Ronald Reagan Presidency – History

The Ronald Reagan Presidency began on January 20, 1981. Ronald Reagan ended his presidency on January 20, 1989.

Ronald Reagan Presidency
Ronald Reagan Presidency

Reagan, a Republican, took office following a landslide victory over Democratic incumbent President Jimmy Carter in the 1980 presidential election.

Ronald Reagan Presidency – Economic Policy

The four pillars of Ronald Reagan Presidency’s economic policy were to reduce the growth of government spending, reduce the federal income tax and capital gains tax, reduce government regulation, and tighten the money supply in order to reduce inflation.

The administration’s economic policies, known as “Reaganomics”, were inspired by supply-side economics.

The results of Reaganomics are still debated. Supporters point to the end of stagflation, stronger GDP growth, and an entrepreneur revolution in the decades that followed.

Critics point to the widening income gap, what they described as an atmosphere of greed.

Under Ronald Reagan Presidency the national debt tripling in eight years. This ultimately reversed the post-World War II trend of a shrinking national debt as percentage of GDP.

Ronald Reagan Presidency – Foreign Policy

Reagan stated the Reagan Doctrine in his State of the Union message on February 6, 1985.

He said “We must not break faith with those who are risking their lives–on every continent from Afghanistan to Nicaragua–to defy Soviet-supported aggression and secure rights which have been ours from birth.”

Later Reagan Administration implemented its strategy to implemented to overwhelm the global influence of the Soviet Union in the late Cold War.

The doctrine was a centerpiece of United States foreign policy from the early 1980s until the end of the Cold War in 1991.

Under the Reagan Doctrine, the United States provided overt and covert aid to anti-communist guerrillas. He supported resistance movements in an effort to “roll back” Soviet-backed pro-communist governments in Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

He designed the doctrine to diminish Soviet influence in these regions as part of the administration’s overall strategy to win the Cold War.

During Reagan’s second term, he sought closer relations with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, and the two leaders signed a major arms control agreement known as the INF Treaty.

Ronald Reagan Presidency – Health

At the time of his inauguration, Reagan was the oldest person to be inaugurated as President (age 69). He remains the oldest person to have held the office; he had reached the age of 77 when his second term ended.

Reagan’s health became a concern at times during his presidency. Later Former White House correspondent Lesley Stahl later wrote that she and other reporters noticed what might have been early symptoms of Reagan’s later Alzheimer’s disease.

Ronald Reagan Presidency – Legacy

Leaving office in 1989, Reagan held an approval rating of 68%. This rating matches the approval ratings of Franklin D. Roosevelt and Bill Clinton as the highest rating for a departing president in the modern era.

Historians and political scientists generally rank Reagan as an above-average president.

Due to Ronald Reagan Presidency’s impact on public discourse and advocacy of American conservatism, some historians have described the period during and after his presidency as the Reagan Era.

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