Anyone want to talk up the achievements of Woodrow Wilson's presidency?

[denem]

I'll start. In return for an Income Tax (TR/Progressive Policy) he handed control of the money supply to the banks (Federal Reserve Act) and dumped Trust busting.altogether in favor of a commission.

[Ichingcarpenter]

1. Asshole and a Racist Bigot

those are only two out of my


14 points.

[Xipe Totec]

2. He kept us out of war

:sarcasm:

[denem]

3. Yep. Official 1916 Presidential Campaign Slogan.

[Ichingcarpenter]

5. He beat Teddy in the election.

Wilson's progressive attitude didn't extent to many areas. For example, he didn't reform the way government corruption occurred. He would even encourage this by giving his friends rewards and punishing his enemies.

He operated on a minimal spoils system. He was also quite racist. His reform policies didn't extend to African-Americans. He appointed many Southern racists to his cabinet and was strongly opposed to black suffrage.

He considered enfranchisement an evil. Wilson also didn't want to reform social injustices. Offering no support for the ratification a suffrage movement, Wilson preferred state action for women's suffrage. Child labor was another issue he considered a state matter. Reform was something Wilson only considered on certain issues.



Roosevelt can be considered a successful progressive president and reformer. In his first inaugural address, he addressed the problems that needed reforming and that he was aware of the issues and prepared to fight them (Doc B). In "High Regard for Theodore Roosevelt by Afro-Americans," from the Cleveland Journal in 1903, it's discussed that African Americans' favored Roosevelt's policies. The article also quotes Roosevelt telling the country that he won't be a corrupt president, offering favors and handing out special privileges (Doc C). His "square deal" sought to create a moral approach to many social problems.

In his speech, "The New Nationalism," he distinguished between what he considered good and bad trusts and he would not respect labor organizations simply because they represented workers, but based on merits (Doc H).


He tried to enforce existing anti-trust laws rather than creating new ones. The square deal called for tighter control of big business, particularly less power for the railroads. In Roosevelt's Annual Message to Congress in 1908, he discussed the corruption in business and how he will reform corporations and reduce their power (Doc F). Roosevelt had many successful endeavors as president.

[Jackpine Radical]

4. Well, there WERE the 14 Points

and laying the groundwork for the League of Nations.

[denem]

11. The 14 points got negotiated away,

The guy who got 23% in 1912, Taft, scuttled the League of Nations.

[JVS]

6. Fuck him.

[Ikonoklast]

7. Anglophile who entangled us in a war fought for empires.

Biggesr mistake this country ever made was to enter WWI.

[jwirr]

8. He was really not a modern Democrat was he. I read a book that

suggested he may have gotten influenza while in France at the peace talks and it effected his brain. Who knows.

[JCMach1]

9. His wife virtually ruled the country when he fell ill

...On the morning of October 2, Mrs. Wilson found her husband unconscious on the bathroom floor of their private White House quarters bleeding from a cut on his head. Wilson had suffered a stroke - a massive attack that left his left side paralyzed and impaired his vision. She immediately summoned Dr. Grayson. Then the conspiracy began. The two of them formed a bulwark between the invalid President and the rest of the country, simultaneously shielding Wilson from intrusion and hiding his condition from outsiders.

For seventeen months the enfeebled President lay in his bed on the brink of death, barely able to write his own name. The outside world knew none of this. All communication with the President went through his wife. She entered the sick room with messages and emerged with

verbal instructions or the scrawl of a signature on a piece of paper. Edith Wilson called the period her "stewardship." Later, others called her the first woman President. The Senate rejected the Treaty of Versailles with its provision for the League. Although Wilson's health improved, he never fully recovered. ... http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/wilsonstroke.htm

This is a pretty good summary...

[Odin2005]

10. He was a Racist, Sexist asshole. Fuck him.