Gregarious And “Loner” Presidents Since 1900; And Remaining Presidential Candidates’ Personalities Assessed!

Presidents have different personalities, with some being very gregarious and outgoing, clearly extroverts: and others being more described as “loners”, who could be cordial in public, but did not like being around government leaders very much, and are clearly introverts.

In the first category, we would include

Theodore Roosevelt

Franklin D. Roosevelt

Harry Truman

John F. Kennedy

Lyndon B. Johnson

Gerald Ford

Ronald Reagan

Bill Clinton

George W. Bush

In the second category, we would include

William Howard Taft

Woodrow Wilson

Warren G. Harding

Calvin Coolidge

Herbert Hoover

Dwight D. Eisenhower

Richard Nixon

Jimmy Carter

George H. W. Bush

Barack Obama is a unique case, not really fitting into either category clearly, as he can tend to be very gregarious, but also has difficulty dealing with Congress, with one speculating that he has been scarred by the total obstructionism of the opposition.  He tends to avoid “schmoozing”, although the feeling is that he is basically quite gregarious.

So putting Obama in a separate category, notice that 9 Presidents (5 Democrats, 4 Republicans) are considered gregarious, while 9 Presidents (7 Republicans,  2 Democrats) are considered more “loners”.

63 years we have had gregarious Presidents; 45 years we have had “loner” Presidents, and then we have the 8 years of Obama.

Notice that the gregarious Presidents have, as a group, a more positive image in history, than the “loner” Presidents, and they have more often been reelected!

Among remaining Presidential Candidates as of this date, the “gregarious” candidates would include Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, Marco Rubio and John Kasich, while the more “loner” types would be Bernie Sanders, Ted Cruz, and Dr. Benjamin Carson.

4 comments on “Gregarious And “Loner” Presidents Since 1900; And Remaining Presidential Candidates’ Personalities Assessed!

  1. Paul Doyle February 26, 2016 4:45 pm

    Professor,
    There will be a new category added if The Donald, God forbid, is elected:

    Totally obnoxious

  2. Ronald February 26, 2016 7:11 pm

    HAHAHA!

  3. Paul Doyle February 27, 2016 8:24 am

    Professor,
    I thought I knew more than the average person when it comes to history. We all know Hilary Clinton is the first serious woman candidate for President. Many names were thrown out in my memory of a party nominating a woman VP. I can remember Margaret Chase Smith’s name being bandied about. And then, of course, Geraldine Ferraro and Sarah Failin’ were actually on party tickets.

    However, the first woman candidate for President was one who could not even vote for herself. I stumbled across an article in the paper about VIctoria Woodhull. In the spirit of the Presidential primaries and election season wanted to share this little known figure in history:

    http://www.victoria-woodhull.com/whoisvw.htm

  4. Ronald February 27, 2016 8:58 am

    Wow, what a great article, and even I learned a lot! LOL Thanks, Paul, appreciate it!

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