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Show t History makes great leaders out of ordinary people s U Even as we prepare to honor our nation's top j executive with a holiday dedicated to the American I presidents, a new group of candidates are clamoring for i New Hampshire's attention in a bid to gain nation-wide favor that can be translated into their party's nomination later this year. ; All of them hope to become our nation's 40th I president. I ' Over the past 200 years since the position of national ! president was created with the U.S. Constitution, 39 men have held that title, with terms ranging from 31 days to over 12 years. Nevertheless, as we prepare to celebrate President's Day on Monday, our attention turns to two of the greatest, not just because George Washington and Abraham Lincoln's birthdays fall in February, but because they have shaped our country's history more than most of our other chief executives. There are times when it is hard to believe that our j next president is one of the several men now making headlines for acting extraordinarily efand the candidates battle for votes m state pr man s ana party caucuses, and quarrel on the floor of the Senate over campaign tactics, it makes you wonder Also, the immediacy of broadcast news Reuses our attention on the candidates with an intensity unknown in years past. One wonders if the the Franklin Purees the Benjamin Harrisons and the Warren G. Hardings have come to hold the highest elective office in the land it tney had to campaign under today's standards. The point is, only rarely have great men been elected president of the United States. Instead, most presidents have been ordinary individuals with the drive, or the political machine, or the luck to become president. Sometimes events have conspired to make these ordinary men great presidents, other times events have done the opposite, and made good men appear to be mediocre chief executives. Still others will go down in history as doing little or nothing. Theodore Roosevelt assumed the presidency m d William McKinley died and went on to capture f imagination of the nation ; Harry Truman did the $2 sT when Franklin Roosevelt died, and is now gaining ! price claim as one of the great presidents. c' om By the same token, presidents such as Andj statf Johnson and Herbert Hoover inherited circumstance S?l that stamped their terms of office as failures. Q Our next president will be human, and the success 0 his term of office will be determined by how well his W individual chemistry will mix with the challenges out pri01 country will face over the next four or eight years. opt'011' The group of men now vying for the office of president rder are no better nor worse than those who usually have tnefil sought the position in the past History has shown we can t often hope to elect a great or leader. We simply choose a good man, and hope that history will make our nation's leader great. |