SECRET LIVES OF THE U.S. PRESIDENTS
WHAT YOUR TEACHERS NEVER TOLD YOU ABOUT THE MEN OF THE WHITE HOUSE
BY CORMAC O’BRIEN
PORTRAITS BY MONIKA SUTESKI
Copyright © 2009 by Cormac O’Brien
Illustrations copyright © 2004 by Quirk Productions, Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher.
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eISBN: 978-1-59474-479-2
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Dedication
For my parents, John and Mary Ann, who created a household in which seeking, questioning, and laughter were always welcome. Would that everyone had such inestimable role models.
CONTENTS
Introduction
George Washington (1789–1797)
John Adams (1797–1801)
Thomas Jefferson (1801–1809)
James Madison (1809–1817)
James Monroe (1817–1825)
John Quincy Adams (1825–1829)
* Founding Fodder
Andrew Jackson (1829–1837)
Martin Van Buren (1837–1841)
William Henry Harrison (1841)
John Tyler (1841–1845)
James Knox Polk (1845–1849)
Zachary Taylor (1849–1850)
Millard Fillmore (1850–1853)
Franklin Pierce (1853–1857)
* Secret Lives of the U.S. Freemasons
James Buchanan (1857–1861)
Abraham Lincoln (1861–1865)
Andrew Johnson (1865–1869)
Ulysses S. Grant (1869–1877)
Rutherford B. Hayes (1877–1881)
James A. Garfield (1881)
Chester A. Arthur (1881–1885)
* The White House
Grover Cleveland (1885–1889, 1893–1897)
Benjamin Harrison (1889–1893)
William McKinley (1897–1901)
Theodore Roosevelt (1901–1909)
William Howard Taft (1909–1913)
Woodrow Wilson (1913–1921)
Warren G. Harding (1921–1923)
Calvin Coolidge (1923–1929)
* Famous First Ladies
Herbert Hoover (1929–1933)
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1933–1945)
Harry S Truman (1945–1953)
Dwight David Eisenhower (1953–1961)
John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1961–1963)
Lyndon Baines Johnson (1963–1969)
Richard Milhous Nixon (1969–1974)
* Presidential Pets
Gerald R. Ford (1974–1977)
James Earl Carter (1977–1981)
Ronald Reagan (1981–1989)
George Herbert Walker Bush (1989–1993)
William Jefferson Clinton (1993–2001)
George W. Bush (2001–2009)
Barack Obama (2009–)
Selected Bibliography
Index
Acknowledgments
Introduction
“When I was a boy, I was told that anyone could be president. I’m beginning to believe it.”—CLARENCE DARROW
Chief Executive. Commander in Chief. Leader of the Free World. The Big Cheese. Whatever you want to call him, the president of the United States wields a fantastic amount of power. He keeps the military at his beck and call. He can veto Congress’s best efforts at the drop of a hat. He receives birthday cards from foreign heads of state. His actions even affect the stock market, sometimes dramatically.
Love him or hate him, he’s the closest thing we have to a monarch, a figure who encapsulates elements of celebrity and patriarchy all at once. Little wonder, then, that the men who have held the title of “Mr. President” have become household names. (Except William Henry Harrison and Chester Arthur. Oh, and Benjamin Harrison.) George Washington was the Father of Our Country, Abraham Lincoln led the nation through its greatest trial, Franklin Roosevelt took on the Great Depression and fascist aggression, and John Kennedy stared down the Soviets during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Yadda, yadda, yadda.
At least, that’s what you read in the textbooks. And some of it is actually true. But what were these fellas really like? Here’s what the Constitution has to say: “No person except a natural born Citizen . . . shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.”
These prerequisites don’t narrow the field by much. Of course, we all know there are a few more unspecified requirements—anyone who wants to be president should probably have enormous piles of cash, close contacts in big business, white skin, and a penis. But compared with the situation in most other countries on Earth, eligibility for the highest office in this land is still pretty wide open. And if there’s any doubt in your mind about that, consider all the ninnies who have managed to get there.
Take Zachary Taylor. He dressed like an old shoe, never voted before becoming president, spat tobacco juice all over the Executive Mansion, and died from an overdose of bad cherries. Then there’s Warren Harding. Bad enough that his middle name was Gamaliel. But this was a man who liked to screw his mistresses in White House closets, lived in fear of his wife, and was a devout believer in his own outstanding incompetence. Rutherford Hayes held sing-alongs every night in the White House, William Taft was too big to fit in an ordinary bathtub, Lyndon Johnson drank Scotch out of a paper cup while driving, and Gerald Ford farted. A lot.
The giants of the presidential pantheon are just as colorful, from George Washington (who had a notoriously short temper) to Jack Kennedy (who had a notoriously long list of mistresses). Remember Ulysses S. Grant, whose generalship during the Civil War led to some of the most gruesome slaughters in American history? He hated the sight of blood. And how about Teddy Roosevelt, whose progressive politics brought him into conflict with some of the nation’s richest robber barons? He loved the sight of blood.
Not that we shouldn’t continue to revere these gentlemen for their accomplishments or thank them for their devotion. After all, they have one of the hardest jobs in the world. But through more than two centuries of war, legislation, and diplomacy, this country’s highest leaders have displayed the consistent ability to remind us that they’re not only presidents but also human beings—flawed, neurotic, hapless, bizarre, frightened, and sometimes depraved.
And thank goodness. Because if they weren’t, this would have to be a book about Hollywood celebs or corporate tycoons. And who wants another one of those?
1 GEORGE WASHINGTON
February 22, 1732–December 14, 1799
ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: Pisces
TERM OF PRESIDENCY: 1789–1797
PARTY: N/A (first term); Federalist (second term)
AGE UPON TAKING OFFICE: 57
VICE PRESIDENT: John Adams
RAN AGAINST: John Adams, John Jay (first term); John Adams, George Clinton (second term)
HEIGHT: 6′2″
NICKNAMES: “Father of Our Country,” “The Old Fox”
SOUND BITE: “My movements to the chair of government will be accompanied by feelings not unlike those of a culprit who is going to the place of his execution.”
Talk about a warm welcome—when General Geo
rge Washington visited New York City at the end of the Revolutionary War, one local newspaper cheered, “He comes! ’Tis mighty Washington! Words fail to tell all he has done!”
These sentiments were shared by virtually every American. Having defeated the mightiest nation on earth (with a healthy dose of French help), the tall, stately Virginian had achieved the stature of a demigod in American eyes. It’s no wonder he became the fledgling nation’s first chief executive; in fact, the office was created by the Founding Fathers with old George in mind.
George Washington’s salary was around a million dollars in today’s money—and he indulged in such luxuries as leopard-skin robes for all of his horses.
Washington was a minor Virginia aristocrat born of humble means whose career in surveying, land speculation, and militia service blossomed into immortality. Over the course of the American Revolution, he managed to avoid losing an army of underfed, underpaid, and often underwhelming rebels to the fierce predation of the British Empire and went on to assume the role of patriarch to an embryonic country. Above all, he resisted the impulse to become king over a people willing to make him one—no small feat, that.
As president, he established many of the customs we take for granted today. The inaugural address was his idea (although the actual speech was written primarily by James Madison). He also liked to be called “Mr. President,” which (when you consider that the Senate wanted to call him “His Highness the President of the United States of America, and the Protector of Their Liberties”) shows good judgment indeed. During his two terms, he put down a very serious insurrection (the Whiskey Rebellion) and, by acting as referee in their many heated disputes, prevented Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton from tearing each other to pieces.
Of course, it’s stuff like this that gets your face on a quarter, but there’s another side of the coin. The Father of Our Country had just as many flaws as any other dysfunctional dad. Here are some of the highlights.
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DREAMS OF WEEMS
Chopping down the cherry tree. “I cannot tell a lie.” Throwing a dollar across the Rappahannock River. These are the myths that come to mind when we think about George Washington, and they’ve been standard fare in textbooks for years. But why? Where did they come from? Blame it all on Mason Locke Weems, a parson who, almost immediately after Washington’s death, published a book of his (alleged) exploits. A History of the Life and Death, Virtues and Exploits of General George Washington says a great deal about how the young nation viewed its late patriarch. People wanted to rememberhim as something more than human, and that’s just how Parson Weems portrayed him.
AN ODD COUPLE
For most of his life, Washington was in love with a woman named Sally Fairfax, wife of George William Fairfax—Washington’s neighbor and best friend. Although his passions for the worldly and beautiful Sally probably never waned, Washington settled for a much more practical match: the widow Martha Custis, whose considerable holdings made him the wealthy gentleman he longed to be. The two were married in January 1759 and made a very odd couple indeed—George, a giant for the time at about 6′2″, towered over his portly bride, whose head didn’t make it to his shoulders.
WOODEN TEETH???
Hardly. You try keeping wood in your mouth without ending up with a maw full of rotting pulp. Washington did have to endure numerous sets of dentures, however, many of which were painfully inadequate. He even had one pair constructed out of hippopotamus bone, a particularly porous material that absorbed much of the first president’s port, staining the dentures black. No wonder he never smiled.
Pitching a Fit
You could say George Washington was all the rage—in more ways than one. At the Battle of Kip’s Bay, when Connecticut militia retreated from British soldiers without firing a shot, the general exploded with an apopleptic fury, hurling his hat to the ground, swearing himself blue in the face, and cane-whipping everyone within reach.
A few years later, Thomas Jefferson, while serving on Washington’s cabinet, had this to say about the president’s reaction to a bit of particularly bad press: “The President was much inflamed. [He] got into one of those passions when he cannot control himself . . . [yelling] that BY GOD he had rather be in his grave than in his present situation.”
IT’S A LIVING
According to historian Willard Randall, “the first president of the United States, George Washington, needed the job.” The Revolutionary War had put Washington in serious financial straits, and accepting the highest office in the land—a responsibility he was somewhat loath to assume—was the answer to his money troubles. He soon proved just how big a spender a chief executive could be. His salary was $25,000 (equivalent to about a million dollars today), of which an incredible seven percent was spent on alcohol. He even splurged on such luxuries as leopard-skin robes for his stable of matched horses.
SEMINAL ISSUE
Was the Father of Our Country sterile? It’s possible. Although he enthusiastically embraced the role of stepfather (Martha had children from a previous marriage), he never sired any children of his own. Some speculate that he’d been rendered sterile by sickness. He had contracted malaria and smallpox simultaneously when he was just seventeen years old, a double affliction that could’ve done the trick.
Interestingly enough, it was the man’s lack of a blood heir that allowed the Founding Fathers to imbue the office of president with real power. Because the framers of the Constitution created the position of chief executive with Washington in mind, any fears they may have had about the first president getting delusions of kingly grandeur could be put to rest. After all, what’s a monarch without an heir? For his part, Washington consistently denied having any such notions whatsoever. In fact, he made no secret of the fact that all he really wanted to do was get back to Mount Vernon and spend his golden years growing tobacco and drinking Madeira by the fire.
BAD MEDICINE
George Washington, who spent the vast majority of his life outdoors, who reveled in horse riding and swordsmanship, who had a physique remarkable for its size and strength, and who managed to avoid getting killed through two savage wars, appears to have died of a cold.
Or pneumonia.
Or was it strep throat?
It isn’t clear from the contemporary accounts what sent Washington to the beyond, but we do know that his throat was very sore and constricted and that the men attempting to cure him, like most eighteenth-century physicians, were quacks. They bled him four times, despite Martha’s protests. They made him drink a concoction of molasses, vinegar, and butter. And they filled him full of laxatives in an attempt to purge his foundering system but succeeded only in forcing the poor geezer to spend many of his last hours on earth with a chamber pot. With medicine like that, who needs sickness?
2 JOHN ADAMS
October 30, 1735–July 4, 1826
ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: Scorpio
TERM OF PRESIDENCY: 1797–1801
PARTY: Federalist
AGE UPON TAKING OFFICE: 61
VICE PRESIDENT: Thomas Jefferson
RAN AGAINST: Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Pinckney, Aaron Burr
HEIGHT: 5′7″
NICKNAMES: “His Rotundity,” “Colossus of Independence,” “Duke of Braintree”
SOUND BITE: “No man who ever held the office of president would congratulate a friend on obtaining it.”
It was John Adams’s great misfortune to be the one man who had to fill the shoes of George Washington. But, then, someone had to do it, and Adams had everything to recommend him to the position.
Adams’s wife, Abigail, used the East Room of the White House for hanging wet laundry—a practice that may have increased her husband’s grouchiness.
Born and raised in the Massachusetts hamlet of Braintree, Adams was a consummate thinker, a gifted writer, and indispensable to the revolutionary cause. He made a name for himself by eloquently defending in court the British soldiers accused of
killing colonists in the infamous Boston Massacre, a task well suited to a man who believed that laws applied equally to all. The constitution of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts—one of the oldest such documents still operating in the world—was his creation. And his diplomatic postings to France, the Netherlands, and England made him the most experienced and widely traveled American ambassador of his time.
Then again, he was also a pigheaded, intemperate prima donna who constantly wrestled with his own insecurity—and many historians still aren’t sure how the fragile new country managed to survive its second chief executive.
When Washington finished his term as president in 1797, he urged his successors to avoid party politics—a request they completely ignored. The emerging partisanship of Federalists and Republicans was so pervasive, it makes today’s arguments between Democrats and Republicans seem like child’s play. Though a Federalist, John Adams tended to avoid party preferences and make decisions based on his own opinions, a habit that earned him enemies in both factions.
Complicating matters was the fact that his vice president, Thomas Jefferson, was not a Federalist but a Republican. Until the electoral system was modified in 1804, the position of vice president was filled by whichever presidential candidate came in second. As you might expect, Adams and Jefferson got along poorly; Jefferson used every available opportunity to fuel opposition to his boss in the press.
Dissension, name-calling, and mudslinging dominated their entire term. Even foreign nations threw decency to the wind. In a scandal that would come to be known as the XYZ Affair, the French foreign minister tried to bribe a group of American envoys. The incident caused Adams to wonder if his VP were secretly aiding French spies, and it led to the president’s biggest blunder, the Alien and Sedition Acts, which actually made it a crime to speak or print libelous opinions about the government. Though he didn’t originate the acts, Adams signed them into law, thereby feeding the widespread belief that he had delusions of kingship. (Jefferson would later scrap them when he became president.)
Secret Lives of the U.S. Presidents Page 1