President (pronounced prez-i-duhnt
or preza-dint
(plus many regional
variations)
(1) The title of the highest executive officer of most
modern republics.
(2) An official appointed or elected to preside over an
organized body of persons.
(3) The chief executive (and sometimes operating) officer
of a college, university, society, corporation etc. Many corporate presidents function as
something like a “char(man) of the board” rather than a CEO or COO.
(4) A person who presides.
(5) An alternative form of “precedent” (long obsolete).
1325–1375: From the Middle English, from the Old French president, from Late Latin praesidēns (presiding over; president of; leader) (accusative praesidentem) from the Classical Latin praesident (stem of praesidēns), the noun use of the present participle of praesidēre (to preside over, sit in
front of). The Latin word was the
substantivized present active participle of the verb praesideō (preside over) while the construct of the verb was prae (before) + sedeō (sit). The verb’s original
sense was “to sit before” (ie presiding at a meeting) from which was derived
the generalized secondary meaning “to command, to govern”, praesidēns thus meaning variously “the one who presides at a meeting”,
“governor or a region”, “commander of a force” etc. In English the construct is thus understood
as preside + -ent. Preside was from the
Old French presider, from Latin praesidēre, the construct being pre- (before) + sedere (to sit). It
displaced the Old English foresittan
which may have been a calque of the Latin.
The –ent suffix was from the Middle English –ent (which existed, inter alia, also as –ant & -aunt. It was from the Old French -ent and its source, the Latin -ēns (the accusative singular was -entem), suffix of present participles of
verbs in the 2nd, 3rd and 4th conjugations.
The word is used with an
upper case if applied honorifically (President of Italy; President Nixon etc)
but not otherwise but this is of the more widely ignored rules in English. Modifiers (minister-president, municipal
president, president-elect etc) are created as required. The spelling præsident is archaic. President
& presidency are nouns, verb & adjective, presidentship
& presidenthood are nouns, presidenting
& presidented are verbs, presidential is an adjective and presiˈdentially is an adverb; the noun plural is
presidents. The feminine form
presidentess dates from at least 1763 and is probably obsolete unless used in
humor but that may risk one’s cancellation.
In the US, “president” was used in the original documents of the constitution (1787), picking up the earlier colonial use as “officer in charge of the Continental Congress” and it had also been used in several of the colonies and that in the sense of “chosen head of a meeting or group of persons”. During and immediately after the Revolution, the tile was adopted by the chief magistrates of several states but before long all instead settled on “governor”, emulating the colonial designation. In the US, the most common slang shortening of president is “pres”, dating from 1892 although dictionaries note the earlier existence of “prex” which was student slang for the president of a university or college. First recorded in 1828, as a Latin verb, it meant “a request, entreaty”. The handy initialization POTUS (President of the United States) dates from 1879 when it was created as part of the “Phillips Code” a system devised by US journalist, telegrapher & inventor Walter Polk Phillips (1846–1920) to speed up the transmission of messages across wire services and reduce their cost (the services charging per letter). Among those in the code was SCOTUS (Supreme Court of the United States) and later (long after the original rationale had been overtaken by technology) journalists and others started using VPOTUS (Vice-President of the United States), FLOTUS (First Lady of the United States) and NPOTUS (next President of the United States) the latter once applied to both Al Gore (b 1948; VPOTUS 1993-2001 and in 2000 the NPOTUS)) and crooked Hillary Clinton (b 1947; US secretary of state 2009-2013 and in 2016 the NPOTUS). Word nerds, pondering nomination of the latest NPOTUS (Kamala Harris (b 1964; VPOTUS since 2021) as the likely Democrat nominee are wondering what will emerge to describe her husband should she become CMOTUS (Chief Magistrate of the United States), the options presumably FGOTUS (First Gentlemen of the United States) or FHOTUS (First Husband of the United States). Presumably FMOTUS (First Man of the United States) won’t be used.
While Lindsay Lohan (b 1986) as POTUS is desirable (and debatably inevitable), a tilt for the nomination in 2020 would have been premature because Article II, Section 1 of the US Constitution requires one be at least 35 years old to to serve in the office. She became eligible on 2 July 2021 so it seems only a matter of time. Of course she would need a running mate and the mechanism for that differs depending on whether she gains the Republican or Democratic nomination or runs as a third-party independent. For the Republicans the choice is relatively simple in that it's a matter just of working out who will attract (1) the highest campaign contributions and (2) the most votes in the places they're needed (ie in the "swing states"; increasing existing surpluses in "safe states" is of only marginal interest). For historic reasons, there's nothing to prevent the Republicans nominating two white, Christian, heterosexual men and even if they deviate they choose the next best thing (Sarah Palin (b 1964; Republican nominee for VPOTUS 2008)). The political stew makes things more challenging for the democrats because if someone white gains their POTUS nomination, the running mate needs to tick as many as possible boxes on the "desirable but not essential" list (person of color; female; lesbian; disabled; trans-something, non-binary sexuality). That obviously can be a challenge but politics is the art of the possible. Were Lindsay Lohan to run as a third-party candidate or an independent (between
the two there is a legal distinction but it’s really of significance only in
the state-based mechanisms which govern how a candidate gets to appear on the
ballots; once there the electoral system treats them in the same way) the selection process would likely be more idiosyncratic but there would still be an interest in some way "balancing the ticket", a term with a definition which bounces around depending on the circumstances which dictate just what needs to be "balanced" (sex ("gender" now preferred), geography, ethnicity etc).
In the US during the nineteenth century there was a joke about two brothers: "One ran off to sea and the other became vice-president; neither were ever heard of again." That was of course an exaggeration but it reflected the general view of the office which has very few formal duties and can only ever be as powerful or influential as a president allows although the incumbent is "a heartbeat from the presidency". John Nance Garner III (1868–1967, vice president of the US 1933-1941), a reasonable judge of these things, once told Lyndon Johnson (LBJ, 1908–1973; US president 1963-1969) being VPOTUS was "not worth a bucket of warm piss" (which is polite company usually is sanitized as "warm spit"). For US vice-presidents, the slang veep (based on the
phonetic V-P (pronounced vee-pee) is
more commonly used. Veep dates from 1949
and may have been influenced by the Jeep, the four wheel drive (4WD) light
utility vehicle which had become famous for its service in World War II
(1939-1945) with a number of allied militaries (the name said to be derived
from an early army prefix GP (general purpose light vehicle)). It was introduced to US English by Alben
Barkley (1877-1956; VPOTUS 1949-1953), reputedly because his young grandchildren
found “vice-president” difficult to pronounce.
In the press, the form became more popular when the 71-year-old VPOTUS
took a wife more than thirty years younger; journalists decided she should be
the veepess (pronounced vee-pee-ess).
Time
magazine entered into the spirit of things, declaring the president should be Peep, the Secretary of State Steep, and the Secretary of Labor Sleep.
In the US, a number of VPOTUSs have become POTUS and some have worked
out well although of late the record has not been encouraging, the presidencies
of Lyndon Johnson (LBJ, 1908–1973; VPOTUS 1961-1963, POTUS 1963-1968), Richard
Nixon (1913-1994; VPOTUS 1953-1961, POTUS 1969-1974), George HW Bush (George XLI, 1924-2018; VPOTUS 1981-1989, POTUS 1989-1993) and Joe Biden (b 1942;
VPOTUS 2008-2017, POTUS 2021-2025 (God willing)) all ending badly, respectively in despair, disgrace, defeat and decrepitude .
In the literature of political science, it’s not uncommon to see
comparisons between “presidential system” and “parliamentary system” and while
that verbal shorthand is well understood within the profession, it’s more
accurate to speak of “presidential systems” because the constitutional
arrangements vary so much. Essentially,
there are (1) “ceremonial presidencies” in which a president serves as head of
state and may nominally be the head of the military but all executive functions
are handled by a chancellor, premier or prime-minister (or equivalent office)
and (2) “executive presidencies” where the roles of head of state & head of
government are combined. However, those
structural models are theoretical and around the world there are many nuances,
both on paper and in practice. While
there are many similarities and overlaps in presidential systems, probably
relatively few are identical in the constitutional sense. Sometimes too, the constitutional arrangements
are less important than the practice. In
the old Soviet Union, the office of president was sometimes filled by a
relatively minor figure, despite it being, on paper, a position of great
authority, something replicated in the Islamic Republic of Iran where ultimate
authority sits in the hand of the Supreme Leader (both of whom have been
ayatollahs). Many systems include
something of a hybrid aspect. In France,
the president appoints a prime-minister and ministers who may come from the
National Assembly (the legislature) but, upon appointment, they leave the
chamber. A US president appoints their
cabinet from anywhere eligible candidates can be found but creates no
prime-minister. In the “ceremonial
presidencies” there is also a spectrum of authority and the extent of that can
be influenced more by the personality and ambition of a president than the
defined powers. One president of Ireland
described the significance of the office as one of “moral authority” rather than
legal power.
Presidents like being
president.
Mr Putin was prime minister from 1999 to 2000, president from 2000 to 2008, and again prime minister from 2008 to 2012 before returning to the presidency. The unusual career trajectory was a consequence of the Russian constitution forbidding the one person from serving as president for more than two consecutive terms. Russia has an executive presidency, Mr Putin liked the job and his solution to (effectively) keeping it was to have Dmitry Anatolyevich Medvedev (b 1965; president of Russia 2008-2012 & prime minister of Russia 2012-2020) “warm the chair” while Mr Putin re-assumed the premiership. Generously, one could style this arrangement a duumvirate but political scientists could, whatever the constitutional niceties, discern no apparent difference in the governance of Russia regardless of the plaque on Mr Putin’s door. Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021 and since 2025) may have studied Mr Putin's tactics in presidential prolongment and wondered how they might be adapted to him obtaining a third (or fourth!) term, something which an amendment to the the US Constitution seems to render impossible but there are imaginative MAGA (Make America Great Again) operatives who claim there's a loophole which they're confident at least five judges on the USSC (US Supreme Court) would find constitutional.
Mr Erdoğan has been president since 2014 having previously served as prime minister between 2003–2014. As prime-minister under Turkey’s constitution with a non-executive president, he was head of government. After becoming president, he expressed his disapproval for the system and his preference for Turkey’s adoption of an executive presidency. On 15 July 2016, a coup d'état was staged by the military and, as coups d'état go (of which Türkiye has had a few), it was a placid and unambitious affair and the suspicion was expressed it was an event staged by the government itself although there’s little evidence to support this. Mr Erdoğan blamed an exiled cleric, his former ally Fethullah Gülen (b 1941), for the coup attempt and promptly declared a state of emergency. It was scheduled to last three months but the parliament extended its duration to cover a purge of critical journalists, political opponents, various malcontents and those in the military not overtly supportive of Türkiye. In April 2017 Mr Erdoğan staged a national referendum (which the people duly approved), transforming the Republic of Türkiye into an executive presidency, the changes becoming effective after the presidential and parliamentary elections of June 2018.
Of course, if one has effectively “captured” the state, one can just decide to become president. When in 1934 Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) was informed Generalfeldmarschall Paul von Hindenburg (1847–1934; Reichspräsident (1925-1934) of the German Weimar Republic 1918-1933) was dying, unilaterally he had replaced the constitutional procedures covering such an eventuality, the “Law Concerning the Head of State of the German Reich” (issued as a cabinet decree) stipulating that upon the president’s death the office of Reichspräsident would be abolished and its powers merged with those of the chancellor under the title of Führer und Reichskanzler (Leader and Chancellor of the Reich). Thus, the leadership of the party, government and state (and thus the military) were merged and placed exclusively in Hitler’s hands, a situation which prevailed until his death when the office of Reichspräsident was re-created (by a legal device no more complex than a brief document Hitler called his “political testament”) as an entity separate from the chancellorship (in a manner typical of the way things were done in the Third Reich, although in 1934 there ceased to be a Reichspräsident, maintained as administrative structures were (1) the Chancellery, (2) the Presidential Chancellery and (3) what became ultimately the Party Chancellery). As a footnote, although in 1945 Hitler appointed as his replacement a separate president and chancellor, he made no mention of the "Führer" title but years later, Albert Speer (1905–1981; Nazi court architect 1934-1942; Nazi minister of armaments and war production 1942-1945) claimed Hitler had told him he expected his successors to continue to use the style.
Mercedes-Benz 600 Landaulets a 1966 short roof (left) and 1970 long roof ("presidential", right),
Between 1963-1981, Mercedes-Benz built 2190 600s (W100), 428 of which were the long wheelbase (LWB) Pullman versions, 59 were configured as Landaulets with a folding roof over the passenger compartment. Built in both six and four-door versions, the Landaulets were available with either a short or long fabric roof, the latter known informally as the "presidential" although the factory never used the designation. Twelve of the presidentials were built, a brace were bought by Kim Il-Sung (Kim I, 1912–1994; Great Leader of DPRK (North Korea) 1948-1994) and subsequently inherited (along with the rest of North Korea) by Kim Jong-Il (Kim II, 1941-2011; Dear Leader of DPRK (North Korea) 1994-2011) and Kim Jong-Un (Kim III, b 1982; Supreme Leader of DPRK (North Korea) since 2011).
The 1970 Landaulet pictured was purchased by the Romanian government and used by comrade president Nicolae Ceaușescu (1918–1989; general secretary of the Romanian Communist Party 1965-1989) until he and his wife were executed (by AK47) after a “people's tribunal” held a brief trial, the swiftness of which was aided by the court-appointed defense counsel who declared them both guilty of the genocide of which, among other crimes, they were charged. Considering the fate of other fallen dictators, their end was less gruesome than might have been expected. Comrade Josip Broz Tito (1892–1980; prime-minister or president of Yugoslavia 1944-1980) had a similar car (among other 600s) but he died undisturbed in his bed. The blue SWB (short wheelbase) car to the rear is one of the few SWB models fitted with a divider between the front & rear compartments including hand-crafted timber writing tables and a refrigerated bar in the centre console. It was delivered in 1977 to the Iranian diplomatic service and maintained for Mohammed Reza Pahlavi (1919–1980; the last Shah of Iran 1941-1979).
The term Watergate has
come to encompass an array of clandestine and often illegal activities
undertaken by members of the Nixon administration but the name is derived from
a break-in into Democratic National Committee’s (DNC) offices at the Watergate
complex in Washington, DC on 17 June 1972.
A series of revelations made it clear the White House was involved in
attempts cover up Nixon’s knowledge of this and other illegal activities. He continued to insist he had no prior
knowledge of the burglary, did not break any laws, and did not learn of the
cover-up until early 1973. Also revealed
was the existence of previously secret audio tapes, recorded in the White House
by Nixon himself. The legal battle over
the tapes continued through early 1974, and in April Nixon announced the
release of 1,200 pages of transcripts of White House conversations between him
and his aides. The House Judiciary Committee opened impeachment hearings and
these culminated in votes for impeachment.
By July, the US Supreme Court had ruled unanimously that the full tapes,
not just selected transcripts, must be released. One of the tapes, recorded soon after the
break-in, demonstrated that Nixon had been told of the White House connection
to the Watergate burglaries soon after they took place, and had approved plans
to thwart the investigation. It became
known as the "Smoking Gun Tape". With the loss of political support and the
near-certainty that he would be impeached and removed, was “tapped on the
shoulder” by a group of Republicans from both houses of Congress, lead by crazy
old Barry Goldwater (1909–1998). Nixon
resigned the presidency on 8 August 1974.
One thing even his most committed
enemies (and there were many) conceded of Nixon was his extraordinary tenacity
and Nixon fought hard to remain president and the most dramatically
Shakespearian act came in what came to be called the Saturday Night Massacre, the term coined to describe the events of
20 October 1973 when Nixon ordered the sacking of independent special
prosecutor Archibald Cox (1912-2004), then investigating the Watergate
scandal. In addition to Cox, that
evening saw also the departure of Attorney General Elliot Richardson (1920-1999)
and Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus (1932-2019). Richardson had appointed Cox in May,
fulfilling an undertaking to the House Judiciary Committee that a special
prosecutor would investigate the events surrounding the break-in of the DNC’s offices
at the Watergate Hotel. The appointment
was made under the ex-officio authority of the attorney general who could
remove the special prosecutor only for extraordinary and reprehensible
conduct. Cox soon issued a demand that
Nixon hand over copies of taped conversations recorded in the Oval Office; the
president refused to comply and by Friday, a stalemate existed between White
House and Department of Justice and all Washington assumed there would be a
break in the legal maneuvering while the town closed-down for the weekend.
However, on
Saturday, Nixon ordered Richardson to fire Cox.
Richardson refused and resigned in protest. Nixon then ordered Deputy
Attorney General William Ruckelshaus to fire Cox. Ruckelshaus also refused and resigned. Nixon then ordered Solicitor General Robert
Bork (1927-2012), as acting head of the Justice Department, to fire Cox; while
both Richardson and Ruckelshaus had given personal assurances to congressional
committees they would not interfere, Bork had not. Brought to the White House in a black
Cadillac limousine and sworn in as acting attorney-general, Bork wrote the
letter firing Cox; thus ended the Saturday Night Massacre. Perhaps the most memorable coda to the affair
was Richardson’s memorable post-resignation address to staff at the Department
of Justice, delivered the Monday morning following the “massacre”. Richardson had often been spoken of as a
potential Republican nominee for the presidency and some nineteen years later,
he would tell the Washington Post: “If I had any
demagogic impulse... there was a crowd... but I deliberately throttled back.”
His former employees responded with “an
enthusiastic and sustained ovation.”
Within a week of the Saturday Night Massacre, resolutions of impeachment
against the president were introduced in Congress although the House Judiciary
Committee did not approve its first article of impeachment until 27 July the
following year when it charged Nixon with obstruction of justice. Mr Nixon resigned less than two weeks later,
on 8 August 1974, leaving the White House the next day.
Nixon’s predecessor also liked being president and few have assumed the office in circumstances more politically propitious, even if it was something made possible by the assassination of John Kennedy (JFK, 1917–1963; US president 1961-1963). Johnson had for over two decades worked to achieve control of the Senate and at the peak of the success of the Johnson-Rayburn congressional era the Democrats held majorities of 64-36 in the Senate and 263-174 in the House of Representatives. In the 1964 presidential election (facing Barry Goldwater), Johnson won a crushing victory, securing over 60% of the popular vote and taking every state except Goldwater’s home state of Arizona and a handful south of the Mason-Dixon Line. Relatively uninterested in foreign policy, Johnson had a domestic agenda more ambitious than anything seen since the US Civil War (1861-1865) a century before and what he achieved was far-reaching and widely appreciated for its implications only decades after his death but it was the US involvement in the war in Vietnam which consumed his presidency, compelling him dramatically to announce in April 1968 “…I shall not seek, and I will not accept, the nomination of my party for another term as your president.” As a message, it was strikingly similar to that in July 2024 delivered by Joe Biden (b 1942; US president 2021-2025), something nobody seemed to think a mere coincidence. Also compelling are similarities between the two, both spending a political lifetime plotting and scheming to become president, having no success until curious circumstances delivered them the prize with which genuinely they achieved much but were forced to watch their dream of re-election slip from their grasp.
Donald Trump of course liked being president and the events of 6 January (the so-called "capitol riot") are regarded by many (though clearly not a majority of US Supreme Court judges) as an attempted (if amateurish) insurrection, something Mr Trump denies encouraging. To the south, in Venezuela, Mr Maduro also really likes being president and is from the comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953) school of democracy. Although the statement often attributed to comrade Stalin: “It's not who votes that counts, it's who counts the votes” probably was apocryphal, it encapsulated his psephological model and was an inspiration for figures such as Saddam Hussein (1937–2006; president of Iraq 1979-2003) and Kim Jong-Un. Accordingly, in July 2024 there was some scepticism when the National Electoral Council (the NEC, controlled by Mr Maduro’s political party) announced the president had won the 2024 presidential election with 51.2% of the vote, despite the country being in a sustained economic crisis during which it had suffered a rate of hyper-inflation at its peak so high the economists stopped calculation once it hit a million percent and seen more emigration than any country in South or Central America not actually in a state of declared war.
For a country which possesses the world’s largest known reserves of crude oil, the economic collapse has been a remarkable achievement. Although Venezuela's crude oil is "heavy-sour" rather than the "light-sweet" most refiners are set-up to handle, the US has a number of refineries on the coast of the Gulf of Mexico (known also as the Gulf of America) dedicated to refining heavy-sour into the diesel and other "heavy" fuels the stuff suits. Mr Maduro came to office after the death of Hugo Chávez, a genuinely charismatic figure who took advantage of a sustained high oil price to fund social programmes which benefited the poor (of which his country had a scandalous number) who, unsurprisingly voted for him; Mr Chávez won his elections fair and square. The decrease in oil revenue triggered a chain of events which meant Mr Maduro hasn’t enjoyed the same advantages and some claim his victories in the 2013 & 2018 elections were anything but fair & square although the numbers were so murky it was hard to be definitive. Details of the 2024 results however are not so much murky as missing and although the NEC provided aggregate numbers (in summary form), only some 30% of the “tally sheets” (with the booth voting details) were published. Interestingly, the (admittedly historically unreliable) public opinion polls suggested Mr Maduro might secure 30-35% of the vote and the conspiracy theorists (on this occasion probably on sound ground) are suggesting the tally sheets made public might have been selected with “some care”.
In the way these things are done, the regime is sustained by being able to count on the reliability of the security forces and the conventional wisdom in political science is this can be maintained as long as (1) the members continued to be paid and (2) the percentage of the population prepared to take to the streets in violent revolt doesn’t reach and remain at a sustained critical mass (between 3-9% depending on the mechanics of the country). So the streets are being watched with great interest but already Mr Maduro has received congratulations from the leaders of Iran, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (the DPRK; North Korea), Bolivia, Cuba, Honduras, and Nicaragua and Russia so there’s that. Mr Maduro runs the country on a basis not dissimilar to being the coordinator of a number of "crime families" and on 2 August the US State Department announced they were recognizing the leader of the opposition as the "legitimate winner" of the election and thus president of the Bolivarian Republic; gestures like this have previously been extended but the regime's grip on power was strong enough to resist. The opposition numbers are now greater and generous will be the resources devoted to ensuring a critical mass of protesters isn't achieved and Caracas doesn't see its own "capital riot". For as long as the security forces remain willing and able to retain control of the streets and ensure the population isn't deprived of food for three days (another trigger point for revolution established by political scientists), Mr Maduro should be able to keep the job he so obviously enjoys.
Mr Maduro’s longer term future remains clouded but, based on similar historic examples, he’ll cling to office until deposed or murdered (either by this opponents or his “friends”). Running a country on the same basis used by the head of a crime family to administer their enterprise has in some cases been maintained for decades but each example must be assessed on its own dynamics and although he has a solid security infrastructure to maintain repression (staffed in its upper echelons by “technical advisors” provided by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) and the Kremlin with many of its “ground level” operatives (ie thugs) from Cuba), the global oil-glut has depressed prices and Mr Maduro is now increasingly reliant on “taking a percentage” of the revenue gained from the narcotics trade into the US. He’s in a difficult position in that he had little popular support and thus for some time has survived only as a sort of “front” while real power is held by an alliance between the military and the various trans-national criminal operations, the profits divided in the way these things are done. It means his country is being looted, assets stolen and revenue "siphoned-off", a business model which ultimately is doomed. Frankly, his future prospects are not good and if he can “cut a deal” and secure an offer of safe & agreeable exile, he should take as many millions as he can grab and run.
1955 Studebaker President Speedster. The West of the 1950s sometimes is described as a period of "dull conformity" and while in some aspects there's truth in that, as well as the occasionally bizarre styling motifs, there was a sense of exuberance in the two (and sometimes three) tone color schemes the US industry offered during those years.
Studebaker used the President name (they also offered a "Dictator" until events in 1930s Europe made that a harder sell) for their most expensive models, the first three generations a range of sedans, coupes and roadsters produced between 1926-1942. The name was revived in 1955 and used until 1958, the range this time encompassing two and four-door sedans & station wagons and two-door coupes and hardtops. The last of the Packards (the much derided, so-called "Packardbakers" which had a brief, unsuccessful run between 1957-1958) was based on the Studebaker President Speedster, the most admired of the range.
