Wilson Faces World War in 1916
THE CANDIDATES
Woodrow Wilson, the incumbent Democratic President, was renominated with
the slogan “He kept us out of war.” He was
renominated by a vote of 1092 to 1, with
Thomas Marshall as his running mate
again.
Charles Evans Hughes, the reform governor of New York, resigned his position
as a U.S. Supreme Court justice in order
to become the Republican candidate for
President. Charles W. Fairbanks was
selected as the Vice-Presidential candidate.
THE CAMPAIGN
1. The election was one of the closest in U.S. history. Early returns indicated Hughes
would win. However, in the end, Wilson won the electoral vote by carrying California
by a mere 3,800 votes.
2. Hughes went to bed election night thinking he had won. When a reporter called to
ask about Hughes’s reaction to the election, his valet said, “The President has retired.”
The reporter responded with, “When he wakes up tell him he is no longer President.”
THE ISSUES
Wilson (Democrat)
Hughes (Republican)
Foreign
Against U.S. involvement in World War I
Wanted greater respect for American
neutrality
Economic
For eight-hour workday
Against union protection
Social
For women’s suffrage
Moderate support for labor
★
Warren G. Harding, senator from Ohio,
was picked by Republican leaders in a
Chicago hotel room after the convention
became deadlocked. Governor Calvin
Coolidge was his running mate.
James M. Cox, governor of Ohio, was
chosen as the Democratic candidate with
Franklin D. Roosevelt as the Vice-Presidential candidate.
THE CAMPAIGN
1. Harding ran a front-porch campaign. He delivered speeches from his home in
Marion, Ohio.
2. In contrast to Harding’s style, Cox traveled more than twenty-two thousand miles
across the nation giving speeches.
3. Neither candidate discussed the controversial issue of prohibition despite the passage
of the Eighteenth Amendment in 1919.
4. The election was the first in which all women in the U.S. could vote for President.
THE ISSUES
Harding (Republican)
Cox (Democrat)
Foreign
Against the League of Nations
For U.S. support for the League
Economic
For higher tariff, reduced income taxes
For Wilson’s program
Social
For restricted immigration
For labor improvements
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QUOTES & CUSTOMS
War Message “The world must be made
safe for democracy.”
Mowing the Lawn To release White
House groundskeepers for the war effort,
the Wilsons kept sheep on the White
House lawn to eat the grass. Those same
sheep were shorn, and $100,000 was given
the Red Cross from the sale of their wool.
Fourteen Points When Georges Clemenceau learned about Wilson’s Fourteen
Points, he exclaimed, “Le bon Dieu Wavait
que dix!” [“The good Lord only had ten!”]
THE LESSONS
1. This campaign showed the important
role that foreign affairs can play in
American politics.
2. Campaign slogans do not always predict
the future. Within six months of the
election, Wilson asked Congress to
declare war on Germany.
Harding Turns to Normalcy in 1920
THE CANDIDATE
★
★
QUOTES & CUSTOMS
Normalcy “America’s present need is
not heroics but healing, not nostrums but
normalcy; not revolution but restoration.”
Qualifications “I am not fit for this office and never should have been here.”
Ohio Gang Harding’s friends met regularly to play poker and dispense jobs and
favors. After Harding’s death, numerous
scandals were revealed. Harding’s involvement is difficult to know because his wife
destroyed all his papers after his death.
THE LESSONS
1. The election of 1920 indicated a public
rejection of Wilson’s idealism.
2. After the stress of war, people wanted to
return to a simpler way of life. They had
tired of progressive crusades.
Copyright © by McDougal Littell, a division of Houghton Mifflin Company.
★
Presidential images © Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division
3/2/05 9:31:01 AM