Four Causes of WWI (in Europe)
1. Militarism
Germany competing to
have a bigger navy.
•2. Alliances
•Countries made pacts
to support each other
in the event of war.
•3.Imperialism
•Germany wanted to
expand influence and
compete with England.
•4.Nationalism
•Belief in nat’l
superiority
•Independence
movements in old
empires.
In 1914, the British Empire covered
about ¼ of the world’s land and ruled
over about 1/5 of it’s population.
US policy of neutrality.
In what ways was the US not particularly neutral before entering the war?
Wilson wanted friendly foreign relations.
US wanted to sell materiel and keep peace with
both sides; US was funding both sides of the war.
Isolationism: US did not want to get drawn into
foreign conflict
US had nothing to gain
Keep America Safe!
High cost of war.
Lusitania and Submarine Warfare
•Lusitania 1915
•British Passenger ship
sunk, killing civilians.
•US threatened
Germany if they did
not end unrestricted
Submarine Warfare.
•Held weapons
shipments.
•Unrestricted
Submarine Warfare
•If UK can be cut off by
sea, they would starve
and exit war.
•Germany pledged to
stop indiscriminate
sinking of civilian
ships.
Zimmermann Telegram
Decoded in January, 1917: Shared with US at
end of February. England waited to share
intelligence to make US more likely to join war;
to hide UK spying capability from Germans.
Germany proposed plan to get Mexico to enter
war against US
Wilson showed Congress  US declares war in
April.
Mexico might want to join war: Pancho Villa and
Vera Cruz.
Woodrow Wilson
•Insists on “open door”  to make the world safe
for democracy.
•1918 – endorses women’s suffrage as vital for
winning the war. (by 1917, 16 states had given women
the right to vote).
•Obsessive fear of disloyalty:
–Espionage Act (900 people sentenced to prison during
war)
–Sedition Act
–Selective Service Act
–Trading with the Enemy Act
–Alien Enemies Act
–Alien Act
US Cavalry invading Mexico in pursuit of Pancho Villa in
1916.
Trade and Economics
Making the World Safe for Democracy
•US spent $32 billion (52% of GNP).
•Money raised for war with taxes and War Bonds
(like savings bonds), and sales of public land.
•US trading with both sides of war; UK
blockaded US ships from going to Germany. US
could not access German markets  traded
with UK instead.
•US loaned $2bil to UK by 1917 (if UK lost war,
US would not get $back)
Trade and Economics
•In 1917, the estimated cost of the war was $3.5
billion.
–Actual cost: $35 billion & 116,516 US soldiers.
•The US had loaned $2 billion to Britain and
France before entering the war, compared to
$27million to Germany.
Tax Base
•Before the war, most of the government’s revenue
came from tariffs.
•In 1917, the War Revenue Act was passed,
imposing an “excess profits levy” as high as 60%.
–Fed. Revenue went from $930 million in 1916 to
$4,388 million in 1918
•The personal exemption for income tax went from
3,000 – 1,000
•Tax on earnings above $500,000 went from 7% to
77%
–Thus the income tax became the most important
source of federal revenues.
4. Demographics
• Fertility rates (# of kids born): drastically
dropped during war  “Baby Boom”
• Portion of men dropped, making recovery
slower.
Demographics
•1/3 of Americans were 1st or 2nd generation
Germans.
–These 8 million Germans and another 4 million
Irish did not love England.
•National Defense Act of 1916 expanded Army
from 90,000 to 175,000
–While Wilson was still maintaining a policy of
neutrality, a draft was instituted to expand the army.
African Americans in WWI
• Four all-black regiments in the army.
• Very few African Americans saw combat: most
were labor batallions.
• All-Black regiments not sent overseas.
• Unequal treatment from other parts of army.
• First Africans sent overseas as part of service
unit.
US Army
•1917: US Army was the 7th largest in the world.
Equipped with old weapons and only had a day and a
half of ammunition in reserve.
–Spring, 1917: Army + Nat’l Guard =379,000
–End of War: 3.7 million
•Early summer, 1917: token American forces and the
French Army was plagued by mutinies.
•March, 1918: 300,000 Americans in France
•November, 1918: over 2 million!
•(1,400,000 of them saw action)
•367,000 African American troops
WWI and Women
•-
Free Speech
in times of war
WWI Ends the Progressive Era
-
World War and the death of
Progressive Party
•By 1916, Progressives became extremely
committed to the defense of national honor,
nationalism, and opposition to Wilson. But,
imperialism and militarism replaced old liberal
formulas of protest, and within a year, the party
was dead.
•War was justified with progressive rhetoric and on
progressive terms.
–Discredited progressive language – morals and ideals
–Guaranteed that anti-war reactions would be antiprogressive.
US Reaction to the
Russian Revolution of 1917
•-
Human cost of WWI
•10 million military and 7 million civilians were
killed in the war. (~ 117,000 Americans).
•20 million died of hunger and disease related to
war.
–Spanish Flu killed 600,000 Americans in 1918 and
1919.
National War Labor Board
NWLB
•To mediate disputes, recognize fair wages and
hours, collective bargaining.
•War Labor Policies Board
–Set standards for federal employees
Neutrality?
•William Jennings Bryan: Wilson practiced a
false neutrality by allowing US passengers on
ships that we know might be sunk. The ships are
not neutral.
5. Wilson, WWI and Progressivism
Civil Society on the eve of war
1913 Armory Show,
Chicago
$45,000 worth of paintings sold!
Duchamp’s Nude
descending a
Staircase
(or, explosion in a shingle factory)
Wassily Kadinsky – Improvisation #27 – Garden of Love
Matisse’s work was chosen by
students at Chicago's Art
Student's League as the most
appalling and blasphemous
pictures in the exhibition. The
charges brought against him
were "artistic murder, pictorial
arson, artistic rapine, total
degeneracy of color, criminal
misuse of line, general aesthetic
abberation, and contumacious
abuse of title“
Troubled by the public’s
reaction to his work, Matisse
said in an interview:
"Oh do tell the American
people that I am a normal man;
that I am a devoted husband
and father, that I have three
fine children, that I go to the
theatre!"
Meanwhile, in Europe, the press had
been paying attention to the Caillaux
affair. Joseph Caillaux, former premier
and current minister of finance and
radical socialist leader in France was
accused of high crimes and
misdemeanors.
His wife was enraged by how the press
had destroyed his career. She decided
to solve the problem by buying a gun
and killing the responsible journalist.
When news arrived of the
assassination of the Archduke Franz
Ferdinand in Serbia, it seemed only a
brief distraction from the Calliaux trial.
How did the war affect the Economy?
•-- Unions
•-- Wages
•-- Production
•-- Taxes
How do you think the war affected
politics?
WWI killed 10 million in battle
2 million died of hunger related to war
Efforts to save grain led to the 19th
Amendment– prohibition.
1915-1918: the real income of farmers
grew 30%
$20 billion were raised with Liberty Bonds
Bernard Baruch, head of the
War Industries Board (WIB)
Women working in a shipyard, 1918
1918, the government wanted to
encourage women to work on farms
to keep food production up.
Women in the Workforce
Wartime policies and economic changes wound
up killing progressivism, even though progressives
were in power. Why do you think?
Red Scare
•Russian Revolution causes fear of communism
in America.
•US passes laws to crack down against socialists.
Peace Conference
at
Versailles
•One reason Wilson wanted to join the war, was
to participate in the peace conference.
–14 Points: US goals in peace
•Free Trade in Europe
•Self Determination (Countries can choose their own
form of Gov’t, but not for colonies)
•League of Nations
–Republicans feared that it would force the US into another
foreign war.
–US never joined.