Chief Justice Edward Douglass White dropped a big hat he had been holding so he too could raise his hands to clap. To such a task we can dedicate our lives and our fortunes,. God helping her, she can do no other. As his voice trailed off, there was a moment of silence interrupted by loud applause—even louder than when he had first begun the address. Other than shaking a few outstretched hands as he left the rostrum, including one extended by his biggest critic, Republican Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, Wilson did not linger at the Capitol.
He got back into the Cadillac and quickly returned to the White House. There the President gathered in the Oval Office with his wife, daughter Margaret, and Colonel House to reflect on the speech and its ramifications. My message today was a message of death for our young men. How strange it seems to applaud that.
Hours later, newspaper editorials around the world commended Wilson. At four in the morning, exhausted after debating for most of the day, members responded yea, while six answered nay. Among the handful of nays was Jeannette Rankin, a Republican representative from Montana and the first woman ever elected to the House. John J. On April 6, , the war resolution arrived at the White House just as Wilson finished his lunch. Edith handed her husband a gold pen, and war was formally declared against Germany at p.
At the Navy Department, Secretary Daniels ordered a naval officer to step outside and signal in code to another officer that war had been declared. From there the news was flashed around the world by wireless operators. In the pile was a note sent by John J. The year-old major general was congratulatory, but his message had an ulterior motive.
Just back from a year in Mexico chasing after Pancho Villa with his Punitive Expedition, Pershing expected that at some point the United States would join the war in Europe, and he desperately wanted to lead the American military contingent should the opportunity present itself. Your strong stance for the right will be an inspiration to humanity everywhere, but especially to the citizens of the Republic. It arouses in the breast of every soldier feelings of the deepest admiration for their leader.
I am exultant that my life has been spent as a soldier, in camp and field, that I may now the more worthily and more intelligently serve my country and you. In defense of his request, the fact remained that no officer in the U. Army was more qualified to lead a fighting force in Europe than Pershing.
Much of his military career had been spent abroad, where he represented his country as a soldier and a politician. An West Point graduate, Pershing served with a cavalry regiment on the frontier in New Mexico, taught military science at the University of Nebraska, was cited for bravery during the Spanish-American War and the Philippine Insurrection.
Deeply sadden by the loss, Pershing put all of his energy into Army service. Baker later said there was never any indication of regret over this decision, though he did agonize over making the selection. The only other serious candidate for the position was former chief of staff and recipient of the Medal of Honor, Maj. Leonard Wood. Even with his impressive credentials, the Wilson administration was wary of him.
Wood had health concerns and lacked recent field experience, and the scuttlebutt around Washington was that he had presidential aspirations and might be a political threat. He also had close ties to Theodore Roosevelt, whom Wilson despised. Pershing raised none of these concerns. Privately, to those he let into his inner circle, Pershing was sensitive, warm, and caring. He won followers, but not personal worshipers, plain in word, sane and direct in action.
The U. Army comprised slightly more than , officers and men in the Regulars and about 67, more federalized National Guardsmen. Left with no other choice, Wilson ordered the War Department to organize a draft, with all males between the ages of 21 and 30 later extended to include ages 18 to 45 required to register. Ten million men complied, and the Army eventually drafted 2.
Meanwhile, the German ruling class, led by an alliance of aristocratic landowners and industrialists, was fighting for its very own survival, threatened by seismic social and political upheaval.
While unrestricted submarine warfare is, of course, the textbook answer as to why the U. Cabled by German foreign minister Arthur Zimmermann in January to the Mexican embassy, the secret diplomatic communication was intercepted and decoded by British intelligence. In the telegram, Zimmermann proposed a military alliance between Germany, Mexico, and Japan—should the United States enter the war. While Goemans says he never found any indication in official notes and papers from the time that the U.
Three years earlier, long-smoldering rivalries in Europe over territory and borders had come to a head with the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife by a Serbian nationalist on June 28, The assassination, while ultimately a scapegoat, became the catalyst for the start of World War I, exactly one month later.
Germany formally surrendered on November 11, In those 19 months of U. On May 7, the British-owned Lusitania ocean liner was torpedoed without warning just off the coast of Ireland.
Of the 1, passengers, 1, were killed, including Americans. The German government maintained that the Lusitania was carrying munitions, but the U. In August, Germany pledged to see to the safety of passengers before sinking unarmed vessels, but in November sunk an Italian liner without warning, killing people, including 27 Americans. With these attacks, public opinion in the United States began to turn irrevocably against Germany.
In , Germany, determined to win its war of attrition against the Allies, announced the resumption of unrestricted warfare in war-zone waters.
Three days later, the United States broke diplomatic relations with Germany, and just hours after that the American liner Housatonic was sunk by a German U-boat. In late March, Germany sunk four more U. Four days later, his request was granted.
On June 26, the first 14, U. When the war finally ended, on November 11, , more than two million American soldiers had served on the battlefields of Western Europe, and some 50, of them had lost their lives.
Have Entered World War I? But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us! The German air force launches Operation Castigo, the bombing of Belgrade, on April 6, , as 24 divisions and 1, tanks drive into Greece. The attack on Yugoslavia was swift and brutal, an act of terror resulting in the death of 17, civilians—the largest number of civilian
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