Wilson to Modern America
The push to establish the US as a
world power
Woodrow Wilson
• Presidential Election of 1912
Wilson only 41% of the popular
vote.
Wilson regarded himself as a the
personal representative of the
people.
Wilson was familiar with war and
he was not a supporter of
conflict.
President of Princeton, 1902
Campaigned on the slogan of “New
Freedom” supporting individual
liberty and States’ rights.
New Freedom
Battle on the “Triple Wall of
Privilege: The tariff, the
banks and the trusts”
Underwood Tariff Act
Federal Reserve Act
Federal Trade Commission
Act
Clayton Antitrust Act
Unique delivery of legislation
• Wilson was the first President since Jefferson
to personally deliver his message to Congress.
• Wilson’s eloquent, effective and aggressive
leadership spurred the passage of his “New
Freedom” Legislation.
Important New Freedom
Legislation
• The Federal Farm Loan
Act of 1916
• The Warehouse Act of
1916
• La Follette’s Seaman Act
• Workingmen’s
Compensation Act
• Child Labor Act
• Adamson Act 1916
Wilsonian Foreign Policy
• Wilson was not a fan
of imperialism
Situations:
Mexico – Pancho Villa
Haiti
Dominican Republic
Virgin Islands
ABC Powers
The Coming Storm
• Assassination of
Archduke Ferdinand
and his wife Sophie
• Tangled Web of
Alliances
• The long night in
Europe
America Remains Neutral
• “Neutral in thought as
well as deed”
• War pulls the US
economy out of
recession
• Uboat as a
development to fight
economic warfare
• Sussex Pledge
US involvement in the War to
End All Wars
• January 22, 1917 – Peace without victory address
• January 31, 1917 – Unlimited/Unrestricted
submarine warfare.
• Zimmerman Telegram
• Red Revolution – Fall of the Tsars
• April 2, 1917 – Wilson asks for a declaration of
war, declaration is granted 4 days later.
War in France
• The war exacted a heavy toll at home and abroad
– Labor and preparedness
• Draft – Conscription was the only way the US
was going to develop the manpower necessary to
win
• Russian Revolution and Russian withdrawal as a
force spurred US intervention in Europe.
• John Pershing
14 Points
• Foreign Diplomacy and idealism
• Wilson was born and raised in the South
during the Civil War, he did not like
conflict
• WWI represented an opportunity to
increase democratic values around the
world, represented in the League of
Nations.
Interwar years
• Flappers
• Economic Boom to
Bust
• Margin buying of
equities
• Women’s Suffrage
• Automobile
• KKK
• Labor unrest
Onset of WWII
• Causes of WWII: Rise of Dictators,
Economic Nationalism, Imperialist
Expansion, Appeasement
• German War Reparations
• World Economic Crisis – Overproduction
• Crashing prices the agricultural effect and
its impact on solvency
US into WWII
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Everything short of war policy
Lend-Lease
Atlantic Charter
Arsenal for Democracy
Pearl Harbor
War in Europe – Allies and Axis
Pacific
Atomic bomb
End of the war
Holocaust