Presidents who claimed to limit government often actually did the opposite. History often looks unfavorably on presidents who may have actually contributed smart and important policies.
Were Harding and Coolidge really as ineffective as their reputations maintain? Did Hoover not do enough to end the Depression? Was Reagan a true champion of small-government conservatism?
We all know that the American president is one of the most powerful people in the world. But to understand the presidency today we often have to learn from the past. Author Ivan Eland offers a new perspective in Eleven Presidents on the evolution of the executive office by exploring the policies of eleven key presidents who held office over the last one hundred years: Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush. The book combines an exploration of how political currents shape historical legacies with an in-depth analysis of presidents’ actual policies. An important, revealing book about the presidency, legacy, and the formation of history, Eleven Presidents is essential reading for understanding the American presidency.
“Ivan Eland’s Eleven Presidents looks to be as indispensable as his last excellent book on the U.S. presidents, Recarving Rushmore. How well have American presidents since World War I done in keeping their promises to constrain government? Read this book!”
“Ivan Eland has done it again. In Eleven Presidents, he looks at the history of the presidency from an entirely new perspective. Along the way, this well-written and thoroughly researched book persuasively challenges the conventional wisdom at every turn. Even when readers disagree with Eland’s interpretations, he will make them think and ponder.”
“Political conservatism may or may not be out of ideas as some of its adversaries claim, but sincere small-government advocates like Ivan Eland in Eleven Presidents are continuing to stimulate debate in original and highly interesting ways.”
“‘All is not what it first appears to be in presidential history,’ as the excellent volume Eleven Presidents makes painfully clear. The book offers a devastating critique of Republican presidents and their ‘limited government hypocrisy.’ Beginning with Herbert Hoover, GOP presidents have expounded on the benefits of smaller government but expanded it nonetheless. (Dwight Eisenhower gets credit for being the one Republican president who kept his promises.) ‘Watch what they do, not what they say’ is a lesson to be learned from this insightful volume. Carefully comparing promises with results, Eland shows how GOP presidents, from Hoover to George W. Bush, have been Big Government Republicans, despite their rhetoric about ‘limited government.’ Eleven Presidents turns historical assessments of U.S. Presidents upside down—and makes for a fascinating read. Eland makes a good case that Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge, normally ranked low in presidential polls that prize presidential ‘energy,’ were in fact two of our greatest presidents when judged by keeping their promises to limit government, both here and abroad. The lesson here is that neither major political party is committed to limited government in practice. While there are episodes of deregulation (under Jimmy Carter) or restrained spending (Eisenhower, Clinton), government grows inexorably. So, what is to be done? Eland states that the ‘continuing hypocrisy of promising limited government and then not delivering it should be penalized [by voters], not rewarded.’ Whether there is any public will to hold presidents accountable or not is then a serious question for readers to ponder.”
