The President and the Prime Minister Quiz

Answer: William

William Howard Taft, who belonged to the Republican Party, was the 27th President of the United States and held that office from 1909 until 1913. He later served as Chief Justice of the United States from 1921 until a month before his death in 1930. His appointment to the latter post meant that he became the first man in history to hold the top job in both the executive and judicial branches of the US's federal government. However, Taft is often best-remembered for being one of the heaviest Presidents of all time - although the popular story about him getting stuck in the White House's bathtub is apocryphal.

William Pitt the Younger held the post of British Prime Minister from 1783 to 1801 and then again from 1804 until his death in 1806. His father, William Pitt the Elder, had previously held the same position. When he first came to power in 1783 he was just 24 years old and his government was widely expected to fail within a few weeks or months. However, he had the support of the King, the people and (eventually) his colleagues, so was able to build a government that remained in power for the next 18 years despite having to deal with major issues such as the ongoing war with France, the complicated affairs of the East India Company (that had brought down his predecessor), a spiralling national debt and King George III's initial descent into madness.

Answer: John

John Tyler was elected as Vice President to William Henry Harrison in 1840. However, the new President only lived for a month after his inauguration in March 1841 and Tyler became the first Vice President to succeed to top job in April 1841. It was his swift decision to have himself sworn in as President (rather than just taking on the role of Acting-President) that set the precedent for how to deal with similar scenarios in future years. Tyler's main political aim during his presidency was to annex the Republic of Texas, something that he was able to set in motion just before the end of his presidency in March 1845 but actually occurred while his successor, James K. Polk, was in office.

John Major succeeded Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister in 1990 after winning a Conservative Party leadership contest. He didn't actually face the electorate until 1992 when he presided over a surprise Conservative victory despite the country being in the depths of recession and opinion polls that indicated a Labour win. Black Wednesday - the date of Britain's catastrophic exit from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism - occurred later that year and Major's perceived lack of action (particularly his failure to sack Norman Lamont, the unpopular Chancellor of Exchequer) tainted the remainder of his time in office. He was eventually replaced by Tony Blair after the landslide Labour election victory of 1997.

Answer: Thomas

Thomas Jefferson was the third US President, second US Vice-President and main author of the Declaration of Independence. Another key achievement of his political career was the decision to make the Louisiana Purchase in 1803 that added a huge swathe of land to the territory of the United States of America. He inherited his plantation at Monticello from his father and the home that he designed and built for himself on that estate is often depicted alongside his image - notably on the reverse side of the US nickel (the five cent coin). However, Jefferson's memory is somewhat controversial due to his history as a slave owner and evidence that he fathered children with one of his female slaves, Sally Hemings.

Thomas Pelham-Holles, Duke of Newcastle, had two terms in office as British Prime Minister. His first term began in 1754 when he succeeded his younger brother (Henry Pelham) in the role and lasted until November 1756 when he was blamed for British losses in the Seven Years' War and replaced by the Duke of Devonshire (the second duke to be Prime Minister). However, Newcastle bounced back into office seven months later and remained in power for a further five years. Interestingly, he held two separate dukedoms - for most of his life he was the Duke of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, but in 1756 he was also created Duke of Newcastle-under-Lyne and became known simply as the Duke of Newcastle.

Answer: George

George W. Bush was US President from 2001 until 2009 and was often mocked in the press for his gaffes and unusual use of language, such as "misunderestimated". His early presidency was dominated by the events of September 11th, 2001 when al-Qaeda terrorists hijacked four planes and used them to destroy the Twin Towers of New York's World Trade Center and other nearby buildings; cause major damage to the Pentagon; and take thousands of innocent lives. The response of the US Government, including military action in Afghanistan and Iraq, was described by Bush as a "War on Terror".

George Canning was British Prime Minister for just 119 days before his death in office in August 1827 at the age of 57. He had been active in politics and government since the late 18th century and had held the posts of Foreign Secretary and Chancellor of the Exchequer under his predecessor as Prime Minister, Lord Liverpool (who had, somewhat ironically, been forced to resign in favour of Canning due to ill health). However, Canning's early political success was damaged when he chose to fight an illegal duel against fellow Cabinet minister Lord Castlereagh in 1809 - Canning missed his opponent entirely and was shot in the thigh.

Answer: James

James Madison was the fourth US President and held the office from 1809 to 1817, a period that included the War of 1812 (which actually lasted until 1815) between the US and Great Britain. Madison's plan for the war was to quickly capture Canada and use that victory as leverage to stop British attacks on American trade and shipping. However, it turned out that capturing Canada was much harder in practice than it initially seemed, and the war dragged on for three years. Both sides had some successes (the British burned down the White House in 1814 and US forces won the Battle of New Orleans in 1815) before a peaceful end to the conflict was agreed under the terms of the Treaty of Ghent.

James Callaghan, whose full name was actually Leonard James Callaghan, was British Prime Minister from 1976 to 1979. For much of his time in office he led a minority Labour government and relied on the support of smaller parties in the House of Commons. To add to his problems, the country was suffering economic depression, which his economic policies seemed only to exacerbate and led to a series of strikes over the winter of 1978-79 that became known as the "Winter of Discontent" (a name taken from the Shakespeare play 'Richard III'). In those circumstances, his subsequent election defeat by Margaret Thatcher in 1979 was probably inevitable.

Answer: William

William McKinley became the third US President to be assassinated when he died in the early hours of September 14th, 1901 - just over a week after he had been shot twice in the abdomen by Leon Czolgosz. Like Abraham Lincoln before him, McKinley had recently been re-elected for a second term in office. McKinley's first stint as President (from 1897 to 1901) was notable for rapid economic improvement, the annexation of the Republic of Hawaii and the US victory in the Spanish-American War of 1898.

William Ewart Gladstone was known as the 'Grand Old Man' of British politics in the second half of the 19th century and was noted for his long-standing rivalry with his political opponent Benjamin Disraeli. Gladstone first became a Member of Parliament in 1832 and held influential positions in the governments of Robert Peel and Lord Palmerston. He became Prime Minister himself for the first time in 1868. His first ministry lasted until 1874 and he then held office again from 1880 to 1885, for five months in 1886 and then finally from 1892 to 1894. He retired from parliament in 1895 at the age of 85.

Answer: Benjamin

Benjamin Harrison was the first grandson to follow in the footsteps of his grandfather as US President. While his grandfather, William Henry Harrison, was a member of the Whig Party, Benjamin Harrison was a Republican President. His single term in office between 1889 and 1893 is notable for being sandwiched between the two separate presidencies of Grover Cleveland as well as tackling issues such as antitrust laws, civil rights and the development of a modern navy. Harrison is also the first President whose voice was recorded and preserved for posterity.

Benjamin Disraeli, a Conservative, had two stints as British Prime Minister. His first ministry lasted for most of 1868 before suffering a significant General Election defeat by William Gladstone's Liberal Party, while his second, more successful, period in office lasted from 1874 to 1880. Notable successes of his second ministry include improvements to working conditions for factory workers, living conditions for the working classes, public sanitation and education. He was also responsible for the Royal Titles Act of 1876 that bestowed the title of "Empress of India" on Queen Victoria. Outside of politics, Disraeli's literary works include 'Vivian Grey', 'Coningsby' and 'Sybil'.

Answer: Andrew

Andrew Jackson was a senior military leader before he became US President in 1829. In his military career he was best-known for defeating British forces in the Battle of New Orleans, the final engagement of the War of 1812 and for successfully invading Florida in 1818 during the First Seminole War. Jackson served two full terms as US President and was the first member of the Democrat Party to be elected to the office. His politics and policies resulted in some polarisation of historical views of his presidency. His Indian Removal Act of 1830 that resulted in dozens of different Native American groups being relocated from their homelands has been much criticised, while his patriotism and efforts to reduce government corruption and promote democracy have been lauded.

Andrew Bonar Law (who is often simply referred to as Bonar Law) was the British Prime Minister from October 1922 to May 1923. He was a member of the Conservative Party and took over as both party leader and Prime Minister upon the collapse of the previous government - a coalition between the Conservatives and the Liberal Party, led by David Lloyd George. Much of Bonar Law's time in office was dominated by the question of the payment and collection of various First World War debts. However, he was then diagnosed with throat cancer and forced to resign when his ill health meant he was no longer able to speak in parliament. He died five months after leaving office; the somewhat unkind description of "the Unknown Prime Minister" is believed to be derived from a remark made at his funeral by the former Prime Minister H.H. Asquith.

Answer: John

John Fitzgerald Kennedy became the second-youngest US President in history and the first Roman Catholic US President when he took office in January 1961. The early 1960s were dominated by the Cold War and communism and many of the most well-known events of Kennedy's short time in office relate to that conflict. These include the failed attempt in April 1961 to overthrow the Cuban government of Fidel Castro in the incident known as the Bay of Pigs Invasion and the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 when the USSR set up ballistic missiles in Cuba. Kennedy's assassination by Lee Harvey Oswald in Dallas in November 1963 was one of the major historical events of the 20th century and remains the subject of numerous conspiracy theories and historical debates.

John Russell had two periods in office as British Prime Minister; the first lasted from 1846 to 1852 and included his controversial policies that failed to provide sufficient help to the Irish population during the famine that resulted from the prolonged failure of the country's potato crop between 1845 and 1849. He was raised to the House of Lords as Earl Russell in 1861, so his short second ministry from 1865 to 1866 is recorded under that title. Despite his actions with regard to the Irish Famine, Russell's time in politics (albeit before he got the top job) also included achievements such as the Reform Act of 1832 and support for Catholic emancipation. Charles Dickens (a known champion of the working classes in Victorian England) dedicated his famous novel 'A Tale of Two Cities' to Russell.

Answer: Herbert

Herbert Hoover (not to be confused with J. Edgar Hoover of the FBI) was US President from 1929 to 1933 - a period of history synonymous with the economic difficulties and subsequent deprivation of the Great Depression. The Wall Street Crash took place just over six months after Hoover's inauguration and none of Hoover's economic policies had any effect in alleviating the problems. As a result Hoover was soundly defeated by Franklin D. Roosevelt when he campaigned for re-election in 1932. As the Great Depression took effect, many hundreds of thousands of ordinary Americans lost their jobs and homes and ended up living in shanty towns built in public spaces in cities across the country. Famous examples of these slums included a massive one in St. Louis and eight separate ones that developed in Seattle. They soon became known as 'Hoovervilles' - a clear indication of who most people felt was responsible for their problems.

Herbert Henry Asquith (who was generally known as H. H. Asquith during his political career) was the British Prime Minister on the outbreak of the First World War in 1914, having held the office since 1908. British and Allied losses in the first two years of the war (which included the disastrous Dardanelles Campaign and losses on the Western Front) along with difficulties at home such as the Easter Rising in Ireland in 1916, led to the fall of Asquith's coalition government and his replacement as Prime Minister by his fellow Liberal, David Lloyd George.