WASHINGTON, DC

“I’m sick and tired of reading how we’re planning another ‘hundred days’ of miracles,” griped John F. Kennedy before assuming the presidency. The sentiment made its way into his inaugural address, albeit in a more stirring manner: “All this will not be finished in the first 100 days. Nor will it be finished in the first 1,000 days, nor in the life of this administration.”

A recurrent trope of American politics is to scour the actions of the first 100 days of a new president’s administration and compare it, usually unfavourably, with the productivity of the first 100 days of Franklin Roosevelt’s presidency (in which he managed to pass 76 pieces of legislation, 15 of them country-changing). The exercise is both arbitrary and imperfect: presidents with early legislative successes tend to have more later on in their term, but it is hardly a guarantee. Nonetheless, it is still a test that White Houses past and present torture themselves over. Lyndon Johnson ordered his congressional liaison to “jerk out every damn little bill you can and get them down here by the 12th”. “On the 12th you’ll have the best 100 days,” Johnson boasted. “Better than [fdr] did!” Joe Biden’s administration is no different.

One year ago, when enthusiasm was difficult to detect from even his keenest supporters, the comparisons with Roosevelt would have seemed absurd. And yet here they are. “Biden is off to an excellent start—arguably, one of the best since Roosevelt,” writes David Gergen, a former adviser to four presidents of both parties.