The Presidency: Job Specs for the Oval Office

By HEDLEY DONOVAN

What does it take to be a good President? The former Editor-in-Chief of Time Inc., who spent a year in the White House as senior adviser to Jimmy Carter, offers some suggestions

The U.S. is halfway from the presidential election of 1980, which offered us the choice of Ronald Reagan or Jimmy Carter, to the election of 1984. With the midterm elections out of the way, and Ted Kennedy removing himself, the 1984 campaign is on. Various preliminaries have been visible for months, in the speaking schedules of the various Democratic possibles. If any Republican other than the incumbent entertains thoughts of 1984, he would be foolhardy to say so; the obligatory sentiment is that Reagan will run and be reelected.

Still, many citizens of this populous Republic cannot help wondering if Reagan-Mondale, for instance, is the best we can come up with. This is not to deny the several estimable qualities of the President or the former Vice President. We could do worse; arguably we have, within the past 20 years; quite possibly we will again, within the next 20.

The question is: How did the machinery for identifying potential Presidents, nominating candidates and choosing winners come to be so seriously out of sync with the modern requirements of the office? Compare the political leadership we are producing in this literate democratic society of some 230 million people with the leadership of the Thirteen Colonies in the late 18th century. For all its familiarity, the point is still a painful one. From 3 million people living on the edge of a wilderness: Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton, Madison, Franklin, the Adamses. (Would these men have survived the scrutiny of a Mike Wallace or Ben Bradlee? Probably so. The press was much more savage in those days.) But perhaps, out of all the mysterious historical chemistries that can produce a golden age—the Athens of Pericles, Renaissance Florence—the America of two centuries ago was a golden age for political thought and political leadership. Perhaps we should simply be grateful for the founders, not haunted by them.

If so, we could better be bothered by a comparison from our own time. The modern presidency begins with Franklin Roosevelt, and nine men have held the job. In the 28 years from 1933 to 1961, we had one great President, F.D.R., and two very good ones, Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower. None of the next six could be put in either of those categories. John Kennedy perhaps had a potential for greatness; the actual accomplishments of his presidency were meager. However, his short presidency and Gerald Ford's short presidency, for all the differences of style, were the best, or least unsuccessful, of the 1960s and 1970s. Lyndon Johnson's Great Society legislation was a noble achievement (though the programs went wildly out of control). But the L.B.J. presidency is forever blighted by the tragic failure in Viet Nam. Richard Nixon was our best President of foreign policy since Eisenhower, not just because he had the wit to employ Dr. Kissinger, but his presidency will never recover from Watergate. The returns are not yet in on Jimmy Carter's foreign policy. His economic policies were an unsuccessful muddle; it is not yet clear that Reagan's very different policies will work out better.

It is not an inspiring roll call. The gap between electability and the capacity to