President Reagan

As president, Reagan implemented sweeping new political and economic initiatives. His policies, dubbed “Reaganomics,” advocated reducing tax rates to spur economic growth, controlling the money supply to reduce inflation, deregulation of the economy, and reducing government spending.

In his first term he survived an assassination attempt, took a hard line against labor unions, and ordered military actions in Grenada. He was reelected in a landslide in 1984, proclaiming it was “Morning in America.”

His second term was primarily marked by foreign matters, such as the ending of the Cold War, the 1986 bombing of Libya, and the revelation of the Iran-Contra Affair.  Reagan supported anti-Communist movements worldwide and spent his first term forgoing the strategy of détente by ordering a massive military buildup in an arms race with the USSR. Reagan negotiated with Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev culminating in the INF Treaty and the decrease of both countries’ nuclear arsenals.

Reagan left office in 1989.