REAGAN, RONALD
(1911- ), fortieth president of the United States. Reagan, an ex-liberal, built what was probably the most successful conservative coalition of the twentieth century. Born in Tampico, Illinois, he cultivated an optimistic personality despite—or because of—his father's intermittent unemployment and heavy drinking. After graduating from Eureka College in 1932 and briefly working as a radio broadcaster, he went to California and quickly established himself in the movies. Little affected by Hollywood glamour, Reagan aptly described himself as "Mr. Norm." He was during these years a staunch Democrat who voted four times for Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Following World War II (during which he acted in government films), a near-fatal bout with pneumonia, a painful divorce from actress Jane Wyman, and a declining film career, Reagan turned to a new career as spokesman for General Electric. He soon changed his political views, leaving the Democratic party and becoming a conservative Republican. In 1966, he was elected governor of California and in office verbally assailed big government but enlarged the state budget and often compromised with Democratic legislators. Reagan won the presidential nomination in 1980 and defeated President Jimmy Carter in the election.
Intelligent but intellectually lazy, Reagan was prone to making groundless assertions that he often rendered as quips. More than any other modern president, he enunciated broad themes and then left day-to-day governance to subordinates. Personally he exuded friendliness and optimism, and, after an attempted assassination in 1981, grace and bravery. These qualities deflected criticism and facilitated negotiations with Congress, enabling him to hold together a coalition of Republican regulars, recently politicized evangelical Protestants, and disenchanted Democrats. Though affable to everyone, Reagan felt close only to a few old friends and his wife, Nancy Reagan. Indeed, she was said by White House watchers to have exerted greater influence on government operations than any previous First Lady.
Reagan reshaped American politics. While leaving intact such popular New Deal programs as Social Security, his administration gutted Great Society antipoverty programs, accepted a deep recession in order to curb inflation, and sharply reduced income taxes in the higher brackets. Initially Reagan supported the largest military buildup in American history and denounced the Soviet Union as an "evil empire," but in his second term he reached a détente with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.
His administration intervened briefly yet disastrously in the multisided Lebanese civil war, invaded Grenada, bombed Libya, and sponsored the Nicaraguan Contras, who were trying to overthrow the leftist government in that country. In 1985, Reagan authorized the sale of arms to Iran in an unsuccessful effort to free Americans held hostage in Lebanon, but he claimed not to know that subordinates were illegally diverting the proceeds to the Contras.
Reagan left office as the most popular president since Dwight D. Eisenhower. But the future of his coalition, the long-term impact of his economic policies, and thus his place in history remained uncertain.
Laurence I. Barrett, Gambling with History: Ronald Reagan in the White House (1984); Lou Cannon, Reagan (1982); Jane Mayer and Doyle McManus, Landslide: The Unmaking of the President, 1984-1988 (1988).
Leo P. Ribuffo
See also Anticommunism; Conservatism; Elections: 1980, 1984; Republican Party. For events during Reagan's administration, see Cold War; Gramm-Rudman Act; Iran-Contra Affair; Middle East-U.S. Relations; National Debt.
