Most Americans think that some of the United States's forty-three Presidents are "great" presidents, but everybody uses different criteria. Some think that Presidents who expanded the office's capabilities were among the greatest, while others think the great Presidents are ones who preside over times of prosperity. One of the more formal efforts to assess Presidential greatness was Arthur Schlesinger Jr 's 1996 poll of around 30 historians of the Presidents. This followed earlier polls of historians in 1962 and 1948 run by Arthur Schlesinger Sr . In these polls, which some contend mostly included left-leaning academicians, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln, and George Washington occupy the "great" level and the near-greats included such figures as Woodrow Wilson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Andrew Jackson--mostly activist Presidents. In the 1996 poll, conservative icon Ronald Reagan was given 25th place out of 39 Presidents.

In a 2000 Poll, conducted by The Wall Street Journal and the Federalist Society, 78 scholars ranked the following Presidents - in order - in the top ten: George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, Andrew Jackson, Harry Truman, Ronald Reagan, Dwight Eisenhower, and James K. Polk.

Other measures of which Presidents Americans think are great are a study of American currency and of monuments built in Washington D.C. and elsewhere (i.e., mainly Mount Rushmore). Those Presidents on whom there is a wide consensus about greatness receive a monument or memorial in the capital city--Thomas Jefferson, Lincoln, Washington, and more recently FDR. Currency too, which (unlike that of most other countries) tends to focus on political figures in general and Presidents in particular, is a good barometer of public thinking about the greatness of various Presidents. The most used notes now feature Washington, Lincoln, Alexander Hamilton (not a President), and Jackson; there is a large movement to place Reagan on one of these notes.

List of Presidents on US Currency

• Ulysses Grant
• Andrew Jackson
• Thomas Jefferson
• John F. Kennedy
• Abraham Lincoln
• Franklin D. Roosevelt
• George Washington