Overview
The founding fathers of the United States created a unique institution, the presidency, as they were determined to authorize an effective chief executive but wary of monarchy. They endowed this office with broad prerogatives and power but hedged it in with limitations. The presidency that developed over the next generation, however, was fashioned less by the clauses in the Constitution than by the way that the first presidents responded to challenges such as sectional enmity and the vexing Napoleonic warfare that jeopardized maritime rights. Patriot Presidents explores how the presidency took shape from the medley of clauses handed down to George Washington, who said, ""I walk on untrodden ground,"" for virtually everything he did created a precedent. It then follows the overwhelming challenges faced by his successors, from the austere John Adams who spoke passionately in favor of a strong executive, to Thomas Jefferson, a zealous advocate of American liberties, to James Madison, the creator of the first political party, and James Monroe, whose Monroe Doctrine protected the sovereignty of the Western Hemisphere. It concludes with John Quincy Adams, who could be called the prophet of the expansive twentieth-century state of the Square Deal, the New Deal, the Fair Deal, and the Great Society.
Full Product Details
Author: William E Leuchtenburg ,
Tim Fannon ,
Tim Fannon
Publisher: Kalorama
Imprint: Kalorama
Edition: Unabridged edition
ISBN: 9798228371439
Publication Date: 04 March 2025
Audience:
General/trade
,
General
Format: Audio
Publisher's Status: Active
Availability: In Print
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Author Information
William E. Leuchtenburg is William Rand Kenan Jr. Professor Emeritus of History at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Over the course of six decades, he taught at Columbia University, UNC-Chapel Hill, and, as a visiting professor, at Harvard, Cornell, Duke, William and Mary, and other American universities, as well as at Oxford, where he held the Harmsworth chair. He served as presidential elections analyst for NBC and as presidential inauguration consultant for CBS, PBS, and C-SPAN. Elected president of the American Historical Association, the Organization of American Historians, and the Society of American Historians, he is the first recipient of the Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. Award for Distinguished Writing in American History of Enduring Public Significance. He is the author of fifteen books, including The American President; The Perils of Prosperity, 1914-32; Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal, 1932-1940; In the Shadow of FDR; The White House Looks South; and The FDR Years. Tim Fannon is an actor, director, and teaching artist living in Los Angeles. He received his MFA in acting from Brooklyn College and has studied Shakespeare at the Royal National Theatre and the British Academy of Dramatic Arts in London, and in Stratford-upon-Avon with the Royal Shakespeare Company. Tim Fannon is an actor, director, and teaching artist living in Los Angeles. He received his MFA in acting from Brooklyn College and has studied Shakespeare at the Royal National Theatre and the British Academy of Dramatic Arts in London, and in Stratford-upon-Avon with the Royal Shakespeare Company.
