That was his mandate though. Polk accomplished most of his campaign promises then dropped the mic after one term. It was a much simpler time to be sure...
I think it's a good argument that on World influence Washington is up there. What makes history so interesting is that while Washington set a great example that shaped later US Presidents and other world leaders he himself warned against the US getting entangled in foreign conflicts. We obviously have no idea what Washington would've done if he was President during the WWI or WWII but Washington's farewell speech warned about the dangers of the new country getting caught up in European conflicts.
That's certainly a possibility and one of the great questions of history is where would LBJ be if he had withdrawn US forces from Vietnam. Consider that in 1964 we didn't know how Vietnam would turn out and if he withdrew early and South Vietnam fell history might look at that as a failure of abandoning an ally. If he withdrew after the Tet offensive that might look even more of a failure as a battlefield defeat.
The issue is more about our approach to Vietnam. Either we should have withdrawn or invaded North Vietnam. We never had a plan for victory.
Let me guess, Trump is Top 5? LOL. FDR and Lincoln led the US thru the most turbulent times in its History (Great Depression/WW2 and Civil War).
You forget. FDR was a communist. You can't be a communist and be a elite president. Right @StupidMoniker ? Lincoln wanted to destroy the southern economy just to unify the country and get out of the institution of slavery. Obviously it makes him one of the worst. Can't have that can we?
Not sure if serious but taking it on face value I can see how from a Libertarian standpoint FDR could be considered the worst. In these type of discussions I think you need to put aside ideology to some extent and look at their overall records. Most politicians make compromises and it's more the norm for them to make decisions against held ideology depending on circumstances. Reagan is a great example as in the 1986 Tax Reform he did end up raising taxes. We can also look at GH Bush's famous "read my lips." that he went against, not so much ideological but breaking an obvious campaign promise and raising taxes. In those case there were other circumstances and if you look at the totality of those decisions there were good things or at least, significant things that came out of it. In the case of FDR and Lincoln you have to look at the totality of them. While I certainly think FDR deserves a lot of criticism for interning Japanese Americans and Lincoln suspending habeas corpus among many other questionable things that both did. Yet in both cases they accomplished very historical things and things that most historians and most Americans would consider to be very good.
That's the most obvious but there were many other things that he did that are questionable. There is good debate whether he knew that Japanese were going to attack Pearl Harbor and that he essentially lured them into it. It's very obvious that he wanted the US to enter the war and did all that he could to help the allies well before Pearl Harbor.
No, Trump is a clown. There would not have been a civil war absent Lincoln, so I don't credit him for that. FDR turned a downturn in the economy into a permanent ruination of the ideas of a republican system and limited goverment. The Axis powers had no chance of winning WWII, regardless of who was president. I wouldn't say he was a communist. He radically expanded the federal government, imprisoned people for their national origin, and had no respect for the rule of law. He threatened court packing. The long term effects of his policies and trashing of the Constitution persist to this day. Lincoln prosecuted an aggressive war against people that didn't want to be part of the Union anymore. He also had no respect for the rule of law, suspending habeus corpus. Both that and the emancipation proclamation were blatantly unconstitutional. He was also okay with preserving slavery if it would preserve the Union. Absolutely serious. All five of the presidents I listed were responsible for massively increasing the power and scope of the federal government, to the detriment of the people. They were lacking in principle and cared not to respect the law, the rights of individuals, or the rights of states.
There was always going to be a Civil War. There was no way Slavery was going survive in an expanding United States.
I think slavery eventually would have ended without a civil war. Importation of slaves had already ended. Eventually it would have been cheaper either to pay laborers or to automate. Slavery was outlawed all over the world without any other nation having a civil war over it. Brazil imported far more slaves than the United States, but they didn't have a Civil War to end slavery, they just eventually ended it when it became economically advantageous to do so, roughly 33 years after the Civil War in the United States.
By winning WWII how do you define that? I think the Axis ending up conquering the World like in the Man in the High Castle was extremely unlikely but I think Germany and Japan were in position to hold out and solidify their control of much of the territory they conquered. If the US didn't engage in Lend Lease and then enter the war it's very questionable if the UK would've had the resources to hold out. Both the USSR and China had given up vast swaths of territory that while the Axis might've had trouble holding without US help those countries might've had a hard time mounting a counter attack especially one that could've ended up in Berlin or forcing a Japanese surrender. Yes you are correct that those Presidents did those things and as said that most politicians make compromises and give up on ideology. This is very true in wartime. You have to look at the totality of what they did and the results. If you feel that the persistence of slavery indefinitely and a much weaker US as being a lesser evil than a temporary suspension of Habeas Corpus and the Emancipation Proclamation that was done under war powers and later formalized by the 13th Amendment then yes Lincoln is a horrible President. If you feel that a prolongation of the Great Depression and the Fascist states dominating Europe and Asia are lesser evils than what FDR did then yes FDR is a horrible President.
You underestimate the determination of Southern Whites. You can still see it now with those Confederate Flags and their support of Donald Trump.
Once Hitler attacked the Soviet Union and was in a two front war, he had already lost. He had to draw troops away from the western front to fight the Soviets, who could outproduce him substantially by themselves. The allies were much better positioned and had very tough to conquer territories (the Brits for having an island nation and the Soviets for having Russian winter and spring thaw. I was looking at the totality of what they did. You are assuming both that the US would be much weaker and that Slavery would have continued indefinitely in the South. I think there is very little evidence for the second assumption especially, given the example of every other nation, including other nations in the Americas that had imported African slaves. We can't possibly know what the US would be like now without the Civil War. For all we know it would have rejoined with the Confederacy after abolition and we would have a freer, more republican government that better respects the rights of the states and the people. I think FDR prolonged the Great Depression and that Allied victory in WWII was inevitable, so I wouldn't be concerned about things that were never going to happen being lesser or greater than the terrible things FDR actually did. I present as my argument every other country that abolished slavery without a Civil War.
several well-known alternate histories have argued that reunification would have occurred, including MacKinlay Kantor's: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/If_the_South_Had_Won_the_Civil_War
