Ranking the presidential spouses

Numerous polls have offered rankings of the presidents but little effort ha s been made to rate the performance of the president's spouse. Not only has there been far less academic attention devoted to the first ladies, but th ere are difficulties inherent in assessing this "office" that presidential scholars need not worry about when ranking the commanders-in-chief Yet, the first lady has emerged as a political "institution" worthy of scholarly at tention, including an attempt at ranking them. This article provides the re sults of a poll ranking the first ladies, along with an analysis of the ran kings between activist and traditionalist first ladies, first ladies of dif ferent historical periods, and between the presidents and their spouses.