document_title: Historical rankings of presidents of the United States

question_text: who is rated the best president of the united states

root

text: General findings[edit]

text: Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and George Washington are most often the three highest rated presidents among historians. The remaining places in the top 10 are often rounded out by Theodore Roosevelt, Thomas Jefferson, Harry S. Truman, Woodrow Wilson, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Andrew Jackson, and John F. Kennedy. More recent presidents such as Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton are often rated among the greatest in world opinion polls, but do not always rank as highly among presidential scholars and historians. The bottom 10 often include James Buchanan, Warren G. Harding, Andrew Johnson, Franklin Pierce, Millard Fillmore, William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, Ulysses S. Grant, Zachary Taylor, and George W. Bush. Because William Henry Harrison (30 days) and James A. Garfield (200 days, incapacitated after 119 days) both died shortly after taking office, they are sometimes omitted from presidential rankings. Zachary Taylor also died after serving as president for only 16 months, but he is usually included. In the case of these three, it is not clear if they received low rankings due to their actions as president, or because each was president for such a limited time that it is not possible to assess them more thoroughly.

tag: p

text: Political scientist Walter Dean Burnham noted the "dichotomous or schizoid profiles" of presidents, which can make some hard to classify. Historian Alan Brinkley stated that "there are presidents who could be considered both failures and great or near great (for example, Nixon)". Historian and political scientist James MacGregor Burns observed of Nixon, "How can one evaluate such an idiosyncratic president, so brilliant and so morally lacking?"[4]

text: David H. Donald, noted biographer of Abraham Lincoln, relates that when he met John F. Kennedy in 1961, Kennedy voiced his deep dissatisfaction and resentment with historians who had rated some of his predecessors. Kennedy said that "No one has a right to grade a President—even poor James Buchanan—who has not sat in his chair, examined the mail and information that came across his desk, and learned why he made his decisions."[5]

text: Historian and political scientist Julian E. Zelizer argues that traditional presidential rankings explain little concerning actual presidential history, and that they are "weak mechanisms for evaluating what has taken place in the White House".[6] Libertarian political commentator Ivan Eland wrote a book titled Recarving Rushmore (2008; updated 2014), in which he wrote that historians' criteria are poor in their capacity to reflect presidents' actual services to the country. In the book, Eland chose to rate 40 U.S. presidents on the basis of whether their policies promoted prosperity, liberty, and non-interventionism, as well as modest executive roles for themselves; his final rankings varied significantly from those of most scholars.

text: Notable scholar surveys[edit]

text: The 1948 poll was conducted by historian Arthur M. Schlesinger Sr. of Harvard University.[1] The 1962 survey was also conducted by Schlesinger, who surveyed 75 historians.[7] Schlesinger's son Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., conducted another poll in 1996.[8]

text: The Complete Book of U.S. Presidents also gives the results of the 1982 survey, a poll of 49 historians conducted by the Chicago Tribune. A notable difference from the 1962 Schlesinger poll was the ranking of Dwight D. Eisenhower, which rose from 22nd in 1962 to 9th in 1982.

text: The Siena Research Institute of Siena College conducted surveys in 1982, 1990, 1994, 2002, and 2010. The 1994 survey placed only two presidents, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln, above 80 points and two presidents, Andrew Johnson and Warren G. Harding, below 50 points.[9][10] The 2010 Siena survey had George W. Bush plummet from the initial 2002 ranking of 23rd down to 39th.

text: The 1996 column shows the results from a poll conducted from 1988 to 1996 by William J. Ridings Jr. and Stuart B. McIver and published in Rating the Presidents: A Ranking of U.S. leaders, from the Great and Honorable to the Dishonest and Incompetent.[11] More than 719 people took part in the poll, primarily academic historians and political scientists, although some politicians and celebrities also took part. Participants from every state were included, and emphasis was placed upon getting input from female historians and "specialists in African-American studies", as well as a few non-American historians. Poll respondents rated the presidents in five categories (leadership qualities, accomplishments and crisis management, political skill, appointments, and character and integrity), and the results were tabulated to create the overall ranking.

text: A 2000 survey by The Wall Street Journal consisted of an "ideologically balanced group of 132 prominent professors of history, law, and political science". This poll sought to include an equal number of liberals and conservatives in the survey, as the editors argued that previous polls were dominated by either one group or the other. According to the editors, this poll included responses from more women, minorities, and young professors than the 1996 Schlesinger poll. The editors noted that the results of their poll were "remarkably similar" to the 1996 Schlesinger poll, with the main difference in the 2000 poll being the lower rankings for the 1960s presidents Lyndon B. Johnson and John F. Kennedy, and higher ranking of President Ronald Reagan at 8th. Franklin D. Roosevelt still ranked in the top three.

text: Another presidential poll was conducted by The Wall Street Journal in 2005, with James Lindgren of Northwestern University Law School for the Federalist Society.[12] As in the 2000 survey, the editors sought to balance the opinions of liberals and conservatives, adjusting the results "to give Democratic- and Republican-leaning scholars equal weight". Franklin D. Roosevelt still ranked in the top three, but editor James Taranto noted that Democratic-leaning scholars rated George W. Bush the sixth-worst president of all time, while Republican scholars rated him the sixth-best, giving him a split-decision rating of "average".

text: A 2006 Siena College poll of 744 professors reported the following results:[13]

text:
"George W. Bush has just finished five years as President. If today were the last day of his presidency, how would you rank him? The responses were: Great: 2%; Near Great: 5%; Average: 11%; Below Average: 24%; Failure: 58%."
"In your judgment, do you think he has a realistic chance of improving his rating?" Two-thirds (67%) responded no; less than a quarter (23%) responded yes; and 10% chose "no opinion or not applicable".

tag: ul

text: Thomas Kelly, professor emeritus of American studies at Siena College, said: "President Bush would seem to have small hope for high marks from the current generation of practicing historians and political scientists. In this case, current public opinion polls actually seem to cut the President more slack than the experts do." Douglas Lonnstrom, Siena College professor of statistics and director of the Siena Research Institute, stated: "In our 2002 presidential rating, with a group of experts comparable to this current poll, President Bush ranked 23rd of 42 presidents. That was shortly after 9/11. Clearly, the professors do not think things have gone well for him in the past few years. These are the experts that teach college students today and will write the history of this era tomorrow."[13]

text: A 2010 Siena poll of 238 presidential scholars found that former President George W. Bush was ranked 39th out of 43, with poor ratings in handling of the economy, communication, ability to compromise, foreign policy accomplishments, and intelligence. Meanwhile, the then-current president, Barack Obama, was ranked 15th out of 43, with high ratings for imagination, communication ability and intelligence and a low rating for background (family, education and experience).[14][15]

text: The C-SPAN Survey of Presidential Leadership consists of rankings from a group of presidential historians and biographers. The C-SPAN Survey of Presidential Leadership has taken place three times: in 2000, 2009, and 2017.[16][17][18] The most recent survey was of 91 presidential historians, surveyed by C-SPAN's Academic Advisor Team, made up of Douglas G. Brinkley, Edna Greene Medford, and Richard Norton Smith. In the survey, each historian rates each president on a scale of one ("not effective") to 10 ("very effective") on presidential leadership in ten categories: "Public Persuasion", "Crisis Leadership", "Economic Management", "Moral Authority", "International Relations", "Administrative Skills", "Relations with Congress", "Vision/Setting An Agenda", "Pursued Equal Justice for All", and "Performance Within the Context of His Times"; each category is equally weighed.[19] The results of all three C-SPAN surveys have been fairly consistent. Abraham Lincoln has taken the highest ranking in each survey, and George Washington, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Theodore Roosevelt have always ranked in the top five, while James Buchanan, Andrew Johnson, and Franklin Pierce have been ranked at the bottom of all three surveys.[18]

text: In 2008, The Times daily newspaper of London asked eight of its own "top international and political commentators" to rank all 42 U.S. presidents "in order of greatness".[20]

text: In 2011, through the agency of its United States Presidency Centre (USPC), the Institute for the Study of the Americas (located in the University of London's School of Advanced Study) released the first ever U.K. academic survey to rate U.S. presidents. This polled the opinion of British specialists in American history and politics to assess presidential performance. They also gave an interim assessment of Barack Obama, but his unfinished presidency was not included in the survey (had he been included, he would have attained eighth place overall).[21]

text: In 2012, Newsweek magazine asked a panel of historians to rank the ten best presidents since 1900. The results showed that historians had ranked Franklin D. Roosevelt, Theodore Roosevelt, Lyndon Johnson, Woodrow Wilson, Harry Truman, John F. Kennedy, Dwight Eisenhower, Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, and Barack Obama as the best since that year.[22]

text: A 2013 History News Network poll of 203 American historians, when asked to rate Obama's presidency on an A–F scale, gave him a B- grade. Obama, whom historians graded using 15 separate measures plus an overall grade, was rated most highly in the categories of communication ability, integrity, and crisis management, and most poorly for his relationship with Congress, transparency, and accountability.[23]

text: A 2015 poll administered by the American Political Science Association (APSA) among political scientists specializing in the American presidency had Abraham Lincoln in the top spot, with George Washington, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Theodore Roosevelt, Thomas Jefferson, Harry S. Truman, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Bill Clinton, Andrew Jackson, and Woodrow Wilson making the top 10. The results of this poll are reflected in the table below.[24]

text: Incumbent President Donald Trump is not included in any survey, as none have been conducted since his inauguration on January 20, 2017.

text: Scholar survey results[edit]

text: Within each column:

text:
Blue backgrounds indicate first quartile.[25]
Green backgrounds indicate second quartile.
Orange backgrounds indicate third quartile.
Red backgrounds indicate fourth quartile.

text: Note: Click the "sort" icon at the head of each column to view the rankings for each survey in numerical order.

text:
No.
President
Political party
Schl. 1948 [1]
Schl. 1962 [7]
M-B 1982
CT 1982
Siena 1982
Siena 1990
Siena 1994
R-McI 1996 [11]
Schl. 1996 [8]
C-SPAN 2000
WSJ 2000
Siena 2002
WSJ 2005 [12]
C-SPAN 2009 [26]
Siena 2010 [14][27]
USPC 2011 [28]
APSA 2015 [24]
C-SPAN 2017 [29]
Aggr. [30]

1
George Washington
(independent)
02
02
03
02
04
04
04
03
02 (tie)
03
01
04
01
02
04
03
02
02
03

2
John Adams
Federalist
09
10
09
15
10
14
12
14
11
16
13
12
13
17
17
12
15
19
13

3
Thomas Jefferson
Dem-Repub
05
05
04
05
02
03
05
04
04
07
04
05
04
07
05
04
05
07
05

4
James Madison
Dem-Repub
14
12
14
17
09
08
09
10
17
18
15
09
17
20
06
14
13
17
14

5
James Monroe
Dem-Repub
12
18
15
16
15
11
15
13
15
14
16
08
16
14
07
13
16
13
15 (tie)

6
John Quincy Adams
Dem-Repub
11
13
16
19
17
16
17
18
18
19
20
17
25
19
19
20
22
21
21

7
Andrew Jackson
Democratic
06
06
07
07
13
09
11
08
05
13
06
13
10
13
14
09
09
18
09

8
Martin Van Buren
Democratic
15
17
20
18
21
21
22
21
21
30
23
24
27
31
23
27
25
34
24

9
William Henry Harrison
Whig
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
26
35
28
35
99  –
37
99  –
36
99  –
39
35
99  –
39
38
37

10
John Tyler
(independent)[31]
22
25
28
28
34
33
34
34
32
36
34
37
35
35
37
37
36
39
38

11
James K. Polk
Democratic
10
08 (tie)
12
10
12
13
14
11
09
12
10
11
09
12
12
16
19
14
11

12
Zachary Taylor
Whig
25
24
27
26
29
34
33
29
29
28
31
34
33
29
33
33
33
31
35

13
Millard Fillmore
Whig
24
26
29
31
32
32
35
36
31
35
35
38
36
37
38
35
37
37
39

14
Franklin Pierce
Democratic
27
28
31
33
35
36
37
37
33 (tie)
39
37 (tie)
39
38
40
40
39
40
41
40

15
James Buchanan
Democratic
26
29
33
34
37
38
39
40
38
41
39
41
40
42
42
40
43
43
42

16
Abraham Lincoln
Republican
01
01
01
01
03
02
02
01
01
01
02
02
02
01
03
02
01
01
01

17
Andrew Johnson
Democratic
19
23
32
30
38
39
40
39
37
40
36
42
37
41
43
36
41
42
41

18
Ulysses S. Grant
Republican
28
30
35
32
36
37
38
38
33 (tie)
33
32
35
29
23
26
29
28
22
36

19
Rutherford B. Hayes
Republican
13
14
22
22
22
23
24
25
23
26
22
27
24
33
31
30
30
32
25

20
James A. Garfield
Republican
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
25
30
26
30
99  –
29
99  –
33
99  –
28
27
99  –
31
29
29

21
Chester A. Arthur
Republican
17
21 (tie)
23
24
24
26
27
28
26
32
26
30
26
32
25
32
32
35
28

22/24
Grover Cleveland
Democratic
08
11
17
13
18
17
19
16
13
17
12
20
12
21
20
21
23
23
18

23
Benjamin Harrison
Republican
21
20
26
25
31
29
30
31
19
31
27
32
30
30
34
34
29
30
30

25
William McKinley
Republican
18
15
18
11
19
19
18
17
16
15
14
19
14
16
21
17
21
16
19

26
Theodore Roosevelt
Republican
07
07
05
04
05
05
03
05
06
04
05
03
05
04
02
05
04
04
04

27
William Howard Taft
Republican
16
16
19
20
20
20
21
20
22
24
19
21
20
24
24
25
20
24
23

28
Woodrow Wilson
Democratic
04
04
06
06
06
06
06
06
07
06
11
06
11
09
08
06
10
11
07

29
Warren G. Harding
Republican
29
31
36
36
39
40
41
41
39
38
37 (tie)
40
39
38
41
38
42
40
43

30
Calvin Coolidge
Republican
23
27
30
29
30
31
36
33
30
27
25
29
23
26
29
28
27
27
31

31
Herbert Hoover
Republican
20
19
21
21
27
28
29
24
33 (tie)
34
29
31
31
34
36
26
38
36
33

32
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Democratic
03
03
02
03
01
01
01
02
02 (tie)
02
03
01
03
03
01
01
03
03
02

33
Harry S. Truman
Democratic
99  –
08 (tie)
08
08
07
07
07
07
08
05
07
07
07
05
09
07
06
06
06

34
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Republican
99  –
21 (tie)
11
09
11
12
08
09
10
09
09
10
08
08
10
10
07
05
08

35
John F. Kennedy
Democratic
99  –
99  –
13
14
08
10
10
15
12
08
18
14
15
06
11
15
14
08
10

36
Lyndon B. Johnson
Democratic
99  –
99  –
10
12
14
15
13
12
14
10
17
15
18
11
16
11
12
10
12

37
Richard M. Nixon
Republican
99  –
99  –
34
35
28
25
23
32
36
25
33
26
32
27
30
23
34
28
32

38
Gerald R. Ford
Republican
99  –
99  –
24
23
23
27
32
27
28
23
28
28
28
22
28
24
24
25
26

39
Jimmy Carter
Democratic
99  –
99  –
25
27
33
24
25
19
27
22
30
25
34
25
32
18
26
26
27

40
Ronald Reagan
Republican
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
16 *
22
20
26
25
11
08
16
06
10
18
08
11
09
17

41
George H. W. Bush
Republican
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
18 *
31
22
24
20
21
22
21
18
22
22
17
20
22

42
Bill Clinton
Democratic
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
16 *
23 *
20 *
21 *
24 *
18
22
15
13
19
08
15
20

43
George W. Bush
Republican
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
23 *
19 *
36
39
31
35
33
34

44
Barack Obama
Democratic
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
15 *
99  –
18 *
12
15 (tie)

45
Donald Trump
Republican
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –
99  –

Total in survey

29
31
36
36
39
40
41
41
39
41
39
42
40
42
43
40
43
43
43

tag: table

text: Note: Grover Cleveland was elected to two non-consecutive terms, serving as both the 22nd and 24th President of the United States; to date he is the only person to have achieved this distinction. Because of it, the total number of people who have served as president is one fewer than the number of presidents in order of succession.

text: Liberal and conservative raters[edit]

text: The Murray-Blessing 1982 survey asked historians whether they were liberal or conservative on domestic, social and economic issues.[32] The table below shows that the two groups had only small differences in ranking the best and worst presidents. Both groups agreed on the composition of nine of the top ten Presidents (and were split over the inclusion of either Lyndon B. Johnson or Dwight D. Eisenhower), and six of the worst seven (split over Jimmy Carter or Calvin Coolidge).

text:
Rankings by Liberals and Conservatives

Rank
Liberals (n = 190)
Conservatives (n = 50)

1
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln

2
Franklin D. Roosevelt
George Washington

3
George Washington
Franklin D. Roosevelt

4
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson

5
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt

6
Woodrow Wilson
Andrew Jackson

7
Andrew Jackson
Harry S. Truman

8
Harry S. Truman
Woodrow Wilson

9
Lyndon B. Johnson
Dwight D. Eisenhower

10
John Adams
John Adams

...

30
Calvin Coolidge
Jimmy Carter

31
Franklin Pierce
Richard Nixon

32
James Buchanan
Franklin Pierce

33
Andrew Johnson
Andrew Johnson

34
Ulysses S. Grant
James Buchanan

35
Richard Nixon
Ulysses S. Grant

36
Warren G. Harding
Warren G. Harding

text: Statistical analysis[edit]

text: Scholars have explored whether historians' rankings of a president are correlated with quantifiable measures. Economist David R. Henderson and Zachary Gochenour applied a linear regression model to explain the C-SPAN Survey of Presidential Leadership rankings.[33] They found the following correlations to be statistically significant:

text:
Variable
coefficient
p-value

Real Per-Capita GDP Growth
7.75
<.05

Years In Office
22.67
<.01

Intellectual Brilliance
57.79
<.01

War Hero
147.86
<.01

Assassination
195.97
<.001

Military Deaths Per-Capita Rank
−8.73
<.001

text: They concluded that "the results indicate that military deaths as a percentage of population is a major determinant of greatness in the eyes of historians."

text: Excluded groups ranking approach[edit]

text: In 2002, Ronald Walters, former director of the University of Maryland's African American Leadership Institute, stated that presidents ranked by how each one balanced the interests of majority interests and the interests of excluded groups was practical in respect to American debate on racial politics. Presidents have traditionally been ranked on personal qualities and their leadership ability to solve problems that move the nation in a positive direction. Walters stated there was a qualitative difference between white and African-American intellectuals in evaluating presidents. In the 1996 New York Times poll by Arthur Schlesinger Jr., 31 white historians and one black historian ranked presidents on differing categories of greatness. In a survey done by professors Hanes Walton Jr. and Robert Smith, in their text book American Politics And The African American Quest For Universal Freedom, 44 African-American political scientists and historians ranked presidents in terms of racial attitudes and racial legislation proposed.[34] Individual presidents' attitudes, policies, and perspectives were historically ranked in five categories: White Supremacist; Racist; Racially Neutral; Racially Ambivalent; Antiracist.[35]

text: Popular opinion[edit]

text: Rasmussen poll[edit]

text: According to a Rasmussen poll conducted in 2007, six presidents—George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and John F. Kennedy—were rated favorably by at least 80% of Americans.[36]

text:
President
Favorable
Unfavorable
Net favorable

George Washington
94
2
92

Abraham Lincoln
92
4
88

Thomas Jefferson
89
4
85

Theodore Roosevelt
84
8
76

Franklin D. Roosevelt
81
12
69

John F. Kennedy
80
13
67

John Adams
74
9
65

James Madison
73
8
65

Ronald Reagan
72
22
50

Dwight D. Eisenhower
72
15
57

Harry S. Truman
70
14
56

Andrew Jackson
69
14
55

Gerald Ford
62
26
36

John Quincy Adams
59
7
52

Ulysses S. Grant
58
24
34

George H. W. Bush
57
41
16

Jimmy Carter
57
34
23

William Howard Taft
57
15
42

Woodrow Wilson
56
19
37

Bill Clinton
55
41
14

James Monroe
49
10
39

Herbert Hoover
48
34
14

Lyndon B. Johnson
45
42
3

Andrew Johnson
45
26
19

Chester A. Arthur
43
17
26

James A. Garfield
42
16
26

William McKinley
42
24
18

George W. Bush
41
59
−18

Grover Cleveland
40
26
14

Calvin Coolidge
38
31
7

Rutherford B. Hayes
38
19
19

Richard Nixon
32
60
−28

Benjamin Harrison
30
35
−5

Warren G. Harding
29
33
−4

James Buchanan
28
32
−4

James K. Polk
27
21
6

Zachary Taylor
26
18
8

Martin Van Buren
23
19
4

William Henry Harrison
21
16
5

Franklin Pierce
17
25
−8

Millard Fillmore
17
25
−8

John Tyler
9
15
−6

text: Gallup poll[edit]

text: A Gallup poll about presidential greatness taken February 2–5, 2011, asked 1015 adults in the U.S. "Who do you regard as the greatest United States president?"[3]

text:
Ronald Reagan (19%)
Abraham Lincoln (14%)
Bill Clinton (13%)
John F. Kennedy (11%)
George Washington (10%)
Franklin Roosevelt (8%)
Barack Obama (5%)
Theodore Roosevelt (3%)
Harry Truman (3%)
George W. Bush (2%)
Thomas Jefferson (2%)
Jimmy Carter (1%)
Dwight Eisenhower (1%)
George H. W. Bush (1%)
Andrew Jackson (<0.5%)
Lyndon B. Johnson (<0.5%)
Richard Nixon (<0.5%)

text: In addition, "Other" received 1%, "None" received 1%, and "No opinion" received 5%.

text: Popular opinion polls on recent presidents[edit]

text: These polls evaluate recent presidents only.

text: 2010 Gallup poll[edit]

text: A Gallup poll, taken on November 19–21, 2010, asked Americans to say, based on what they know or remember about the nine most recent former presidents, whether they approve or disapprove of how each handled his job in office.[37]

text:
John F. Kennedy (85% approval/10% disapproval)
Ronald Reagan (74% approval/24% disapproval)
Bill Clinton (69% approval/30% disapproval)
George H. W. Bush (64% approval/34% disapproval)
Gerald Ford (61% approval/26% disapproval)
Jimmy Carter (52% approval/42% disapproval)
Lyndon B. Johnson (49% approval/36% disapproval)
George W. Bush (47% approval/51% disapproval)
Richard Nixon (29% approval/65% disapproval)

text: Public Policy Polling[edit]

text: A Public Policy Polling poll taken between September 8–11, 2011, asked 665 American voters, based on what they know or remember about the nine most recent former presidents, whether they hold favorable or unfavorable views of how each handled his job in office.[38]

text:
John F. Kennedy (74% favorability/15% unfavorability)
Ronald Reagan (60% favorability/30% unfavorability)
Bill Clinton (62% favorability/34% unfavorability)
George H. W. Bush (53% favorability/35% unfavorability)
Gerald Ford (45% favorability/26% unfavorability)
Jimmy Carter (45% favorability/43% unfavorability)
Lyndon B. Johnson (36% favorability/39% unfavorability)
George W. Bush (41% favorability/51% unfavorability)
Richard Nixon (19% favorability/62% unfavorability)

text: Vision Critical/Angus Reid poll[edit]

text: A Vision Critical/Angus Reid poll taken on February 18–19, 2011, asked respondents about 11 former presidents plus the current president and whether each was a good or bad president.[39]

text:
John F. Kennedy (80% approval/6% disapproval)
Ronald Reagan (72% approval/16% disapproval)
Bill Clinton (65% approval/24% disapproval)
Dwight D. Eisenhower (61% approval/6% disapproval)
Harry S. Truman (57% approval/7% disapproval)
Jimmy Carter (47% approval/28% disapproval)
George H. W. Bush (44% approval/38% disapproval)
Barack Obama (41% approval/33% disapproval)
Gerald Ford (37% approval/25% disapproval)
Lyndon B. Johnson (33% approval/27% disapproval)
George W. Bush (30% approval/55% disapproval)
Richard Nixon (24% approval/54% disapproval)

text: 2013 Gallup poll[edit]

text: A Gallup Poll taken November 7–10, 2013, asked 1039 adults in the U.S. "How do you think each of the following presidents will go down in history—as an outstanding president, above average, average, below average, or poor?"[40]

text:
Gallup poll 2013

President
Outstanding
Above Average
Average
Below Average
Poor
No Opinion
Weighted Average [41]

Dwight D. Eisenhower
10%
39%
36%
2%
1%
12%
3.63

John F. Kennedy
18%
56%
19%
2%
1%
4%
3.92

Lyndon B. Johnson
4%
16%
46%
14%
8%
12%
2.93

Richard Nixon
2%
13%
27%
29%
23%
6%
2.38

Gerald Ford
2%
14%
56%
15%
5%
8%
2.92

Jimmy Carter
4%
19%
37%
20%
15%
6%
2.76

Ronald Reagan
19%
42%
27%
6%
4%
2%
3.67

George H. W. Bush
3%
24%
48%
12%
10%
2%
2.98

Bill Clinton
11%
44%
29%
9%
6%
1%
3.45

George W. Bush
3%
18%
36%
20%
23%
1%
2.58

Barack Obama
6%
22%
31%
18%
22%
1%
2.72

text: 2014 Quinnipiac poll[edit]

text: A Quinnipiac University poll taken June 24–30, 2014, asked 1446 registered voters in the U.S. who they thought were the best and worst presidents since World War II.[42]

text: Best president since World War II:

text:
Ronald Reagan (35%)
Bill Clinton (18%)
John F. Kennedy (15%)
Barack Obama (8%)
Dwight Eisenhower (5%)
Harry S. Truman (4%)
Lyndon B. Johnson (tie) (3%)
George H. W. Bush (tie) (3%)
Jimmy Carter (2%)
Richard Nixon (tie) (1%)
Gerald Ford (tie) (1%)
George W. Bush (tie) (1%)

text: Worst president since World War II:

text:
Barack Obama (33%)
George W. Bush (28%)
Richard Nixon (13%)
Jimmy Carter (8%)
Lyndon B. Johnson (tie) (3%)
Ronald Reagan (tie) (3%)
Bill Clinton (tie) (3%)
Gerald Ford (tie) (2%)
George H. W. Bush (tie) (2%)
Dwight Eisenhower (1%)
Harry S. Truman (tie) (<1%)
John F. Kennedy (tie) (<1%)

text: 2017 Quinnipiac poll[edit]

text: Four years later, a Quinnipiac University poll taken January 20–25, 2017, asked 1190 voters in the U.S. who they thought were the best and worst presidents since World War II.[43]

text: Best president since World War II:

text:
Ronald Reagan (30%)
Barack Obama (29%)
John F. Kennedy (12%)
Bill Clinton (9%)
Dwight Eisenhower (tie) (3%)
George W. Bush (tie) (3%)
Harry Truman (tie) (2%)
Lyndon B. Johnson (tie) (2%)
Jimmy Carter (tie) (2%)
George H.W. Bush (tie) (2%)
Richard Nixon (<1%)
Gerald R. Ford (<1%)

text: Worst president since World War II:

text:
Richard Nixon (24%)
Barack Obama (23%)
George W. Bush (22%)
Jimmy Carter (10%)
Ronald Reagan (5%)
Bill Clinton (4%)
Lyndon B. Johnson (3%)
George H.W. Bush (2%)
Gerald R. Ford (1%)
Harry S. Truman (tie) (<1%)
Dwight Eisenhower (tie) (<1%)
John F. Kennedy (tie) (<1%)

text: Siena College Research Institute, Presidential Expert Poll of 2010[edit]

text: Abbreviations

text:
Bg = Background
PL = Party leadership
CAb = Communication ability
RC = Relations with Congress
CAp = Court appointments
HE = Handling of economy
L = Luck
AC = Ability to compromise
WR = Willing to take risks
EAp = Executive appointments
OA = Overall ability
Im = Imagination
DA = Domestic accomplishments
Int = Integrity
EAb = Executive ability
FPA = Foreign policy accomplishments
LA = Leadership ability
IQ = Intelligence
AM = Avoid crucial mistakes
EV = Experts' view
O = Overall

text:
Blue backgrounds indicate first quartile.
Green backgrounds indicate second quartile.
Orange backgrounds indicate third quartile.
Red backgrounds indicate fourth quartile.

text:
Seq.
President
Political party
Bg
PL
CAb
RC
CAp
HE
L
AC
WR
EAp
OA
Im
DA
Int
EAb
FPA
LA
IQ
AM
EV
O

1
George Washington
(independent)
7
18
12
3
3
4
1
3
4
1
4
9
4
2
2
3
1
12
1
3
4

2
John Adams
Federalist
4
29
18
26
10
13
23
32
16
15
13
17
22
3
19
12
20
7
15
12
17

3
Thomas Jefferson
Dem-Repub
1
4
6
4
6
16
6
11
8
5
5
3
6
14
5
7
6
1
6
5
5

4
James Madison
Dem-Repub
3
10
11
9
7
12
17
7
15
9
6
8
12
5
14
20
17
2
10
8
6

5
James Monroe
Dem-Repub
9
12
15
8
14
9
9
8
17
8
16
16
8
10
11
2
13
15
7
9
7

6
John Quincy Adams
Dem-Repub
2
34
20
35
16
14
30
29
23
13
15
11
18
4
21
16
26
5
20
21
19

7
Andrew Jackson
Democratic
30
2
10
14
27
28
4
38
5
19
12
13
14
23
6
19
5
23
12
13
14

8
Martin Van Buren
Democratic
16
13
23
19
24
38
33
13
32
25
24
24
27
29
23
25
27
22
27
24
23

9
William Henry Harrison
Whig
24
30
25
31
33
27
42
35
30
24
37
35
36
30
33
39
24
31
33
34
35

10
John Tyler
(independent)[31]
33
42
39
42
39
31
22
39
26
34
35
29
34
33
37
35
36
33
32
36
37

11
James K. Polk
Democratic
17
9
13
12
21
15
7
23
7
16
17
14
11
24
9
8
10
20
9
11
12

12
Zachary Taylor
Whig
37
35
28
37
37
24
36
34
28
28
34
27
37
21
31
34
25
37
25
33
33

13
Millard Fillmore
Whig
40
41
40
38
35
33
25
25
37
35
38
36
35
36
38
33
39
39
30
35
38

14
Franklin Pierce
Democratic
38
37
37
41
40
34
35
36
38
38
39
39
39
38
40
40
40
38
35
40
40

15
James Buchanan
Democratic
23
40
41
40
42
41
40
41
43
39
42
42
43
40
42
41
43
40
41
43
42

16
Abraham Lincoln
Republican
28
6
2
6
4
5
13
1
2
2
1
2
1
1
1
5
2
3
2
1
3

17
Andrew Johnson
National Union
42
43
43
43
43
37
39
43
34
42
41
41
42
37
41
38
42
41
42
42
43

18
Ulysses S. Grant
Republican
26
28
24
22
25
29
21
22
22
40
28
26
26
27
34
24
21
29
31
31
26

19
Rutherford B. Hayes
Republican
29
33
30
29
29
26
19
18
33
33
33
32
33
28
30
30
32
30
24
29
31

20
James A. Garfield
Republican
20
22
22
24
32
23
41
27
31
29
25
28
25
25
26
31
23
26
22
27
27

21
Chester A. Arthur
Republican
41
31
32
27
28
19
14
21
27
26
30
25
20
32
27
26
28
32
17
26
25

22/24
Grover Cleveland
Democratic
19
16
17
15
17
22
20
19
24
18
20
22
17
19
17
21
19
25
14
19
20

23
Benjamin Harrison
Republican
39
32
34
28
30
35
29
30
39
36
36
34
32
31
35
28
34
35
23
32
34

25
William McKinley
Republican
21
14
19
11
23
18
24
20
21
20
21
23
19
22
18
15
18
27
11
20
21

26
Theodore Roosevelt
Republican
6
7
3
5
1
2
2
12
1
4
3
1
2
6
4
4
4
6
3
4
2

27
William Howard Taft
Republican
14
36
29
30
18
20
32
24
36
22
23
30
21
18
25
23
31
18
28
23
24

28
Woodrow Wilson
Democratic
8
8
9
16
8
8
15
37
9
10
8
5
9
11
10
10
12
4
29
10
8

29
Warren G. Harding
Republican
43
38
36
34
36
39
37
26
40
43
43
43
40
42
43
37
41
43
39
41
41

30
Calvin Coolidge
Republican
25
24
38
21
26
30
12
28
41
30
32
37
31
17
28
32
33
28
19
28
29

31
Herbert Hoover
Republican
10
26
31
33
19
43
43
40
42
32
26
38
41
13
29
36
37
14
40
38
36

32
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Democratic
5
1
1
2
2
1
5
2
3
3
2
4
3
16
3
1
3
10
4
2
1

33
Harry S. Truman
Democratic
35
15
14
20
15
6
11
15
6
7
7
15
7
8
8
6
9
17
8
6
9

34
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Republican
12
17
21
10
9
11
8
5
20
17
11
20
13
9
7
9
7
19
5
7
10

35
John F. Kennedy
Democratic
13
19
4
13
12
7
27
6
10
6
14
7
15
35
13
17
11
11
16
14
11

36
Lyndon B. Johnson
Democratic
15
3
16
1
5
10
28
9
12
12
9
12
5
34
12
43
15
21
37
16
16

37
Richard Nixon
Republican
18
20
26
36
38
25
34
33
14
37
22
19
24
43
24
11
29
16
43
37
30

38
Gerald Ford
Republican
27
25
35
17
22
36
31
17
35
23
31
33
30
15
32
27
30
34
26
25
28

39
Jimmy Carter
Democratic
31
39
27
39
20
40
38
31
25
21
29
21
29
7
36
29
35
13
36
30
32

40
Ronald Reagan
Republican
34
5
5
7
31
21
3
14
11
31
19
18
23
26
20
13
8
36
13
17
18

41
George H. W. Bush
Republican
11
27
33
23
34
32
26
16
29
27
27
31
28
20
22
14
22
24
18
22
22

42
Bill Clinton
Democratic
22
11
8
25
11
3
10
4
18
11
10
10
10
41
15
18
14
9
34
15
13

43
George W. Bush
Republican
36
23
42
32
41
42
18
42
19
41
40
40
38
39
39
42
38
42
38
39
39

44
Barack Obama
Democratic
32
21
7
18
13
17
16
10
13
14
18
6
16
12
16
22
16
8
21
18
15

Seq.
President
Political party
Bg
PL
CAb
RC
CAp
HE
L
AC
WR
EAp
OA
Im
DA
Int
EAb
FPA
LA
IQ
AM
EV
O

text: Memorability of the presidents[edit]

text: In November 2014, Henry L. Roediger III and K. Andrew DeSoto published a study in the journal Science asking research subjects to name as many presidents as possible.[45][46] They reported data from three generations, as well as from an online survey conducted in 2014. The percentage of participants in the online survey sample who could name each president was:

text:
Barack Obama (100%)
Bill Clinton (96%)
George W. Bush or George H. W. Bush (95%)
George Washington (94%)
Abraham Lincoln (88%)
John F. Kennedy (83%)
Richard Nixon (82%)
Jimmy Carter (79%)
Thomas Jefferson (72%)
Ronald Reagan (66%)
Gerald Ford (62%)
Franklin D. Roosevelt or Theodore Roosevelt (60%)
John Adams or John Quincy Adams (56%)
Dwight D. Eisenhower (54%)
Harry S. Truman (50%)
Andrew Jackson (47%)
Herbert Hoover (42%)
Andrew Johnson or Lyndon B. Johnson (41%)
William Howard Taft (39%)
James Madison (38%)
Ulysses S. Grant (38%)
James Monroe (30%)
Woodrow Wilson (29%)
Calvin Coolidge (22%)
James A. Garfield (19%)
James K. Polk (17%)
Warren G. Harding (16%)
William McKinley (15%)
John Tyler (12%)
James Buchanan (12%)
Grover Cleveland (11%)
William Henry Harrison or Benjamin Harrison (11%)
Martin Van Buren (11%)
Rutherford B. Hayes (10%)
Zachary Taylor (10%)
Millard Fillmore (8%)
Franklin Pierce (7%)
Chester A. Arthur (7%)


document_title: The war to end war

question_text: who coined the phrase war to end all wars

text: The war to end war

text: Origin[edit]

text: During August 1914, immediately after the outbreak of the war, British author and social commentator H. G. Wells published a number of articles in London newspapers that subsequently appeared as a book entitled The War That Will End War.[3] Wells blamed the Central Powers for the coming of the war and argued that only the defeat of German militarism could bring about an end to war.[4] Wells used the shorter form of the phrase, "the war to end war", in In the Fourth Year (1918), in which he noted that the phrase had "got into circulation" in the second half of 1914.[5] In fact, it had become one of the most common catchphrases of the First World War.[4]

text: In later years, the term became associated with Woodrow Wilson, despite the fact that Wilson used the phrase only once.[6] Along with the phrase "make the world safe for democracy", it embodied Wilson's conviction that America's entry into the war was necessary to preserve human freedom.[6]

text: Later use[edit]

text: Even during World War I, the phrase met with some degree of skepticism; the British politician David Lloyd George is reputed to have said, "This war, like the next war, is a war to end war."[7] As it became apparent that the war had not succeeded in ending war, the phrase took on a more cynical tone. The British staff officer Archibald Wavell, a future field marshal and viceroy of India, said despondently of the Paris Peace Conference, "After the 'war to end war', they seem to have been in Paris at making the 'Peace to end Peace'."[8] Wells himself used the phrase in an ironic way in the novel The Bulpington of Blup (1932).[9] Walter Lippmann wrote in Newsweek in 1967, "The delusion is that whatever war we are fighting is the war to end war", while President Richard Nixon, in his "Silent Majority" speech, said, "I do not tell you that the war in Vietnam is the war to end wars".[2]


document_title: Albert E. Brumley

question_text: who wrote if we never meet again this side of heaven

text: Albert E. Brumley

text: This article includes a list of references, but its sources remain unclear because it has insufficient inline citations. Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations. (July 2013) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)

text:
Albert E. Brumley

Birth name
Albert Edward Brumley

Born
(1905-10-29)October 29, 1905
near Spiro, Oklahoma, United States

Died
November 15, 1977(1977-11-15) (aged 72)
Powell, Missouri, United States

Genres
Christian

text: Albert Edward Brumley (October 29, 1905 – November 15, 1977) was an American shape note music composer and publisher, prolific in the genre of southern gospel

text: Biography[edit]

text: Brumley was born near Spiro, Oklahoma on October 29, 1905. Pre-Dustbowl Oklahoma was primarily made up of sparse agricultural communities; Brumley's family was no different. He spent much of his early life chopping and picking cotton on his family's farm. In 1926, he enrolled in the Hartford Musical Institute of Hartford, Arkansas, and studied there through 1931. The Institute was led by Eugene Monroe Bartlett (1884–1941), owner of the Hartford Music Company and composer of the well-known gospel song "Victory in Jesus".[1] Brumley purchased Hartford Music Company in 1948.

text: Brumley married Goldie Edith Schell in 1931. They lived on the banks of Big Sugar Creek in Powell, Missouri, where they raised six children.

text: "I'll Fly Away," "Turn Your Radio On," "If We Never Meet Again (This Side of Heaven)," "I'll Meet You In The Morning," and "He Set Me Free" are among a host of favorites written by Albert E. Brumley. He wrote over 800 songs. He established the Albert E. Brumley Sundown to Sunup Gospel Sing (now Albert E. Brumley Gospel Sing) in 1969 in Springdale, Arkansas. Brumley has been inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, Gospel Music Hall of Fame, and Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame.

text: Albert Brumley was a member of the Church of Christ and is buried at Fox Church of Christ Cemetery near Powell, Missouri. He died November 15, 1977. Brumley's son Tom, who would die in 2009, later became a respected steel guitarist in country music and songleader in the Church of Christ in Powell.[2]

text: Notes[edit]

text:
Jump up ^ Freeman, Greg (2013-02-21). "E. M. Bartlett (1885 1941)". Encyclopedia of Arkansas history & culture (Southern ed.). Retrieved 2013-07-11.
Jump up ^ Wolfe, Charles (1998). "Albert E. Brumley". In Paul Kingsbury. Encyclopedia of Country Music. New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 62–63.

tag: ol


document_title: Long-distance calling

question_text: where was the first long distance phone call made

text: Long-distance calling

text: History[edit]

text: In 1892, AT&T built an interconnected long-distance telephone network, which reached from New York to Chicago, the technological limit for non-amplified wiring. Users often did not use their own phone for such connections, but made an appointment to use a special long-distance telephone booth or "silence cabinet" equipped with 4-wire telephones and other advanced technology. The invention of loading coils extended the range to Denver in 1911, again reaching a technological limit. A major research venture and contest led to the development of the audion—originally invented by Lee De Forest and greatly improved by others in the years between 1907 and 1914—which provided the means for telephone signals to reach from coast to coast. Such transcontinental calling was made possible in 1914 but was not showcased until early 1915, as a promotion for the upcoming Panama–Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco in the spring of the same year.[3]

text: On January 25, 1915, Alexander Graham Bell ceremonially sent the first transcontinental telephone call from 15 Dey Street in New York City, which was received by his former assistant Thomas A. Watson at 333 Grant Avenue in San Francisco. This process, nevertheless, involved five intermediary telephone operators and took 23 minutes to connect by manually patching in the route of the call.

text: "On October 9, 1876, Alexander Graham Bell and Thomas A. Watson talked by telephone to each other over a two-mile (3 km) wire stretched between Cambridge and Boston. It was the first wire conversation ever held. Yesterday afternoon the same two men talked by telephone to each other over a 3,400-mile (5,500 km) wire between New York and San Francisco. Dr. Bell, the veteran inventor of the telephone, was in New York, and Mr. Watson, his former associate, was on the other side of the continent. They heard each other much more distinctly than they did in their first talk thirty-eight years ago."

text: On November 10, 1951, the first direct dial long-distance telephone call in North America was placed from Mayor M. Leslie Denning of Englewood, New Jersey to Mayor Frank Osborne of Alameda, California via AT&T's Bell System.[5] The ten digit call (seven digits plus a three-digit area code) was connected automatically within 18 seconds.[6]

text: The first subscriber trunk dialling in the United Kingdom was deployed December 5, 1958 with Elizabeth II placing a call from Bristol to Edinburgh.[7]

text: International calling

text: After World War II, priority was given by AT&T in the USA and the various PTT entities in Europe to automating switching on the toll networks in their respective countries (initially for Operator Toll Dialing).  Thus, when TAT-1 was opened for service, it was connected to international gateway offices at White Plains, NY and London that were already automated for domestic calls. These were designed to be able to automatically switch outward and inward international circuits as soon as common signalling standards (and political considerations) could be negotiated.  However, at the outset, to set up an international call, multiple operators were required: one to originate the call and one at each national gateway to complete a call via either ringdown to a local operator or operator toll dialing.

text: International Direct Dialling from London to Paris was first offered in March 1963, with Amsterdam following by the end of 1963.  Simultaneously, operator-dialed transatlantic calling began March 30, 1963 with the originating international operator in Western Europe or the USA able to complete calls to the terminal station without further operator assistance via the gateway exchanges at White Plains, NY and London.[8]  Operator-dialed transpacific calling to Hawaii, Japan, and Australia began with the completion of the COMPAC cable, also in 1963.[8]

text: By mid-1968, transatlantic cable capacity had increased to the point where scheduling calls between Western Europe, the UK, and USA was no longer necessary and calls were completed on demand.   Transatlantic International Direct Dialing between New York City (212 area code) and London (01 STD code) was introduced in 1970,[9] with service extended to the whole of the USA and the 6 largest UK cities in 1971.[10]

text: Collect/Reverse Charge calling

text: Various schemes were devised to allow large organisations to automatically accept collect calls, where the recipient pays long-distance charges for any call from a predefined area. A Zenith number in the late 1950s required an operator manually determine the destination number from a printed list; the 1967 Wide Area Telephone Service introduced the first automated toll-free telephone numbers, terminated on special fixed-rate trunks. By the 1980s, computerisation of the system allowed British Telecom "Linkline" 0800 freephone numbers and AT&T +1-800- toll-free numbers to be controlled by a database and terminated virtually anywhere with each inbound call itemised and billed individually. This smart network was further refined to provide toll-free number portability in the 1990s.

text: Technical Issues

text: Until the early 1980s a called party could instantly recognize an incoming long-distance call by its hiss or low level, due to the inherent signal loss and introduction of noise. The deployment of digital technologies such as pulse-code modulation and T-carrier circuits in the 1970s and 1980s let long-distance calls match the high voice quality of local calls.[citation needed]

text: Improvements in switching technology, the deployment of high-capacity optical fibre and an increase in competition substantially lowered long-distance rates at the end of the 20th century.  Using the Internet, the distinction between local and long-distance communication is fading to the point where an Internet call from the United States to Beijing carries a lower wholesale cost than a domestic landline call to a rural independent in small-town Iowa.

text: In media[edit]

text: Dramatization of a long distance call circa 1949

text: In this excerpt from the radio series Dragnet, Sgt. Joe Friday (Jack Webb) places a person-to-person long-distance call to a number reached via a manual switchboard in Fountain Green, Utah — a town of several hundred people served by an independent telephone company.  In the call, Friday calls a long-distance operator in Los Angeles and gives the name and number of the called party.  The operator then calls a rate & route operator, who responds that the call should be routed through Salt Lake City and Mount Pleasant, Utah and the rate-step for the call is 140 (the long distance operator would mark her ticket with that rate-step, and could use it to quote the rate from her rate table, in terms of the first three minutes and each additional minute, if the caller requested the toll).

text: The Los Angeles long distance operator then plugs into a direct trunk to the Salt Lake City inward operator and asks her for Mount Pleasant; the Salt Lake operator rings Mount Pleasant inward, and the Los Angeles operator asks the Mount Pleasant inward operator for Fountain Green.  The Mount Pleasant operator next rings Fountain Green, and the Los Angeles operator gives the Fountain Green operator the number and name of the called party in Fountain Green.  The Fountain Green operator rings the number, "14R2", a party line where a specific ringing pattern summons the second subscriber on the shared line.  A man answers; the Los Angeles operator asks for the called party and states that Los Angeles is calling.

text: This dramatization (and others like it) illustrates the cumbersome, costly and time-consuming process needed for long-distance calling before direct distance dialing was available. Local calls within the Los Angeles area had long been direct dial, but a long distance call to a tiny town in a distant state was a complex manual effort. The caller would dial the long-distance operator (typically ‘112’ in large Bell System cities of that era; "0" was for local assistance) and provide the destination city name and called number as well as their own number for billing purposes (there was no automatic number identification). Before the era of operator assisted dialing, which began in the late 1940s, an operator would first set up the route, then ring back the original caller several minutes later to announce the call was ready, rather than having him or her remain on the line.

text: Once operator distance dialing was implemented, the operator would have received a numerical routing from the rate and route operator, such as "Mark:  Other Place.  Route:  A ring-down.  Numbers:  801 plus 073 plus 181.  Operators 801 plus 073 plus."  This routing would allow the Los Angeles operator to dial via the tandem switch (i.e., class-4 telephone switch) to the Mount Pleasant operator’s switchboard, and have the call come in on a special special trunk (designated by the 181 code) used for incoming calls to ring-down points (places with manual service whose connection to the national network was via a larger point).

text: Routings were important during the 1950s and 1960s, when many medium-sized and smaller cities had automatic service, but were not yet reachable by the growing numbers of people in cities with direct dialing. For example, if by the late 1950s, our fictional "Fountain Green" had upgraded its manual service with an automatic (dial enabled four-digit number) one, an operator could often dial the call after obtaining the Rate and Route would quote ("Numbers 801 plus 833 plus 4D.  Operators 801 plus 073 plus.").  The operator could add 833, to the local four digit number, which in a few years, would become the seven digit number for the residents.

text: Regional variations[edit]

text: The definition of "local" or "long distance" calling (and the corresponding pricing) is largely a regulatory construct, by which every point outside an arbitrary group of exchange boundaries is charged at a higher "trunk call" or "toll call" rate. The charges often do not correlate directly to either straight-line distance or network topology; two exchanges 75 km apart may be local in some cases, while in other cases an adjacent pair of exchanges (or even two different exchange prefixes on the same physical switch) may arbitrarily be long-distance.

text: Canada[edit]

text: In Canada, local calls from landline telephones are flat-rated even in the largest cities (unlike the United States, which has metered service in a few of the largest markets). Local telephone numbers were lengthened to a standard seven digits in all of the largest markets in 1958 to accommodate US-style direct-dial equipment (Montréal and Toronto previously had 2L+4N six-digit local calling, smaller communities had four or five digits).

text: Long distance calling from landlines was opened to competition in the early 1990s and the use of long distance revenue to subsidise local service phased out a few years later. It is not possible for mobile telephone subscribers or coin-paid telephone users to select a default carrier, so long distance calls are often priced higher from these services. The use of prepaid telephone calling cards is a possible workaround.

text: United Kingdom[edit]

text: The regulatory structure in British Telecom exchanges differs from the North American system as there are no free local calls. A long-distance call is therefore known not as a "toll call" but as a trunk call. It traditionally carried a higher rate ("national rate" instead of "local rate") and requires a trunk prefix and area code be dialled before the number. A trunk call is prefixed with '0' for national calls and '00' for international calls, the European standard. It is now normal for local calls to cost the same as long distance UK calls, and is now common, for a small extra monthly charge, to allow free calls to landlines within the UK.  This free call allowance does not normally cover calls to the Isle of Man or the Channel Islands, which whilst confusingly having UK national dialling codes, are separate telephone administrations.

text: International calling from the UK is deregulated in that many alternative providers allow very cheap international calling by the caller dialling an access code, usually beginning with the digit 1, followed by the full international code.  These services generally use internet-based connections in the same way as computer-based services such as Skype, Friend Caller and many others, but with the added convenience of there being no need to use a computer.  It is this use of the internet for the calls which allows such low prices.  Often these same services are available from a mobile phone by the use of a special access number, though in this case there may be a charge equivalent to that of a standard landline call.

text: United States[edit]

text: The US regulatory structure splits long-distance calls into two major categories.  An intrastate call is regulated under state law.  Federal regulation applies to interstate calls (being interstate commerce).

text: In 1968, the Federal Communications Commission forced AT&T to allow MCI to connect their own long distance lines into the Bell system.[11]

text: During the 1984 breakup of the Bell System, the local access and transport area or LATA concept was created to distinguish between in-region calls (which were handled by local telephone companies such as the Baby Bells) and out-of-region calls (handled by interexchange carriers such as AT&T, MCI and Sprint).

text: The breakup of the Bell system in 1984 came with federally imposed rules to allow the Baby Bells and other long-distance providers to compete via "equal access."  Equal access allows telephone subscribers to choose an authorized telephone company or companies to handle their local toll and long-distance toll (including international) calls from their traditional, wireline telephones.

text: Various feature groups were used where equal access is available to allow callers to select a long-distance carrier for each call. In feature group 'D', the current system, subscribers may dial the prefix "101" and a four-digit code identifying a long-distance carrier to handle the InterLATA call.  For instance, 1010288 sends a call via AT&T, 1010333 is Sprint, 1010550 goes to CenturyLink. Area code 700, rarely used, is reserved for carrier-specific services; each carrier places a recorded self-identification message on 1-700-555-4141 to allow a subscriber to identify the default InterLATA carrier for their line.

text: In the United States, long-distance is either of two different classes of calls that are not local calls.  The most common class of long-distance is often called interstate long-distance, though the more accurate term is inter-LATA interstate long-distance. This is the form of long-distance most commonly meant by the term, and the one for which long-distance carriers are usually chosen by telephone customers.

text: Another form of long-distance, increasingly relevant to more U.S. states, is known as inter-LATA intrastate long-distance. This refers to a calling area outside of the customer’s LATA but within the customer's state. While technically and legally long-distance, this calling area is not necessarily served by the same carrier used for "regular" long-distance, or may be provided at different rates. In some cases, customer confusion occurs as, due to rate or carrier distinctions, a local long-distance call can be billed at a higher per-minute rate than interstate long-distance calls, despite being a shorter distance.[citation needed]

text: Often, in large LATAs, there is also a class known by the oxymoronic name local long-distance, which refers to calls within the customer's LATA but outside their local calling area. This area is normally served by the customer's local telephone provider, which is usually one of the Baby Bells, despite attempts by some CLECs to compete in the local telephone market.[citation needed]

text: In California, in addition to intra-LATA and inter-LATA calling, there are ZUM (Zone Usage Measurement) areas  within the local Service Areas.[citation needed]

text: Callers are usually offered a variety of rate "plans" depending on usage, although which plan is cheapest for a given amount of usage is often not obvious. Plans may be "unlimited" or may package an initial number of minutes and charge additional minutes at a flat rate, and further varieties abound. Some plans can be compared easily if the number of minutes of usage will be estimated in advance, but others are not as clearly comparable. Some of these plans can be found on websites that compare a variety of long-distance phone and phone card options, giving consumers useful and timely information.[citation needed]