Re-Emergence of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s

In class on Tuesday, we discussed causes of the re-emergence of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s. I decided to go a little deeper and examine causes of this re-emergence, activities undertaken by the “new” clan, and the Klan’s ideology as a whole.

The 1920s were a decade of optimism in the United States. Business was booming, cities were thriving, and economic prosperity was abundant. However, the rapid change occurring in American society was met with opposition by many groups. In particular, this decade saw a reemergence in Ku Klux Klan membership.

The revival of the Klan began with the release of D.W. Griffith’s widely popular film, the Birth of a Nation. The film chronicles the relationship between two families during the Civil War, one pro-Union family and one pro-Confederacy family. In particular, the film was notable for it’s portrayal of African American men. The movie portrayed freedmen as sexually aggressive towards white women. It also depicted African Americans as good for little but subservient labor, and the Ku Klux Klan as a “heroic” police force.

This favorable portrayal of the clan prompted a huge resurgence in membership. By the mid 1920s, at the Klan’s peak, there were over four million members.  The initial targets of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s were African Americans, who many whites believed needed to be “put back in their place.”

The Klan’s message and core beliefs then began to shift, and they started targeting Jews, Catholics and immigrants. Agendas of the clan were molded by community conditions and concerns. Essentially, the clan became a conservative police force, dedicated to preserving values of “Old America.” Historian Leonard J. Moore sees the 1920s Klan as, “the story of a backward segment of American society, one trapped by economic insecurity, dying small-town ways, and an inability to adjust psychologically to the 'modern age'.”

The Klan organized to oppose the teaching of evolution in schools, they attempted to oppose spreading of birth control devices and informations, and tried to enforce prohibition. Many klan members confined their opposition tactics to things like burning crosses and marching in protests. However, violence was not uncommon, public whippings and lynchings occurred in many parts of America.

In the West and South, the Ku Klux Klan consisted largely of poor, rural fundamentalist Christians, who opposed non Western European immigrants, and despised the post war tolerance for loose morality. In particular, they opposed the foreign ideals brought in by non Western European immigrants.

It seems there were many causes for the re-emergence of the clan, notably the Birth of the Nation movie and the rapid industrial and urban changes occurring in American society. What do you think? How influential were things like the Birth of the Nation in increasing Ku Klux Klan membership?

Sources:

http://chnm.gmu.edu/courses/hist409/klan.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Birth_of_a_Nation

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/movies/2013/02/birth-of-a-nation-revisited.html

http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1381.html

Some Causes of the Great Depression

1. Over speculation
          As we learned in the documentary in class today, Americans in the 1920's started moving to a new form of payment: credit. In fact, 75% of American' household items were bough on credit. While credit did have some benefits, it also had some drawbacks, notably over speculation.
           Specifically, in the stock market, enterprising investors could buy millions of stocks on margin, meaning that they only had to pay 10% up front (they would pay off the rest of the loan when they sold the stock for a profit). The easiness of buying stocks led to rampant speculation which led to falsely high stock prices, and when the stock market began to tumble in the months leading up to the October 1929 crash, speculative investors couldn’t make their margin calls, and a massive sell-off began.
           The massive stock sell-off hit its peak on Black Tuesday of October 29, 1929 when over 16 million shares of stocks were sold. By the end of 1929, stockholders had lost $40 billion (WWI had cost about $32 billion).

2. Increased Tariffs
            The Fordney-McCumber Tariff of 1922 and the Hawley-Smoot Tariff of 1930 increased tariff rates to the highest it had ever been in the nation's peacetime history: 60%. While benefitting American business, the tariffs adversely affected the struggling European economies. Already debt stricken from the war, these high tariffs prevented the European countries from trading with the U.S. In response, the Europeans imposed their own tariffs which further dried up international trade and decreased markets for American goods.

3. Overproduction
            Fewer markets proved to be detrimental to U.S. businesses, especially considering the voluminous amount of goods they were producing. In a vicious cycle, too much money was going to the wealthy who invested the money into building more factories, which simply led to more production. Not enough money was going into wages and salaries, which meant less buying power for the average American and fewer markers. Essentially, the nation's ability to produce goods had outrun its capacity to consume them.

While these 3 problems contributed to the Great Depression, I am sure that there were many more. Please add on to the list by commenting below. 

Basic Outline of the Washington Disarmament Conference

The Washington Disarmament Conference was held from November 1921 to February 1922. Also commonly known as the Washington Naval Conference and the Washington Arms Conference. The conference was held in Washington which was called by President Warren Harding and was led by the U.S. Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes.

Cause:
Senator William Borah believed that the arms race between Britain, the U.S. and Japan needed to be slowed down, in order to avoid another war. Japan's militarism was gaining strength fast, which made Borah persuade Harding and Hughes to negotiate disarmament with both Japan and Britain. There was also tension among nations because of territories in the Far East and Harding and Hughes decided the best way to solve these conflicts was to hold a conference with eight other nations.  America's main goals were to keep the Japanese navy from expanding in west part of the Pacific Ocean, decide on naval restraints, and to resolve the tension in Eastern Asia.

Countries Involved:
-The United States (obviously)
-Great Britain
-France
-Japan
-Italy
-Belgium
-the Netherlands
-China
-Portugal

Great Britain, France, Japan and Italy were invited to discuss naval reduction and Belgium, the Netherlands, China and Portugal were invited to talk about the current tension in the Far East.

Outcome:
The Washington Naval Conference led to the creation of three major treaties: The Five-Power Naval Treaty, The Four-Power Treaty and the Nine-Power Treaty.

The Five-Power Naval Treaty: This treaty was based off of Hughes's idea of ship ratios. This gave the U.S., Great Britain, Japan, France and Italy a set amount of certain amount of battleship tonnage they could have. Both the U.S. and Great Britain could have 525,000 tons and Japan could have 315,000 tons. France and Italy were set to have the least at 175,000 tons.

The Four-Power Treaty: The Four-Power Treaty involved the U.S., Britain, France and Japan. These four countries agreed that if a future crisis happened in the Far East, they would consult each other first before taking action. This Treaty also eliminated the Anglo-Japanese alliance which was an agreement between the British and the Japanese. The U.S. wanted to get rid of the alliance because if they went to war with Japan, the British might have to join the Japanese side. By eliminating the Anglo-Japanese alliance and establishing The Four-Power Treaty, all countries involved agreed they would not be obligated to engage in a future conflicts between any of these four nations.

The Nine-Power Treaty: This agreement involving all nine nations at the conference, stated to globalize the Open Door Policy in China. All of the nations who signed the Treaty would keep the territorial boundaries in China and China would not refuse to let other nations do business in their country.

Presidents of the Roaring Twenties

While all three presidents (Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover) hailed from the Republican party, they each had subtle difference and goals. This blog will just provide a summary of the character and main policies of each one.

Warren G. Harding:

Character:
-Easygoing, gracious, and loving

-Unable to detect evil associates (appointed Albert Fall and Harry Daugherty, two corrupt men)

-Hated saying "no"

-Overwhelmed; allegedly said "God! What a job!"



Policies:
-Approved of a joint resolution with the Central Powers that declared the war officially ended

-Washington Disarmament Conference in 1922
-Five-Power Naval Treaty led to ship ratios

-Fordney-McCumber Tariff Law: boosted schedules from 27% (in 1913) to 38.5% (in 1922).

Harding died on a speechmaking tour in San Francisco on August 2, 1923. His vice president, Coolidge, took over.

Calvin Coolidge:
Character:
-Stern, honest, moral, industrious, and frugal New Englander

-"Silent Cal"

-mediocre powers of leadership

-boring speeches





Policies:
-Twice vetoed the McNary-Haugen Bill (a bill to help farmers by keeping the agricultural prices high by authorizing the government to buy up surpluses and selling them abroad)

-Half heartedly and unsuccessfully pursued further naval disarmament

-Skillfully negotiated with the Mexicans in 1926 over an oil dispute

Coolidge announced that he would not run in the 1928 presidential election. The obvious Republican nominee was Secretary of Commerce, Herbert Hoover.

Herbert Hoover:
Character:
-Was a poor orphan boy who went to Stanford and became a successful mining engineer

-Wanted to avoid foreign entanglements

-Believed in individualism, free enterprise, and small government

-Shy, standoffish, and stiff

-Talented in administration
Policies:
-Agricultural Marketing Act of 1929 was designed to help farmers, largely through producers' cooperatives

-The Hawley-Smoot Tariff of 1930 raised the average duty from 38.5% (in 1922) to 60%! It became the nation's highest protective tariff in the nation's peacetime history.

-During the depression, he had Congress appropriate $2.25 billion for useful public works such as the Hoover Dam

-He also established the Reconstruction Finance Corporation: assisted insurance companies, banks, agricultural organizations, railroads, and even local and state governmetns

-Refused to help the League in dealing with Japan's flagrant violation in invading Manchuria

-Withdrew U.S. troops from Haiti and Nicaragua


Hope this helps! If you feel like an important policy was left out, or you have some commentary to share, please comment below.

Reverting to Isolationism

Republican Warren Harding's victory in the presidential election of 1920 essentially pounded the final nail into the death coffin of the League of Nations. It also signaled the start of a decade that would be dominated by American isolationism.

Harding began his term by making peace with the Central Powers. Because the U.S. had rejected the Treaty of Versailles, America was still technically at war with Germany, Austria, and Hungary. Congress quickly resolved the problem, though, by passing a simple joint resolution that declared the war officially ended.

The Republicans then looked to downsize the world's navies at the Disarmament Conference in 1921-1922, held in Washington D.C. The Five-Power Naval Treaty set a definite ship ratio while the U.S. agreed to refrain from fortifying their Far Eastern Possessions, such as the Philippines.

President Calvin Coolidge continued along the lines of isolationism during his term as well. For example, when the Mexican government began to assert its sovereignty over oil resources in 1926, American oil companies called for a military expedition. Instead, the isolationist Coolidge defused the Mexican crisis with some skillful diplomatic negotiating.

Finally, President Herbert Hoover played the biggest role in completing the shift to isolationism. In 1931, Japanese imperialists lunged into Manchuria and shut down the Open Door pact in the conquered area. Meeting in Geneva, the League looked to punish Japan for its flagrant violation of the League covenant. Despite the League's pleas for American support, the U.S. flatly rebuffed the attempts. American newspapers retorted that America did not "give a hoot in a rain barrel" about who controlled Manchuria. In the end, isolationist America proclaimed in the Stimson doctrine that it would not recognize any territorial acquisitions that were achieved by force. This had very little impact on Japan.

Hoover also strove to step away from Roosevelt Corollary attached to the Monroe Doctrine. In 1932, he negotiated a treaty with Haiti which promised the withdrawal of U.S. troops within a couple years. In 1933, the last marine leathernecks sailed away from Nicaragua after a continuous stay of 20 years.

The real question now is whether or not isolationism was overall beneficial or harmful to the U.S. Proponents could argue that the new "Good Neighbor" policy in Latin America led to better relations while opponents could point out that the lack of action in Japan was a partial precursor to the Second World War. What do you think? Did the benefits of isolationism outweigh the harms?

Quick DBQ Fact Review Stuff

I’m v sorry this is so late, 5th period kids will probably find this more helpful

for all you last minute reviewers, here ya go.

LAST MINUTE/QUICK DBQ REVIEW SHEET

Paris Peace Conference 1919 in (shocker) Paris:

• Big 4:
• Italy:
• main guy: Vittorio Orlando
• wanted money and land
• England:
• main guy: David Lloyd George (guy with 3 first names)
• wanted to punish Germany
• France:
• main guy: George Clemenceau (the walrus who was actually the tiger)
• wanted to punish Germany
• US:
• main guy: Woodrow Wilson (hopefully y’all got this one)
• wanted to “heal wounds” and restore peace
• Potential Outside Info?!?!?!
• War Guilt Clause passed two things
• FORMALLY placed blame on Germany (this embarrassed the German people and this embarrassment+resentment will be manipulated by Hitler in later years)
• charged Germany with cost of the war 33 billion!!!!!!!!!!!
• this was not Wilson’s favorite thing, but he agreed to it in order to get his League of Nations
• Other general info things
• German Punishment
• military limited to 100k men
• 13% of territory lost
• $reparations$
• Occupation of Rhineland
• American Politics
• Wilson refused to compromise with reservationists like Henry Cabot Lodge resulted in his the refusal to ratify the Treaty of Versailles.
• Treaty of Versailles
• only had 4 of Wilsons 14 original points
• Some rad other stuff
• Espionage Act 1917 +Sedition Act of 1918
• enacted to keep Americans united in war effort
• Eugene V Debs arrested and convicted under violation of Sedition Act
• approx 1900 prosecuted, mostly anti-war socialists
• He hinted WEB Dubois might be on the DBQ so
• first black to get a PhD from Harvard
• demanded equal rights for blacks
• opposed by Booker T Washington
• former slave who was an accommodationist  
• PROGRESSIVE TRAITS
• anti concentration of power
• social cohesion
• social organizations
• assumptions
• optimistic outlook
• order+stability
• role of government=BIG
• initiatives: people can put own laws on ballot
• referendum: state govt passed a law so the people can overturn what was passed, if they didn’t like it
• direct primary: attempt of people to have say in nomination 17th Amendment!!!!!!
• senators elected by people of states
• 18th Amendment: prohibition
• 16th amendment: income tax

DBQ Outlines

Hey all -

I know you are all studying hard for the DBQ! Here are the outlines for Chapters 32 and 33...I found a site called WikiNotes (Google it) that is really awesome! They have great outlines for the 11th edition of The American Pageant, but aren't overwhelmingly long, as some can be. So here they are!

Enjoy!

Chapter 32: http://www.scrible.com/contentview/page/64G80104J6HK826204O5K2PS4GC002A7:55394444/index.html

Chapter 33: http://www.scrible.com/contentview/page/2KOO0905JK1K826204C5G1PS4KE0GIA2:55394440/index.html

Good luck!

Vocab List for the DBQ

Hello, friends. This is a brief vocabulary list based on information regarding the Paris Peace Conference and Wilson's Fourteen Points. Obviously, I don't know what the DBQ will be on, but based on Mr. Stewart's hints, I (and others I've consulted) think the DBQ is headed in this direction. Good luck!

Self determination: the idea that minorities within empire conglomerates (of the Central Powers, only) should be allowed to choose their own forms of government and their own way of living. This was primarily seen as a method of punishment of the Central Powers that had international colonial holdings.

League of Nations: the 14th of Wilson’s 14 points: the League of Nations was somewhat of an evolution of the Concert of Europe, except that it was on the international level. Basically, a bunch of the great powers in the world meet in a certain location and discuss things and decide on them. This is a precursor to the United Nations.

Sedition Act of 1918: an act passed by Congress before the end of World War I which claimed that if anybody spoke out against the government, they would be imprisoned indefinitely. Eugene V. Debs, a socialist spokesman, was imprisoned for opposing the war on moral grounds. Luckily, at the end of the war, many pardons were issued for arrests under the Sedition Act.

The Big Four: Vittorio Orlando (Italy), Georges Clemenceau (France), David Lloyd George (Britain) and Woodrow Wilson (US) did most of the negotiating at the Paris Peace Conference

Paris Peace Conference: held in Paris in 1919 where many of the conditions of the Treaty of Versailles were negotiated by the Big Four. Russia (recently experiencing a communist revolution) was not invited to the conference. Wilson lost some of his leverage at the conference because he was the only Big Four leader who did not command a congressional majority back home. The PPC ended with the issuing of the Treaty of Versailles.

The Treaty of Versailles: (1) mandates: colonial holdings were taken from former Central Power empires and were then nationalized and given to the League of Nations. Over due time, the League of Nations would call for self-determination of these mandated regions and they would become independent nations [this includes modern nations like Iran, Iraq and Israel] (2) Germany takes responsibility for the war and agrees to pay reparations for all countries involved [of course, it is unable to do that, and this causes the German economy to topple] (3) Italy wants Yugoslavian holdings but is denied (4) Japan wants German holdings in China but is denied; it is given control of certain island colonies in the Pacific, though (5) Rhineland occupied (6) Alsace and Lorraine returned to France

Senate Foreign Relations Committee: Remember, Wilson negotiated the treaty, but he cannot ratify it… only Congress can ratify a treaty. When Wilson returns to America, many people are dissatisfied with the terms of the Treaty of Versailles and so they try and stall its passing.

Lodge Reservations: When Congress received the Treaty of Versailles, Lodge came up with fourteen “reservations” of the Treaty, one of which nullified Article X (which would morally oblige the US to respond when a foreign power is under attack). Wilson, hating Lodge and his provisions, ordered the Democratic party to vote against the Treaty of Versailles that included the Lodge provisos → this all culminates with the US NOT ratifying the Treaty of Versailles and rendering it (somewhat) powerless.

Closer Look at the Committee on Public Information

The Committee on Public Information was a huge part of American propaganda during World War I and could be argued that without this Committee there would have been barely any propaganda. Although we talked a little bit about this topic in class, I wanted to do some more research on the Committee on Public Information (also known as CPL). The main goal of the CPL was to obviously get the American people excited about the war and get all citizens involved in war efforts. It was established on April 13, 1917, less than a week after America entered the war. George Creel was the head of the committee, who was put in charge by President Woodrow Wilson.

Since the goal was to make the American people supportive of the World War, CPL would censor all of the information about the war released to the public. The committee would give newspapers and other forms of media "guidelines" to what stories could be published. Although these guidelines were considered "voluntary", CPL did enforce this and later helped to establish both the Espionage Act of 1917 and the Sabotage Act of 1918.

Creel also tried to get the word out there to the citizens that America entering the war was a good thing. One way he did this was by a group called the Four Minute Men. The Four Minute Men was a group of volunteers that went out into communities all over the US and made pro-war speeches. This group would most commonly speak in movie theaters or different types of meetings. These volunteers would give four-minute speeches about many different topics and encourage all American citizens to get involved. The Four-Minute Men was widely successful and according to Creel,more than 7.5 million speeches were given.

The Committee was getting their pro-war ideas out there through many different newspapers, articles, speeches and even cinema. However, Creel felt like something was missing. He wanted to find a way to get the citizens involved who did not read the newspaper or go to the movies. Creel ended up working with Charles Dana Gibson, an artist, and created many different types of pro-war posters. Many other artists also made posters for American propaganda as pro-war posters and billboards became extremely efficient at getting the people of the United States involved and for World War I. Overall, the Committee on Public Information was quite successful at creating different and unique ways to spread American Propaganda throughout the country.

Woodrow Wilson...war? Summary and closer look.

I imagine it must be an inconceivably difficult moral task for anyone to decide to lead their country into war; most of all for Woodrow Wilson.

Wilson was an idealist, and above all, he was a believer in America. While studying towards his PhD, Wilson’s doctoral dissertation was specifically centered on America’s congressional government. He had his own ideas about the system -- for example, he believed that the US should have a parliamentary system closer to Britain’s -- but nonetheless he focused his scholarly efforts on America.

After earning his PhD, Wilson started his career as an educator, and his resume boasts the names of colleges such as Cornell, Bryn Mawr, Wesleyan, New York Law School and Princeton. At all these schools, Wilson lectured on American political science. Wilson’s academic career was committed to the study of the American system, and when he became president in 1912, Wilson, like many presidents before him, had  notably little experience in foreign affairs.

In 1916, Wilson was up for reelection. His opponent, Hughes, was a fellow professor and ex-colleague at the New York Law School. The Democrats claimed that Hughes would throw America into the war. However Wilson did not openly say that he would avoid war. He knew that would be a difficult promise to uphold.

So how did Wilson, the American idealist, end up in front of Congress on April 2, 1917, somberly asking them to declare war on Germany?

It was inevitable. Despite Wilson’s constant attempts to make agreements with both the Allies and the Central Powers, the Kaiser’s dogged refusal of these agreements and numerous naval actions against American ships meant that Wilson had no choice but to declare war, going against every fiber of his body. The textbook would have you believe that Wilson’s subsequent message of a war to “make the world safe for democracy” was a tactic to convince wary Americans to support the war. But I think it was a little more than that -- I think Wilson also had to convince himself. He somehow had to justify to himself that by fighting in the Great War, he would be able to engineer the war to end all wars by spreading democratic ideals. He could not simply fight for peace.

Wilson attempted to live up to his moral justifications of war by crafting his Fourteen Points...but that’s for another blog post.

Do you think Wilson was fundamentally against war? Do you think he still could have avoided entering the war, or was it inevitable? What do Wilson’s actions -- entering the war, lead his country to support the war, and ultimately engineer an attempt at a  moral end to the war, despite his reluctance -- say about his leadership abilities?

EDIT: Fun fact -- Wilson learned German as part of his PhD studies. I wonder how he felt about kids angrily throwing away German books in support of the war he had reluctantly joined.

Eugene V. Debs

We discussed Eugene V. Debs and his arrest because of his opposition to WWI in class, so I thought I'd give some background as well as the details of his arrest.

Eugene V. Debs was born in Terre Haute, Indiana in 1855, the son of poor immigrants. He left school early to work on the railroads, where he joined the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen and later co-founded the Industrial Workers of the World. He would lead the American Railway Union to challenge the federal troops sent to end the Pullman Strike of 1864, and was subsequently jailed for six months. After his release, Debs rose to become a key speaker for the socialist party, and ran for president in 1900. He reached the peak of popularity in the election of 1912, in which he ran against Democrat Woodrow Wilson, president-at-the-time William Howard Taft, and former president Theodore Roosevelt. Debs received nearly one million votes in this election. In 1916, Debs ran for an Indiana Congressional Seat; his campaign was composed of pacifist beliefs and a strong conviction in American Neutrality. Debs was elected into the seat in 1916, however was arrested under the Espionage Act of 1917 in 1918 when he made an “anti war speech;” in fact he only mentioned the war once in this speech. Debs' was accused by the district attorney of Canton, Ohio.Throughout the trial, Debs did not call any witnesses, however addressed the court at length; he did not deny the speech he made, nor his socialist beliefs, but he argued that his right to free speech was protected under the First Amendment. He even sarcastically quoted President Woodrow Wilson’s campaign speeches in 1912 which strongly supported free speech. Debs was found guilty by a jury on six counts of sedition on September 12, 1918. He was sentenced to ten to fifteen years. Debs’ continual  popularity in the Socialist party was demonstrated by the fact that he was nominated as the Socialist Party presidential candidate in 1920, and despite running his campaign from a jail cell, Debs’ was able to win over a million votes in the election of 1920. Throughout his time in jail, Debs never renounced his belief that capitalism had caused World War I. He was released under presidential pardon on Christmas, in 1921, by President Harding. President Woodrow Wilson refused to grant Debs his freedom, despite the pleas of over one million of his followers, as Wilson saw Debs as a security threat.

Do you think Wilson had basis to believe that Debs was a threat? Or was his arrest simply a result of war fever?

“I am opposing a social order in which it is possible for one man who does absolutely nothing that is useful to amass a fortune of hundreds of millions of dollars, while millions of men and women who work all the days of their lives secure barely enough for a wretched existence.”

-Debs' Statement to the Court Upon Being Convicted of Violation of The Espionage Act in 1918

Sources:

"Democracy's Prisoner: Eugene V. Debs, the Great War, and the Right to Dissent." Publishers Weekly 3 Mar. 2008: 39. Student Resources in Context. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.

<http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA176592961&v=2.1&u=los42754&it=r&p=GPS&sw=w&asid=21d2cd5c7da985259d12aa8c237b8b93>

<http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/wilson/peopleevents/p_debs.html>

Propaganda During WWI

In class on Friday, we briefly went over some of the propaganda used during WWI. If you want more information on this propaganda and its influence, then keep reading!

This was one of the most famous propaganda pieces of the time. In it, Germany is depicted as ape-like, uncivilized "mad brutes" carrying a club with the word "kultur" (culture) and wearing a helmet with the word "militarism" on it. This creature is stepping out of the sea onto American soil carrying a woman, possibly Lady Liberty, in its hand. This poster encourages Americans to "Destroy this mad brute" by enlisting in the army, evoking a strong anti-German and conjuring up a spirit of nationalism for the civilized and endangered culture of America.

Another use of American propaganda was to encourage people to purchase Liberty Bonds, which would help fund the war effort. In this poster, the Germans are referred to as the Hun, a group of barbarians in ancient times. In order to encourage Americans to join the war effort, it was necessary to make them feel a sense of hatred and fear of the enemy, and what better way to do that than dehumanize the Germans? In propaganda like this, Germans were transformed into crazy, violent animals, making it easier to hate them rather than fellow humans from another land. In the picture above, the German face looms over the ocean, looking barbaric and crazed with his blood drenched fingertips grasping the dark land. I don't know about you, but this image definitely would have succeeded in making me fear the Germans and support the war effort by buying bonds to help stamp out the German threat.

Propaganda during the war was not just limited to the US and other Allied Powers. In the German illustration above, the British are depicted as cowards, hiding their weapons in churches so that the Germans won't fire on them. Like this one, some pieces of propaganda are more comical than fearful; for there are even ships disguised as floating churches and airplanes as churches flying in the sky! Yet the message was still clear and powerful to people of Germany, evoking a feeling of superiority and anger towards the cowardly enemy. 

These are just a few examples of some of the propaganda shown during WWI. The feelings of anger, fear, and superiority that these pieces evoked were very effective in conjuring up a spirit of war among the fighting nations of the world, making it even more difficult to restore peace when the end of the war finally came about.

Submarine Warfare

During WWI, the control of the seas was a vital key to victory.  The two ships of the greatest importance were the dreadnaught, a steel behemoth that made all other ships obsolete, and the submarine, the result of new technology and a ship that can attack while remaining submerged under the water.  The submarine was intended to be used an effective counter against dreadnaught, and was used primarily by the Germans.  Other countries had functional submarines, but did not effectively use them as the Germans did.  The biggest problem was the use of torpedoes.  When fired, the torpedo was a very unreliable weapon.  While it allowed the submarine to stay submerged and still attack, the torpedo couldn't maintain a straight course, swerving away from the target into the ground or even the submarine that it was fired from.  The Germans fixed this problem by building a gyroscope inside the torpedoes, helping the projectile keep straight; this technology would later be stolen by other countries through the inspection of German torpedoes.

Thanks to these, Chancellor Bethmann Hollweg called for unrestricted submarine warfare, a "shoot everything that moves" tactic that allowed for the Germans to sink any ship that comes into their field of view, sans their own.  At this time, America was still rooted in neutrality.  Germany, not wanting to provoke another country into the war against them, issued warnings in American newspaper to come to the war zone on boat, otherwise they might die.  Despite warnings, 128 unfortunate Americans of the 1198 other victims pay any mind when German U-boats sunk the Lusitania, a cruise liner bearing weapons for Britain.  President Wilson reacted to matter by ordering Germans to stop unrestricted submarine warfare, or otherwise incur the wrath of the Americans.  German subs then had to surface, radio the target's passengers to abandon ship, then sink the boat.

During the last stretch of the war, Germany was getting desperate and in need of a new plan.  A plan did come, and it involved an aggressive offense on land, with the use of quick moving storm troopers, coupled with unrestricted submarine warfare to cripple the flow of supplies to the opposing countries.  Germany hesitated on this plan because if they used unrestricted submarine warfare, they would drag America into the war against them.  However, they reasoned that the submarines would prevent any ships from crossing the Pacific, the new plan would win the war effectively, and the Americans were a sod bunch who wouldn't take much to deal with.  Respectively, wrong, wrong, and wrong.  The British employed to use of escorting ships with a small fleet of dreadnaught ships, severely reducing the damage done by submarines.  The plan did work, but it was so ineffectively used by Ludendorff that all of his victories made no lasting impression on the enemies.  The arrival of the Americans served more for morale purposes, but the morale was enough to push the lines all the way to the German border.

What led America to join World War One

In MEHAP and World Studies when we studied the overall causes of World War One we focused largely on how each European country got involved, putting less attention on what drew America into the War.  While we studied important events such as the sinking of the Lusitania and the Zimmerman note affair, we did not go much farther than that.  Today’s class lecture got me very interested in finding out more details on why the U.S. joined the war and what U.S. politics and public opinions were like at the time.

President Woodrow Wilson had managed to keep the United States out of the war until 1917 largely because the general public was not interested in fighting.  Wilson and the Americans felt that it was in their best interest to remain neutral, desiring to conduct foreign policy as they had before the War had started.

Despite the United States’ intention to remain entirely neutral, they had more in common with the Triple Entente/Allied Powers.   For one, they spoke the same language as the British.  In addition, America shared a democratic republic form of government with Britain and France.  Germans began to realize that the U.S. was siding with the Allied Powers as the U.S. chose not to challenge the British blockade and yet violated the German Blockade.  As the war progressed and America upheld its claim of neutrality, they supported the Allied Powers with provisions such as food, clothing, and weaponry.  In essence they were informally playing an influential one-sided role in the war. 

After the Lusitania incident occurred, Wilson notified Germany that if such an incident happened again, the U.S. would consider it “deliberately unfriendly” and Americans would respond.  Germany, already fighting a two front war with France and Russia, realized that they were in no position to take on another enemy, so they put an end to their unrestricted submarine warfare. 

With the election of 1916 coming up, it was especially important for Wilson to pay special attention to what he said and the way he said it if he wanted to maintain public support.  The general public interest was still anti-war.  Wilson had to respond to incidents like the sinking of the Lusitania boldly enough as to not seem passive and week, yet not overly aggressively as to assail public interest.  Once the election was over, he could speak more freely regarding foreign politics, and did so, urging Americans to be prepared.  He believed that if America went to war, its intentions should be motivated by progressive ideals.

At this time, nearly all foreign war news and information reaching the United States came through British controlled communication wires the stretched through the Atlantic Ocean.  As a result, it was very pro-Allied Powers.  This ultimately led Americans to side with the Allies.

In 1917 Germany announced that it was returning to its policy of unrestricted warfare, resulting with more incidents with America, as the latter felt this was unjust.  Compiled with the Zimmerman Note affaire and overall rising tension the United States could no longer avoid battle.  On April 6^th, 1917, the United States proclaimed war, believing it was their moral obligation to bring democracy and peace to the World.  The American slogan of the time was that they would be fighting in a “war to end all wars.” 

With the existing political circumstance on both a domestic as well as international level, were these reasonable intentions and beliefs for the Americans to have as they entered the war?

Sources:  American Pageant Textbook

                   Lecture Notes