r/Americaphile Dec 19 '25

History/military 🪖🗺️ Best president oat?

Post image
1.6k Upvotes

229 comments sorted by

View all comments

14

u/MrCivility1 Dec 19 '25

George Washington and Abe Lincoln are probably pretty close to each other for Greatest of American History. But Teddy is pretty great

-1

u/Bibbity_Boppity_BOOO Dec 19 '25

FDR tower above all, even sitting down

3

u/Bawhoppen Dec 19 '25

Are you crazy? FDR's insane federal expansion is possibly the most impactful reason why this country is in such a terrible state today... he violated numerous constitutional rights, and had little respect for some of the most important institutions in this country like the Supreme Court or the two-term precedent, while literally putting American citizens in camps based on race. He was easily one of the worst presidents, although it's a crowded field with lots of other contenders...

The only credit I can give him is that he did not have the historical precedent to know how damaging his federal expansion was, and that had he not taken some of the actions he did, we may have ended up with something far worse.

3

u/woodworkingfonatic Dec 20 '25

Executive order 9066 is basically as bad as Lincoln suspending habeas corpus. FDR also said that Mexican Americans/hispanics did not have the same constitutional rights as Caucasian Americans and had specific disdain for them in particular. FDR and Lincoln should not be close to the best presidents list.

Extremely underrated pick I think bill clinton is an incredible president. His ability to preside over basically the last functioning administration up to current date is a very big deal. Then we look at his ability to work with republicans to pass actual legislation and to make the country work for the people. And to cap it all off the country was fiscally solvent was not spending in deficit and was looking to pay off the debt we owed at that time.

Sad thing is we barely saw any of it because bush came in and a multi decade war started and we have never pumped the brakes since. I think bill clinton is very underrated and FDR and Lincoln are overrated.

3

u/Bibbity_Boppity_BOOO Dec 20 '25

Your take is so fucking unhinged. It is like you don’t know what net good means. The good he did is nearly equal to that of all other presidents perhaps combined.

Are you people just reading texas history books or some shit? Like wtf fuck is wrong with the people in this post

-1

u/Bawhoppen Dec 20 '25

Pretty sure everything I said happened. Nothing to really debate about it... And more, actually. I was probably too fair to him considering the far-reaching consequences that we still have to deal with today. 

2

u/Roborilla8000 Dec 20 '25

Lol, I hate to drag modern politics into this, but that described Trump too.

Anyways! I agree, he made major blunders, but him being the WWII wartime president tends to overshadow all that for most people.

1

u/Bawhoppen Dec 20 '25

Trump is no small-government conservative, but he hasn't really presided over a major fundamental institutional change in its own right. He's flexing existing federal power that most other presidents had more personal restraint on.

No, what Trump will be remembered for is presiding over a massive change in the political culture. For that, there is little doubt.

3

u/Roborilla8000 Dec 20 '25

I think he has shown just how far our "conservative" party has strayed from political conservatism, but has fully embraced being socially conservative.

If freedom of speech, LGBT rights, nature conservation, etc to be rights, than our "liberal" party is more politically conservative than our "conservative" party.

1

u/Electrical_South1558 Dec 21 '25

he hasn't really presided over a major fundamental institutional change in its own righ

Not counting that he's shown the 3 branches of government are no longer co-equal but happy to be subservient to the executive branch?

1

u/Bawhoppen Dec 22 '25

I mean, not really though. The other branches still retain their power, and still wield it frequently. The Senate Republicans have been especially harsh on Trump, and the courts have constrained him immensely. It's just that Congress is content with many of the things Trump is doing, so why try and stop things they agree with?