Local Presidents Questions

1. Local Presidents Questions Junior/Senior Divisions #25-44

2. 25-35 #1 (6 points) I began my administration by replacing my predecessor’s Secretary of the Interior, James Rudolph Garfield (son of the assassinated president), with Richard Ballinger, a former Mayor of Seattle. Ballinger's appointment was a disappointment to conservationists. Within weeks of taking office, Ballinger reversed some of my predecessor’s policies by restoring 3 million acres of government land to private use. (4 points) There was a Progressive onslaught against me. It was unfortunate that the Progressives paid little attention to the fact that my administration initiated 80 antitrust suits and that Congress submitted to the states amendments for a Federal income tax and the direct election of Senators. I also set up the Interstate Commerce Commission that was directed to set railroad rates. (2 points) When the Republicans re-nominated me, my predecessor bolted the party to lead the Progressives, thus guaranteeing the election of a Democratic President. I would go on to become a Chief Justice of the Untied States Supreme Court.

3. 29-39 #2 (6 points) Important legislation signed into law by me was the Submerged Land Act which gave states along coastal areas title to the natural resources and lands below the water to the three mile territorial limit and the bill that created the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado. (4 points)My Secretary of State John Foster Dulles and I devised the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization to respond to the threat of Communist expansion in the Eastern Hemisphere. I later added a doctrine named after me stating that the United States would support any Middle Eastern country against the Communist threat. (2 points) My wife and I celebrated our 40th wedding anniversary while in the White House. I was the leader of the Allied Forces on D Day in 1944, and I was the first president to serve after the fiftieth state was added to the Union.

4. 26-36 #3 (6 points) I selected the well-known William Jennings Bryan to be my Secretary of State because he supported me in my run for the presidency. I only nominally consulted with him, and I made all the major foreign policy decisions myself. Bryan resigned following the sinking of the British cruise liner Lusitania because he feared my stern warnings to Germany would suck the United States into the hostilities. (4 points) I was born several years before the Civil War, and my family sympathized with the Confederacy. As a historian at Princeton, I wrote the History of the American People, which had quotes like “The white men were roused [to secede] by a mere instinct of self-preservation.” My administration re-segregated the federal government for the first time since 1863, and I banned Blacks from the White House. While I was president, General Douglas MacArthur became the youngest superintendent of West Point. (2 points) I was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for my peace-making efforts after World War I. My failure, however, was suffered at home when the Senate declined to approve American acceptance of the League of Nations.

5. 28-38 #4 (6 points) When I was a teenager in a boarding school, the headmaster, Endicott Peabody, instilled in me and others the desire to live a life of public service by giving back to the community and entering politics. I was happy to do just that — serving in the State Senate, then as Assistant Secretary of the Navy along with an unsuccessful vice-presidential run with James Cox. (4 points) With the help of my wife Eleanor, I was able to stay in the public eye and was elected governor of my home state during a time of great economic hardship. My fellow Democrats chose me to carry the banner of the party and run for president with John N. Garner (pictured) as my running mate. I appointed General George Marshall as Army Chief of Staff. (2 points) Garner did not want to continue as vice president in our third try at the White House. So my Secretary of Commerce, Henry Wallace, served as my vice president during this term.

6. 28-38 #5 (6 points) I chose my vice president not because I liked him, but because I realized that I could not be elected without him. He helped solidify my support from traditional Southern Democrats. My vice president accosted my brother Robert, my Attorney General, in front of friends and officials. Halfway through my presidency, there were rumors in Washington circles that I planned to drop my vice president from the Democratic ticket in the upcoming presidential election. (4 points) My wife Jackie is remembered for reorganizing entertainment for White House social events and restoring the interior of the presidential home. She was extremely popular in America and throughout the world. While we lived in the White House, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his “I Have a Dream” speech in Washington. I appointed Thurgood Marshall to the U.S. Court of Appeals. (2 points) I was the first Catholic to be elected president. My presidency was cut short at the hands of Lee Harvey Oswald.

7. 25-35 #6 (6 points) I was the first president since the Civil War to advocate equal rights for Blacks. I also led an International Conference to limit tonnage and spending to curtail armaments. My wife enlisted other First Ladies in a campaign to aid war veterans. (4 points)In my choices of cabinet members, the most distinguished and hardest working were my Secretary of Treasury Andrew Mellon and Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover. On the other hand, my “poker cabinet” -- Interior Secretary, Secretary of War, Attorney General, and Interior Secretary -- were the key figures in the various scandals that plagued my presidency. (2 points) On a personal note, I had the biggest feet of all the previous presidents at size 14, was the first president to have a radio in the White House, and first for whom women could vote due to the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution.

8. 34-44 #7 (6 points) With the help of my Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, my administration developed the policy of Detente, beginning talks to reduce strategic arms (SALT), encouraging China to expand international trade and foreign relations, and ending the Vietnam War. (4 points) In his fifth year as my vice president, Spiro Agnew was under investigation by the United States Attorney’s office in Baltimore, Maryland, on charges of extortion, tax fraud, bribery and conspiracy. He was forced to resign as a result of his actions. Cesar Chavez led a march to the Mexican border to protest the use of illegal immigrants as strikebreakers. (2 points) Like my first vice president, I left office in disgrace because of my role in covering up the Watergate break-in.

9. 34-44 #8 (6 points) I inherited from my predecessor one of the worst economies since the Great Depression. I selected Donald Regan to serve as Treasury Secretary, making him the spokesman for my economic policies. He helped engineer changes in the tax code, reducing income tax rates and decreasing taxes for corporations. By the end of my administration, the nation was enjoying its longest recorded period of peacetime prosperity without recession or depression. (4 points) Only 69 days after becoming president, I was shot by John Hinckley, a would-be assassin. I quickly recovered and returned to duty. My grace and wit during the dangerous incident caused my popularity to soar. I appointed Sandra Day O’Connor as the first female justice of the Supreme Court. (2 points) I moved to Los Angeles in 1937 where I began a career as an actor, first in films and later television. Some of my most notable films include Knute Rockne All American,Kings Row, and Bedtime for Bonzo. I later served as president of the Screen Actors Guild.

10. 34-44 #9 (6 points) My second term as president was highlighted by several free trade agreements. I also pushed the Energy Policy Act and for offshore and domestic drilling. I nominated Justices John Roberts and Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court and pushed for Social Security and immigration reform. (4 points) I selected Condoleezza Rice, the first African-American woman to serve as Secretary of State. Rice championed my goal to advance democratic reform and support basic rights throughout the Middle East. (2 points) The airborne terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and the thwarted flight against the White House on September 11, in which nearly 3,000 Americans were killed, transformed me into a wartime president.

11. 33-43 #10 (6 points) During my administration, I could point to the lowest unemployment rate in modern times, the lowest inflation in 30 years, the highest home ownership in the country’s history, dropping crime rates in many places, and reduced welfare rolls. I proposed the first balanced budget in decades and achieved a budget surplus. (4 points) I selected Madeleine Albright as Secretary of State. She was the first woman ever to hold this position. She helped me shape my policy for the U.S. role in participating in the wars in Kosovo and Bosnia. (2 points)My wife Hillary was the first to have an office in the West Wing of the White House. She was part of the innermost circle reviewing appointments to the new administration, and her choices filled at least eleven top-level positions and dozens of lower-level ones. She is regarded as the most openly empowered presidential wife in American history, save for Eleanor Roosevelt.

12. 31-41 #11 (6 points) My foreign policy accomplishments included the Panama Canal treaties, the Camp David Accords, the treaty of peace between Egypt and Israel, the SALT II treaty with the Soviet Union, and the establishment of U.S. diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China. (4 points) My Secretary of State, Cyrus Vance, approached foreign policy with an emphasis on negotiation over conflict and a special interest in arms reduction. Vance resigned in protest of Operation Eagle Claw, the secret mission to rescue the American hostages in Iran. I replaced Vance with Edmund Muskie. (2 points) My most controversial decision was to boycott the Summer Olympics in Moscow in response to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. I lost my bid for reelection because of a “stagflation” economy.

13. 26-36 #12 (6 points) As president of the New York City Police Commission, I helped reform one of the most corrupt police forces in America. I was later appointed the Assistant Secretary of the Navy by William McKinley. (4 points) I kept my predecessor’s cabinet and promised to continue his policies. One of my first notable acts as president was to curb the power of large corporations called trusts. For my aggressive attacks on trusts over my two terms, I was called the “Trust Buster.” In 2001, I was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for my actions leading the Rough Riders on San Juan Hill. • (2 points) I was the first president to do the following things: • Fly in an airplane • Be submerged in a submarine • Travel outside the borders of the U.S. while in office • Win the Nobel Peace Prize

14. 25-35 #13 (6 points) Rutherford B. Hayes was my commanding officer during the Civil War. After the war, I settled in Canton, where I practiced law. I was later elected to Congress and became an expert on the protective tariff. Before becoming president I was elected governor of my native state. (4 points) My first Secretary of the Interior, Cornelius Bliss, eventually left his position and returned to the business world. My first vice president, Garrett Hobart, died in office, and I replaced him with the person who would become my successor. (2 points) I asked Congress to declare war on Spain after the USS Maine mysteriously blew up while visiting Cuba. I always wore a red carnation on my lapel for good luck. However, while attending the Pan American Exposition in Buffalo, New York, I was struck by an assassin’s bullet.

15. 34-44 #14 (6 points) I took a lot of flack over my selection of my Secretary of the Treasury, Timothy F. Geithner (pictured), because he hadn’t paid $35,000 in self-employment taxes for four years. My Attorney General, Eric Holder, was accused of obstructing the Congressional probe into the Fast and Furious Scandal where the government let thousands of weapons fall into the hands of Mexican drug cartels. (4 points) Shortly after taking office, I won the Nobel Peace Prize. I devoted the first full year of my term getting a health care bill passed. The Democratic Party lost 63 seats in the House of Representatives halfway through my term. I called this “humbling” and a “shellacking.” I said the results came because not enough Americans had felt the effects of the economic recovery. (2 points) I was raised with help from my grandparents. My wife Michelle has been compared to Jacqueline Kennedy due to her sense of style and also to Barbara Bush for her discipline and decorum.

16. 25-44 Answers #27 William Howard Taft #34 Dwight Eisenhower #28 Woodrow Wilson #32 Franklin D. Roosevelt #35 John F. Kennedy #29 Warren Harding #37 Richard Nixon #40 Ronald Reagan #43 George W. Bush #42 Bill Clinton #39 Jimmy Carter #26 Theodore Roosevelt #25 William McKinley #44 Barack Obama