'I cannot imagine power as a thing negative and not positive...No
doubt a lot of nonsense has been talked about the inalienable rights
of the individual, and a great deal that was mere sentiment and pleasing
speculation has been put forward as fundamental principle. The
President is at liberty, both in law and conscience, to be as big a man
as he can. His capacity will set the limit…'
- Woodrow Wilson, in his most famous book, Constitutional Government in the United States
By
Robert W. Merry’s recent post, “The Six Best U.S. Presidents of All Time,”
posed some provocative questions as to how one should define “greatness
in the presidency.” Unfortunately, in scholarly circles, “greatness” is
too often defined as activist presidents pursuing progressive policies.
Far too many scholars have a predilection for presidents such as
Woodrow Wilson, Harry Truman, John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson, while
“caretaker” presidents, like William H. Taft, Calvin Coolidge, Dwight
Eisenhower or Gerald Ford, are slighted in such polls because of their
unwillingness to remake American society.
'The (true) competent leader of men cares little for the internal niceties of
other people’s characters: he cares much–everything–for the external
uses to which they may be put…. He supplies the power; others supply
only the materials upon which that power operates…. It is the power
which dictates, dominates; the materials yield. Men are as clay in the
hands of the consummate leader. (They are the tools of the Master).'
- Woodrow Wilson, Leaders of Men, 1890
This bias toward progressive presidencies is part of Woodrow Wilson’s legacy,
for the Princeton professor changed the way both practitioners and his
fellow academics thought about the presidency. Both Professor Wilson and
President Wilson believed that the Constitution was not fit for the
complexities of twentieth-century American life. A document written at a
time when the horse and buggy was the main mode of transportation was
seen as an obstacle to creating an activist government capable of
checking big business. Wilson held that it was the responsibility of the
president to break the gridlock caused by the Constitution’s separation
of powers and unleash the power of the federal government to restrain
the barons of industry.
'We want one class of persons to have a liberal education and we want
another class of persons, a very much larger class of necessity in every
society, to forgo the privilege of a liberal education and fit
themselves to perform specific difficult manual tasks.'
- Woodrow Wilson, on education
The president would break this gridlock by serving as his party’s
leader, thereby bridging the separation of powers between the executive
and the legislature, and would preside over an executive branch composed
of experts who would regulate the economy in the interest of the common
man. In addition to presiding over this regulatory state, the president
would serve as an educator and visionary who would lead the nation
through his oratorical skills.
'If any trait bubbles up in all one reads about Wilson it is this: he
loved, craved, and in a sense glorified power.'
- Walter
McDougall, Wilsonian historian
The president would no longer be indebted to a political party for
his selection, for presidential nominees would be chosen through
primaries and the nominee would then impose his will on his party, not
the other way around. Wilson’s chief executive was free to be as big a
man as he wanted to be, with his power no longer anchored in the
Constitution or in his party, but rooted in his personal charisma;
presidential effectiveness would hinge on his personal attributes, not
on any formal grant of power.
There
can be no equality or opportunity if men and women and children be not
shielded in their lives from the consequences of great industrial and
social processes which they cannot alter, control, or singly cope with.
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/woodrow_wilson.html#YJvSIc5r9RbgEhcD.99
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/woodrow_wilson.html#YJvSIc5r9RbgEhcD.99
There
can be no equality or opportunity if men and women and children be not
shielded in their lives from the consequences of great industrial and
social processes which they cannot alter, control, or singly cope with.
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/woodrow_wilson.html#YJvSIc5r9RbgEhcD.99
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/woodrow_wilson.html#YJvSIc5r9RbgEhcD.99
'The Constitution was not made to fit us like a straitjacket. In its elasticity lies its chief greatness.'
- Woodrow Wilson
There
can be no equality or opportunity if men and women and children be not
shielded in their lives from the consequences of great industrial and
social processes which they cannot alter, control, or singly cope with.
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/woodrow_wilson.html#YJvSIc5r9RbgEhcD.99
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/woodrow_wilson.html#YJvSIc5r9RbgEhcD.99
More than a century later, we continue to live under Woodrow Wilson’s
regime, as scholars judge Wilson’s successors by the standards he set.
Wilson upended the Founding or Constitutional understanding of the role
of the president and overturned the expectations of what a president
could be expected to achieve.
Unfortunately, the Wilsonian conception of the presidency, adopted wholeheartedly by Democrats and eventually by Republicans, produced a massive expectations gap—a long train of heightened expectations followed by dashed hopes. The impact of Wilson’s personal presidency, or personalized presidency, can be seen in the following examples from the era of “presidential government”:
'[T]he
whole nation has awakened to and recognizes the extraordinary importance of the
science of human heredity [eugenics], as well as its application to the
ennoblement of the human family…'
- President Woodrow Wilson, on eugenics, 1913
Unfortunately, the Wilsonian conception of the presidency, adopted wholeheartedly by Democrats and eventually by Republicans, produced a massive expectations gap—a long train of heightened expectations followed by dashed hopes. The impact of Wilson’s personal presidency, or personalized presidency, can be seen in the following examples from the era of “presidential government”:
John F. Kennedy
JFK was not the choice of party leaders; his campaign was a family effort, not a party effort. Kennedy claimed that
“man can be as big as he wants. No problem of human destiny is beyond
human beings. Man’s reason and spirit have often solved the seemingly
unsolvable—and we believe they can do it again” and that the president
“must be prepared to exercise the fullest powers of his office—all that
are specified and some that are not.” His vision of American omnipotence
led him to proclaim that the United States would “bear any burden, pay
any price” to defend liberty around the globe, including in the swamps
of South Vietnam.
'Wilson was a typical Puritan. Magnanimity was simply beyond him.'
- H.L. Mencken, 1921
Lyndon B. Johnson
Johnson believed that America could win the hearts and minds of the
South Vietnamese by exporting a model similar to the Tennessee Valley
Authority to the Mekong Delta. His “War on Poverty” was accompanied by
extravagant claims by members of his administration that poverty would
be abolished in the United States by 1975. Johnson saw no boundary
between himself and the office he held; when a young military officer
tried to direct Johnson to his presidential helicopter, LBJ snapped,
“Son, they are all my helicopters.”
Richard M. Nixon
In response to a question about alleged abuses of power during his presidency, Nixon responded, “when the President does it, that means it is not illegal.”
Nixon also launched a “War on Drugs,” which is now America’s longest
war, having been fought, unsuccessfully, for forty-three years.
Jimmy Carter
Carter pledged to abolish depravity in government, promising an administration that was “as good and honest, decent, truthful, and competent, and compassionate, and as filled with love,
as are the American people.” Carter’s Vice President, Walter Mondale,
argued that it was the proper role of government to assist “the sad.”
George W. Bush
Bush fought a “War on Terror” and sought to transform Iraq and Afghanistan.
Barack Obama
Obama noted when he clinched his party’s nomination that “this was the moment . . . when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal.”
These extravagant claims, and many others, produced an “expectations
gap” that is fueled by inflated rhetoric, demagoguery and pandering, and
would repulse the Founding Fathers (although it should be noted, in
fairness, that it is also fueled by the insatiable demands of the
American public). The Founding Fathers understood something many modern
politicians and political scientists do not: the more you personalize
the presidency and the more you inflate the presidential portfolio, the
more you diminish it. It is important to note that the Founders
presidency provided both a floor and a ceiling that protected but also
energized the office; without this, the office is trapped in a cycle of
raised expectations followed by public disappointment and cynicism.
A century of progressive disregard for the Constitution has damaged
our nation’s polity, possibly beyond repair. Too much is expected of the
federal government, especially the presidency. Even strong nationalists
like Alexander Hamilton acknowledged limits to what the presidency
should do: it should concentrate on administering the government,
conduct foreign negotiations, oversee military preparations, and if need
be, direct a war. The president was to avoid demagogic appeals, engage
in the steady administration of the law, protect the right to property,
and conduct (in partial concert with the Senate) the nation’s foreign
relations. It should not attempt to democratize the world, comfort the
sad, or heal the planet.
Unfortunately, the Founders’ understanding of the presidency died
over a hundred years ago with the election of Woodrow Wilson (our
nation’s only President with a PhD—which should serve as a warning). The
prospects are remote that we can restore the Founders’ “energetic
executive” and rollback some of the excesses of the Wilsonian
presidency. But scholars could start by defining “great presidents” as
those with an appreciation for the Constitution and a grasp of the
virtue of humility.
Stephen F. Knott is a Professor of National Security Affairs at the United States Naval War College.
Sophie:
As
Governor of New Jersey, that great 'Progressive,' Woodrow Wilson,
appointed American eugenicist, Dr Edwin Katzen-Ellenbogen, to be the
Chief Eugenicist of New Jersey. Dr Katzen-Ellenbogen wrote the New
Jersey eugenics laws. He had served on the faculty of the Harvard
Medical School and was a founding member of the prestigious, but
pro-Nazi Eugenics Research Association headquartered at the Carnegie
Institution. Dr Katzen-Ellenbogen, who was also quite possibly one of
the fattest Jews ever to leave a Nazi concentration camp, was later
convicted of war crimes in a trial at Dachau and was referred to as one
of the 'Butchers of Buchenwald.'
I covered a rather famous example of Wilson's Police State in How
Woodrow Wilson And Progressives Killed Robert Goldstein Through Censorship, Police State
Tactics, Unconstitutional Laws, & Railroading All The Way Into A
Cattlecar On The Road To A Nazi Concentration Camp
Related Reading:
Woodrow Wilson: A Frenzied Pedagogue
How Did Woodrow Wilson Become America’s Most Hated President?
World War I as Fulfillment: Power and the Intellectuals
We're Still Paying The Price For Woodrow Wilson's Failure In The Ukraine
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