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Is it just Obama, or do Democrats do inaugurations better?

By John A. Tures
Associate Professor of Political Science
LaGrange College

January 22, 2009 — You might get the impression from some accounts that Republicans have a tougher time getting a bounce Inauguration Day than Democrats.  That’s because Obama seems to bask in the glow of the media and the people, while George W. Bush’s last inauguration is barely remembered.  To analyze whether the same pattern holds up over time, I compared the approval ratings of all incoming presidents, dating back to Dwight D. Eisenhower, to determine whether or not Democrats seem to get initial breaks from the people. 

Eisenhower came into office with a commanding 68% approval rating, in a Gallup Poll from February 1, 1953.  He boosted that to 72 percent four years later, in another Gallup Poll.  John F. Kennedy, despite his electoral razor-thin margin in the popular vote, received an approval rating of 72% in the first Gallup Poll taken after his inauguration. 

I looked at two moments for Lyndon Baines Johnson.  After he was sworn in after the tragic assassination of Kennedy, he had an approval rating of 78% (Gallup Poll: December 5, 1963).  But more than a year later, his approval rating was at 70% in a Gallup Poll taken on January 28, 1965.

Folks think of Richard M. Nixon as a pretty unpopular guy with the people, but he seemed to manage the polls well around inauguration time.  On January 23, 1969, he was at 59% in a Gallup Poll on presidential approval.  That number jumped to 67% on January 26, 1973.

History doesn’t seem to pay as much attention to Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter, but both did well in their opening days in the Oval Office.  Just over 70% of voters approved of Ford in an August 1974 Gallup Poll, while after Inauguration Day, Carter posted a 66% approval rating in a Gallup Poll.

We may think of Ronald Reagan as having the great inaugural charm, but he had one of the lowest presidential approval ratings on Inauguration Day.  Barely 51% gave him the benefit of the doubt in a January 30 Gallup Poll in 1981.  Of course, four years later, his approval rating was a more respectable 65% in a January 25, 1985 Gallup Poll, despite the frigid weather.  Like Reagan, George Herbert Walker Bush barely mustered a majority of the voters in a similar poll on January 26, 1989.

For Bill Clinton, a Gallup Poll between January 24-26, 1993 had him average 58%.  Four years later (February 24-26, 1997) it was an eerily similar 57%.  That number was duplicated by George W. Bush from February 1-4, 2001.  Four years later, he had the lowest incoming approval rating of a president; an NBC/WSJ poll found him with a 50% approval rating around Inauguration Day.  Meanwhile, that Yahoo News story reported that the Pew Research Center rates Barack Obama’s approval rating at 79%.

For those keeping score, that means Democrats average an inaugural approval rating of 68.571%.  Republicans do well, but manage only a 61.1% average approval rating.  Furthermore, since 1981, only one GOP president (Reagan in 1985) has had approval ratings in sixties around the first days of the administration.  Whether it is the media, Democratic Party promises, or bad public relations, Democrats have the advantage in the early days of their administration.  In my next column, I’ll look at who has the longer “honeymoon period.”