Has any US President been of either the poor or middle class when they took office?

Question

My question is specifically about their financial state as they take the oath of office. I guess a follow up question would be "Should we believe that a person must be rich in order to be a good leader for our country?"

Answer 1

By the time President rise in political power and get into office most of them are relatively well off. Lincoln was a lawyer and lawyers have always been paid well as compared to the general population.

A few noted Presidents were BORN into poverty or middle class, but to my knowledge no President was penniless upon being voted into office.

The Lincoln myth dictates that he was dirt poor his entire life, he wasn't. Yes, he was born pretty poor and he did have lean years as an adult. And Clinton came into office directly from being a Govenor, trust me, he was in no way "poor" then.

Answer 2

Truman when he took the Vice Presidency, he was Vice President when he made President due to FDR's death. Lincoln was middle class (struggling attorney) and had been poor.

Reagan was a poor son of an alchoholic, but as an adult was an actor and politician.

I'm sure there are others.

You need a certain amount of clout to get in front of the people. Is it really the second before they took the Presidency you are looking at? The Presidents who had been poor had all achieved a measure of success by that time.

Answer 3

Lincoln was hardly poor since he was a Lawyer.Clinton was the governor of Arkansas and a lawyer, with a lawyer wife. It was so rare as for me to say no. But the quantification may have to be refined. Since most were either Senators or Representatives, or Goernors, they were not poor. Today's common man or woman could not hope to do it. Many may have started poor or middle class but came up, Truman comes to mind, certainly Lincoln was not well off as a child, but then neither was Nixon or Eisenhower.

Answer 4

Zachary Taylor was a lifelong soldier before becoming President -- not exactly a high-paying job.

Ulysses Grant was unemployed before becoming President. In fact, except for his time in the Army, he spent more of his life unemployed than employed.

Many of our earliest Presidents (Washington, Jefferson, etc.) lived well but were not cash rich. In fact, George Washington actually had to borrow money from a friend to make the trip to New York City for his presidential inauguration. Jefferson was all but broke by the time he left the White House.

Answer 5

Uh, the Republicans did no longer supply tax breaks to the undesirable or midsection class, yet in basic terms to those that have in simple terms approximately all the money. Republicans are bent on turning our usa right into a Feudal-like gadget -- the place a million% of the inhabitants owns each and every thing, and everybody else are their slaves, with no longer something. Drilling in the present day won't help gasoline expenditures (it incredibly is Republicans who've been coziest in mattress with people who shop gasoline expenditures extreme, and us based on it) the next day. in the time it could take for that oil to get to the pumps, we ought to strengthen technologies to make it no longer necessary, and us much less based on oil in maximum situations. Of all the events you suggested, the only maximum bent on destroyign the midsection class, and of coming up the undesirable as depressing as accessible is the Republican occasion. BTW, "No new child" is ANTI-tutorial, with the aid of fact it turns the finished tutorial gadget into mindless preparation to bypass device-gradable exams, no longer in unquestionably discovering something. Unfortunatly, it replaced right into a bi-partisan factor, no longer in basic terms Republican. The Republican occasion is passionate in basic terms approximately enriching the already wealthy, on the cost of everybody else. The Democrats was obsessed on helping the undesirable and midsection class, yet are actually lots greater mixed, having been offered out by employing the wealthy.

Answer 6

Lincoln

Answer 7

Bill Clinton was middle class when he took office. That is why the powerful wealthy in this country were so bound and determined to get him. He could not be bought.

Answer 8

Lincoln and Truman. Ulysses Grant wasn't the richest man in life before the war, and certainly not after his Presidency.

Answer 9

Clinton was a poor man or average person. That's why he took care of the poor more so than for the riches like Bush is doing now. Down with Bush!

Answer 10

none of them were actually poor when they took office, some were poor in their past but they either became wealthy in their own right or married into money before they got into politics and got elected , but, one thing is for certain they all sold their souls before the masters allowed them to even get into the running,