What Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush can teach Barack Obama about life after the White House.
In 1912, after he lost his bid for reelection, William Howard Taft mused about what the country should do with its ex‐presidents once they leave the White House. “A dose of chloroform,” he proposed, to protect the nation “from the troublesome fear that the occupant could ever come back.”
Today, the Twenty‐Second Amendment limits how often a president may come back. The question concerning Barack Obama is not what should be done with him, but rather, what should he do with himself?
For most of our history, ex‐presidents who were not independently wealthy had to work—not until 1958 did Congress pass a law granting them a pension. George Washington became the country’s largest whiskey producer. John Quincy Adams won a seat in the House of Representatives and fought slavery. And William Howard Taft! Good thing no one took him up on the chloroform. Nine years after he left office, he was appointed chief justice of the Supreme Court, a position that the presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin says gave him “probably the happiest decade of his life.”
At 55, Obama will be one of the youngest ex‐presidents, and— despite the defeat of his intended successor, Hillary Clinton—a popular one. He is in good health and could easily live for another four decades, which is a long time to be ex‐anything.
What can he learn from Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush, who likewise walked out of the White House as vigorous middle‐aged men?
THE DOWNSHIFT FROM presidency to post‐presidency has bewildered quite a few former White House residents. Having lost in a landslide to Ronald Reagan in 1980, Jimmy Carter left Washington an unpopular one‐term president. When he and Rosalynn returned to Plains, Georgia, they found the family peanut business $1 million in debt, and their house in need of repairs.
This story is from the January - February 2017 edition of The Atlantic.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the January - February 2017 edition of The Atlantic.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
THE AIRPORT-LOUNGE ARMS RACE
Inside the ever more extravagant competition to lure affluent travelers
Hypochondria Never Dies
The diagnosis is officially gone, but health anxiety is everywhere.
Miranda July's Weird Road Trip
The author's midlife-crisis novel is full of estrangement, eroticism, and whimsy.
The Wild Blood Dynasty
What a little-known family reveals about the nation's untamed spirit
The Engrossing Darkness of The Crow
Can a cult hit point the way forward for the beleaguered comic-book movie?
The Godfather of American Comedy
The funniest people on the planet think there's no funnier person than Albert Brooks.
The History My Family Left Behind
A gun, a lynching, and an exodus from Mississippi
Ozempic or Bust
America has been trying to address the obesity epidemic for four decades now. So far, each new \"solution\" has failed to live up to its early promise.
THE ART OF SURVIVAL
In living with cancer, Suleika Jaouad has learned to wrench meaning from our short time on Earth.
DEMOCRACY IS LOSING THE PROPAGANDA WAR
AUTOCRATS IN CHINA, RUSSIA, AND ELSEWHERE ARE NOW MAKING COMMON CAUSE WITH MAGA REPUBLICANS TO DISCREDIT LIBERALISM AND FREEDOM AROUND THE WORLD.