When President Trump recently trolled the media by placing himself atop a list of America’s greatest presidents, pundits were quick to dismiss it as a joke. But for conservative columnist Arthur Schaper, the exercise raised a serious question: How should we actually rate the men who have held the highest office in the land?
In a new piece for American Thinker, Schaper offers his own ranking—a list that puts President Trump and Ronald Reagan in the top five, names Lyndon B. Johnson as the worst president in U.S. history, and champions Calvin Coolidge as a forgotten giant.
“Of course, how any of us rate the presidents tells a lot about ourselves and our times,” Schaper writes, “and our ratings reveal the prevailing political attitudes of these times for posterity, too.”
The Bottom Five: ‘Get the Worst of It Out of the Way’
Schaper begins with the presidents he considers the worst, starting with James Buchanan, the 15th president, who is widely ranked near the bottom by historians. Buchanan, Schaper notes, was the “epitome of an office seeker,” with a long resume in Pennsylvania politics, Congress, the Senate, and as secretary of state. But his tenure was defined by failure: he tried to force the pro-slavery Lecompton Constitution on Kansas, intervened in the Dred Scott case, and “dithered” as Southern states seceded during his lame-duck period.
Woodrow Wilson also earns a spot on Schaper’s worst list. The progressive academic, Schaper argues, rejected the Founders’ limited constitution, expanded the federal bureaucracy, locked up political dissidents, and dragged the U.S. into World War I—all while “running roughshod over the rule of law” and being hobbled by a stroke in his final years.
Schaper agrees with Trump’s inclusion of Jimmy Carter, Joe Biden, and Barack Obama on the worst list, calling all three “evil in their own way.” Carter’s administration, he says, was marked by “unremitting incompetence,” stagflation, fuel rationing, and the fall of Iran. Obama was “the divider-in-chief,” and Biden was “Obama’s third term.”
But the absolute worst, in Schaper’s view, is Lyndon Baines Johnson.
“While Obama pushed divisive critical race theory and other Marxist tropes (and Biden prolonged his agenda), President Johnson initiated all those abusive government measures and much worse,” Schaper writes. He criticizes Johnson for Medicare, Medicaid, and expanded Social Security, which he says “supercharged” federal debt; for signing “overreaching, unconstitutional Civil Rights legislation” that he claims was aimed at buying Black votes; and for the “War on Poverty,” which Schaper asserts “declared war on prosperity.”
Johnson also signed the 1965 Hart-Celler Act, which increased legal immigration from countries that Schaper says “share few of America’s values,” and he “wasted troops and resources” in Vietnam. “Johnson was the worst,” Schaper concludes, “and our country still suffers because of his legacy.”
The Top Five: Washington, Lincoln, Trump, Reagan, and Coolidge
On the positive side, Schaper identifies five presidents he considers the best. George Washington, the “Father of our country,” commands the Continental Army to victory and set the standard for leadership and honor. Abraham Lincoln, he says, saved the country, pushed through the Thirteenth Amendment, and “persisted in shutting down an unjust, unsound, and unconstitutional rebellion.” Lincoln, Schaper argues, edges out Washington because he “gave his life for America and suffered the assassin’s bullet for the cause of liberty.”
Trump and Reagan also make the top five. Trump, Schaper writes, “has made Americans proud to be American again,” refused to accept decline as inevitable, and “turned the tables on the Wilson-Johnson-Obama-Biden onslaught of progressive destruction.” He also credits Trump with building a coalition of successors at the state and federal levels to continue his work. Reagan’s “consistent victories against international communism and restoration of free-market capitalism” are also cited.
The fifth spot goes to Calvin Coolidge, who Schaper says “doesn’t get the love he deserves because he was silent, simple, and cut everything: spending, wars, immigration, and corruption.”
Underrated and Overrated Presidents
Beyond his top and bottom lists, Schaper highlights a few presidents he considers underrated: Coolidge, James K. Polk—who oversaw the largest expansion of the country—and Grover Cleveland, who vetoed more bills than all other presidents combined. Cleveland, he says, represented “total commitment to fiscal discipline, sound money, and America First policies.”
As for overrated presidents, Schaper names Teddy Roosevelt, calling him a “Big Government Progressive masquerading as a populist” who did not honor constitutional checks and balances. And he notes that Obama is “the most overrated”—but, in Schaper’s view, also one of the worst.
A List That Reveals More Than Rankings
Schaper’s list is unabashedly conservative, and he acknowledges that presidential rankings say as much about the rater as they do about the rated. “Now more than ever,” he writes, “the ability to speak our minds is crucial to the republic we cherish.”
Whether readers agree with his picks or not, Schaper’s list offers a clear window into how many on the right view the presidency—and which legacies they believe should be celebrated or condemned.
Source: www.americanthinker.com — https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2026/08/a-proper-president-list/