Would Tom Dewey have made a good President?

[Col. Roosevelt]

If he had been elected in 1948, do you think Thomas Dewey would've made a good President?

[ElectionsGuy]

Hell no!

[Blue3]

I don't know much about him, but the impression I do have of him is something like "technocratic robot."

Similar to Mitt Romney, but less quirky and more serious and more detached.

[Zioneer]

I think Truman was a great president, so no. Now if Dewey hadn't run in 1948 and Eisenhower passed in 1952, that would be a more interesting story.

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

Dewey was quite probably the most inane presidential candidate in American history. Had he won in '48, he might have replaced Millard Fillmore as the most forgettable president.

Imagine a State of the Union address composed entirely of quotes like this:

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[Mr. Smith]

Yes

People forget that the "inane" statements were part of a strategy to look harmless, above it all, and classy, and ride in on that image...which almost worked.

But in the primaries and 1944 campaign showed him doing a decent job regarding authenticity as principles, even all these things were in a moderate sort of way.

He just wasn't Harry Truman.

[TDAS04]

Possibly, I guess.

[RogueBeaver]

He would've appointed Hoover AG, so HELL NO.

[Antonio the Sixth]

No. He represented what's worst about many politicians (even more so today than in his days).

[Col. Roosevelt]

I think his Presidency would've been much better than the disaster of Truman's second term. Truman was great in his first term but his second term was just one big fail. There's a reason why McCarthy was able to find an audience and why Truman didn't run for a third term.

[Col. Roosevelt]

"Good" as in "competent enough to not let the country go to hell"? Sure.

"Good" as in "the consequences, good and bad, of his Presidency"? Maybe. He was a liberal 1940s Republican afterall who expanded the welfare state, was pro-civil rights, and friendly to business in a non-evil way, so I really cannot think of any major policy differences between him and Truman. I would suppose so?

Consider the following was among the GOP platform in 1948:

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[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

No. He was a creep.

[Bigby]

He would've appointed Hoover AG, so HELL NO.

This. People always seem to forget this.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

He would've appointed Hoover AG, so HELL NO.

This. People always seem to forget this.

Big offices require men of great intellectual and personal stature. Hoover showed he had ambitious designs for the American justice system. With him dominating the cabinet given Dewey's own uselessness, this country might have seen real greatness. Nixons move the world forward. Not Carters.

[Famous Mortimer]

Probably not much different from Eisenhower.

[Col. Roosevelt]

He would've appointed Hoover AG, so HELL NO.

This. People always seem to forget this.

Big offices require men of great intellectual and personal stature. Hoover showed he had ambitious designs for the American justice system. With him dominating the cabinet given Dewey's own uselessness, this country might have seen real greatness. Nixons move the world forward. Not Carters.

If by move forward, you mean forward to hell, then yes.

This country was much better under Nixon than it was under Carter.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

I don't know much about him, but the impression I do have of him is something like "technocratic robot."

His own secretary described him as "cold like a February iceberg".

[Col. Roosevelt]

He would've appointed Hoover AG, so HELL NO.

This. People always seem to forget this.

Big offices require men of great intellectual and personal stature. Hoover showed he had ambitious designs for the American justice system. With him dominating the cabinet given Dewey's own uselessness, this country might have seen real greatness. Nixons move the world forward. Not Carters.

If by move forward, you mean forward to hell, then yes.

This country was much better under Nixon than it was under Carter.

Because nobody knew what was going on at the top, while Carter was more open. Both were failures of confidence in the end. And let's not forget the economy was good when Nixon took office while it was stagflating when Carter came in.

Overall, the nation had a lot more pride in the Nixon years then it did in the Malaise. Nixon was so popular he won all but a single state, and I think Watergate as this massive crisis has been inflated by historians. If Watergate was this all-consuming monstrosity, the election in 1976 between Carter and Nixon's hand-picked successor wouldn't have been as close as it was.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

Overall, the nation had a lot more pride in the Nixon years then it did in the Malaise.

You do realize that the late 1970s troubles were, in at least some part, created by the aftermath of Watergate?

[Mr. Smith]

He would've appointed Hoover AG, so HELL NO.

This. People always seem to forget this.

Big offices require men of great intellectual and personal stature. Hoover showed he had ambitious designs for the American justice system. With him dominating the cabinet given Dewey's own uselessness, this country might have seen real greatness. Nixons move the world forward. Not Carters.

If by move forward, you mean forward to hell, then yes.

This country was much better under Nixon than it was under Carter.

Because nobody knew what was going on at the top, while Carter was more open. Both were failures of confidence in the end. And let's not forget the economy was good when Nixon took office while it was stagflating when Carter came in.

Overall, the nation had a lot more pride in the Nixon years then it did in the Malaise. Nixon was so popular he won all but a single state, and I think Watergate as this massive crisis has been inflated by historians. If Watergate was this all-consuming monstrosity, the election in 1976 between Carter and Nixon's hand-picked successor wouldn't have been as close as it was.

If it wasn't, Carter never would've been a candidate in the first place, and it's possible that Ford never would've even become Vice President in the first place. And if he had somehow made it against Scoop Jackson or Frank Church, he would've lost in a landslide comparable to 1980.

More importantly is that the "national pride" as you put it never would've fallen at all.

[Supersonic]

If by 'good', you mean 'competent', then yes.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

He would've appointed Hoover AG, so HELL NO.

This. People always seem to forget this.

Big offices require men of great intellectual and personal stature. Hoover showed he had ambitious designs for the American justice system. With him dominating the cabinet given Dewey's own uselessness, this country might have seen real greatness. Nixons move the world forward. Not Carters.

If by move forward, you mean forward to hell, then yes.

That is, after all, the goal of progress, right?

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

I very much doubt Dewey would be much effective. A quintessential "me-too Republican", he'd be plunged into a war of attrition with the Taft wing.