By the Maui Curmudgeon (18th in a 43-part series)

How do the U.S. Presidents stack up? I thought I’d find out by reading biographies of all 43 presidents, in the order of their administrations. Here are briefly the pros and cons of my discoveries, the interesting bits, and how I’d rank him. For comparison, I give you the 1982 Murrary-Blessing ranking, a survey of hundreds of leading historians who ranked each president by number. This survey is the gold standard of presidential rankings and is most cited when this kind of thing needs bringing up in media.

ULYSSES S. GRANT: 1869-1877  ~ 18th U.S. President

First, I admit to reading ahead a bit before I write these synopses. So I can say that up to Theodore Roosevelt, the presidency of U.S. Grant is easily the most surprising. The general consensus, particularly in high school history, is that Grant’s administration was a failure, riddled by scandal. The truth is far more interesting. Further, it is impossible to separate the man from his generalship, nor his generalship from his presidency.

He was born Hiram Ulysses (always pronounced U-liss-is) Grant. At 17, he showed up at West Point, and the congressman who recommended him couldn’t remember his name, and so wrote ‘Ulysses S. Grant’ on the form, and thus he became known.

He was in the army from 1839 until his election as president nearly 30 years later. During this time, he fought in dozens of battles from the Mexican War to the Civil War. General Robert E. Lee of the Army of Virginia is justifiably lauded as a great general who did much with little. It is often said that Lee graduated first in his class at West Point, while Grant was 22nd of 34. The story (true) has it that Lincoln offered command of the Union army to Lee when Civil War broke out. Lee turned it down. All this is by way of saying that Lee was the great general while Grant merely won the Civil war because he had greater numbers. This is a mixture of historical misunderstanding and southern lies.

Read the rest…