How many U.S. presidents have not had a college degree?

Were there US presidents who did not have a college degree? Were they effective?

• Have the American people ever voted someone without a college degree to the presidential office? If yes, what were their performance?

• Answer:

  The following presidents did not have college degrees George Washington A fairly uncontroversial pick for greatest US president insofar as that question can be answered without controversy. Point being, Washington never attended college and is still a revered figure in US history, not only for his generalship in the American Revolution (which wasn't so impressive on the battlefield, but was nothing short of astounding off it) but also for having set an excellent precedent with his presidency. Having said that, Washington's election wasn't directly by the people - the electoral college worked differently back then. Still, he was the only president to be elected unanimously by the electoral college. James Monroe Monroe did attend the College of William and Mary for a year, but he dropped out to fight in the Revolutionary War. Monroe's presidency coincides with an era in US history known as "the Era of Good Feelings," so clearly he wasn't too lousy at his job. Monroe very nearly won unanimous re-election - he didn't because one of the electors, William Plummer, either felt that Washington should be the only unanimously elected president or that his (Plummer's) hatred of Monroe was too strong to ever justify voting for Monroe. History's unclear on this point. Andrew Jackson Jackson was really the first president elected in a way that would seem completely familiar to modern Americans - the electoral college voted based on popular vote, for example. Jackson was undeniably effective in implementing his policies, but his legacy is mixed and controversial. On the one hand, he took a strong stance against state nullification of federal law. On the other hand, he destroyed the Second National Bank and effectively caused the Panic of 1837 - and he also forcibly, and illegally, death-marched several Native American groups from their homes to Oklahoma. Martin Van Buren Van Buren got stuck dealing with the Panic of 1837 and couldn't do so effectively. He was voted out after a single term in office. William Henry Harrison Harrison attended Presbyterian Hampden-Sydney College, transferred to the University of Pennsylvania and was forced to drop out due to lack of funds. He was a completely ineffective president, as he caught pneumonia at his inauguration and spent his thirty days as president in bed. He was the first US president to die in office. Zachary Taylor Taylor was the second US president to die in office. He was in office for about a year and accomplished nothing of note. Millard Fillmore Fillmore wasn't much of a president, but in all fairness, even the college-educated presidents in the lead-up to the Civil War were a decidedly uninspiring lot. Abraham Lincoln Another uncontroversial pick for greatest US president, Lincoln guided the Union through the Civil War, somehow leading one of the more talented, but fractious, cabinets to do it. All of Lincoln's presidency was a delicate balancing act, and the man did it with style. Andrew Johnson Johnson was a gigantic step down from Lincoln - really, anyone would have been - and when he attempted to fire one of his cabinet secretaries, was impeached. His presidency was thoroughly ineffective. Grover Cleveland Cleveland is the only president to have served non-consecutive terms and to have been married in the White House. He is also one of a very small number of presidential candidates to have won the popular vote but to have lost the election. He is generally viewed as having been an effective reformer at a particularly corrupt time in American politics. William McKinley McKinley attended Allegheny College, but dropped out after a year. Foreign policy-wise, the US decisively won the Spanish-American War during his presidency, and on the domestic front, saw economic growth. McKinley's legacy is a bit controversial today as he was an unapologetic imperialist, but he was a fairly effective president. Harry S Truman Truman's reputation was in tatters when he left the White House. It has since recovered substantially to the point where he is now generally recognized as one of the better presidents of the twentieth century. He had an impossible act to follow in Franklin Delano Roosevelt, but he still did an excellent job of guiding the US through the immediate postwar era.