Herman Cain: Can lack of experience be a virtue?

Even here, however, events may turn judgments regarding candidates’ qualifications on their head. During the tightly contested 2008 Democratic nomination race, Hillary Clinton, seeking to paint Obama as a political novice who lacked foreign policy experience, ran her celebrated 3 a.m. phone call ad. John McCain picked up on this theme during the general election by repeatedly contrasting his years of political and military service to Obama’s much thinner resume. Most voters, however, weren’t seeking experience so much as a new direction in the nation’s politics.

It is thus no small irony that three years into Obama’s presidency, voters appear to be seeking change again. The Candidate of Change, after all, has become in large part the President of Continuity. The strongest portion of Obama’s record, many would argue, is not how much he’s changed Washington, but his foreign policy accomplishments, many of which build off of his predecessor’s administration.

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If this is another change election, then is Herman Cain, by virtue of his less traditional background, prepared to bring that change? And if so, is he ready to be president? Of course not. But then, no one ever is. In truth, the presidency is, in most respects, sui generis; no prior jobs can truly prepare one for the position.

But if biography can mislead, it doesn’t mean we should simply ignore it. Here, I think, Neustadt had it right after all. He ends the first edition of his classic work with these words: “If we want Presidents fully alive and useful, we shall have to pick them from among experienced politicians of extraordinary temperament.” Biography is useful for what it reveals about a candidate’s values, judgments and, most critically, their core convictions.

History teaches that all presidents will be faced with making difficult decisions under conditions of extreme uncertainty, on issues that often have momentous consequences for the nation, and in the face of conflicting advice from experts. How can we be sure the president will, in times of duress, sort through the conflicting evidence and advice to make the right decision? The answer, I think, depends less on what presidents have done in the years before reaching the Oval Office, and more on how they have done it—and why. 

Matthew Dickinson is a professor of political science at Middlebury College, where he writes the Presidential Power blog. He is also the author of Bitter Harvest: FDR, Presidential Power, and the Growth of the Presidential Branch .

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