page_862 < previous page page_862 next page > Page 862 See also Depressions; Great Society; Harrington, Michael; Internal Migration; Mobility, Social and Economic; New Deal; Settlement Houses; Townsend Plan; Unemployment; Wealth and Its Distribution; Welfare and Public Relief. Presidency Established under Article 2 of the Constitution, the office of the president was unique and without precedent, although some of its features, including the designation "president," were foreshadowed in several state constitutions. The principal architect was James Wilson of Pennsylvania, head of the faction at the Constitutional Convention calling for a strong executive on the ground that in a country as large as the United States only such a one could have influence in distant parts. As chairman of the Committee of Detail, he proposed a single rather than a plural head, who would have control of foreign affairs and be able to exercise a legislative veto. Wilson's view that the president must be a man of the people carried the day, though his desire that the president be elected directly by the people did not. The question of how to choose the executive was commingled with the question of how to keep the office independent of the legislature. The outcome was the creation of an electoral college chosen by the state legislatures exclusively for the purpose of naming a president. The assumption that George Washington would be the first president and willing to serve indefinitely informed the decision that there should be no limit on the reeligibility of the president. The length of the president's term, much discussed, was fixed at four years by the committee appointed late in the convention to deal with unfinished business. Charged to see that the laws are faithfully executed, the president is head of the executive branch and commander in chief of the armed forces. Through the veto he also exercises legislative power, and through his power to appoint judges and the requirement that he execute the laws, he exercises judicial power, too. In practice the presidency has been an evolving office. Each chief executive has put his stamp on it through the force of his personality and the requirements of the day. The president is now the central American political figure, a constant source of news and symbol of the nation. He has become the de facto head of his political party, and the chief shaper of foreign policy, including the initiation of treaties. Through the device of executive agreements a president may make international arrangements for the life of his term in office that dispense with the need to obtain the approval of Congress. Congress, moreover, has by statute conferred extra-constitutional powers upon the president that include such matters as the management of trade relations, the protection of natural resources, and the right to intervene in labor-management disputes. The recruitment of presidents has been a source of fascination, wonderment, and entertainment for Americans almost from the beginning of the Republic. George Washington in 1789 (and again in 1793), and John Adams in 1797 were chosen chief executive by the electoral college, as the Constitution intended. Adams was succeeded in turn by Thomas Jefferson (1801), James Madison (1809), and James Monroe (1817)  all from Virginia. This so-called Virginia Dynasty came to an end as new states farther to the west entered the Union and made claims requiring satisfaction. Meanwhile, by 1800, divergent political factions were coalescing into the Federalist and Democratic-Republican parties, and these loosely organized entities, through their leaders in Congress assembled in caucuses, selected the candidates for the office. After 1824, when John Quincy Adams was elected in a canvass so close that it had to be decided by the House of Representatives, "King Caucus," increasingly criticized as "undemocratic," gave way to popularly chosen nominating conventions, which had already found favor in many states. By 1832, the major parties, now the National Republicans and the Democrats, were nominating their presidential candidates in national conventions. Andrew Jackson, an icon of the frontier, was elected handily in 1828. He was the first "man of the people" and the creator of a new kind of president, a man with a national rather  < previous page page_862 next page >