Greatest President Poll - Trails Section

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Vol. 17 No. 21	Final Edition

February 20, 2001

Reagan, Kennedy and Lincoln Receive the
Most Votes for "Greatest U.S. President"
By Amy Williams, Staff Writer

    CLOVIS -- Presidents Day gives Americans an opportunity to celebrate the February birthdays of George Washington, America’s first president, and Abraham Lincoln, as well as all past United States presidents.
    The most recent CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll, conducted February 9-11, asked Americans to name the one man they consider to have been America’s greatest president.      The winner was neither Washington nor Lincoln, but Ronald Reagan, named by 18% of Americans. John F. Kennedy, with 16%, follows Reagan.
      Third place belongs to Abraham Lincoln, with 14%, and the most recent ex-president, Bill Clinton, comes in fourth with 9%. George Washington receives just 5% of all mentions, and is 7th on the list, behind not only Reagan, Kennedy, Lincoln and Clinton, but Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman as well.
     Here are the detailed results of the "greatest president" question for the past three years: Who do you regard as the greatest United States president?

BASED ON -- 529 -- NATIONAL ADULTS IN FORM A; ±5 PCT. PTS.

	2001 Feb 9-11	2000 Feb 14-15	1999 Feb ^
	%	%	%

Ronald Reagan	18	11	12
John Kennedy	16	22	12
Abraham Lincoln	14	18	18
Bill Clinton	9	5	12
Franklin Roosevelt	6	12	9
Harry Truman	6	3	4
George Washington	5	5	12
Jimmy Carter	4	3	3
George Bush, Sr.	3	3	5
Theodore Roosevelt	2	3	3
Thomas Jefferson	1	3	2
Richard Nixon	1	2	2
Dwight Eisenhower	1	3	2

Other	5	3	1
None	2	*	1
No opinion	7	4	2

^ Asked of full sample

     Reagan moved to the top spot after being only number four last year, and it is possible that the timing of the poll this year may have affected the results. The poll was taken the weekend after Reagan’s 90th birthday, which received considerable media coverage.
      There is no way to tell for sure, it is probable that the heightened news coverage of Reagan before this poll was taken boosted his image in the public’sconsciousness.
     Although Reagan receives more votes than any other ex-president overall, a few subgroups are particularly likely to regard him as the greatest president: Men are more likely than women to name Reagan (23% vs. 14%). Women, in turn, are more likely to name Kennedy than are men (18% vs. 13%). 23% of Southerners name Reagan, compared to 15% of people from the East, 17% from the Midwest and 16% from the West.
     Choice of greatest president varies by age. The poll reveals that the perception of greatness in the presidential arena depends somewhat on one’s age. Those aged 18 to 49 are most likely to name Reagan as the greatest president (22%), while people aged 50 and older are most likely to regard Kennedy as the best chief executive (19%). Truman receives 15% of the vote among people 50 and older, but less than 1% of the vote of those younger than 50. Bill Clinton is much more popular with the younger set, as 14% of those aged 18-49 regard him as the greatest president, compared to only 4% of those aged 50 and older.
      Republicans herald Reagan; democrats choose Clinton. Not surprisingly, Republicans and Democrats differ as to their choices of the best U.S. president. Almost one-third of Republicans (31%) choose Reagan as the greatest president, while about one in five Democrats (22%) pick the recently departed Clinton. Lincoln, the nation’s first Republican, is second among Republicans today, while Kennedy is second among Democrats. Who do you regard as the greatest United States president?

	%		%
Democrats		Republicans
Bill Clinton	22	Ronald Reagan	31
John F. Kennedy	19	Abraham Lincoln	19
Franklin D. Roosevelt	10	George Washington	8
Abraham Lincoln	9	John F. Kennedy	8

    Americans have traditionally held Lincoln in higher regard than Washington.
Over a half century ago, in a February 1945 Gallup poll, a plurality of Americans (42%) thought that Lincoln was a greater president than Washington.
    Near the end of the 20th century, that sentiment still prevailed -- in a June 1999 poll, 67% said that Lincoln was greater than Washington while 28% said Washington was the more remarkable leader. Apparently the public continues to have a greater affinity for the man who freed the slaves than for the one who led the American Revolution.
     When Americans were asked whether they would rather see Washington or Lincoln as president today, 62% preferred Lincoln and 28% chose Washington.

      [Editor's Note: The results reported here are based on telephone interviews with a randomly selected national sample of 1,016 adults, 18 years and older, conducted February 9-11, 2001. For results based on this sample, one can say with 95 percent confidence that the maximum error attributable to sampling and other random effects is plus or minus 3 percentage points. In addition to sampling error, question wording and practical difficulties in conducting surveys can introduce error or bias into the findings of public opinion polls. If it were possible, whom would you rather see as president of the United States today -- [ROTATED: George Washington, (or) Abraham Lincoln]?

BASED ON -- 487 -- NATIONAL ADULTS IN FORM B; ±4 PCT. PTS.

George
Washington

Abraham
Lincoln

No
opinion

2001 Feb 9-11

28%

62

10

Letter to the Editor

©2001 Clovis Free Press. All rights reserved.

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"Of the people ~ By the people ~ For the People" - A. Lincoln

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