Even though the University didn’t take Monday off for President’s Day, I was sick, so I took the day off anyway.
I spent the day reading some interesting presidential facts. For instance, the Oval Office is less than 100 years old. Though the West Wing of the White House was built in 1902, the Oval Office was not built until 1909, when Howard Taft was president. Many of the fringe benefits of the presidency, such as Air Force One and Camp David, first became perks of the job for Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Also, FDR had a pool built at the White House that he used for his polio therapy. Later, Gerald Ford had the pool removed. “You don’t need a pool in the White House to get in deep water,” he said. Currently, the press briefing room sits on top of the pool’s old site, with the press secretary standing over the deep end.
The U.S. president is often called the most powerful man in the world. It was not always so. As the United States has not always been the most powerful nation in the world, it follows that the most powerful American wouldn’t have had more power and influence than other world leaders. Moreover, the president wasn’t always meant to be the most powerful American.
Our founders used anti-monarchy rhetoric to justify the American Revolution. As such, when our constitution was written, the framers limited the power of the president so that no one man would have the kind of unchecked powers then vested in the king of England.
In fact, the Constitution strictly limits the scope and purview of the entire federal government. However, just as the Congress and the federal courts have taken it upon themselves to expand their own portfolio of responsibilities, so too has the presidency grown as an institution.
As the size and scope of the federal government has grown over the years, influence on the lives of its citizens has grown as well. Sadly, though, we as a people seem to be growing more apathetic even as government becomes more powerful. Mind you, I’m not talking about this particular president, but the presidency itself. I’m not criticizing the actions of any one man. I am not making partisan statements, but rather observations of the trends in government over time. If you want proof that the size of government has grown, look at the expanding size of the staffs that elected officials employ. If you want proof that the scope of government has grown, look at the number of zeros in the federal budget. If you want proof that this growth has outpaced America’s willingness to foot the bill, look at the ever-expanding deficit.
The president, though, is a unique figure in American government. Aside from the myriad constitutional duties endowed to the president, the man (and I hope someday soon, woman) in the Oval Office has an important symbolic role in our culture. Congress has a 97 percent incumbent reelection rate. Congress provides stability, continuity and consistency in the day-to-day business of governing a nation. However, because of term limits, we elect a new president every four to eight years. With the new president comes a new face to our government.
America gets the chance to reinvent itself every few years. By and large, the status quo remains. But with every changing of the guard, there’s always the hope – the glimmer of a chance – that we’ll see a truly remarkable turning point in our history. When Lincoln presided over a deeply divided Union, he told the people that it was they, not he, who would determine whether the nation would experience the scourge of a civil war. When Kennedy took office, he pledged to get America moving again even though it would mean every American would have to sacrifice. When Reagan took office, he decided to tow a hard line against communism abroad so that the next generation of Americans would not have to live in fear of a global thermonuclear war.
These are the stories that make up the American mystique: stories of strength, responsibility and sacrifice. Though our national failures are many, our national triumphs are more. And the president is the symbol of all of it – good and bad. Every president has been praised by some and despised by others. But every president is immortalized in the story of America, a story begun by freedom-loving people 230 years ago that will continue long after you and I have turned to ashes and dust. So as the debate rages on in this country about what the next chapter of our story should say, let the debate be vigorous, honest and fair. For when our great-grandchildren are learning about the early 21st century, they will not only learn the names of the presidents, they will learn that the president is the symbol of a time as well.
As Lincoln knew well, the true history of a nation is written in the lives of its people.

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