Paul A. Rahe: An Absence of Executive Temperament
[Paul A. Rahe holds The Charles O. Lee and Louise K. Lee Chair in the Western Heritage at Hillsdale College, where he is Professor of History and Politics.]
In politics, temperament matters – it matters a great deal, as Barack Obama has unwittingly shown us time and again.
Some women and men love to posture, talk, debate, and negotiate. Temperamentally, they are suited for a legislative role.
It is said – only partly in jest– that, in Washington, DC, the most dangerous space to occupy is that which lies between a United States Senator and a microphone.
Other women and men – think of Winston Churchill, Margaret Thatcher, Indira Ghandi, Golda Meir, and Ronald Reagan – were born to take charge. When Harry Truman put a sign on his desk, reading, “The buck stops here,” he knew what he was talking about. As Alexander Hamilton observed in The Federalist, it is vital that we have in our Constitution a unitary executive because, in human affairs, emergencies are commonplace; secrecy, vigor, and dispatch are often requisite; and, in such circumstances, there has to be someone in high office able, willing, and even eager to take responsibility for the conduct of affairs.
Americans have an instinctive understanding of what is at stake. Ordinarily, they choose as Presidents men with executive experience – men with a track record in directing affairs that can be judged. George Washington, Andrew Jackson, William Henry Harrison, Zachary Taylor, Ulysses S. Grant, and Dwight D. Eisenhower had been prominent generals before they were elected Presidents, and Rutherford B. Hayes, James A. Garfield, Benjamin Harrison, and Theodore Roosevelt had also demonstrated an aptitude for leadership in war.
John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Martin Van Buren, the younger Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Lyndon Baines Johnson, Richard Nixon, and George H. W. Bush had held the vice-presidency. Jefferson and Van Buren had also been Secretary of State, and the same can be said for James Madison, James Monroe, John Quincy Adams, and James Buchanan. Monroe had also been Secretary of War, and this was true was well for William Howard Taft. Herbert Hoover had managed relief efforts in Europe early in and after World War I; he had served as Food Administrator within the United States after we entered that war; and, from 1921 to 1928, he served as Secretary of Commerce.
Many of the others elected to the presidency had previously held gubernatorial office.
This was true for Jefferson, Monroe, Van Buren, the younger Roosevelt, and, if one counts his service as governor of the Philippines, for Taft as well. It applies also to James K. Polk, Rutherford B. Hayes, Grover Cleveland, William McKinley, Woodrow Wilson, Calvin Coolidge, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter, William Jefferson Clinton, and George H. Bush.
The only men ever elected to the presidency who had no executive experience of any sort were Franklin Pierce, Warren G. Harding, John F. Kennedy, and the hapless incumbent we have today....
Witness Barack Obama. Leave aside his first year in office. As I pointed out in posts entitled “Barack Obama and the Exhausted Presidency” and “Obama’s First Year,” from the outset, he conducted himself in an irresponsible fashion that is highly unpresidential....
It is high time that Republicans start asking the obvious question: who, in their number, is best prepared to do what this presidential incumbent has no desire to bother with: to take what the authors of The Federalist called responsibility. Governor Jindal may not be at the very top of the list of possible presidential contenders, but he is certainly high on it.
Read entire article at The Hill's Congress Blog
In politics, temperament matters – it matters a great deal, as Barack Obama has unwittingly shown us time and again.
Some women and men love to posture, talk, debate, and negotiate. Temperamentally, they are suited for a legislative role.
It is said – only partly in jest– that, in Washington, DC, the most dangerous space to occupy is that which lies between a United States Senator and a microphone.
Other women and men – think of Winston Churchill, Margaret Thatcher, Indira Ghandi, Golda Meir, and Ronald Reagan – were born to take charge. When Harry Truman put a sign on his desk, reading, “The buck stops here,” he knew what he was talking about. As Alexander Hamilton observed in The Federalist, it is vital that we have in our Constitution a unitary executive because, in human affairs, emergencies are commonplace; secrecy, vigor, and dispatch are often requisite; and, in such circumstances, there has to be someone in high office able, willing, and even eager to take responsibility for the conduct of affairs.
Americans have an instinctive understanding of what is at stake. Ordinarily, they choose as Presidents men with executive experience – men with a track record in directing affairs that can be judged. George Washington, Andrew Jackson, William Henry Harrison, Zachary Taylor, Ulysses S. Grant, and Dwight D. Eisenhower had been prominent generals before they were elected Presidents, and Rutherford B. Hayes, James A. Garfield, Benjamin Harrison, and Theodore Roosevelt had also demonstrated an aptitude for leadership in war.
John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Martin Van Buren, the younger Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Lyndon Baines Johnson, Richard Nixon, and George H. W. Bush had held the vice-presidency. Jefferson and Van Buren had also been Secretary of State, and the same can be said for James Madison, James Monroe, John Quincy Adams, and James Buchanan. Monroe had also been Secretary of War, and this was true was well for William Howard Taft. Herbert Hoover had managed relief efforts in Europe early in and after World War I; he had served as Food Administrator within the United States after we entered that war; and, from 1921 to 1928, he served as Secretary of Commerce.
Many of the others elected to the presidency had previously held gubernatorial office.
This was true for Jefferson, Monroe, Van Buren, the younger Roosevelt, and, if one counts his service as governor of the Philippines, for Taft as well. It applies also to James K. Polk, Rutherford B. Hayes, Grover Cleveland, William McKinley, Woodrow Wilson, Calvin Coolidge, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter, William Jefferson Clinton, and George H. Bush.
The only men ever elected to the presidency who had no executive experience of any sort were Franklin Pierce, Warren G. Harding, John F. Kennedy, and the hapless incumbent we have today....
Witness Barack Obama. Leave aside his first year in office. As I pointed out in posts entitled “Barack Obama and the Exhausted Presidency” and “Obama’s First Year,” from the outset, he conducted himself in an irresponsible fashion that is highly unpresidential....
It is high time that Republicans start asking the obvious question: who, in their number, is best prepared to do what this presidential incumbent has no desire to bother with: to take what the authors of The Federalist called responsibility. Governor Jindal may not be at the very top of the list of possible presidential contenders, but he is certainly high on it.