“When the idea for the book first started running around in my head, Clinton’s approval ratings were abysmally low,” Wert recalled. “This was around early 1994, and Clinton’s approvals were around 35-40 percent. Usually, when a president has approval ratings that low, there is something serious going on—like a really poor economic situation.”

But that wasn’t the case in ’94.

“I got interested in why Clinton was so unpopular and was going to do my dissertation on a study of Clinton’s disapproval ratings. A study like this had never been done,” he said.

By the time Wert got started on the project, Clinton had pulled his approval ratings up sharply, and the book became a study of both Clinton’s approval and disapproval ratings.

“The interesting thing about this is that I had access to maybe the only data set in the country from a survey that actually asked people why they approved or disapproved of Clinton,” Wert said. “This was data I gathered from the Institute for Policy Research at the University of Cincinnati.

How will Clinton be viewed in history?

“It’s too early to tell,” Wert said. “Interestingly, those presidents who have been considered ‘great’ have been presidents who have served in times of great turmoil (like Washington, Lincoln and FDR). Clinton didn’t have that. The good times we were in caused his approval ratings to be high, but that won’t do a lot for his standing in history. I have seen some scholarship on the Clinton presidency that has come out recently, and it has been fairly negative.

“The scandals and abuse of power that happened with Clinton did some damage to the presidency. However, when the dust settles and we look back on the Clinton presidency, I think he will be seen as an average to above average president.”