Accidental Presidents

By Jared Cohen

Categories: History

Jared Cohen's Accidental Presidents, published in 2019, looks at the eight men who became president of the United States when the incumbent died in office, and at how each of them changed the nation. Cohen covers John Tyler, Millard Fillmore, Andrew Johnson, Chester Arthur, Theodore Roosevelt, Calvin Coolidge, Harry Truman and Lyndon B. Johnson. He shows how Tyler was expelled from his party, how Arthur reformed the civil service that had made his career, and how Truman surprised everyone after succeeding Franklin Roosevelt.

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• Ray Dalio
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• Ben Shapiro: “@jaredcohen's excellent book about accidental presidents is out in paperback!”