The 26 Best American Diplomats of All Time

Treaties, alliances and back-channel dinners: the people who talked America out of trouble.

1. 1
   Benjamin Franklin

   Talked France into an alliance in 1778 and signed the Treaty of Paris that ended the war.
   1000pts
2. 2
   George C. Marshall

   Architect of the Marshall Plan that rebuilt post-war Europe, and a Nobel laureate.
   752pts
3. 3
   Thomas Jefferson

   Succeeded Franklin as minister to France in 1785 and became the first Secretary of State under Washington.
   631pts
4. 4
   Frank B. Kellogg

   Secretary of State who co-authored the 1928 Kellogg-Briand Pact renouncing war and received the 1929 Nobel Peace Prize.
   609pts
5. 5
   Henry Kissinger

   Secretary of State who opened relations with China and negotiated the Vietnam withdrawal.
   546pts
6. 6
   John Quincy Adams

   Negotiated the Treaty of Ghent and drafted the Monroe Doctrine before becoming President.
   546pts
7. 7
   Richard Holbrooke

   Forced the Dayton Accords through and ended the war in Bosnia.
   546pts
8. 8
   Daniel Webster

   Twice Secretary of State, he negotiated the 1842 Webster-Ashburton Treaty that settled the Maine-Canada border with Britain.
   546pts
9. 9
   Elihu Root

   Secretary of State who settled disputes with Latin America and Japan through arbitration treaties and won the 1912 Nobel Peace Prize.
   546pts
10. 10
    John Jay

    Negotiated the treaty that kept the young republic out of a second war with Britain.
    473pts
11. 11
    Charles Evans Hughes

    Secretary of State who convened the 1921-22 Washington Naval Conference, the first major arms limitation agreement between great powers.
    473pts
12. 12
    Hamilton Fish

    Grant's Secretary of State who settled the Alabama Claims with Britain through the 1871 Treaty of Washington and international arbitration.
    473pts
13. 13
    Cordell Hull

    Longest-serving Secretary of State, who launched the Good Neighbor policy and won the 1945 Nobel Peace Prize as a father of the United Nations.
    387pts
14. 14
    George F. Kennan

    Diplomat and historian whose Long Telegram defined American strategy for forty years.
    387pts
15. 15
    John Foster Dulles

    Eisenhower's Secretary of State who negotiated the Japanese peace treaty and built the Cold War alliance system around SEATO.
    387pts
16. 16
    Eleanor Roosevelt

    Chaired the commission that produced the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
    387pts
17. 17
    Colin Powell

    Career soldier who became the first Black Secretary of State.
    387pts
18. 18
    John Hay

    Lincoln's secretary turned Secretary of State who issued the Open Door notes on China and negotiated the treaties for the Panama Canal.
    387pts
19. 19
    James Baker

    Secretary of State who managed German reunification, built the Gulf War coalition and convened the 1991 Madrid peace conference.
    387pts
20. 20
    Madeleine Albright

    First woman to serve as Secretary of State, and a driving force behind NATO's expansion.
    284pts
21. 21
    Charles Francis Adams Sr.

    Minister to Britain during the Civil War who kept London from recognising the Confederacy and helped defuse the Trent Affair.
    284pts
22. 22
    Ralph Bunche

    Mediated the 1949 Arab-Israeli armistice and became the first Black Nobel Peace laureate.
    284pts
23. 23
    George Shultz

    Secretary of State for six and a half years who negotiated with Gorbachev towards the 1987 INF Treaty that scrapped a class of nuclear missiles.
    284pts
24. 24
    Averell Harriman

    Wartime ambassador to Moscow and London, and a fixture of American diplomacy for fifty years.
    0pts
25. 25
    William H. Seward

    Secretary of State who kept Britain and France out of the Civil War and bought Alaska from Russia in 1867.
    0pts
26. 26
    Dean Acheson

    Secretary of State who built the NATO alliance and the post-war containment strategy.
    0pts

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