What Joe Biden Can Learn From Studying Presidential History

President Donald Trump and President-elect Joe Biden are quite different from each other. It is obvious in their personalities and in their policy positions. So, we can reasonably assume that their White House management styles will also be radically different. One thing is for sure: No matter how the new administration is managed, there will be some internal conflict.

That’s one of the many lessons I learned from Tevi Troy’s 2020 book, Fight House: Rivalries in the White House from Truman to Trump. The book was named one of the best political books of 2020 by The Wall Street Journal. Troy is a historian who has written many books about the presidency. This one is particularly entertaining, though, at times, disheartening. While many of us have shaken our heads in disapproval and dismay at the open chaos and infighting in Trump’s White House, Troy reveals some of the other epic battles in the modern White House.

The reasons behind the fights are numerous. Some were the product of Cabinet members butting heads with White House staff. There were, for instance, the intense conflicts that occurred during the Kennedy presidency between then-Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson and the president’s brother-slash-attorney general, Robert “Bobby” Kennedy. The two men hated each other and would sometimes end