Showing posts with label political parties. Show all posts
Showing posts with label political parties. Show all posts

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

What political party has had the most Presidents?

Ahh, partisanship.  Despite Washington's warnings, America is a party that has thrived on its partisan divisions.  Though taking many forms and many different names, with relatively few exceptions, America has been a two party country, with control of the Presidency always reigning supreme.  So, here is today's question, off of our Pocket Trivia: U.S. Presidents:  What political party has won the Presidency the most times?  Whig, Republican, Democrat or Federalist?

Not the Federalist party.  You can only really count Adams as a Federalist President, though you can make the argument that Washington was a Federalist as well, even if he wasn't an official "member" of the party.

Not the Whigs - they went the way of the dodo bird in the 19th century.  Only four Whigs ever served as President:  Harrison, Tyler, Taylor & Fillmore.

Not the Democrats either - excluding Democratic-Republicans, fifteen Democrats have served as President:  Jackson, Martin Van Buren, Polk, Pierce, Buchanan, Johnson, Cleveland, Wilson, Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy, Johnson, Carter, Clinton & Obama.

Thus, it is the Republicans that are the correct answer to this question, with a league-leading eighteen men that have occupied the oval office:  Lincoln, Grant, Hayes, Garfield, Arthur, Harrison, McKinley, Taft, Harding, Coolidge, Hoover, Eisenhower, Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush Sr., Bush Jr.