that he is willing to take your money to offset your breathing and gas passing.
February 16th, 2009 at 2:42 pm
Carter stood up to the Russians, in deed, not only in word. Remember the corn embargo, pulling us out of the Olympics? What did Reagan do? He watched a Korean airliner get shot down by Russian jets, and an attempted democratic revolution happen in communist China, and did absolutely nothing at all, except talk. He was good at that. The Iran hostage crisis was a set up. The rescue mission was sabotaged. Carter’s only failure was that he was too naive to deal with his powerful political enemies at home. Congress tried to investigate the whole Iran hostage mess, but the Republicans killed it with a filibuster. Why do this, if there was nothing to hide? Maybe now we got a Democratic congress they will try again, but I doubt it. It is all HISTORY now, which is something that people who disagree with this list apparently do not understand.
February 16th, 2009 at 3:01 pm
Arch or Edward or whoever you are, you are too young to know what an inept boob Carter was and what Reagan did.
I suppose you would like us to only have democrats become president.
How does that Obama butt flavored kool-aid taste? Must be good because every post of yours is the same old song.
February 16th, 2009 at 3:10 pm
I’m fifty-nine, George. Nothing you said addressed any of the issues I raised re: Carter at all. It is just an insult. Everything I said was true. Deal with it. Tell me where I am wrong. I am listening.
February 16th, 2009 at 3:16 pm
59 in dog years?
Look, Arch, no middle-aged guy with a brain is still buying liberal dogma. You are suppose to grow out of the ideological nincompoopedness into a mature, thinking adult. Do a little traveling, read a few books, and learn the world. Yes We Can is for kids.
February 16th, 2009 at 3:17 pm
Well then you are as dumb now as you were 1976. How long have you had a non-functioning brain?
I won’t waste my time trying to tell you anything. You already know it all. So for me or anyone to tell you anything, it just a waste of time.
February 16th, 2009 at 3:23 pm
There’s another website I blog on known as best and worst presidents and they have Kennedy at number 4 and I say what the hell did he do beside create a recession, rig an election with mobsters, start the Vietnam war, and get the record for the most affairs in the in office. He was one of the worst presidents in history I mean he makes me sick. I mean I give him credit for the Cuban Missle Crisis, but he should really be in the 20s and Reagan should have his place or Easenhower. No wait Easenhower should have Truman’s spot because he ended the Curian War and led us to the highest surplus in goods in US history. Reagan should have the spot as number 2 simple because he destroyed the Soviets and had the longest increase in prosperity in US history threw conservative ideas of low taxes and small goverment that puts him better than Washington. Jimmy Carter should be on the top five worst. Bill Clinton is over rated the tech boom was all that helped him get there and he did terrible things like Nafta, letting Osama become more powerful, cut down the size of our military, and increase welfare. Now as for obama he’ll make it to the bottom Buchanan you flaming homo of a president hold on because there’s a new worst out there.
February 16th, 2009 at 3:24 pm
George, tell me something. You know Churchill’s famous quote about old liberals. So why do most people grow up while others retain the idealism of youth? Do you agree there is a certain immaturity associated with self-described liberals who actually work? Michael Savage thinks liberalism is a mental disorder. What do you think?
February 16th, 2009 at 3:41 pm
…and “drill baby drill” is for adults?
Mccain: if you want to get beyond dogma, and I agree we should, you (and George) need to examine your neo-con philosophy.
We are in an era of ‘post neocon politics’, a legacy of GWB. If nothing else, his administration showed the logical end of Milton Freidman’s ideas.
February 16th, 2009 at 3:48 pm
Young Davey, we are in a 4-week period of Obama slowly becoming the laughing stock of our country. This too shall pass, and although I would love to label the Obama weeks an “era” I have to resist the temptation.