Unit Two, Lecture Two: The United States as Neutrals
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When
war erupted in 1914, the United States attempted to remain neutral and
was a proponent for the rights of neutral states. Isolationist
foreign policy was encouraged by Congress's apprehensions about giving
other countries a political door into U. S. policies and the cultural
melting pot of the American population. Nevertheless, the United
States did eventually enter the war as the result of several events. In an attempt by both the allied and central powers to involve the Americans, the warring nations saturated the United States with propaganda. Much of the material had a pro-British slant which was aided by the connection to Britain as a "cultural brother" and the United States' concern with affairs in Western Europe. While propaganda sympathetic to Germany did also exist, it did not carry much weight with the American public. Most Americans saw Germany as a dangerous monarchy with autocratic militaristic thinking, including a hidden agenda to undermine democracy and U. S. power. There were allegations of industrial sabotage, poisoning water supplies, kidnapping individuals, and engaging in espionage within American labor unions by Germans to keep the United States busy on the home front. These rumors, along with extensive submarine warfare, added to the distrust of the Germans. Prior to 1915, German subs had a policy of warning and allowing time to evacuate ships carrying passengers before they sank them. However, in response to the British blockade of German ports cutting off vital supplies, the Germans declared a new policy of unrestricted submarine warfare in 1915. The German government published advertisements in American newspapers warning people not to travel aboard ships bound for the British Islands, which Germany declared a war zone where they would sink British ships without warning. However, many Americans ignored the warning and refused to accept any restrictions on their freedom to travel. So it was that on May 7, 1915, a British ship, the S. S. Lusitania, was sunk by a German submarine without warning off the coast of southern Ireland. 120 Americans were among the 1,000+ men, women, and children who died as the ship sank in two minutes. The sinking of the Lusitania outraged Americans, who had been fed a diet of pro-British propaganda depicting Germans as ruthless and cruel "Huns." The Germans defended their actions, claiming the British were shipping "contraband" war materials on a civilian liner. (The British denied it, but evidence uncovered years later indicated that the Lusitania had been carrying what the Germans labeled "war materiel.") In 1916, a German submarine sank another ship, the Sussex. These violations of the "neutral rights" of American citizens prompted many Americans, including former president Theodore Roosevelt, to demand an immediate declaration of war against Germany. President Woodrow Wilson found himself in an uncomfortable predicament. In 1912, he had pledged to serve only one term as president; however, as the situation in Europe worsened, he changed his mind and declared he would stand for a second term. That meant Wilson had to woo some disaffected voters, such as labor unions and the more liberal elements of the progressive movement, who felt Wilson's New Freedom had not gone far enough to satisfy the social goals of the reform movements, such as enacting an eight-hour work day or passing child labor laws. Many labor unionists opposed war on the Marxist grounds that it was a rich man's war designed to exploit the working classes, and so the latter should have nothing to do with it. Many Progressives were pacifists, opposed to war on principle (like Randolph Bourne). Also, many of the strongest supporters of progressive reform were women, who, though they could not yet vote, had a strong voice in lending their moral support to progressive causes, and many of them opposed the war on the grounds the lives of their husbands and sons. So Wilson had to pursue a contradictory policy of promising these voters he would not get the United States into the war, but also forced to protect U. S. interests by telling Germany that if it did not abandon unrestricted submarine warfare, the U. S. would sever diplomatic relations--a first step towards war. Luckily for Wilson, the Germans pledged to abandon unrestricted submarine warfare after the sinking of the Sussex (the Sussex pledge). In the meantime, Wilson helped pass the Adamson Act (a measure) favored by unions), which established an eight-hour work day for railroad employees engaged in interstate commerce, and changed his stance on child labor laws (a measure favored by women) by supporting a bill eventually passed by Congress, but later declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. Finally, Wilson campaigned by promising to keep the U. S. out of the war. These actions helped Wilson win re-election in 1916. Unfortunately for Woodrow Wilson, the Germans faced a different set of priorities. The German people were starving, thanks to the British blockade and the effects of the war. Marxists in Germany, like their counterparts in the U. S., opposed the war on principal. As the war dragged on with the victory promised by the generals always somewhere on the horizon, their opposition gained more credence among the German people, who pressured Parliament to find a way to end the war. Unfortunately, Kaiser Wilhelm and the German generals held the only real power in their hands, and they refused to consider surrender. |
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| Sources |
"The U-Boat War:
1914-1918," http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Parthenon/1871/ |
This page last updated September 26,
2005.
© Kahne Parsons 2006
© Kahne Parsons 2006