The Methodology
Each president is evaluated across thirteen weighted categories and fifty-six sub-criteria using dual-axis scoring. Every sub-criterion carries an independent good score (0–10) and harm score (0–10); the net is good minus harm. The framework is structured so that two evaluators applying the same rubric to the same evidence should arrive at the same numbers — and so that the framework’s own assumptions sit in plain view.
The Framework
A category net is the mean of its sub-criterion nets. A president’s weighted total is the sum of category nets times their default-weight share, scaled so the weights sum to 100. Sub-criteria within a category are equal-weighted; category weights are blended from the published methodologies of C-SPAN, APSA, Siena, and Brookings/UVA.
For presidents whose terms ended too recently for long-tail effects to resolve (currently Biden and Trump’s second term), Category 10 — Long-tail consequences — is dropped and the remaining categories are proportionally renormalized so the remaining weights still sum to 100. Scoring will revise as long-tail data resolves.
The scoring scale is −10 to +10. Anchoring is established by reference to five calibration presidents (FDR, Truman, Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan) whose scores were drafted first against era benchmarks; all other presidents were scored relative to those anchors.
The Thirteen Categories
Default weights shown. Sub-criteria within a category are equal-weighted.
- C19%
Economic outcomes
Growth, employment, inequality, fiscal trajectory, and worker conditions during and attributable to the administration.
- C211%
Foreign policy & war
Decisions on war and peace, alliance management, diplomacy and soft power, and the civilian cost of military action.
- C39%
Civil rights & equality
Racial, gender, LGBTQ+, disability, and tribal/indigenous rights advanced or rolled back.
- C48%
Civil liberties & rule of law
Press freedom posture, surveillance, executive restraint, transparency, and treatment of dissent.
- C59%
Domestic welfare & health
Healthcare access, education, the social safety net, and the cost and availability of housing.
- C66%
Environmental stewardship
Climate posture, air and water regulation, public-lands stewardship, and biodiversity protection.
- C79%
Crisis management
Speed and effectiveness of response to crises, honesty with the public during them, and long-term resolution.
- C88%
Institutional integrity
Adherence to constitutional, statutory, and norm-based limits on the presidency; staffing of independent institutions.
- C98%
Democratic health
Defense or erosion of free and fair elections, peaceful transfer of power, and the rule of law over partisan ends.
- C107%
Long-tail consequences
Effects that ripen years after the term ends — policies, appointments, and precedents whose impact unfolds over time.
- C114%
Decorum & conduct
Personal and rhetorical conduct in office; respect (or disrespect) for the dignity of the office itself.
- C126%
Effect on populace
Felt impact on the American population — economic security, civic morale, sense of national direction.
- C136%
Immigration & demographics
Legal immigration policy, treatment of unauthorized migrants and asylum-seekers, and demographic/labor effects.
Weight derived internally (no published-methodology source)
The Nine Lenses
Each lens reweights the same scoring data to surface how rankings shift under different value frameworks. The default lens is a blend; the eight others are tradition-anchored.
Default (expert blend)
apply →Blended from published methodologies (C-SPAN, APSA, Siena, Brookings/UVA). The default ranking.
Top category weights
FOREIGN POLICY11%ECONOMY9%CIVIL RIGHTS9%WELFARE9%CRISIS MGMT9%CIVIL LIBERTIES8%Progressive
apply →Civil rights, welfare, environment, and immigration lead. Decorum and populace mood given little weight; structural outcomes matter more than tone.
Top category weights
CIVIL RIGHTS14%WELFARE14%IMMIGRATION12%ENVIRONMENT11%ECONOMY9%FOREIGN POLICY9%Classical Liberal
apply →Civil liberties, rule of law, institutional integrity lead. Skeptical of executive expansion. Tradition: Locke, Mill, Hayek.
Top category weights
CIVIL LIBERTIES15%ECONOMY11%INSTITUTIONS11%DEMOCRACY11%FOREIGN POLICY9%CIVIL RIGHTS9%Conservative
apply →Foreign policy strength, economic growth, decorum, institutional integrity lead. Tradition: Burke, Kirk, Buckley. Immigration enforcement weighted heavily. v1.3: Cat 8 9%→10%.
Top category weights
ECONOMY13%FOREIGN POLICY13%IMMIGRATION11%CRISIS MGMT10%INSTITUTIONS10%CIVIL LIBERTIES7%Libertarian
apply →Civil liberties dominant. Foreign-policy restraint, fiscal discipline, institutional integrity highly weighted. The 13% on Institutional Integrity reflects Hayekian rule-of-law-as-liberty-foundation, not Rothbardian anti-state.
Top category weights
CIVIL LIBERTIES19%ECONOMY13%INSTITUTIONS13%DEMOCRACY11%IMMIGRATION10%FOREIGN POLICY7%Communitarian
apply →Welfare, social cohesion, institutional integrity, and decorum lead. Tradition: Etzioni, MacIntyre, Sandel, Putnam.
Top category weights
IMMIGRATION12%WELFARE11%INSTITUTIONS9%ECONOMY7%FOREIGN POLICY7%CIVIL RIGHTS7%Realist
apply →Foreign policy, crisis management, long-tail consequences dominate. Tradition: Morgenthau, Kennan, Mearsheimer. Substantially discounts decorum, populace mood, and rights-talk.
Top category weights
FOREIGN POLICY21%CRISIS MGMT15%LONG-TAIL13%ECONOMY9%INSTITUTIONS7%CIVIL RIGHTS6%Populist
apply →Anti-elite framing; emphasizes economic and welfare delivery to working/middle-class citizens; immigration enforcement weighted very high. Composite of left- and right-populist traditions.
Top category weights
IMMIGRATION14%ECONOMY13%WELFARE13%POPULACE11%CRISIS MGMT9%FOREIGN POLICY7%Internationalist
apply →Liberal internationalism / multilateralism. Heavy weight on foreign policy, environment (multilateral climate), international standing. Tradition: Wilson, Acheson, Brookings/CFR mainstream. v1.3: Cat 2 15%→13%, Cat 10 4%→6%.
Top category weights
FOREIGN POLICY13%ENVIRONMENT11%CIVIL RIGHTS8%CIVIL LIBERTIES8%CRISIS MGMT8%INSTITUTIONS8%
Calibration Anchors
Five presidents act as calibration anchors: Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry S. Truman, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Richard Nixon, and Ronald Reagan. Their scores establish the calibration against which all other presidents are scored — they are the rulers.
Anchor scoring is published as the framework’s calibration baseline. Any calibration error in the anchors propagates to every other president’s score — see the bias audit below.
What We Acknowledge
Six biases the framework ships with, documented rather than hidden.
Recency bias
Recent presidents (Biden, Trump T2) score against incomplete long-tail data. Category 10 (long-tail consequences) is dropped for them, and the remaining 12 categories are proportionally renormalized so the weights still sum to 100.
Post-1933 scope
Framework covers FDR onwards (the modern administrative state). Pre-FDR presidents operated under fundamentally different institutional constraints and are out of scope.
Internal calibration
Anchor scores (FDR, Truman, Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan) are scored internally against era benchmarks. Every other president's score is calibrated relative to these. Reasonable readers can disagree with the anchor calls; if they do, the entire ranking shifts.
Western-liberal value frame
Lens presets span Progressive → Conservative → Libertarian → Realist etc., but all sit inside a broadly liberal-democratic value frame. A Christian Nationalist lens was declined; alternative non-Western framings are not represented in v1.
Living-subject scoring
Trump T1, Biden, and Trump T2 receive harm scores while their political and legal consequences are still unfolding. Scores will be revised as long-tail data resolves.
Source-tier asymmetry
Pre-1995 evidence skews toward academic histories (tier 1) while post-2000 evidence skews toward contemporary journalism (tier 2). The framework treats both as eligible; tier asymmetry may affect comparability across eras.
Where This Diverges From C-SPAN
The framework’s default ranking differs from the C-SPAN historian survey in documented ways: it is more harm-sensitive on civilian-impact and civil-rights dimensions, and it weights long-tail consequences more heavily than survey methodologies typically do. Lens presets surface where reasonable value frameworks diverge — by design, the same evidence produces materially different rankings under Progressive vs. Conservative vs. Realist weights.
The honest position is that there is no single correct ranking. There are rankings consistent with a stated value framework, applied uniformly to documented evidence. That is what this framework provides.