Ronald Reagan's term on this planet is almost up. Out of the public eye for some time, he's back in the news these days because his would-be assassin's long leash from confinement is getting longer. John Hinkley has exceptional privileges in custody that allow him considerable freedom. Reagan's daughter, Patti Davis, wrote an article in Time (April 17, 2000) that made an emotional plea to keep him locked up. However, there is more to Reagan than being a surviving president. His conservative, “family values” policies, shown clearly in his natal chart, are part of U.S. history now.

A Telling T-square

Perhaps the most revealing feature of Reagan’s horoscope is his T-square between the Sun, Moon and Jupiter. Reagan's Aquarius Sun forms a "T" with the opposition (180-degree angle) of his Taurus Moon in the Fourth House of home and family, and Jupiter in Scorpio in the Tenth House  of public image. This indicates that Reagan's home life, feelings and private relationships are very protected, while his public image is expressed through Jupiter—a planet of many guises.

The Moon in the Fourth House in Taurus shows Reagan's family values stance, and his rigid, home-team-like side. But, even within his own family, his anxiety and fear of heterodoxy manifested. There were many years in the Reagan family where his son, Ron, was not mentioned or acknowledged because he was a ballet dancer and gay.

The planet Jupiter, often called a benefic planet in old-style astrology books, has a profoundly sinister side to it. Jupiter/Zeus of the Greek pantheon was the moral arbiter and the head god of law, justice and dogma. His was a power greater than any other god's, and similarly, the astrological Jupiter lies at the root of our own belief systems, our own attitudes toward unorthodox or heterodox beliefs and ethics. In Reagan's chart, Jupiter lends a high moral tone, fundamentalist attitude, and a distinct dislike of foreigners, strangers and anything “different”—in short, anything that does not conform to his own beliefs, ethics and dogma.

Moon-Jupiter Projections

The Jupiterian inflation of a man in a high office of ethical and dogmatic power can run rampant when it is opposed to the Moon. His personal feelings and beliefs (Moon) are then projected out onto society and become collective ideals, visions and ethical and religious mores (Jupiter). His personal endorsement of right-wing moral majority politicians and supreme court justices during his reign as president brought the fundamentalist religious camp into high profile.

Reagan's Moon (feelings, instincts, family loyalties) in opposition to Jupiter (moral arbiter, law-maker, highest legal power in the land) has been played out in the course of his political career. Many may have forgotten Reagan's time as governor of California. It was under his rule that the teenagers and young adults at the institutes of higher learning, the universities, were threatened with violence.

A shocking headline came out in the San Francisco Chronicle in 1969: "Governor Reagan of California Declares a Bloodbath on the University Campuses.” Civil disobedience, in the context of constitutional rights, was being enacted by young, intelligent, concerned people, and the Aquarian governor declared all-out war against them. SWAT teams and the National Guard were placed on campuses around the U.S., culminating in the mass gassing, and finally the assassination of students at Kent State University—kids whose offensive weapons were ideologies and slogans on placards. The imprint remains in the minds of all who saw this on television or were present for the killings.

The Dark Side of Aquarius

One characteristic of Aquarius that is not about brotherhood and love is the icy-cold, distant, critical side. Aquarius is ruled by, or linked to, Uranus—a planet that has no human attributes, and no sense of humanitarianism. As a god-figure, Uranus was the sky itself, from where he coldly observed the animals of earth, and did not like them all. He only liked the ones in his own image. Now, the idealistic part of Aquarius states that it loves humanity, but in the personal sense, the human sense, there is a feeling of revulsion for the soft, vulnerable and imperfect natures of actual people. Reagan has this cool, brittle facade himself, a great lover of mankind, but only if they are members of his ideological clan.

The astrological ideal of "Aquarian humanitarian" is dealt another blow in Reagan's chart. His dismissal of environmental concerns during his presidency—his inability to see the world as a whole system—resulted in what environmentalists are saying today: that Reagan ignored the pollution problem in favor of a buffed up economy. Reagan exhibits the dark side of Uranus—love of only man-made things, and a distinct rejection of nature and natural laws.

The Sun-Moon-Jupiter Combination

So his Sun (purpose in life, ego and deep self), in square to the Moon-Jupiter opposition, expands the xenophobic and moralistic characteristics for which Reagan is well-known. The Sun in this tense aspect means that he really believed in his right to impose a moral, judicial and religious limit on the population. Indeed, in the autumn of 1982, he signed a law that would make the year 1983 the "Year of the Bible.” Which bible, I might ask?

It was the "Reagan years" that coined the term "moral majority,” and it is both Reagan and George Bush Senior who have attempted to limit the Senate and Supreme Court to fundamentalist Christian conservatives. Here is Jupiter at its most dark—it supports only those who ascribe to its doctrines, and crushes those who deviate.

These days, Reagan's small power and large influence is over. His slow sinking into senility personally is very unfortunate, but his legacy lives on in the shape of his political supporters and party members. Though it might be bedtime for Bonzo, his keepers are still well and strong, and full of Jupiterian moralistic, dogmatic fundamentalism.

Notes

A T-square is an aspect in which two planets are opposite each other, and another planet is at a 90-degree angle to that opposition. T-squares occur in signs of the same modality—cardinal, fixed and mutable—and are strong when the planets are within 6-8 degrees of each other. The cardinal signs, which direct energy forward, are Aries, Cancer, Libra and Capricorn; the fixed signs, which make foundations and hold their ground, are Taurus, Leo, Scorpio and Aquarius; and the mutable signs, which change to fit circumstances, are Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius and Pisces. Reagan's is a fixed T-square.

Advanced Notes For Astrology Students

Even with just transits and secondary progressions, we are looking at a time of completion for Reagan. Considering his status with Alzheimers and his age, the lineup of contacts is quite profound. Firstly, the transit of Uranus has been back and forth across his Sun, making stations on it twice, with a pass over it in the midst of the retrograde cycle. This is his release from his life-contract. Also, his progressed Ascendant (life-force, life-progress) is now conjunct his natal Saturn at 0 degrees Taurus.

The collection of planets in Taurus in early May, 2000, emphasizes the terminal aspect of the Fourth House, this house being home or the end of the matter. With Mars, Saturn and Jupiter all transiting his Moon and squaring his Sun in April and leading into May, his thread to life is likely very thin, and having had his third Saturn return this past year, it seems that time (Saturn) is bringing the inevitable transition.

Also, his progressed Mercury (the psychopompos, the soul guide, the Greek god who takes the souls of the dead to the underworld) is conjunct his Moon (going home) at 13 degrees Taurus, and the progressed Sun has just passed that point in the last six months. It is now just at 14 degrees. In benign deaths, and in many sudden deaths, Jupiter and Mercury are always strong—Jupiter for the long journey and Mercury as the guide for the soul's travel. So, his return to infancy in illness (Alzheimers is a regression back to the womb) is beautifully symbolized in his horoscope. And, the Fourth House is just that, it is both the womb and the tomb.