In the following table, columns 1 & 2 are the president and his last year in office, columns 3 & 4 are the debt and (estimated) population for that year (from the websites shown below), and column 5 is the computed per-person share of the U.S. National debt in that year's dollars. The numbers are correlated to the year, but not the day (i.e., President Clinton left office in January of 2001, the debt number is from 09/30/2001, and the population estimate is from 1 July).
I considered, but ultimately rejected, another column showing the debt share in 2006 dollars because the several internet-based inflation calculators I consulted gave different results. However it is interesting to consider that in 1901 an ounce of gold cost (roughly) the per-person share of the debt, while today the per-person share is (about) 51 ounces of gold.
Some might argue that it isn't fair to blame the president for the debt. I agree that congress is partly (or mostly) to blame; however, the president is responsible because of his ability to veto. And yes, he can line item veto simply cross out the offending lines and veto the entire bill (with a note to congress that the bill will be signed after the offending lines are removed). Whether the fault is the president or congress, would honorable men (and women) vote (and sign) for such indebtedness?
President (1)
Year (2)
Debt (3)
Population (4)
Share (5)
Bush
2006
8,348,224,303,886
295,734,134
$28,229
Clinton
2001
5,807,463,412,200
284,796,887
$20,392
Bush
1993
4,411,488,883,139
257,782,608
$17,113
Reagan
1989
2,857,430,960,187
246,819,230
$11,577
Carter
1981
1,028,729,000,000
229,465,714
$4,483
Ford
1977
718,943,000,000
220,239,425
$3,264
Nixon
1974
492,665,000,000
213,853,928
$2,304
Johnson
1969
368,225,581,254
202,676,946
$1,817
Kennedy
1963
309,346,845,059
189,241,790
$1,635
Eisenhower
1961
296,168,761,215
183,691,481
$1,612
Truman
1953
275,168,120,129
160,184,192
$1,718
Roosevelt
1945
258,682,187,410
139,928,165
$1,849
Hoover
1933
22,538,672,560
125,578,763
$179
Coolidge
1929
16,931,088,484
121,767,000
$139
Harding
1923
22,349,707,365
111,947,000
$200
Wilson
1921
23,977,450,553
108,538,000
$221
Taft
1913
2,916,204,914
97,225,000
$30
Roosevelt
1909
2,639,546,241
90,490,000
$29
McKinley
1901
2,143,326,934
77,584,000
$28
1. & (2) from http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/presidents/index2.html 3. from http://www.publicdebt.treas.gov/opd/opd.htm#history 4. from http://www.census.gov/popest/archives/1990s/popclockest.txt 5. computed per-person share of nation debt (in year specified dollars)
March 27, 2006