Posted on 12/31/2014 4:23:04 AM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
As government’s scope expands, voters see the advantages of a candidate from inside the Beltway.
In 1947, U.S. historian Wilfred E. Binkley took stock of the 13 men who had been president since the end of the Civil War and reached a stark conclusion: Governorship was “a training school for successful presidents.” The seven ex-governors on the list – including both Roosevelts, Theodore and Franklin – were far more effective chief executives than the six others.
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said pretty much the same thing during the Republican Governors Association meeting last month. “We’re better at it,” Christie told his fellow state leaders. “The American people are done with the experiment of having somebody (as president) who’s never run anything before.” He was preaching to the choir. The list of potential 2016 Republican presidential candidates is dominated by governors. Alongside Christie, there’s John Kasich (Ohio), Scott Walker (Wisconsin), Bobby Jindal (Louisiana), Mike Pence (Indiana) and Rick Scott (Florida). And don’t forget Florida’s former Gov. Jeb Bush and Arkansas ex-Gov. Mike Huckabee, who are considering presidential runs as well.
But if you look across our nation’s whole history, it’s hardly clear that former governors make the best presidents. The ranks of governor-turned-presidents include not just the Roosevelts, after all, but also Grover Cleveland, Calvin Coolidge and Jimmy Carter.
Governors’ fates during presidential elections have ebbed and flowed, reflecting shifts in how Americans think about government itself. Before the American Revolution, Colonial governors were appointed by the British crown. Americans in the early republic continued to view them with suspicion: In seven of the original 13 states, governors were elected for just one-year terms.
The job was certainly no steppingstone toward the White House. After George Washington, the next five presidents were vice presidents or secretaries of state when they ran. When Alexis de Tocqueville came to America in the 1830s to study its nascent democracy, one politician told him, “The governor counts for absolutely nothing and is only paid $1,200!”
After the Civil War, governors started to come into popular favor. In 1876, both parties nominated a governor for president. Although New York Gov. Samuel Tilden won the popular vote, Ohio Gov. Rutherford B. Hayes received the majority in the Electoral College. (It was the Bush v. Gore election of its day.)
For 52 of the next 68 years, the Oval Office was occupied by former governors. State governments in the early 1900s became “laboratories of democracy,” as future Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis called them, experimenting with workplace safety regulation and a host of other reforms. That made state governors like Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson into much more prominent figures, who moved easily onto the national stage.
But after World War II, experience in Washington came into vogue. All of our chief executives from Truman to Ford were former members of Congress, with the notable exception of ex-Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower. Amid the national security concerns of the Cold War, voters wanted their commander in chief to be someone who knew his way around the federal government.
Writing in 1959, pollster Louis Harris wondered whether an ex-governor could ever win the presidency again. “In a cosmic, atomic, mass-media age, governors have shrunk to … local figures,” Harris wrote.
But the tide would turn again in the 1970s, when the Watergate scandal soured Americans on Washington pols. At the same time the rise of modern conservatism devolved many powers to the states and made “Washington, D.C.” a term of derision and scorn. Starting with Carter in 1976, four of the next five presidents were former governors.
Then came a U.S. senator, Barack Obama, who beat the trend. He defeated a fellow senator (John McCain) the first time around and an ex-governor (Mitt Romney) the next. His party appears likely to select another ex-senator, Hillary Rodham Clinton, to run in 2016.
So despite all the Republican governors lining up to be the presidential nominee, don’t be surprised if Republicans choose a senator with a national profile – say, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio or Rand Paul.
The scope of the federal government has greatly expanded during the Obama years, including health care, the National Security Agency and the presidential order on immigration. And the more influence that the federal government exerts on voters, the more they see the advantages of a candidate from inside the Beltway. Like it or not, that makes Congress – not the statehouse – the more likely training school for our next president.
Historically, governors rose to president but senators now have an edge
Politics in America has become a game of deception, smoke and mirrors to bilk the “stupid” voters out of as much income as is possible.
Interestingly, I love Ted Cruz, but would be concerned with him as president because he has not held the executive position. I’d much prefer Scott Walker.
But Cruz is a good second choice.
On a side note, my Christmas family get together was at Wisconsin Dells. They really like Walker up there.
I don’t recall Jimmy Carter, Dubya, Bill Clinton, FDR and Wilson being great presidents, yet they were all former governors.
Cruz was the longest serving Solicitor General in Texas’ history.
I don’t recall Jimmy Carter, Dubya, Bill Clinton, FDR and Wilson being great presidents, yet they were all former governors.
I also think Dubya was better than people gave him credit for, though the only thing he did that I fully support to this day was the invasion of Iraq.
And if we are going to ding ex governors, lets call out the ex senators as well. e.g. Obama. :-D
Oh, I definitely prefer senators with zero proven leadership skills. Oh, we’ve already done that, and look what it got us!
No. I actually prefer someone who shows they can lead a state. Even more important, I want someone who can point to conservative successes while governing.
That’s a big problem for the Republican Party. The GOPe favorites all claim to be conservative, but none of them can point to a single way they made government smaller. The moderates always keeping moving left—never holding the line or pushing to the right. Wouldn’t a true moderate try to accomplish at least some things for the right, right?
What Walker did with the public unions (and the continuing fight that ensued) blew me away.
But yeah, I don’t support any moderates. Not one. McCain is their poster boy.
An ‘intellectual discussion over who’s going to put the pieces of this country back together after two more years if this and a campaign against the baby killing open borders corruption machine? And that’s just jeb - not to
Mention the mud bro Benghazi queen?
You are going to see a lot more of this seemingly high brow hidden virulent frightened anti Cruz sentiment here on FR.
It’s just troll.
It’s going to be a long nasty two years. Governor, community organizer, or organized crime boss, if the one who is devoted to the true success of the founding principals does not win, our problem is with the people. The voters. For instance, people who would say Cruz is wrong for the job because he is not pure perfection.
They are the problem. Not Hillary, nor Jeb nor boner, who would not be in power or close to it if not for such ignorance and hatred of the truth
Muzbro
Governors are executives. They have to delegate, negotiate and initiate. They also enforce.
My support leans to Republican governors who have shown an ability to win in liberal states.
Ronald Reagan is the prime example...twice in California.
Calvin Coolidge did it in Massachusetts....though Massachusetts may have been a bit more conservative in his day.
Mitt Romney did it in Taxachusetts.
Scott Walker did it twice in Wisconsin.
Reagan is running?
I lived in California back then. It wasn’t a far-left state like now. Romney? Seriously?
I think after the Obama experience, voters are going to be loathe to elect another Senator as POTUS for a LOOOOOONG time.
IMO this may be the one thing that stops the Fake Indian.
Your last paragraph sums it up nicely. Thanks!
I agree with you to a great degree regarding Christie and Rauner.
Romney’s big liability for me is that he was only a one-term governor....but it was better than the rest of the field he was facing.
A two term Republican in a liberal state (Reagan and Walker, for instance) are the best, in my opinion.
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