The concept of the "rhetoric presidency" has become an important device for drawing a qualitative distinction between nineteenth-century and twentieth-century behavior. The twentieth-century version of the rhetorical presidency drew heavily from the contemporary example of the presidency of Ronald Reagan. Some have suggested that Bill Clinton has altered the form of the rhetorical presidency to avoid many of its difficulties. But Clinton's particular deviations from the Reagan model have done less to transform the rhetorical presidency as previously understood than to bring it to fruition. Analysis of the rhetorical presidency is too often divorced from the broader institutional and political context of the office, with particular implications for understanding the Clinton presidency. The paper reexamines the rhetorical presidency and its link to the rise of the "modern presidency," and finds that the early Clinton administration underscores many of the original concerns of the rhetorical presidency literature.