East Baton Rouge Parish Library

Private lives/public consequences, personality and politics in modern America, William H. Chafe

eng

Includes bibliographical references (pages [393]-402) and index

index present

non fiction

Private lives/public consequences

bibliography

60776874

William H. Chafe

personality and politics in modern America

[The author,] a distinguished historian of the twentieth-century America, examines some of the most significant political leaders of the modern era in order to explore the relationship between their personal patterns of behavior and their political decisionmaking processes. The result is a ... look at how personal lives and political fortunes have intersected to shape America over the past fifty years. One might expect our leaders to be healthy, wealthy , genteel and happy. In fact, most of the individuals discussed - from Franklin Delano Roosevelt to Martin Luther King, Jr., from John F. Kennedy to Bill Clinton - came from dysfunctional families. Three of these leaders were children of alcoholics, half grew up in poor or only marginally secure homes; most experienced discord in their marriages; and at least two displayed signs of mental instability. What unites this ... diverse group is an intense ambition to succeed and a drive to overcome adversity. Indeed, adversity offered a vehicle for them to develop the personal attributes that would define their careers and shape the way they exercised power. [The author] explores the influences on the lives of these remarkable Americans, and he profiles the distinctiv

The Roosevelts : a partnership unprecedented -- Martin Luther King Jr. : toward the promised land -- John F. Kennedy : from detachment to engagement -- Robert F. Kennedy : despair and commitment -- Lyndon Baines Johnson : a need for consensus -- Richard M. Nixon : genius and paranoia -- Ronald Reagan : the role of a lifetime -- The Clintons : a flawed co-presidency

Private lives public consequences