Who is the Most Qualified Presidential Candidate Ever?

Many Hillary Clinton supporters respond to accusations from Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump that Clinton is “not qualified” by counter-asserting that she is the “most qualified candidate ever”. Now, these people are often using “qualified” to refer to very different things–Sanders said Clinton was not qualified because she takes money from Super PACs and Trump says she’s not qualified because of her judgment, but when Clinton supporters use the term “qualified” they aren’t denying that she took Super PAC money or even necessarily arguing that she has good judgment. The claim that Clinton is most qualified is made as if it were a statement of obvious fact–it reads not like a nuanced argument about judgment but more like a fact claim about experience. Clinton is said to be “most qualified” because she has the most and the best experience of anyone, and the people saying this do so with a confidence that indicates they don’t think it’s close. This strikes me as a pretty bold historical claim, so I decided to investigate to see where Clinton ranks for experience and to see whether experience has a significant effect on the way historians think about a president’s performance.

To do this I had to come up with a formula. I decided to count as “political experience” all experience in public office at the local, state, or federal levels. An office counts as “public” if it is part of one of the three branches of government (legislative, executive, and judicial). I only count civilian roles, not necessarily to devalue military experience (although some of our worst presidents were generals–e.g. Grant, Taylor) but because I believe military experience and political experience are fundamentally different things. Politicians cannot order other politicians around like subordinates, they have to work within a system of checks and balances and get willing cooperation. I also do not include things like being first lady or first gentleman, because that role has no legal power and therefore doesn’t meet my standard for what constitutes “public office”. Not all experience is worth the same amount. Being senator or secretary of state for one year is worth more than being a state legislator or local mayor for the same period of time. So I came up with six levels of experience:

• Level 1: Most local offices, mayors for small cities (population under 100,000). Each year of Level 1 experience is weighted at 0.25, so if a candidate is country clerk for 4 years, that’s worth 1 experience point.
• Level 2: Most state offices, especially time spent serving in a state legislature. Also mayors of mid-size cities (100,000 to 500,000). Each year of Level 2 experience is weighted at 0.5, so if a candidate is in the New York state legislature for 4 years, that’s worth 2 experience points.
• Level 3: Low level federal offices, including serving in the House of Representatives or being an assistant secretary or ambassador. Also mayors of large cities (500,000+) or delegates to continental congresses or the constitutional convention. Each year of Level 3 experience is weighted at 0.75, so if a candidate is a member of the house for 4 years, that’s worth 3 experience points.
• Level 4: Governors, senators, appellate courts, most secretaries (commerce, agriculture, interior, etc.) Each year of Level 4 experience is weighted at 1, so if a candidate is a senator for 4 years, that’s worth 4 points.
• Level 5: Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense/War, Vice President, or Speaker of the House. Each year of Level 5 experience is weighted at 1.5, so if a candidate is secretary of state for 4 years, that’s worth 6 points.
• Level 6: Years already spent serving as president. Each year of level 6 experience is weighted at 2, so if a candidate is president for 4 years, that’s worth 8 points.

I took each president at the time he or she was first elected and calculated both their total years of public service and their weighted years in accordance with my formula. A president who takes over for a dead president is included if and when that president went on to win an election. Presidents who were never elected are not included, because they were never candidates. I then compared each of those measures with aggregate presidential rankings (which include 18 different surveys of historians since 1948). The results were interesting.

Here are all the elected presidents by total years of public service:

Martin Van Buren leads the pack, with 34 XP. Taylor and Grant come in last with 0 (both were generals). Hillary Clinton has 12 XP, less than half as much as Van Buren. Amusingly, Barack Obama had as much total XP in 2008 as Clinton has now, which means that during the 08 primary he was ahead of Clinton in experience. 19 of the 38 elected presidents (excluding those who were never elected) have more than 12 years experience, which means if Clinton wins she’ll finish in the 52nd percentile for total XP–in other words, her level of experience is very average for an elected president. But Clinton was Secretary of State, and that Level 5 experience should count for a lot. Here’s what the figures look like when we use weighted XP:

John Quincy Adams leads with 29.25 XP. Using weighted XP, Clinton’s 12 years of experience become 14 XP, which is still less than half of JQA’s. There are 13 elected presidents with more than 14 XP, so Clinton finishes in the 36th percentile. That’s still outside the top 3rd. The most recent elected president to have more than 14 XP was Dick Nixon (Ford had more, but was never elected).

The good news for Clinton is that neither total XP nor weighted XP seem to have anything to do with presidential performance. There is no correlation between either XP measure and historian rankings:

When we talk about whether a candidate is “qualified” we really shouldn’t be talking about experience, because experience has nothing to do with performance. We should instead be thinking more broadly about what does make a good president–policies, ideology, judgment, ability to lead, etc. These characteristics are complicated and difficult to judge, and people will often disagree about candidates in these areas. So we need more nuanced arguments a fewer bold assertions. I’d argue that the most qualified presidential candidate of all time was Franklin Roosevelt in 1944, not primarily because he had 12 years experience being president (8 more than any other person to win an election) but because of his performance during those 12 years–he defeated the depression and was well on his way to defeating the Nazis and the Japanese.

I’m also curious about whether more experienced candidates tend to win elections, so I ran the numbers for major party nominees that did not win as well as incumbents running for the second time (or third or fourth). Here’s the full list of elections with candidates’ total and weighted XPs. Winners are in bold, the most experienced (by weighted XP) is italicized:

1788:

George Washington: 2 Total XP, 1.5 Weighted XP

John Adams: 14 TXP, 10.5 WXP

1792:

George Washington: 6 TXP, 9.5 WXP

George Clinton: 5 TXP, 5 WXP

1796:

John Adams 22 TXP, 22.5 WXP

Thomas Jefferson: 12 TXP, 12.5 WXP

1800:

Thomas Jefferson: 16 TXP, 18.5 WXP

John Adams: 26 TXP, 30.5 WXP

1804:

Thomas Jefferson: 20 TXP, 26.5 WXP

Charles Pinckney: 2 TXP, 1.5 WXP

1808:

James Madison: 18 TXP, 19.5 WXP

Charles Pinckney: 2 TXP, 1.5 WXP

1812:

James Madison: 22 TXP, 27.5 WXP

DeWitt Clinton: 12 TXP, 4.5 WXP

1816:

James Monroe: 24 TXP, 25 WXP

Rufus King: 18 TXP, 16 WXP

1820:

James Monroe: 28 TXP, 34 WXP

No Opponent

1824:

John Quincy Adams: 29 TXP, 29.5 WXP.

Andrew Jackson: 2 TXP, 1.75 WXP

1828:

Andrew Jackson: 5 TXP, 4.75 WXP

John Quincy Adams: 33 TXP, 37.5 WXP

1832:

Andrew Jackson: 9 TXP, 12.75 WXP

Henry Clay: 19 TXP, 22.5 WXP

1836:

Martin Van Buren: 34 TXP, 26 WXP

William Henry Harrison: 22 TXP, 20.25 WXP

1840:

William Henry Harrison: 22 TXP, 20.25 WXP

Martin Van Buren: 38 TXP, 34 WXP

1844:

James Polk: 16 TXP, 14.75 WXP

Henry Clay: 29 TXP, 32.5 WXP

1848:

Zachary Taylor: 0 TXP, 0 WXP

Lewis Cass: 33 TXP, 33.75 WXP

1852:

Franklin Pierce: 9 TXP, 8 WXP

Winfield Scott: 0 TXP, 0 WXP

1856:

James Buchanan: 30 TXP, 27.5 WXP

John Fremont: 1 TXP, 1 WXP

1860:

Abraham Lincoln: 10 TXP, 5.5 WXP

John Breckinridge: 8 TXP, 9 WXP

Stephen Douglas: 24 TXP, 20 WXP

John Bell: 29 TXP, 25.75 WXP

1864:

Abraham Lincoln: 14 TXP, 13.5 WXP

George McClellan: 0 TXP, 0 WXP

1868:

Ulysses Grant: 0 TXP, 0 WXP

Horatio Seymour: 4 TXP, 4 WXP

1872:

Ulysses Grant: 4 TXP, 8 WXP

Horace Greeley: 1 TXP, 0.75 WXP

1876:

Rutherford Hayes: 7 TXP, 6.5 WXP

Samuel Tilden: 3 TXP, 2.5 WXP

1880:

James Garfield: 17 TXP, 12.75 WXP

Winfield Scott Hancock: 0 TXP, 0 WXP

1884:

Grover Cleveland: 5 TXP, 3 WXP

James Blaine: 22 TXP, 23 WXP

1888:

Benjamin Harrison: 6 TXP, 6 WXP

Grover Cleveland: 9 TXP, 11 WXP

1892:

Grover Cleveland: 9 TXP, 11 WXP

Benjamin Harrison: 10 TXP, 14 WXP

1896:

William McKinley: 17 TXP, 13.75 WXP

William Jennings Bryan: 4 TXP, 3 WXP

1900:

William McKinley: 21 TXP, 21.75 WXP

William Jennings Bryan: 4 TXP, 3 WXP

1904:

Theodore Roosevelt: 9 TXP, 11.25 WXP

Alton Parker: 6 TXP, 4.5 WXP

1908:

William Howard Taft: 18 TXP, 19.5 WXP

William Jennings Bryan: 4 TXP, 3 WXP

1912:

Woodrow Wilson: 2 TXP, 2 WXP

Theodore Roosevelt: 13 TXP, 19.25 WXP

William Howard Taft: 22 TXP, 27.5 WXP

1916:

Woodrow Wilson: 6 TXP, 10 WXP

Charles Hughes: 10 TXP, 10 WXP

1920:

Warren Harding: 8 TXP, 7 WXP

James Cox: 10 TXP, 9 WXP

1924:

Calvin Coolidge: 14 TXP, 12.25 WXP

John Davis: 11 TXP, 10.5 WXP

1928:

Herbert Hoover: 9 TXP, 8.5 WXP

Al Smith: 22 TXP, 14.5 WXP

1932:

Franklin Roosevelt: 13 TXP, 10.25 WXP

Herbert Hoover: 13 TXP, 16.5 WXP

1936:

Franklin Roosevelt: 17 TXP, 18.25 WXP

Alf Landon: 4 TXP, 4 WXP

1940:

Franklin Roosevelt: 21 TXP, 26.25 WXP

Wendell Willkie: 0 TXP, 0 WXP

1944:

Franklin Roosevelt: 25 TXP, 34.25 WXP

Thomas Dewey: 6 TXP, 3 WXP

1948:

Harry Truman: 24 TXP, 20 WXP

Thomas Dewey: 10 TXP, 7 WXP

1952:

Dwight Eisenhower: 2 TXP, 2 WXP

Adlai Stevenson: 4 TXP, 4 WXP

1956:

Dwight Eisenhower: 6 TXP, 10 WXP

Adlai Stevenson: 4 TXP, 4 WXP

1960:

John F. Kennedy: 14 TXP, 12.5 WXP

Richard Nixon: 14 TXP, 17 WXP

1964:

Lyndon Johnson: 28 TXP, 27.5 WXP

Barry Goldwater: 12 TXP, 12 WXP

1968:

Richard Nixon: 14 TXP, 17 WXP

Hubert Humphrey: 23 TXP, 23.5 WXP

George Wallace: 4 TXP, 4 WXP

1972:

Richard Nixon: 18 TXP, 25 WXP

George McGovern: 16 TXP, 14.5 WXP

1976:

Jimmy Carter: 8 TXP, 6 WXP

Gerald Ford: 30 TXP, 27.75 WXP

1980:

Ronald Reagan: 8 TXP, 8 WXP

Jimmy Carter: 12 TXP, 14 WXP

1984:

Ronald Reagan: 12 TXP, 16 WXP

Walter Mondale: 23 TXP, 22.25 WXP

1988:

George H.W. Bush: 12 TXP, 12 WXP

Michael Dukakis: 18 TXP, 14 WXP

1992:

Bill Clinton: 14 TXP, 13 WXP

George H.W. Bush: 16 TXP, 20 WXP

1996:

Bill Clinton: 18 TXP, 21 WXP

Bob Dole: 35 TXP, 33 WXP

2000:

George W. Bush*: 6 TXP, 6 WXP

Al Gore: 24 TXP, 26 WXP

2004:

George W. Bush: 10 TXP, 14 WXP

John Kerry: 22 TXP, 21 WXP

2008:

Barack Obama: 12 TXP, 8 WXP

John McCain: 26 TXP, 25 WXP

2012:

Barack Obama: 16 TXP, 16 WXP

Mitt Romney: 4 TXP, 4 WXP

2016:

Hillary Clinton: 12 TXP, 14 WXP

Donald Trump: 0 TXP, 0 WXP

Overall, the more experienced candidate is about as likely to win as to lose:

But earlier in American history experienced candidates did better. Since 1972, the more experienced candidate has only won once (Obama in 2012). You can see how powerful this trend is by graphing the lead in elections won experienced candidates had over inexperienced ones throughout most of American history. Watch the seven election lead Team XP spent centuries building totally collapse in just a few short decades:

But our historian surveys indicate that experience doesn’t matter, so this is more a curiosity than a concern in and of itself.

I’ll close with a list of all the major party nominees to beat Hillary Clinton’s weighted XP score of 14:

1. ’28 Adams–37.25
2. ’44 Roosevelt–34.25
3. ’40 Van Buren–34.0
4. ’48 Cass–33.75
5. ’44 Clay–32.5
6. ’20 Monroe–33.0
7. ’96 Dole–33.0
8. ’00 Adams–30.5
9. ’24 Adams–29.25
10. ’76 Ford–27.75
11. ’12 Madison–27.5
12. ’56 Buchanan–27.5
13. ’12 Taft–27.5
14. ’64 LBJ–27.5
15. ’04 Jefferson–26.5
16. ’40 Roosevelt–26.25
17. ’36 Van Buren–26.0
18. ’00 Gore–26.0
19. ’60 Bell–25.75
20. ’16 Monroe–25.0
21. ’72 Nixon–25.0
22. ’08 McCain–25.0
23. ’68 Humphrey–23.5
24. ’84 Blaine–23.0
25. ’96 Adams–22.5
26. ’32 Clay–22.5
27. ’84 Mondale–22.25
28. ’00 McKinley–21.75
29. ’96 Clinton–21.0
30. ’04 Kerry–21.0
31. ’36 Harrison–20.25
32. ’40 Harrison–20.25
33. ’60 Douglas–20.0
34. ’48 Truman–20.0
35. ’92 Bush–20.0
36. ’04 Madison–19.5
37. ’08 Taft–19.5
38. ’12 Roosevelt–19.25
39. ’00 Jefferson–18.5
40. ’36 Roosevelt–18.25
41. ’60 Nixon–17.0
42. ’68 Nixon–17.0
43. ’32 Hoover–16.5
44. ’16 King–16
45. ’84 Reagan–16
46. ’12 Obama–16
47. ’44 Polk–14.75
48. ’28 Smith–14.5
49. ’72 McGovern–14.5

Funfact: If Joe Biden had run in 2016, he would have 44 years total experience with a weighted XP of 48. He actually would have been the most qualified candidate ever, if you still think “qualified” ought to mean “experienced”.