What Presidents Wear

When the Duke of Wellington fought the Battle of Waterloo, he did not wear a resplendent uniform. He wore, as Paul Johnson reminds us, “dark blue civilian dress.” He was, you may say, sending a message about military might. Victory in battle is all very well, but after it’s over, we are going home to peacetime pursuits.

At the Potsdam Conference immediately after World War II, he relates

[Prime Minister Churchill] appeared in Royal Air Force uniform, one of his favorites. Marshal Stalin, as he liked to call himself, appeared in the white full dress uniform of a Marshal of the Red Army. But... Harry S Truman... wore a neat blue civilian suit.

Harry Truman served in World War I and in the reserves thereafter, but US Presidents do not wear uniform while in office. It sends an important message about the role of the commander-in-chief. The president is a civilian, and the United States believes in civilian control of the military.

But when the president visits the troops theses days, he does wear uniform. It is interesting to realize what that uniform is. Typically, it features a baseball cap—often emblazoned with the insignia of the unit or the ship he is visiting—and a baseball warmup jacket.

When the president visits the troops, he dresses like a baseball coach.

That’s an interesting message to send to the world. Think of the President of the United States as a kind of jumped-up baseball coach.