A note to readers on style -- Our special contributors -- Introduction / Susan Swain -- The magnificent lion / Richard Norton Smith -- A brief history of presidential rankings / Douglas Brinkley -- The top ten. Abraham Lincoln / Harold Holzer -- George Washington / Ron Chernow -- Franklin D. Roosevelt / Doris Kearns Goodwin -- Dwight D Eisenhower / William I. Hitchcock -- Harry S. Truman / Aida D. Donald -- Thomas Jefferson / Willard Sterne Randall -- John F. Kennedy / Robert Dallek -- Ronald Reagan / Lou Cannon -- Lyndon B. Johnson / Robert A. Caro -- The men in the middle. Woodrow Wilson / A. Scott Berg -- Barack Obama / David J. Garrow -- James Monroe / John Ferling -- James K. Polk / John Seigenthaler -- William McKinley / Robert W. Merry -- Jame Madison / Noah Feldman -- Andrew Jackson / Mark R. Cheathem -- John Adams / Gordon S. Wood -- George H. W. Bush / Jeffrey A. Engel -- John Quincy Adams / James Traub -- Ulysses S. Grant / Ronald C. White -- Grover Cleveland / H. Paul Jeffers -- William Howard Taft / Jeffrey Rosen -- Gerald R. Ford / James Cannon -- Jimmy Carter / Michael J. Gerhardt -- Calvin Coolidge / Amity Shlaes -- Richard M. Nixon / Evan Thomas -- James A. Garfield / Kenneth D. Ackerman -- Benjamin Harrison / Charles W. Calhoun -- Zachary Taylor / Elbert B. Smith -- Rutherford B. Hayes / Ari Hoogenbom -- George W. Bush / James Mann -- And all the rest. Martin Van Buren / Michael Douglas Henderson -- Chester A. Arthur / Scott S. Greenberger -- Herbert Hoover / Richard Norton Smith -- Millard Fillmore / Edna Greene Medford -- William Henry Harrison / Ronald G. Shafer -- John Tyler / Edward P. Grapol -- Warren G Harding / John W. Dean -- Franklin Pierce / Peter A. Wallner -- Andrew Johnson / David O. Stewart -- James Buchanan / Robert Strauss -- Historians' perspectives on president Donald J. Trump / Douglas Brinkley, Edna Greene Medford, and Richard Norton Smith -- Postscript: The presidency, national identity, and the pursuit of equal justice / Edna Greene Medford -- Appendix I: Historians' survey on presidential leadership, total scores and overall rankings -- Appendix II: US presidents in chronological order.
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