The Presidency of Gerald R. Ford (American Presidency (Univ of Kansas Paperback))
Greene (history, Cazenovia Coll.) gives a balanced, thoroughly researched, and highly analytical look at Gerald Ford's meteoric rise from the House Minority leader role to the White House. Culling recently declassified documents and interviewing numerous principals from the Nixon and Ford administrations, Greene provides an insider view that is both critical of the administration's organizational shortfalls and adulatory about Ford's basic decency, moral character, and leadership qualities. He spends more time on the structural development and operation of the White House than on personal development, which served as the unifying theme of James Cannon's Time and Change: Gerald Ford's Appointment with History (LJ 12/93). While chronicling the cynicism about Ford's decision to pardon Nixon, Greene also convincingly dispatches the commonly held belief that Ford and Nixon had a deal. Though the pardon, the shrinking Republican base in Congress, staff infighting, and the Reagan candidacy in 1976 complicated Ford's governing efforts, the author presents a favorable image of a president who did not shrink from tough but necessary decisions while remaining the "nice guy" he sought to be. Likely to be a standard on a much maligned and little researched administration, this is recommended for academic and public libraries.Frank Kessler, Missouri Western St. Coll., St. JosephCopyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.--This text refers to theHardcoveredition.