ABSTRACT

Historian Eric Goldman wrote that the Dwight D. Eisenhower's years were possibly "the dullest and dreariest in all our history." At a three-day conference on Dwight David Eisenhower held at Hofstra University in March 1984, scholars, journalists, and statesmen portrayed the former President as a skillful, politically astute, and effective leader. Such assessments provide a striking contrast to the perceptions of Eisenhower that prevailed in the academic community during the 1950s and 1960s. As late as the mid-1970s, accounts of Eisenhower's Presidency were generally lacking in archival documentation. Several writers found it useful to draw comparisons between Eisenhower and so-called weak or passive Presidents to illustrate more forcefully their perceptions of Eisenhower's shortcomings. Marquis Childs, for example, asserted that Eisenhower bore a striking resemblance to the President who had served one hundred years before him, James Buchanan. Perhaps the most noteworthy of the Eisenhower analogies is the one drawn by James David Barber in his classic study, Presidential Character.