Who is the greatest crisis president in American history?

Every one of these men took the job with something already on fire. Some of the fires were bigger than others.

1

Franklin D. Roosevelt

Met the Depression with the New Deal and then ran a global war from a wheelchair.

1000pts

2

James Madison

Watched the British burn the White House in 1814 and kept the government running anyway.

770pts

3

John F. Kennedy

Talked his way out of the Cuban Missile Crisis over thirteen days in October 1962.

719pts

4

Theodore Roosevelt

Settled the 1902 coal strike that would have left American cities without winter fuel.

694pts

5

Abraham Lincoln

Inherited a country already breaking apart and spent every day of his presidency at war.

642pts

6

Andrew Jackson

Faced down South Carolina's threat to nullify federal law in the 1832 crisis.

582pts

7

Barack Obama

Took office in the worst financial collapse since the 1930s.

513pts

8

Thomas Jefferson

Doubled the country with the Louisiana Purchase while doubting he had the power to.

434pts

9

Ronald Reagan

Presided over the end of the Cold War and the arms deals that wound it down.

434pts

10

Ulysses S. Grant

Enforced Reconstruction and broke the first Klan in the states that had just lost the war.

434pts

11

James K. Polk

Set four goals for a single term, got all four, and left the country a third larger.

342pts

12

George Washington

Took office with no precedent, no treasury and a rebellion over whiskey inside six years.

233pts

13

Harry S. Truman

Sworn in with no warning in 1945 and handed the end of a world war within weeks.

233pts

14

Woodrow Wilson

Took the country into a world war and through the 1918 influenza pandemic.

233pts

15

Dwight D. Eisenhower

Managed the coldest years of the Cold War and sent troops to integrate Little Rock.

103pts

16

John Adams

Kept the young republic out of a war with France that most of his own party wanted.

103pts