American Presidents

Constitution• Article 2 establishes the second of the three branches of government, the Executive. Section 1 establishes the

office of the President and the Vice-President, and sets their terms to be four years. Presidents are elected by the Electoral College, whereby each state has one vote for each member of Congress. Originally, the President was the person with the most votes and the Vice-President was the person with the second most, though this is later changed. Certain minimum requirements are established again, such as a 35-year minimum age. Presidents must also be a natural-born citizen of the United States. The President is to be paid a salary, which cannot change, up or down, as long as he in is office.

• Section 2 gives the President some important powers. He is commander-in-chief of the armed forces and of the militia (National Guard) of all the states; he has a Cabinet to aid him and can pardon criminals. He makes treaties with other nations, and picks many of the judges and other members of the government (all with the approval of the Senate).

• Section 3 establishes the duties of the President: to give a state of the union address, to make suggestions to Congress, to act as head of state by receiving ambassadors and other heads of state, and to be sure the laws of the United States are carried out.

George Washington

• 1784 – 1792

Set precedents:

Two terms in office

Peaceful transfer of power

Mr. President

Address to Congress

John Adams

• 1797 -1801

Alien and Sedition

Acts

Peaceful transfer

of power

Thomas Jefferson

• 1801-1809

Purchased Louisiana

Scholar, architect,

scientist, diplomat

Andrew Jackson

• 1829 – 1837– First Western president– Fought Bank of America– Opened White House

to public

Millard Fillmore

• 1850 – 1853

Opened Japan

Compromise of 1850

Bathtub joke

Abraham Lincoln

• 1861-1865

First assassinated

president

Fought Civil War

Freed slaves

Noted speaker,

humorist

Rutherford P. Hayes

• 1877-1881

• Ended Reconstruction

Theodore Roosevelt

• 1901 – 1909

Vice President

Crusader

Anti-monopoly

Fought in war

Founded

third party

Woodrow Wilson

• 1913 – 1921

World War I

League of Nations

Stroke: Edith ran

country

Herbert Hoover

• 1929 – 1933

Depression

Hoovervilles

Coxey’s Army

Prohibition

Franklin Roosevelt

• 1933 – 1945

Only four-term

president

NRA

CCC

World War II

Harry S. Truman

• 1945 – 1953

Atom Bomb

The buck

stops here

John F. Kennedy

• 1961 – 1963

First Catholic

Bay of Pigs

Vietnam

Camelot

John Kennedy, J. Edgar Hoover, Bobby Kennedy

Jackie Kennedy

Richard Nixon

• 1969 – 1974

Resigned

Vietnam War

Watergate

• 1972 – 1974 Illegal use of power Woodward and Bernstein

Plumbers Public hearings

Ronald Reagan

• 1981 – 1989

Conservative

End of Soviet Union

Bill Clinton

• 1993-2001– Balanced budget– Full employment– Almost impeached– Ended wars in

• Yugoslavia• Northern Ireland

Barack Obama

• 2009 –

First black

president