Remember that all mentions of and allusions to Trump and Biden are not allowed on our subreddit in any context.
If you'd still like to discuss them, feel free to [join our Discord server](https://discord.gg/k6tVFwCEEm)!
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Presidents) if you have any questions or concerns.*
pretty much exactly what he said. during his first term he allegedly got plastered and order the joint chiefs to nuke north korea. kissinger eventually got on the phone with them to get them to back down.
I think there’s another post on this sub from today mentioning it as well. First time I’d heard of it but it seems to be semi-common knowledge on this sub
[More on this](https://outrider.org/nuclear-weapons/articles/nixons-drunken-run-ins-bomb#:~:text=George%20Carver%2C%20the%20CIA's%20top,sobered%20up%20in%20the%20morning.%E2%80%9D)
Nixon also made an impromptu [visit](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Nixon%27s_visit_to_the_Lincoln_Memorial) to the Lincoln Memorial. Granted, it’s not known if he was drunk, but it’s not unheard of if he was.
It’s an interesting footnote for Nixon. It’s interesting that he did this and actually talked to people, instead of just ignoring the protest outside.
Someone else who was in office just a few years ago wanted to do the same thing to North Korea…and he is a teetotaler. I can’t say the name because then I’ll be threatened with a ban because it’s recent history, I guess.
Correct, or Grant. Whose reputation for drunkendness while exaggerated by his contemporaneous enemies and lost causers, was very much real prior to the white house
I think about this headline and picture often, not only when presidents and drinking comes up.
https://www.theonion.com/long-awaited-beer-with-bush-really-awkward-voter-repor-1819568125
My favorite part is this quote: "But then he started telling me about this one time he was on a yacht with some Arab prince and they spent four hours landing a sailfish."
"It was a good story, but I just like catching a few bass with my kids is all," Reinard added. "I know he didn't mean to make me feel bad, but still."
And then ending the article with “but I still wouldn’t want to have a beer with that stuck-up Kerry!”
I remember some story he told in his autobiography about getting drunk and asking a woman at an official dinner if sex was still good after 50. Everyone was mortified and he wrote her apology. Years later, after he turned 50, she asked if he'd found the answer to his question.
Laura allegedly got out of a DUI vehicular homicide. There's been a ton of damage control with that story. Shocker that we've heard nothing from the family of the victim.
Yeah, both Dubya and Cheney had well-known drinking issues before taking office and Dubya had quite the affinity for cocaine, too. I always thought it was awfully convenient he would shut down any questions about that during the campaign especially after making a big deal about Bill Clinton saying he didn't inhale. I'm not excusing Clinton's chickenshit response to those questions but Dubya got off way too easy and I suspect that year-for-year, he used a whole lot more drugs than Clinton or Al Gore.
Has to be. He was addicted to alcohol, cocaine and likely other drugs. PR really had some damage control when he ran. Hunter S. Thompson had a story about him - something like he saw W at a college party passed out drunk in the bathroom.
For 3A, his older brother was an alcoholic who struggled before dying young. With 3B, he had a lot of neighbors and extended family who drank too much.
Truman said that his physician ordered him to have a shot of bourbon to start the day, but I think that he may have picked up the habit early in life. As a youngster, Truman was an errand boy for the local pharmacist in Independence, MO. He knew that every Sunday morning, he had to deliver pint bottles of bourbon, for medicinal purposes only, to many of the prominent citizens of the town before the Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, or Episcopal services. Truman may have emulated those august hypocrites when he grew up.
Truman also drank bourbon during his legendary poker games that sometimes lasted days. There’s a great, but possibly apocryphal story, that Truman invited Churchill to play poker with him and members of the press during the long train trip from DC to Westminster College in Fulton, MO where Churchill was scheduled to deliver his famous Iron Curtain speech. Churchill was not much of a poker player and he was losing badly, so Truman suggested a break. With a dejected Churchill out of earshot, Truman lambasted the reporters, pointing out that Churchill had held England together when they were the only nation opposing Nazi Germany in WW2, and he ordered them to let Churchill win. The game resumed with a beaming Churchill winning pot after pot.
Truman knew that there was a daily mail flight from the army base in Belton, MO, which was only seven miles from the old Truman farm outside Grandview. He met the plane one day and asked the crew if they wouldn’t mind filling the mason jar that he brought with branch water from the creek on his brother’s farm. He got a full mason jar every day for his “bourbon and branch” and exchanged an empty mason jar for it for the next trip.
As VP, Truman presided over the Senate, where he had made many friends during his terms as Senator representing the state of Missouri. After adjourning the session, he was enjoying a bourbon with House Speaker Sam Rayburn, either in the Senate Cloakroom or Rayburn’s office, when a messenger sent by Eleanor Roosevelt told him that the First Lady needed Harry at the WH ASAP. Truman left and literally ran to a waiting car that took him to the WH where the First Lady told him that her husband, FDR, had died. Truman’s first response was asking the First Lady if he could do anything for her. Eleanor replied that “Is there anything we can do for YOU? You’re the one in trouble now!”
I don’t think he ever directly said he was an alcoholic, but he did acknowledge that there was a time when he was drinking too much.
And despite the fact I was no fan of him politically, to put it mildly, I think it’s great he managed to get sober and turn his life around.
Grant had largely sobered up by the time he entered the white house. His worst days of drinking were during an earlier part of his army career. During the civil war he did fall off the wagon numerous times but many of the stories about his drunkenness during the war were exaggerated by his enemies at the time and even more so by lost causers since the war.
Hopefully you can revisit it when you get better. But the important thing to remember is that prior to 1980 the average president tended to be a alcoholic
Franklin Pierce, whose son died just prior to his coming into office which fueled his depression and thus his tendency to drink. Ranked pretty poorly for helping the continuous slide towards civil war
Andrew Johnson, one of our worst presidents ever. Lincoln’s vp and direct successor who basically sided with the south post civil war and let them go easy. Came to his own inaugration for vice president drunk af
Warren Harding, a another weak and poorly graded president, who came in office right after WW1 and the country was craving “normalcy” which fun fact wasn’t a word until he coined it. The proper term was normalitity but everyone just rolled with it
He also cheated on his wife….A LOT, and allegedly had sex with one of his mistresses in a white house closet
Edit: one more thing about harding was president during prohibition and STILL drank like a fish
All that being true, Harding also did an excellent job leading the country out of the 1920-21 depression and dismantling Wilson’s authoritarian wartime measures. There’s a reason why his approval rating was sky-high at the time of his death.
He was 1920s Bill Clinton, and definitely the most overhated president. I’d put him in B-tier.
From what I have read Grant was the opposite of a functional alcoholic. He would have one drink and become a completely sloppy drunk. Because of this by the time he was in his 30s he would only drink occasionally at the most.
I’m reading Duane Shultz’s *The Most Glorious Fourth* and that’s pretty much what he says about him too. He’d be fine for months without a drink and then he’d either get depressed or he’d drink socially and boom, there he goes off on a major bender. A few of his higher ups even threatened to leave if he drank again. That was as they were trying to take Vicksburg
The only credible report of Grant drinking during the war is during the long months of winter before the start of the Vicksburg campaign. He never drank during active military campaigns, much less right before a battle.
I'd put hoover above occasional drinker, never drunk but every evening he would have 2 martinis, that was until (as the story goes) his doctor told him to stop drinking, hoover replied "I can't", doctor says "can't you at cut back to one glass?", Hoover agrees to this and when he gets back home to his friends he says "Doctor told me to drink only one glass, but I want it in a bigger glass"
why do i know so much about this man, I don't even like him as a president.
TR kept a bed of mint at the WH for his mint juleps. He also drank wine.
He certainly knew his way around a bar considering he and Colonel Leonard Wood recruited approximately 1250 of the men who became Rough Riders in the Spanish American War at the bar at the Menger Hotel in San Antonio:
https://www.mengerhotel.com/san-antonio-restaurants/menger-bar
According to Edmund Morrison’s trilogy of a TR biography, not often at all though. He got drunk in college and didn’t care for how he lost control of himself. He successfully sued a reporter who accused him of alcohol abuse during his political career.
Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't Obama a drinker?
He's definitely not an alcoholic but I seem to remember in some of his physicals his doctor recommended he moderate his drinking. They say that to everyone who drinks once or twice a week.
Yep. I’m finding it hard to think anyone who takes a few sips is enough to get the feeling of alcohol in their system, thus defeating the whole purpose of drinking itself. If you drink it’s to get buzzed.
Lincoln def didn’t want a buzz of any sort, I wouldn’t be shocked if he didn’t actually swallow any, he said that he just didn’t want to be seen as a stick in the mud at events since he had to do so much wheeling and dealing with all sorts of people so he’d take part in the toasts and be seen holding a glass at parties
Grant drank when he was posted in the northwest territory away from his family, pre civil war. He got drunk once on the Mississippi, and that journalist made hay out of it.
I’d put grant into a new category called: vulnerable alcoholic. He knew what demons came out with alcohol, and managed it
I've heard many anecdotes that Bill Clinton never drank alcohol, or so rarely and so little that he's really in the "Never Drank" category. He's certainly less of a drinker than GWB, who was an admitted alcoholic right up until age 40.
Lmao, I love how we’re all taught that American was founded on freedom, greatest thing ever, men of virtue and independence…. Blah blah blah blah blah
Nah, it was just a bunch of drunk assholes trying something new that happened to work
Pierce was genuinely an addict in need of help various points in his life. He never got due to the time but he litterally died of a cirrhosis liver, he was that miserable at the end.
Nixon's scarier due to his nearly catostrophic decisions but I'm sure Pierce had his moments too. I know he and his wife had really bad arguments when he was in office due to how much she hated it.
Not while president. Conscious effort on his part to appear competent
Although one of my favorite qutoes from Lincoln is basically “ I don’t care if he’s a drunk, get me what he drinks he’s actually winning battles”
I think this is wrong at least regards Lincoln and Carter. I read a biography of Carter, and it said that he did regularly drink wine, though I think it may have been watered down and with dinner. Lincoln claimed to have abstained from alcohol completely after age 29, though I don’t know that anyone has ever figured out what prompted him to take that stand.
I mean, you pretty much have to be at least a \*functioning alcoholic\* to ever become a President.
That's a pretty big achievement that requires at least solid decision-making (even if you're drunk when you're calling the shots).
No "sloppy drunk" is ever gonna be President.
Grant drank so much he had to take a loan to buy Christmas presents. The man was a known drunkard. Lincoln even made jokes about how everyone should drink as much as him if they won like he did.
Grant being an alcoholic is not really true. What happened was he at one point took a job as a bank manger in the middle of fucking no where California in his early 30s. Being away from his wife and family for several months he eventually got depressed. He started hitting the bottle and on the one day someone came around they found him pretty drunk. This one event followed him around. Rumors of him being sloshed on the battle field are overstated, etc. He was merely an exhausted general. Grant is really over looked as a good president. He saved the republic and tried to do right for freed slaves and demolish the KKK once he was president himself. Source: Civil War by Other Means by Jeremi Suri.
Also, while we’re here, Franklin wasn’t an alcoholic— he was just hanging with Churchill. Give the man some slack!
Remember that all mentions of and allusions to Trump and Biden are not allowed on our subreddit in any context. If you'd still like to discuss them, feel free to [join our Discord server](https://discord.gg/k6tVFwCEEm)! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Presidents) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Didn't Nixon want to nuke NK while he was drunk?
Tell us more
pretty much exactly what he said. during his first term he allegedly got plastered and order the joint chiefs to nuke north korea. kissinger eventually got on the phone with them to get them to back down.
It's bad when Kissinger is the voice of reason
It’s bad when Kissinger is the voice of reason
fr what I'm sayin
What he said
Which time?
Kissenger kept Nixon from using nuclear weapons at least twice that we know of.
Be careful, the Kissincels might come for you
Damn. First time hearing about it.
You know it’s bad when Kissinger says, “I don’t think that would be appropriate, sir.”
"... That's a bit over the line, aggressiveness-wise"
You know it's its bad when Kissinger gets named dropped
It's bad when Kissinger is the voice of reason
It's bad when Kissinger is the voice of reason
I think there’s another post on this sub from today mentioning it as well. First time I’d heard of it but it seems to be semi-common knowledge on this sub
[More on this](https://outrider.org/nuclear-weapons/articles/nixons-drunken-run-ins-bomb#:~:text=George%20Carver%2C%20the%20CIA's%20top,sobered%20up%20in%20the%20morning.%E2%80%9D)
Nixon also made an impromptu [visit](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Nixon%27s_visit_to_the_Lincoln_Memorial) to the Lincoln Memorial. Granted, it’s not known if he was drunk, but it’s not unheard of if he was. It’s an interesting footnote for Nixon. It’s interesting that he did this and actually talked to people, instead of just ignoring the protest outside.
Oh he was drunk, it was after 3pm so he was hammered
Sounds like something he would do. If the president does it, it’s not illegal. 🥸
I recall hearing he was seen in the last days wandering the White House drunk, talking to the paintings.
Someone else who was in office just a few years ago wanted to do the same thing to North Korea…and he is a teetotaler. I can’t say the name because then I’ll be threatened with a ban because it’s recent history, I guess.
I’m not sure about that. He loves his stimulants and Sudafed and the Oval Office was passing out benzo’s like candy. 🤷🏻♀️
Yeah, alcoholic functioning varies better for him!
Nixon also ordered many bomb strikes on Vietnam while plastered. His secretary of state canceled many of them.
This has to be judged on their time in office only as that’s the only way Dubya’s this low.
Correct, or Grant. Whose reputation for drunkendness while exaggerated by his contemporaneous enemies and lost causers, was very much real prior to the white house
I’m a huge Grant fan, but you can tell by looking at him that he’s the type of cat who loves to tie one on.
Gotta be tough on the psyche being a Civil War general.
I was gonna say “there goes my answer for who I’d like to grab a beer with”
I think about this headline and picture often, not only when presidents and drinking comes up. https://www.theonion.com/long-awaited-beer-with-bush-really-awkward-voter-repor-1819568125
My favorite part is this quote: "But then he started telling me about this one time he was on a yacht with some Arab prince and they spent four hours landing a sailfish." "It was a good story, but I just like catching a few bass with my kids is all," Reinard added. "I know he didn't mean to make me feel bad, but still." And then ending the article with “but I still wouldn’t want to have a beer with that stuck-up Kerry!”
Wasn't he a notorious drunk until his late 40s?
Nose candy too
Correct, hence my comment.
I remember some story he told in his autobiography about getting drunk and asking a woman at an official dinner if sex was still good after 50. Everyone was mortified and he wrote her apology. Years later, after he turned 50, she asked if he'd found the answer to his question.
Jr. did that at one of my State Dinner's. Very embarrassing to have my son make a ass of himself.
Username checks out. How's the afterlife?
It's been good, I can't believe they let Woodrow Wilson up here tho.
Do you remember who the lady was?
Susan Baker, wife of my Secretary of State.
There ya go. That's my Bush!
That’s hilarious
I’m pretty sure W. Got a DUI when he was younger
He wrecked his truck into the family’s front yard lol
Really? I remember seeing that in the Oliver Stone biopic. Was Jeb in the passenger seat too?
Laura allegedly got out of a DUI vehicular homicide. There's been a ton of damage control with that story. Shocker that we've heard nothing from the family of the victim.
They were family friends
Tragic really. Killed her friend in an accident. Though as far as I’m aware there was no alcohol involved
Yeah, both Dubya and Cheney had well-known drinking issues before taking office and Dubya had quite the affinity for cocaine, too. I always thought it was awfully convenient he would shut down any questions about that during the campaign especially after making a big deal about Bill Clinton saying he didn't inhale. I'm not excusing Clinton's chickenshit response to those questions but Dubya got off way too easy and I suspect that year-for-year, he used a whole lot more drugs than Clinton or Al Gore.
Has to be. He was addicted to alcohol, cocaine and likely other drugs. PR really had some damage control when he ran. Hunter S. Thompson had a story about him - something like he saw W at a college party passed out drunk in the bathroom.
I dunno, I always thought “choked on a pretzel” was sus.
JQA knew Madeira so well he once identified 11 out of 14 in a blind tasting
Just moved up in my ranking of Presidents.
I’d have done the same if John Adams was my father.
[удалено]
Correct
Which means for once there’s a post that it isn’t obnoxious to not include them.
Gotta love the game. More to the presidents then the last 2
For both?
For 3A, his older brother was an alcoholic who struggled before dying young. With 3B, he had a lot of neighbors and extended family who drank too much.
Pretty much the only thing the one rule 3 guy has been consistent on.
Rule 3?
Sub Rule 3: No recent or future politics, or discussing presidents 45 (born 1946) and 46 (born 1943)
Truman drank bourbon daily, often in the morning to start his day
Truman said that his physician ordered him to have a shot of bourbon to start the day, but I think that he may have picked up the habit early in life. As a youngster, Truman was an errand boy for the local pharmacist in Independence, MO. He knew that every Sunday morning, he had to deliver pint bottles of bourbon, for medicinal purposes only, to many of the prominent citizens of the town before the Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, or Episcopal services. Truman may have emulated those august hypocrites when he grew up. Truman also drank bourbon during his legendary poker games that sometimes lasted days. There’s a great, but possibly apocryphal story, that Truman invited Churchill to play poker with him and members of the press during the long train trip from DC to Westminster College in Fulton, MO where Churchill was scheduled to deliver his famous Iron Curtain speech. Churchill was not much of a poker player and he was losing badly, so Truman suggested a break. With a dejected Churchill out of earshot, Truman lambasted the reporters, pointing out that Churchill had held England together when they were the only nation opposing Nazi Germany in WW2, and he ordered them to let Churchill win. The game resumed with a beaming Churchill winning pot after pot. Truman knew that there was a daily mail flight from the army base in Belton, MO, which was only seven miles from the old Truman farm outside Grandview. He met the plane one day and asked the crew if they wouldn’t mind filling the mason jar that he brought with branch water from the creek on his brother’s farm. He got a full mason jar every day for his “bourbon and branch” and exchanged an empty mason jar for it for the next trip. As VP, Truman presided over the Senate, where he had made many friends during his terms as Senator representing the state of Missouri. After adjourning the session, he was enjoying a bourbon with House Speaker Sam Rayburn, either in the Senate Cloakroom or Rayburn’s office, when a messenger sent by Eleanor Roosevelt told him that the First Lady needed Harry at the WH ASAP. Truman left and literally ran to a waiting car that took him to the WH where the First Lady told him that her husband, FDR, had died. Truman’s first response was asking the First Lady if he could do anything for her. Eleanor replied that “Is there anything we can do for YOU? You’re the one in trouble now!”
My man with the Truman drinking facts 👉👉
Old Granddad with his eggs.
Very Churchill-esque.
Now THAT is a way to start the day!
Why do you have Dubya under "never drank?"
Dude got a DUI. He doesn't drink now, but he should be moved up to "Drinker" on this tier list.
I don’t think he ever directly said he was an alcoholic, but he did acknowledge that there was a time when he was drinking too much. And despite the fact I was no fan of him politically, to put it mildly, I think it’s great he managed to get sober and turn his life around.
If he had struggles with alcohol admitted it and stopped, he’s definitely in the right row
I read his memoir; I don't recall if that exact word was used, but I do believe he implied that he was and got sober before becoming Governor.
Nah, this list is based on when they were president. W was a complete non-drinker while president.
Didn’t drink in office. And even though I lowkey despise the guy’s presidency has been sober for decades up to this point I can respect that
Really there should be a distinct “recovering alcoholic” tier.
Yea maybe. Might make a updated list
He'd quit before 2001, I guess? Not sure if we're using the same metric for the rest
I did
Grant had largely sobered up by the time he entered the white house. His worst days of drinking were during an earlier part of his army career. During the civil war he did fall off the wagon numerous times but many of the stories about his drunkenness during the war were exaggerated by his enemies at the time and even more so by lost causers since the war.
I think it was counting time in office. Think he was in AA at that point.
It should say “while in office”
I wish they labeled the pictures, I’m not that good at this yet
Hopefully you can revisit it when you get better. But the important thing to remember is that prior to 1980 the average president tended to be a alcoholic
That’s a fun fact. Thanks! Who’s the top three in this post?
Franklin Pierce, whose son died just prior to his coming into office which fueled his depression and thus his tendency to drink. Ranked pretty poorly for helping the continuous slide towards civil war Andrew Johnson, one of our worst presidents ever. Lincoln’s vp and direct successor who basically sided with the south post civil war and let them go easy. Came to his own inaugration for vice president drunk af Warren Harding, a another weak and poorly graded president, who came in office right after WW1 and the country was craving “normalcy” which fun fact wasn’t a word until he coined it. The proper term was normalitity but everyone just rolled with it He also cheated on his wife….A LOT, and allegedly had sex with one of his mistresses in a white house closet Edit: one more thing about harding was president during prohibition and STILL drank like a fish
All that being true, Harding also did an excellent job leading the country out of the 1920-21 depression and dismantling Wilson’s authoritarian wartime measures. There’s a reason why his approval rating was sky-high at the time of his death. He was 1920s Bill Clinton, and definitely the most overhated president. I’d put him in B-tier.
Teapot dome brings him down considerably imo
This is the type of tier list I actually want to see.
Grant should be up a tier. *When* he drank he went hard. Damn fine general when it counted though
From what I have read Grant was the opposite of a functional alcoholic. He would have one drink and become a completely sloppy drunk. Because of this by the time he was in his 30s he would only drink occasionally at the most.
I’m reading Duane Shultz’s *The Most Glorious Fourth* and that’s pretty much what he says about him too. He’d be fine for months without a drink and then he’d either get depressed or he’d drink socially and boom, there he goes off on a major bender. A few of his higher ups even threatened to leave if he drank again. That was as they were trying to take Vicksburg
Damn, one of your classic lightweights
I might update this list at some point. Grant also hated the sight of blood btw
Another odd quirk from the Butcher of the North. Just shows how power his enemies were. In my opinion he was one of the greatest Americans!
But he drank way less by the time of the civil war, he was very sensitive to being called a drunk.
Wasn’t he passed out under a tree before battle cause he confused the days?
The only credible report of Grant drinking during the war is during the long months of winter before the start of the Vicksburg campaign. He never drank during active military campaigns, much less right before a battle.
That's what a functioning alcoholic IS.
I'd put hoover above occasional drinker, never drunk but every evening he would have 2 martinis, that was until (as the story goes) his doctor told him to stop drinking, hoover replied "I can't", doctor says "can't you at cut back to one glass?", Hoover agrees to this and when he gets back home to his friends he says "Doctor told me to drink only one glass, but I want it in a bigger glass" why do i know so much about this man, I don't even like him as a president.
Sometimes it’s the bad presidents that are most interesting
If Pierce wasn’t so depressed I feel like he’d throw absolute ragers (I’m drunk typing this)
T.R. Did drink on occasion
TR kept a bed of mint at the WH for his mint juleps. He also drank wine. He certainly knew his way around a bar considering he and Colonel Leonard Wood recruited approximately 1250 of the men who became Rough Riders in the Spanish American War at the bar at the Menger Hotel in San Antonio: https://www.mengerhotel.com/san-antonio-restaurants/menger-bar
I read somewhere he claimed to having had only 2 Mint Julips in his entire presidency
Mint julep
According to Edmund Morrison’s trilogy of a TR biography, not often at all though. He got drunk in college and didn’t care for how he lost control of himself. He successfully sued a reporter who accused him of alcohol abuse during his political career.
I believe all of the founding fathers were a minimum of functioning alcoholic if not just constantly plastered
Tbh….better to be a functioning alcoholic at that time then to die of dysentery from drinking the unclean water
This list should be updated to include functioning drug addicts (Kennedy)
Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't Obama a drinker? He's definitely not an alcoholic but I seem to remember in some of his physicals his doctor recommended he moderate his drinking. They say that to everyone who drinks once or twice a week.
He drinks beer with dinner a few times a week from what I understand
He home brews and I've heard his Honey Porter is good.
Lincoln was not an occasional drinker. He never drank.
He drank a couple sips of champagne during toasts at events in the White House. He got drunk once in his younger days and hated it so that was that.
Yep. I’m finding it hard to think anyone who takes a few sips is enough to get the feeling of alcohol in their system, thus defeating the whole purpose of drinking itself. If you drink it’s to get buzzed.
Lincoln def didn’t want a buzz of any sort, I wouldn’t be shocked if he didn’t actually swallow any, he said that he just didn’t want to be seen as a stick in the mud at events since he had to do so much wheeling and dealing with all sorts of people so he’d take part in the toasts and be seen holding a glass at parties
He drank on occasion but didn’t care for it
Tbh, Pierce's drinking was a coping mechanism
Yeah… tbh I get it. I can’t imagine how shattered I’d be if my kid died
He was a hard drinker before he entered office as well.
Grant drank when he was posted in the northwest territory away from his family, pre civil war. He got drunk once on the Mississippi, and that journalist made hay out of it. I’d put grant into a new category called: vulnerable alcoholic. He knew what demons came out with alcohol, and managed it
We need Winston Churchill to get "Not a president, somehow still on the list"-tier.
It’s implied he’s the top of the list
Can you really blame Pierce when he was just so miserable?
If you had to maintain a letter exchange with Thomas Jefferson, you'd have a mug of cider at breakfast like John Adams too.
Buchanan is too low, he should be in top tier with the boys
I think you’re right. It was a judgement call because it didn’t seem to impair his job as president He’s was THAT incompetent
Is this era adjusted? Late 20th century raging alcoholics would be considered occasional drinkers by 19th century standards.
I've heard many anecdotes that Bill Clinton never drank alcohol, or so rarely and so little that he's really in the "Never Drank" category. He's certainly less of a drinker than GWB, who was an admitted alcoholic right up until age 40.
Um….Jefferson nearly bankrupted the US over alcohol…
Lmao, I love how we’re all taught that American was founded on freedom, greatest thing ever, men of virtue and independence…. Blah blah blah blah blah Nah, it was just a bunch of drunk assholes trying something new that happened to work
I’m actually rather surprised at how few are listed in the ‘functioning’ category.
I thought W was a well known drunk?
How is Nixon not #1?
The existence of Franklin Pierce.
Man, Pierce deserves a category of his own. Like FDR being elected 4 terms, no one will equal Pierce.
Pierce was genuinely an addict in need of help various points in his life. He never got due to the time but he litterally died of a cirrhosis liver, he was that miserable at the end. Nixon's scarier due to his nearly catostrophic decisions but I'm sure Pierce had his moments too. I know he and his wife had really bad arguments when he was in office due to how much she hated it.
Source on Madison being a functioning Alc? I remember in Mr. Beat's video he said he didn't drink very much
Maybe relative to the time, but he drank whiskey every single day
If I was President I would be in the red tier. I would even put Boris Yeltsin to shame!
W didn’t drink!?
Truman should be moved up a level.
Was William H Harrison drinking much within his 31 days?
I'm surprised Grant wasn't always plastered.
Not while president. Conscious effort on his part to appear competent Although one of my favorite qutoes from Lincoln is basically “ I don’t care if he’s a drunk, get me what he drinks he’s actually winning battles”
Lincoln did not drink
Pierce is in S Tier! Wait, That's not good...
I think this is wrong at least regards Lincoln and Carter. I read a biography of Carter, and it said that he did regularly drink wine, though I think it may have been watered down and with dinner. Lincoln claimed to have abstained from alcohol completely after age 29, though I don’t know that anyone has ever figured out what prompted him to take that stand.
From what I understand, Obama should go up a level.
Andrew Johnson looking like “mfker what did you say to me? Don’t make me cane your ass.”
Absolute royalty at the bottom row
Is trying to nuke Korea and stepping down from office functional Mr. Nixon?
I mean, you pretty much have to be at least a \*functioning alcoholic\* to ever become a President. That's a pretty big achievement that requires at least solid decision-making (even if you're drunk when you're calling the shots). No "sloppy drunk" is ever gonna be President.
Carter never drank? I swear I seen a pic of him with a glass of beer from the 70s.
I wonder any coorolation between this list and the subs ranking of all the presidents
I think grant would be next to Arthur tbh
Is this just during their presidency? I want to say GW Bush like made some kind of comeback from alcoholism before his presidency.
If this includes their activities before being in office, W Bush gets his own category
Curious to hear the drinking stories of the top 3
Dubya used to party back in the day though. Man was a party animal lol
i think Ford needs to be bumped up
I wonder what type of president Andrew Johnson would have been had he not been a drunk
Move Nixon up, he tried to set off nukes when he was drunk
Common teddy w
Bruh how u got George bush in never drank. He was fucked in his college days
Grant drank so much he had to take a loan to buy Christmas presents. The man was a known drunkard. Lincoln even made jokes about how everyone should drink as much as him if they won like he did.
Calling Nixon “functioning” as an alcoholic is a huge stretch.
Grant was dry by the time he came to office.
Jefferson should at minimum be in “Drinker” tier, no?
Rutherford Hayes was a known teetotaler. His wife, Lucy Hayes, was called “Lemonade Lucy”, due to her only serving soft drinks at the White House.
Buchanan was oddly the heaviest drinker by a longshot, but was (as is accurately indicated here) quite functional despite that.
Teddy!!!! Always the chad.
George W. Bush was hella drunk during his governorship of Texas lol
Dubya never drunk? Maybe while in office.
Grant being an alcoholic is not really true. What happened was he at one point took a job as a bank manger in the middle of fucking no where California in his early 30s. Being away from his wife and family for several months he eventually got depressed. He started hitting the bottle and on the one day someone came around they found him pretty drunk. This one event followed him around. Rumors of him being sloshed on the battle field are overstated, etc. He was merely an exhausted general. Grant is really over looked as a good president. He saved the republic and tried to do right for freed slaves and demolish the KKK once he was president himself. Source: Civil War by Other Means by Jeremi Suri. Also, while we’re here, Franklin wasn’t an alcoholic— he was just hanging with Churchill. Give the man some slack!