Did it develop before or during his term? Was the public aware of it? Did it affect his job performance/policies?
I thought of this question because the job seems stressful enough to cause depression or anxiety disorders all by itself, especially for someone like Lincoln or FDR. Plus everyone always comments on how much older Obama or Bush looked when comparing before- and after- term pictures. And Teddy Roosevelt always sounded a bit manic to me.
People never seem to stop talking about insane monarchs, but I've never heard a President described as psychologically afflicted, even by his enemies.
The most obvious answer is Reagan, who suffered the early stages of dementia and/or Alzheimer's in the latter years of his presidency. The extent of his illness and exactly when signs began to show are very contentious, even among historians, but that he suffered from said illnesses is not.
George W. Bush admitted to being an alcoholic, not while in office of course, but you listed addiction as one of your factors. What I found interesting about Bush's alcoholism is that he claimed he was entirely unaware of it until Laura Bush asked him if he could remember the last time he hadn't had a drink - he chalked it up to his habit of having habits, but still stopped drinking. (My source for this is Bush's Decision Points).
JFK was probably not addicted to sex/drugs/power, but he certainly abused all of them. Of the three, only the drug abuse is forgiveable as Kennedy lived most of his life in constant, excruciating pain, and his doctors never really found a treatment for all of his ailments. (Citing Robert Dallek, and the Paterson compilation).
I could go into TR, but much like any figure that exists far enough in the past, I'd end up getting into an argument with someone that would degenerate into differing interpretations of sources.
Now Richard Nixon. I have never read a source that does not admit that Nixon was in at least some way an odd man. On one end of the spectrum you'll have psychobiographies (Summers, Volken et al.) that find a certain event in Nixon's life - his grandmother's disciplinary routine, his father's bombastic attitude, his mother's quiet aloofness etc. - and pin his personality on that. On the other end you'll have biographers that consider Nixon to have been shaped more by a number of factors (Brodie, Black, and so on). However, being odd, paranoid, awkward, competitive, ruthless, and easily agitated does not mean Nixon suffered from a clinical illness. Did he fall into fits of depression? Absolutely, after every speech he gave Pat would have to console him and make him at least half believe he'd done a good job, but that's just low self-esteem.
Was he paranoid? Without question. Consider, however, Nixon's entire political career. He'd built his career on red-baiting, catching a spy in his own lies, and out manoeuvring his opponents. As Vice President he had to compete with John Foster Dulles, Allen Dulles, Sherman Adams, and a bevy of other men Eisenhower considered less politically inclined than Nixon, for input and influence on decisions. Add to this the fact that while Eisenhower knew Nixon's value and half-understood his personality, he often went out of his way to make Nixon feel weak, exposed, and helpless. Then consider the campaign against Kennedy - not only do you have all the claims later made about how the Kennedys "ran" their campaign, but you also have Nixon working to unite a Republican party that seemed dead set on imploding despite the election. Obviously I could go on, but I think that for someone who had been in politics for as long as Nixon had, paranoia was a requirement.
I think the central reason you'll read more about mad monarchs than presidents is that even the most inexperienced president has had to convince others that he is both sane and capable of doing the most important job in the world. That doesn't mean everyone is going to believe they are sane and competent (I cannot remember the last Republican President that the American left did not paint as evil/insane/power-mad/inept nor can I recall the last Democratic President the right didn't paint as suspicious/disloyal/oblivious/weak etc), but in either case, that person has been vetted. A monarch is simply born. In order to remove a monarch you need very extreme measures.
Abraham Lincoln was famously very melancholy. Tragedy and loss were part of his life from a young age and he certainly displayed many characteristics of a manic depressive person.
After the death of Ann Rutledge, a young romantic interest of his, he stopped working as a surveyor and had trouble functioning for a long time. He also cut off his engagement with Mary Todd once and suffered severe depression for some time until they were reunited. Biographer David Donald writes, "He took to his bed for about a week, unable to see anybody.... During this period some friends feared he might commit suicide. Years later (his close friend) Speed said he had felt obliged 'to remove razors from his room--take any all knives and other such dangerous things'" (Donald's "Lincoln," p. 83).
Bouts like these likely began upon the death of his mother when he was a child and continued throughout his presidency. The death of his son Willie in 1862, in particular, caused severe enough trauma to him and Mary Todd that they ceased hosting social gatherings at the White House for over a year.
The Civil War also had impacts on his mental health. He was frequently unable to sleep, rarely remembered to eat, and was constantly absorbed by dismay and sadness at political unrest in the union and military failures in the war.
David Herbert Donald's fantastic biography, quoted above, entitled "Lincoln" provides an especially good look into his mental state, as Donald's angle is one which aims to explore the workings of Lincoln's mind in addition to the basic historical facts of his life. The chapters which deal with Lincoln's relationship with Anne Rutledge, his engagement to Mary Todd, his long periods spent alone in Washington as a representative, and the entirety of the Civil War are particularly telling of his lifelong tendency towards sadness and despair.
Calvin Coolidge.
"The loss of Calvin, his favorite son, was devastating to the President, and within a short time he was displaying every one of the symptoms--including loss of appetite, feelings of extreme guilt, reluctance to speak, extreme indecisiveness, and loss of energy--that the American Psychiatric Association says are signs of a "major depressive episode." He spent much more of his time sleeping--he turned in at 10 p.m., and rose at 9 a.m., and took naps in the afternoon lasting from two to four hours a day; so in all, he spent only about four hours a day working after his son died. Furthermore, the hours he did work were largely unproductive: He basically abdicated his duties for the next four years, retreating from direct interactions with both Congress and his own Cabinet, proposing no major legislation or programs while generally deferring more and more to Congress, and avoiding involvement in foreign policy; he even stopped giving his annual messages to Congress in person, instead letting clerks read them to each house as previous Administrations had done. Personally, Coolidge became increasingly irritable and would often explode with anger. outbursts that were directed at his staff, at the Secret Service men protecting him, and even at his family. His wife Grace was often embarrassed by these episodes, and his surviving son John also was upset over his father's often cruel attacks as well as constant unfavourable comparisons to his brother. In 1927, Coolidge became irrationally convinced that Grace was having an affair with a Secret Service agent assigned to her, and had him replaced.
The question of the role that Coolidge's condition played in events subsequent to his Administration, namely the Great Depression, is an interesting one. Many can speculate that Coolidge's inaction as President prevented the passage of measures designed to regulate the rampant Wall Street speculation that lay behind the stock market crash of 1929; he followed economic conditions closely throughout his career, and took steps to help the economy in his first few months in the White House. Herbert Hoover, his Secretary of Commerce and eventual successor, had urged him to put his weight behind regulatory efforts, and he later blamed Coolidge for not doing more. In particular, Hoover thought that the wartime debt owed by Great Britain and France to the U.S. should be restructured or cancelled, which would have not only helped the European economy, but also relieved American overproduction by opening up a market for its manufactured products, not to mention possibly providing some relief to Germany, struggling to pay reparations forced on them by the Alliance. Coolidge refused to follow this advice. Coolidge's conservative principals would have kept him from getting too deeply involved in the economy in any case, but his grief-induced depression could give some ammunition to those defending him against charges that his "do-nothing" policies caused the Depression.
The theory that this depressive state caused his death less than four years after he left office is purely speculation, but it is based on the above-referenced circumstantial evidence. It is known that if a "major depressive episode" is left untreated, death can result. Suicide is common, but as recent research has revealed, heart disease and heart attacks are just as likely. Coolidge, from all outward appearances, gave no signs of heart problems--he was obviously not overweight, and he did not drink alcohol; he apparently liked his tobacco, but presumably not to excess. This leaves depression as the cause of his condition. Nevertheless, it is true that Coolidge died of a heart attack on January 5, 1933, at the age of 60. His final moments culminated a process of slow death that began more than eight years earlier, with the death of his son--this and any other conclusions are (again) highly speculative, but they are still better than the unsubstantiated assumptions of his critics."
http://thebolesfamily.hubpages.com/hub/Calvin-Coolidge-How-Depression-Killed-a-President
See also: Marilyn Elias, USA Today, "Depression Can Break the Heart," from http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2009-03-04-depression-heart_N.htm
The American Presidency Project, "Calvin Coolidge: First Annual Message, December 6, 1923," from http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=29564
Robert E. Gilbert, The Tormented President: Calvin Coolidge, Death, and Clinical Depression, from http://books.google.com/books?printsec=frontcover&vid=ISBN0275979318&vid=LCCN2002029894#v=onepage&q&f=false
Hello everyone.
Please keep in mind that we do not allow answers that consist mostly of a quote, of a link or consists of two sentences.
Proper comments for this subreddit should be in-depth, comprehensive, and informative while properly situating the answer in its historical context. It should also be backed by appropriate primary and secondary sources, whether or not explicitly mentioned in the comment (i.e. you should always be ready to provide sources if asked). In other words, answers here should be such as an historian of the subject would give.
Thank you.
To kind of latch on to this: is there any information about Truman suffering from PTSD or any other combat related illness, considering that he fought in World War I?
FDR was rumored to be in the grip of major depressive illness during the talks with Stalin about how to divide Europe after WW2. Of course, he was also suffering from other illnesses at this time, but some historians speculate that his illnesses (and Stalin's willingness to take advantage of them) led to less favorable terms.