“How long ago is it — eighty odd years — since on the Fourth of July for the first time in the history of the world a nation by its representatives, assembled and declared as a self-evident truth that “all men are created equal.” That was the birthday of the United States of America.” – Abraham Lincoln

It’s the Fourth of July, but this year I can understand why many might shudder at the above quote. Despite its founding ideals, Americans as a nation have often committed actions based on bigotry, oppression, and self-serving. Even Lincoln gave the above quote to comment on a defeat of those Americans in Gettysburg he identified as standing against the idea that “all men were created equal.” That we are still debating if their ideological traitors are still worthy of celebration shows the deep disconnect between our national way of thinking and our ideals.

At the heart of every American beats the contradiction at the nation’s core: that a nation built on slavery and conquest chose ideals of liberty and equality as its mantra. This undercurrent can corrupt any attempt at justice or retrospection, no matter how well-intentioned. Yet progress has been made and more than a few American politicians, including some Presidents of the United States, have been a part of those decisions.

For two weeks, we’ve debated, researched, and compared these 44 men. Whatever can be said about them has been said. And now, based on your votes, we can present our final four champions.

But first….

…congrats to our ambiguously Presidential match winner…..

EDITH WILSON!

Now on to the final four…

FOURTH PLACE

A man who impeached Andrew Johnson…left William Howard Taft stuck in a bath tub….and burned James Madison’s house down…

…the greatest of our 18th Century Presidents….the Father of His Country…..

GEORGE WASHINGTON

THIRD PLACE

A man who defeated James Garfield in both Greek and Latin….made Ulysses S. Grant unconditionally surrender…made Jimmy Carter more scared of him than a water rabbit….and defeated George Washington on two non-consecutive occasions…

…the best President of the 21st Century….a ray of light in a sea of awful…

BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA, JR.

SECOND PLACE

James Buchanan was happy to leave this competition when he entered the house…drove Rutherford B. Hayes down to Paraguay….left John Adams sinking more than swimming….showed Theodore Roosevelt he was more a Delano than a Roosevelt….and spilled mustard all over Barack Obama’s suit….

…the towering President of the 20th Century…after all, this sphinx served for 12 years of it…

FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT

FIRST PLACE

He rolled Donald Trump down a ramp…made Martin Van Buren panic like it’s 1837….forced Thomas Jefferson to edit his Bible into one where he did not lose twice in this competition….led Lyndon B. Johnson to not seek another round as the nominee of his party….beat George Washington harder than Germantown…and made Franklin Delano Roosevelt greatly depressed….

…The Great Emancipator…the Railsplitter…Honest Abe…a man who clarified the purpose of a government of the people, by the people, and for the people….

….the Avocado’s Favorite President of the 19th or any other century….

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

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“Lincoln replied that he was more than willing to die, but that he had “done nothing to make any human being remember that he had lived, and that to connect his name with the events transpiring in his day and generation and so impress himself upon them as to link his name with something that would redound to the interest of his fellow man was what he desired to live for.” – Doris Kearns Goodwin

Congrats to our top four! Now, here’s where it gets really interesting.

Below is our current ranking of every single person who’s been President. Ties were determined by points, seeding, and, in the case of the first round only, down votes. So take a look and see what our 2020 site consensus was. Here’s the original 2018 Siena College ranking for comparison.

The Avocado’s 2020 Ranking of The Presidents Of The United States Of America

1. Abraham Lincoln
2. Franklin Delano Roosevelt
3. Barack Hussein Obama, Jr.
4. George Washington
5. Theodore Roosevelt
6. Lyndon Baines Johnson
7. Dwight David Eisenhower
8. Harry S Truman
9. James Earl Carter, Jr.
10. James Madison
11. Thomas Jefferson
12. John Adams
13. John Fitzgerald Kennedy
14. Ulysses S. Grant
15. Chester Alan Arthur
16. James Monroe
17. William Jefferson Clinton, Jr.
18. James Knox Polk
19. John Quincy Adams
20. William Howard Taft
21. Rutherford Birchard Hayes
22. Martin Van Buren
23. William McKinley, Jr.
24. Stephen Grover Cleveland
25. William Henry Harrison
26. Thomas Woodrow Wilson
27. George Herbert Walker Bush
28. Ronald Wilson Reagan
29. James Abram Garfield
30. Zachary Taylor
31. John Calvin Coolidge
32. John Tyler
33. Benjamin Harrison
34. George Walker Bush
35. Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr.
36. Franklin Pierce
37. Herbert Clark Hoover
38. Warren Gamaliel Harding
39. Andrew Jackson
40. Millard Fillmore
41. Richard Milhous Nixon
42. James Buchanan
43. Andrew Johnson
44. Donald John Trump

Well, that’s that! If you’re not taking the day to relax and be with your families, I’d love to hear your thoughts. Anyone you wish were higher? Lower? Burning in Hell? Drop your own rankings below. I’d love to see what you all think.

I again want to thank everyone for participating. Starting with the over 600 comments on the first match, this is one tournament I knew would start conversations and it did. We’ve all shown what makes the Avocado such a special place: we laughed a little, we learned a little, and we were lucky to have such a diverse range of opinions.

But what’s next? Well, I’m probably going to take a break for a bit. This was kind’ve a dry run for a Greatest Historical Figure tournament, which would be a bigger undertaking if perhaps less controversial in some respects. But I’m down for any historical, film, or comic book ideas!

Then again…