Second-term curse

The second-term curse is the perceived tendency of second terms of U.S. presidents to be less successful than their first terms.^[1][2]

A depiction of the Assassination of Abraham Lincoln, an event which happened in his second term.

According to the curse, the second terms of U.S. presidents have usually been plagued by a major scandal, policy inertia, some sort of catastrophe, or other problems.^[3][4][5] There have been twenty-one U.S. presidents who have served a second term,^[6] each of whom has faced difficulties attributed to the curse^{[citation needed]}. The legend behind the second-term curse is that after Franklin D. Roosevelt broke the de facto second term limit by running for third and fourth terms, the ghost of George Washington might have put a curse on any president who seeks a second term.^[4][5] This legend notwithstanding, several presidents who served prior to this, including Washington and Roosevelt themselves, were plagued by problems in their second term more serious than in their first.^[2]

Whether this perceived tendency is real is a subject of dispute: for example, political statistician Nate Silver, after analyzing presidential approval ratings for Harry S. Truman through Barack Obama, did find that approval ratings were lower on average during second terms, but he also found a variety of other reasons to explain those ratings, such as regression toward the mean, and he concluded that "the idea of the second-term curse is sloppy as an analytical concept".^[7] In addition, political writer Michael Barone cited several presidents who had successful second terms, and wrote that "second-term problems resulted more often from the failure to adjust to changed circumstances and unanticipated challenges".^[2] Conversely, a 2013 report in The Economist has said that the existence of the second-term curse is supported by data. The report stated that each of the eleven second terms served from the beginning of the Theodore Roosevelt administration to the end of the George W. Bush administration were less economically prosperous than their respective president's first term, save for the second terms of Truman, Ronald Reagan, and Bill Clinton.^[8] However, these findings could be due to the effect of survivorship bias; presidents who are elected for a second term are more likely to have had a good first term, making their second term look worse by comparison.

Presidents of the curse

President		Second term	Attributed event(s)
	George Washington	1793–1797	Ramifications of the French Revolutionary Wars[2] Controversy over his signing of the Jay Treaty[1] Fatigue due to political infighting[9]
	Thomas Jefferson	1805–1809	Burr conspiracy[6] Embargo Act of 1807[2]
	James Madison	1813–1817	Burning of Washington[2]
	James Monroe	1821–1825	Congressional rejection of his anti-slavery efforts[6]
	Andrew Jackson	1833–1837	Events in the Bank War which laid the groundwork for the Panic of 1837[10]
	Abraham Lincoln	1865	His assassination[11]
	Ulysses S. Grant	1873–1877	Panic of 1873[6] Failure of his Reconstruction efforts to uphold the rights of Southern African-Americans[2] Numerous scandals[9]
	Grover Cleveland	1893–1897[note 1]	Personal struggles with oral cancer[11] Panic of 1893[6]
	William McKinley	1901	His assassination[2]
	Theodore Roosevelt	1905–1909[note 2]	The U.S. economy was not as strong as it was during his first term[8]
	Woodrow Wilson	1917–1921	U.S. entry into World War I[2] Unpopularity stemming from his refusal to accept reservations to the Treaty of Versailles,[2] leading to the Senate's rejection of the treaty Failure to get the U.S. to join the League of Nations[9] Suffered a stroke[9] Controversy over the Espionage Act of 1917 and the Sedition Act of 1918 The U.S. economy was not as strong as it was during his first term[8]
	Calvin Coolidge	1925–1929[note 2]	The U.S. economy was not as strong as it was during his first term[8]
	Franklin D. Roosevelt	1937–1941	Failure of the "court-packing plan"[1] The U.S. economy was not as strong as it was during his first term[8]
	Harry S. Truman	1949–1953[note 2]	Korean War[12] Controversy over his relief of General Douglas MacArthur[13]
	Dwight D. Eisenhower	1957–1961	Overcoat scandal[1] 1960 U-2 incident[1][5] The U.S. economy was not as strong as it was during his first term[8]
	Lyndon B. Johnson	1965–1969[note 2]	Vietnam War[12] Reaction to the Great Society[12] Urban riots and the Kerner Commission[12] Loss of Wisconsin primary to Eugene McCarthy[6] The U.S. economy was not as strong as it was during his first term[8]
	Richard Nixon	1973–1974[note 3]	Watergate scandal and subsequent resignation[4][12] The U.S. economy was not as strong as it was during his first term[8]
	Ronald Reagan	1985–1989	Iran–Contra affair[1][4]
	Bill Clinton	1997–2001	Paula Jones lawsuit[7] Lewinsky scandal and subsequent impeachment[1][4] Pardon controversy[14]
	George W. Bush	2005–2009	Failure of Social Security reform[3] Hurricane Katrina[15] Indictment of Scooter Libby during the Plame affair[13] Financial crisis of 2007–2008[16]
	Barack Obama	2013–2017	Edward Snowden leaks[14] United States federal government shutdown of 2013[11] IRS targeting controversy[17] David Petraeus' affair and guilty plea[18] Failed Supreme Court nomination of Merrick Garland.[19]

See also

• Curse of Tippecanoe
• Six-year itch

Notes

1. Grover Cleveland's two terms are non-consecutive.
2. Was serving his first full term after finishing out the term of his predecessor, who died in office.
3. Became the first president to resign the office

References

1. Clymer, Adam (November 7, 2012). "Triumphant Obama Faces New Foe in 'Second-Term Curse'". The New York Times. Archived from the original on November 8, 2012. Retrieved November 9, 2012.
2. Barone, Michael (January 20, 2013). "Unlucky (Lame) Ducks?". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on December 20, 2016. Retrieved December 5, 2016.
3. Fournier, Ron (November 6, 2012). "5 Reasons Why Obama and Romney Will Get No Mandate". National Journal. Archived from the original on November 8, 2012. Retrieved November 9, 2012.
4. Susan Page; Judy Keen (October 31, 2005). "Bush sets out to salvage 2nd term". USA Today. Archived from the original on March 14, 2021. Retrieved July 23, 2017.
5. Duberstein, Kenneth M. (October 29, 2005). "Breaking the second-term curse". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on November 3, 2012. Retrieved November 9, 2012.
6. Lehrman, Robert A. (January 19, 2013). "Obama's second term: What history says to expect". The Christian Science Monitor. Archived from the original on February 25, 2021. Retrieved December 6, 2016.
7. Silver, Nate (May 16, 2013). "Is There Really a Second-Term Curse?". The New York Times. Archived from the original on June 8, 2013. Retrieved May 19, 2013. My view, then, is that the idea of the second-term curse is sloppy as an analytical concept. There is certainly a historical tendency for presidents who earn a second term to become less popular — but some of this reflects reversion to the mean. And some recent presidents have overcome the supposed curse and actually become more popular on average during their second terms.
8. "Second-term blues". The Economist. January 26, 2013. Archived from the original on December 20, 2016. Retrieved December 6, 2016.
9. Akhil Reed Amar (January–February 2013). "Second Chances". The Atlantic. Archived from the original on November 25, 2016. Retrieved December 6, 2016.
10. Henningsen, Vic (January 21, 2013). "Henningsen: Second Term Curse". Vermont Public Radio. Archived from the original on December 20, 2016. Retrieved December 6, 2016.
11. Cornwell, Rupert (November 2, 2013). "The curse of the second term hovers over hapless President Obama". The Independent. Archived from the original on June 11, 2020. Retrieved December 5, 2016.
12. Broder, David (January 20, 2005). "Fending Off the 'Second-Term Curse'". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on June 10, 2015. Retrieved November 9, 2012.
13. Hickey, Walt (February 18, 2013). "Watch Out, Obama: Second Terms Have Been Tainted By Scandal". Business Insider. Archived from the original on September 3, 2019. Retrieved September 3, 2019.
14. Hughes, Brian (July 19, 2014). "The 10 worst second-term moments for presidents since Richard Nixon". The Washington Examiner. Archived from the original on July 26, 2014. Retrieved December 18, 2016.
15. "Like Predecessors, Bush Has Second-Term Blues". The Wall Street Journal. October 29, 2005. Archived from the original on March 14, 2016. Retrieved November 9, 2012.
16. Kurtz, Howard (May 14, 2013). "Obama's second-term curse? Not so fast". CNN. Archived from the original on December 22, 2017. Retrieved December 19, 2017.
17. Pianin, Eric (October 22, 2014). "While Obama Skulks Around, Hillary Rides a Crest of Popularity". The Fiscal Times. Archived from the original on December 20, 2016. Retrieved December 5, 2016.
18. Harwood, John (January 6, 2016). "Avoiding the Dreaded 'Second-Term Curse'". The New York Times. Archived from the original on October 16, 2017. Retrieved December 5, 2016.
19. Elving, Ron (June 29, 2018). "What Happened With Merrick Garland In 2016 And Why It Matters Now". NPR. Archived from the original on April 2, 2019. Retrieved December 24, 2021.