Let's Sort the U.S. Presidents!
While sitting around the hospital one day, I decided to sort the U.S. Presidents. Well, half of them. Before you read, set the following things firmly in mind:
Everything you read in the Harry Potter novels is fiction;
Everything you read in the Harry Potter novels is the intellectual property of Jo Rowling;
I cannot conceive of American Muggle political leaders going to Hogwarts;
The Sorting Hat does its work on the heads of eleven-year-old kids, not men in their late thirties to early seventies.
Consequently, if you find yourself getting irate over this, please seek competent psychiatric assistance.
Seriously, like most people who've read the books have seen, simply being in a given house means very little; the reason one is in that house means much. Both George Washington and Andrew Johnson, for instance, are Hufflepuffs. George Washington is a Hufflepuff because of his self-discipline, humility, and willingness to do much for the sake of a greater good. He's a "positive Hufflepuff." Andrew Johnson, and every successor I sorted into that house, are "negative Hufflepuffs," in there because the traits that make for sorting into other houses are even more lacking than the characteristics of Hufflepuff.
Most people who do this sort of thing simply put the presidents they like into the Good House (usually Gryffindor) and the presidents they don't like into the Bad House (Slytherin), forgetting that one of the villians (Wormtail) was in Gryffindor and that one of the benign characters (Slughorn) is a Slytherin. I tried to rise above that.
Ultimately, sorting the presidents is not a cut-and-dried affair for most, as the qualities of all four houses are necessary to even become president:
- Gryffindor: As the Bob Dole campaign made abundantly clear, a successful run for president requires personal charisma, and while many who actually did hold the office were lacking in the personality department, when this was the case it was the result of something that happened during the term of a predecessor.
- Hufflepuff: If you are not a workaholic, do not even dream of becoming president of our republic, for the job is not suited to any other kind of person.
- Ravenclaw: Rocket scientists do not make good presidents, and while many presidents have styled themselves as the smartest people ever to set foot in Washington D.C., it has long been known that only a leader who is trying to micromanage needs significantly more than the average dose of brains. A casual glance at the history of our republic is enough to observe that the mistakes made by American presidents, for the most part, have their root in a failure of courage and commitment to American values, and not failures of brainpower; to paraphrase Jo Rowling (via Dumbledore) our presidents fail when they do what is easy instead of what is right. It is sufficient for a president that he grasp the principles of the issue at hand; any more than that is surplus.
- Slytherin: Except for Washington—who was practically drafted into the role—every president has had to face a winner-take-all contest for the job, and therefore a dose of self-interest has been at work in all the presidents to succeed him.
George Washington
Hufflepuff!
The father of our country was perhaps the most modest person ever to hold the rank of general. His overwhelming lack of political ambition precludes him from placement in Slytherin. History credits him with no greater an intellect than is necessitated by the roles of general and gentleman farmer. While he was a man of courage and honor, he was also quite cool in his passions. The picture that history gives us is a man of great talent and humility, who sought at every turn to do what he believed to be the best for his country.
I have been told that Washington demanded that certain privileges be accorded to him while he was president, but he was clearly of the opinion that these priviliges were necessary to maintain the prestige of the office, without which America could never become a respectable nation.
Thomas Jefferson
Ravenclaw!
While redheads tend to wind up in Gryffindor, and Jefferson's willingness to be the master of slaves nudges him towards Slytherin, his lifelong devotion to intellectual pursuits bears the firm stamp of Ravenclaw.
Andrew Jackson
Gryffindor!
Andrew Jackson, being a man of Scots-Irish passion, is the president most likely to get into a fist-fight as an adult. While his indifference to the suffering of the Cherokee leans him towards Slytherin, in all other repsects Jackson belongs in the Good Old Red and Gold.
Abraham Lincoln
Gryffindor!
"Difficult, very difficult." As with Harry Potter, Lincoln was a man of immense talent, ambition, discipline, and personality. Lincoln was this close to being sorted into Slytherin, because he had an amazing talent for getting what he was after, and tended not to scruple about how he got it. But in my book, the other three houses give way to Gryffindor. Lincoln was a leader.
Andrew Johnson
Hufflepuff!
The governor of Johnson's home state wrote in a letter to a friend in Washington, "give my regards to that dead dog in the White House." Johnson was the first president to spend the entirety of his term in lame-duck status. Any of the gifts that would have made him a more effective president would have put him into one of the other houses.
Ulysees S. Grant
Gryffindor!
Really, does an alcoholic war hero belong anywhere but in Hagrid's house?
Theodore Roosevelt
Gryffindor!
The first Roosevelt had a dose of personal courage and a dynamic personality. His political savvy was lacking, and he just doesn't cut the figure of an intellectual or a diligent laborer.
Woodrow Wilson
Ravenclaw!
Wilson is a good indicator of why people of great intellect don't make very good presidents. "He kept us out of war" was one of his prominent re-election slogans. Shortly aafter his reinauguration, he got us into war that he had kept us out of. He also created the agency which caused the Great Depression. This gives us a clue as to why Ravenclaws don't make good presidents: Chief executives must not be given to ivory-tower thinking, of which habit Ravenclaws (like myself) are most frequently guilty.
Herbert Hoover
Hufflepuff!
The bomb lit by Woodrow Wilson went off on Hoover's watch. Hoover lacked any of the talents that could have salvaged the situation.
Since first writing this, I have been informed that Hoover more rightly belongs in Ravenclaw; if this is a fairer assessment of his character than my own evaluation, it only bolsters my view that Ravenclaws don't make very good presidents.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt
Slytherin!
Roosevelt's lingering fame is proof that people don't understand economics or foreign affairs, but they understand government checks with their names on them. A non-Slytherin wouldn't have hidden his poor physical health from the country, and would have lended Hoover a hand between the 1932 election and the following inauguration, instead of sitting back until he could ride in on his white horse.
Harry Truman
Gryffindor!
His personality was more dynamic than Roosevelt's, and he was far less manipulative.
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Hufflepuff!
Yes, he was a war hero, but there really was nothing more to him.
John F. Kennedy
Slytherin!
Rather an opposite of Lincoln, JFK was this close to being sorted into Gryffindor, because on some issues he used his tremendous influence to promote sound policy (he is the only Democrat who has made tax cuts a major policy issue). But much of his public persona was fabricated; like FDR, his physical health was a topic on which the American public was purposefuly and systematically misinformed.
Lyndon Johnson
Slytherin!
Lyndon Johnson's policies were mostly designed to further the political career of Lyndon Johnson.
Richard Nixon
Slytherin!
He was a more competent president than Johnson, but he was just as crooked.
Gerald Ford
Hufflepuff!
Like Hoover, Ford was the hapless heir of a situation he did nothing to create, and like Hoover he had neither the intellect, the ambition, nor the charisma to stay in the Oval Office. Of course, he fell down about as much as Neville, so maybe placement in Gryffindor wouldn't miss the mark.
Jimmy Carter
Hufflepuff!
Too clueless to be in Ravenclaw, too lacking in courage for Gryffindor, and too naive to be in Slytherin.
I have since been informed that Carter had more brains than one would discern from his foreign policy stance, and thus belongs in Ravenclaw. Evidently, while he was in the US Navy, he was a nuclear engineer; but the fellows who designed the Chernobyl reactor were also nuclear engineers, so that isn't saying a whole lot. And frankly, his public life has been marked with such crass stupidities that I simply can't see him there. But even if we allow that while he may not have had brains, he did at least seem to think they are valuable, and thus belongs in Ravenclaw, it's just more evidence that Ravenclaws tend not to make good Presidents.
Ronald Reagan
Gryffindor!
He had the kind of charisma that appealed to common people, he had a keen sense of loyalty ("Thou shalt not speak evil of a fellow Republican"), and he stood for what he believed in.
George H. W. Bush
Hufflepuff!
Not smart enough to see that breaking his "read my lips" promise would make him a one-term president, not courageous enough to stand by that promise, and not politcally savvy enough to survive the aftermath of breaking the promise.
Bill Clinton
Slytherin!
I will brook no quibbling: The primary factor driving every decision made by Bill Clinton was the furtherance of Bill Clinton's fortunes.
George W. Bush
Hufflepuff!
He tries to be another Reagan, but he's only about halfway there, and in any event a real Gryffindor like Truman or Jackson would have nuked one or more Middle Eastern nations in retaliation for the September 11th attacks. Bush's 2000 and 2004 campaigns would have been far nastier if he really were a Slytherin at heart (or if ultra-Slytherin Lee Atwater were still managing Republican presidential campaigns), so that's out too. Although he is smarter than his opponents want us to think he is (and he isn't a pseudo-intellectual like his 2000 and 2004 opponents and his critics are), he's no Ravenclaw, either.
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Send it to me at evilsnack at hotmail dot com.