NATION/WORLD
Saturday, April 29, 2017
East Oregonian
Page 13A
From 0-100: Presidents’ first days come at varying speed
WASHINGTON
(AP)
— A president’s first 100
days can be a tire-squealing
hustle from the starting
line (Franklin Roosevelt),
a triumph of style over
substance (Jimmy Carter),
a taste of what’s to come
(Ronald Reagan) or an ambi-
tious plan of action that gets
rudely interrupted by world
events (pick a president).
Here’s a snapshot of the
first 100 days for presidents
back to the one who set
the standard for getting big
things done fast:
FRANKLIN
ROOS-
EVELT, 1933
Roosevelt came to office
in the Great Depression, with
one in four workers idle,
more than 80 percent of the
stock market’s value gone,
farmers destitute, urban
dwellers in breadlines, and
banks failing at an alarming
rate, eliminating the savings
of millions. Fellow Demo-
crats controlled the House
and Senate.
FDR
immediately
declared
a
temporary
national closure of banks to
stop panic withdrawals and
passed an emergency law to
stabilize the banking system.
He came forward with a
flurry of legislation that set
the pillars of the New Deal
in place within his first 100
days, “the most concentrated
period of U.S. reform in U.S.
history,” say Alan Brinkley
and Davis Dyer in “The
Reader’s Companion to the
American Presidency.” More
than a dozen sweeping laws
were enacted in that time as
FDR threw the public purse
behind the cause of indus-
trial recovery, agricultural
renewal and public works,
expanding federal powers in
the process. Social Security
and much more came later.
HARRY TRUMAN
“I felt as if I had lived five
lifetimes in those first days
as president,” Truman said
of his ascension from vice
president upon FDR’s death,
April 12, 1945, during World
War II.
On May 7, Germany
surrendered; Japan pressed
on. On Truman’s 116th day
as president, Aug. 6, the U.S.
dropped an atomic bomb on
AP Photo/Ron Edmonds, File
AP Photo
In this May 7, 1933, file photo, President Franklin D.
Roosevelt is shown at his desk at the White House.
Hiroshima, then on Nagasaki
three days later.
DWIGHT
EISEN-
HOWER
The war hero came to
power without plans to
overturn the status quo in
domestic policy and his 100
days unfolded without much
of a mark. The armistice
ending the Korean War
happened later that year and
the domestic achievement
for which he has become
most known, the interstate
highway system, later.
JOHN KENNEDY
A master orator, JFK was
not a high achiever in his first
100 days, a period marked
by the bungled Bay of Pigs
invasion of Cuba by U.S.-
trained Cuban exiles and the
Soviet Union’s launch of the
first human into outer space.
Kennedy proved more
sure-footed in Cold War
brinksmanship that followed,
declaring a quarantine on
Soviet shipping to Cuba to
prevent the establishment of
missile bases able to strike
the U.S.
LYNDON JOHNSON
LBJ’s priority when
Kennedy’s assassination in
November 1963 made him
president was stability, unity
and security. Those goals,
and efforts to pass items on
JFK’s agenda, dominated his
early days. Johnson fiercely
wheeled and dealed behind
an agenda of his own as time
went on. The Civil Rights
Act passed in 1964 and,
after he won the presidential
election that year, Medicare,
Medicaid and other pillars
of his Great Society fell into
place, even as his escalation
of the Vietnam War eroded
his standing with the public.
RICHARD NIXON
On the surface, Nixon’s
early months offered few
clues to the foreign policy
strides that would register
in history or to the dark
scheming that would destroy
his presidency. He visited
Europe for eight days in his
first full month, three years
before his groundbreaking
visit to China. In March,
he ordered a secret and
sustained bombing campaign
on Cambodia — its revela-
tion further drove opposition
to the Vietnam War.
GERALD FORD
Nixon’s resignation in
disgrace made Ford president
on Aug. 9, when he declared
“our long national nightmare
is over.” A burst of relief
and popularity followed but
his decision a month later
to pardon Nixon sank the
public’s estimation of him
and that never recovered.
JIMMY CARTER
The Democrat’s first 100
days were largely about tone.
Although he sent lawmakers
ambitious legislation on
economic stimulus, energy
conservation, immigration
and more, he got little of it
despite Democratic control of
Congress. Brinkley and Dyer
write that Carter set out to
In this 1981 file photo, President Ronald Reagan winces
and raises his left arm as he was shot by an assailant
as he left a Washington hotel after making a speech to
a labor group.
demystify the presidency by
ending the playing of “Hail to
Chief” at his events, having
his Cabinet members drive
their own cars and asking
Americans to recognize that
“even our great nation has its
recognized limits.”
RONALD REAGAN
Reagan took office with
fellow Republicans in control
of the Senate, Democrats in
control of the House, and
big plans brewing to put the
government on a conserva-
tive path.
He got off to a fast start
— but not by achieving a
mountain of legislation in
the first 100 days. Rather, he
used his powers of persua-
sion with lawmakers and the
public to soften the ground
for the most consequential
tax, spending and govern-
ment-overhaul Congress had
seen in decades. After more
than two months in office,
Reagan was shot in an assas-
sination attempt that nearly
killed him.
GEORGE H.W. BUSH
His priority was to get out
of Reagan’s shadow. Despite
only modest achievements
in his first 100 days, like a
bipartisan budget agreement,
Bush capped the period with
a six-state tour to talk about
his goals and successes.
Momentous times were
unfolding — the Berlin Wall
came down that November
and the Soviet Union
dissolved in December 1991,
a Cold War resolution for
which Reagan got the most
credit in the U.S.
BILL CLINTON, 1993
With Congress under
Democratic control, Clinton
promised to put legislation
in play within 100 days
to overhaul health care,
guaranteeing coverage for
everyone. That became a
drawn-out failure, ultimately
collapsing in late 1994. The
Democrat’s early months
were dominated by contro-
versies over his appoint-
ments; his first two choices
for attorney general flopped,
as did his first choice to head
the Justice Department’s
civil rights division.
But his 100 days were
not without results: He won
passage of a law guaran-
teeing 12 weeks of unpaid
family leave for child care
and family illnesses.
GEORGE W. BUSH
The Republican who eked
into office after the closest
U.S. presidential election in
history dealt with a Repub-
lican-controlled House and
a Senate that was evenly
divided. Republicans held
the tie-breaking vote in the
Senate until June, when a
GOP lawmaker switched to
vote with Democrats.
Bush did not get much
more in his 100 days than a
House vote backing central
elements of his big tax
cuts. A dispute with China
intervened over a collision
between a U.S. spy plane and
a Chinese fighter plane that
killed the Chinese pilot and
resulted in the detention of
the U.S. crew.
BARACK
OBAMA,
2009
Obama came to office in
the worst economic crisis
since the Depression and
both houses of Congress in
the hands of fellow Demo-
crats. Financial institutions
had been failing, the auto
industry was in trouble
and unemployment was on
the rise, over 8 percent in
February 2009 on its way to
more than 10 percent before
the end of the year.
Lawmakers from both
parties were inclined to act
quickly and did, even as they
fought over the details of
how to respond to the tanking
economy.
Obama signed a massive
stimulus package into law
in his first month. He also
achieved laws expanding
health care for children and
advancing equal pay for
women in his first 100 days.
DONALD
TRUMP,
2017
Of 10 major pieces of
legislation Trump promised
to put in play in his first 100
days, none was achieved and
only one made it formally
to Congress — the failed
first effort to replace his
predecessor’s health law.
The contours of another, a
big package of tax cuts, were
announced this week. The
confirmation of Neil Gorsuch
to the Supreme Court stood
as his biggest achievement.
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