Wilsonian
Progressivism
The Election of 1912 had several
candidates:
Taft
Wilson
TR
Eugene Debs
Taft: Republican Party Platform
High import tariffs.
Put limitations on female and child labor.
Workman’s Compensation Laws.
Against initiative, referendum, and recall.
Against “bad” trusts.
Creation of a Federal Trade Commission.
Stay on the gold standard.
Conservation of natural resources because they are finite.
T.R. “Bull Moose” Progressive Party Platform
Women’s suffrage.
Graduated income tax.
Inheritance tax for the rich.
Lower tariffs.
Limits on campaign spending.
Currency reform.
Minimum wage laws.
Social insurance.
Abolition of child labor.
Workmen’s compensation.
Eugene Debbs: The Socialist Party Platform
“The issue is Socialism versus Capitalism. I am for Socialism because I
am for humanity.”
Government ownership of railroads and utilities.
Guaranteed income tax.
No tariffs.
8-hour work day.
Better housing.
Government inspection of factories.
Women’s suffrage.
Woodrow Wilson: Democratic Party Platform
Government control of the monopolies
 trusts in general were bad
 eliminate them!!
Tariff reduction.
One-term President.
Direct election of Senators.
Create a Department of Labor.
Strengthen the Sherman Anti-Trust Act.
Did NOT support women’s suffrage.
Opposed to a central bank.
Election Results
Wilson was a minority president, with only 41% of the popular
votes.
The 1912 election marked the peak of the Socialist movement in
America: the Socialists elected over 1,000 to state and local offices.
Wilson became the first Southerner (Virginia)
to be elected president since the Civil War.
After his election, the moralistic, self-righteous
Wilson told the chairman of the Democratic
Party: "Remember that God ordained that I
should be the next president of the United
States.” Wilson sympathized with the
Confederate’s attempt to win its independence,
and his foreign policy was based on “selfdetermination.”
Foreign Policy
Wilson began as something of an isolationist in
foreign policy. He apologized to Colombia for the
U.S. role in Panama's independence; and he
appointed the pacifistic William Jennings Bryan
as secretary of state. But he would later vow to
teach Latin Americans lessons in democracy. This
was Wilson’s “moral diplomacy”: Wilson would
deal only with those leaders he thought were
democratically elected or otherwise supported
American interests.
Only a week after taking office in 1913, Wilson
called upon Mexico's president, Huerta, who had
seized power after the constitutional president was
murdered, to step aside when elections were held.
When Huerta refused, Wilson used minor
incidents--including the arrest of some American
sailors in Tampico and the arrival of a German
merchant ship carrying supplies for Huerta--as a
pretext for occupying the Mexico port of Veracruz.
Within weeks, Huerta was forced to leave his
country.
During the conflict, the Mexican revolutionary Pancho
Villa had made a number of raids into U.S. territory near
the Mexican border. Wilson responded by ordering Gen.
John J. (Black Jack) Pershing to cross into Mexico.
As president, Wilson also sent American troops to occupy
Haiti in 1915 and the Dominican Republic in 1916. A year
later, the United States bought the Virgin Islands,
thereby gaining control of every major Caribbean island
except British Jamaica. He engaged in more military
interventions abroad than any other American president.
Economic Policy
The Underwood Simmons Tariff (1913), which substantially
lowered taxes on imports for the first time since the Civil War.
The Federal Reserve Act (1913), which established a Federal
Reserve Board and 12 regional Federal Reserve banks to
supervise the banking system, setting interest rates on loans to
private banks and controlling the supply of money in circulation.
The Federal Trade Commission Act (1914), which established
the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The FTC sought to
preserve competition by preventing businesses from engaging in
unfair business practices.
Clayton Act Anti-Trust Act (1914), which limited the
ownership of stock in one corporation by another,
implemented non-competitive pricing policies, and
forbade interlocking directorship for certain banking
and business corporations. It also recognized the right of
labor to strike and picket and barred the use of antitrust statutes against labor unions.
Interlocking directorship: the practice of members of a
corporate board of directors serving on the boards of
multiple corporations.
The Child Labor Act (1916), which forbade the interstate
sale of goods produced by child labor; and
The Farm Loan Act (1916), which made it easier for
farmers to get loans.
The Adamson Act (1916), which established an eighthour workday for railroad workers.
The Workingmen's Compensation Act (1916), which
provided financial assistance to federal employees injured
on the job.
Civil Rights
Wilson’s record on race relations was not very good.
During his first term in office, the House passed a law
making racial intermarriage a felony in the District of
Columbia. His new Postmaster General also ordered that
his Washington offices be segregated, with the Treasury
and Navy soon doing the same. Suddenly, photographs
were required of all applicants for federal jobs. When
pressed by black leaders, Wilson replied, "The purpose of
these measures was to reduce the friction. It is as far as
possible from being a movement against the Negroes. I
sincerely believe it to be in their interest."
When Wilson allowed his cabinet members to segregate
government offices, William Monroe Trotter, a civil rights leader,
led a delegation to meet with the president and protest this
discriminatory policy. Wilson's explanation, that "segregation
was caused by friction between the colored and white clerks, and
not done to injure or humiliate the colored clerks, but to avoid
friction," infuriated Trotter. After the shouting match that
followed, Trotter was ordered out of the White House. Trotter then
did what Wilson considered unforgivable. Standing on the White
House grounds, he held a press conference and detailed what had
just happened. A Wilson supporter in 1912, Du Bois now sided
with Trotter. In Du Bois' view, Wilson "was by birth . . . unfitted
for largesse of view or depth of feeling about racial injustice."
World War I
At the outbreak of the war, the official foreign policy was
neutrality, and the isolationist Americans felt, “snug,
smug, and secure,” but not for long.
In 1914, America was in an economic recession, but
during American “neutrality,” but JP Morgan advanced
the Allies 2.3 billion dollars, and America attempted to
trade with both sides.
British ships began forcing American vessels into their
ports to prevent trade with Germany.
Germany retaliated with a U-boat war off the British
Isles.
The Lusitania, a passenger ship sailing from New York
to London, was sunk off the coast of Ireland on May 7,
1915. Almost 1200 lives were lost, including 128
Americans.
The Lusitania was carrying 4200 cases of small arms
ammunition, and the Germans had given a warning that
they would sink the ship.
Wilson refused to engage Germany in war, but in 1916,
when a French ship, the Sussex, was sank, Wilson gave
an ultimatum: sink another ship and face America in
war.
Re-Election
The Progressives wanted TR to run again, but he
thought he would split the ticket and so did not run,
killing the Progressive Party.
The Republicans ran Charles Evans Hughes, Supreme
Court justice and former governor of New York.
The Republicans criticized the progressive reforms of
Wilson and his foreign policy.
Wilson’s campaign slogan was, “He kept us out of war.”
The East voted for Hughes, but the rest of the country
carried Wilson: 277 to 254 electoral votes.