The Business of Church and State: Social Christianity in Woodrow Wilson's White House

2013 ◽  
Vol 82 (3) ◽  
pp. 659-666
Author(s):  
Cara L. Burnidge
Keyword(s):  
Church And State ◽  
The United States ◽  
Great War ◽  
Woodrow Wilson ◽  
White House ◽  
Folk Tale ◽  
Social Christianity ◽  
Commander In Chief ◽  
The Great War ◽  
War Stories

Tall tales are often told in times of war. Stories of masculine courage under fire, of the fog of war, and of the grim realities experienced by embattled bodies dominate the genre. During the Great War, however, Americans told a different kind of story about their president. Rather than picture their president entrenched and fighting, Americans shared accounts of President Woodrow Wilson praying. Dr. Admiral Cary T. Grayson recalled a popular wartime tale about an unnamed Congressman who sought President Wilson's counsel. The story begins with a Congressman, distraught with the state of the war-torn world, insisting upon visiting the White House to speak with the President. Travelling through the White House residence, the Congressman searched for his Commander-in-Chief from the East room to the Green room to the Blue room; all to no avail. Finally, he came to the Red Room, where “he discovered the President on his knees wrestling in fervent prayer, like Jacob, with the Most High.” As Wilson's friend and physician, Grayson remembered that this story and variations of it were popular despite its complete lack of credibility. This folk tale, Grayson believed, began as a rumor by Wilson's opponents (one that poked fun of a President who preferred to kneel on the floor rather than prepare the country for war) but, after the United States declared war in April 1917, was taken more seriously (as a testament to a Commander-in-Chief who led a righteous war). What perhaps began as a joke at the president's expense, gained credence as a reflection of President Wilson's approach to the Great War: it was, for him, a part of his religious life.

“HE KEPT US OUT OF WAR!” A COUNTERFACTUAL LOOK AT AMERICAN HISTORY WITHOUT THE FIRST WORLD WAR

2017 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 2-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manfred Berg
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
The United States ◽  
Great War ◽  
Woodrow Wilson ◽  
The First World War ◽  
Indispensable Tool ◽  
International Role ◽  
The Great War ◽  
First World

One hundred years after President Woodrow Wilson led Americans into the Great War, this essay ponders various counterfactual scenarios based on the assumption that the United States had not become a belligerent power in 1917. The methodological introduction makes a case for counterfactual analysis as a useful and indeed indispensable tool of historians. The second part demonstrates that contemporaries, including Wilson himself, did not consider American entry into the war a foregone conclusion. The third section looks at the possible consequences of continued American neutrality on the international position of the United States, while the fourth part focuses on the question which major domestic developments would have been unlikely had America remained neutral. Had the United States stayed out of the Great War, America's international role in the postwar world would not been very different from what it actually was in the 1920s, but the nation would have been spared the spasms of war hysteria that altered domestic politics.

scholarly journals THE SLOVAK QUESTION DURING THE GREAT WAR (A CASE STUDY OF L. ŠTUR SLOVAK-RUSSIAN SOCIETY)

Rusin ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 67-90
Author(s):  
M.V. Vedernikov ◽  
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
The United States ◽  
Political Elite ◽  
Active Part ◽  
Great War ◽  
Russian Society ◽  
Habsburg Empire ◽  
Separatist Movements ◽  
The Great War

With the outbreak of WWI (1914–1918), the participating countries began to promote separatist movements on their own territory, which aimed to destroy the foundations of hostile multinational empires. Of particular interest to the Russian authorities were the compatriots of the Slavic peoples of Austria-Hungary, who loudly declared their desire to destroy the Habsburg Empire. One of the most active diasporas was the Czechs, who managed to meet with Nicholas II twice in the first month of the war and achieve the formation of the Czech squad. However, the Czech question, initially incorporating the Slovak one due to the ethnic and linguistic proximity, exposed significant contradictions. An active part of the Slovak political elite living in Russia opposed the formation of a single Czech-Slovak state, because they were close to the idea of Slovakia’s accession to Russia. To popularize these ideas, a Slovak-Russian society named after L. Štur was established in Moscow. It received support from the outstanding Russians as well as the largest Slovak diasporas in the United States. The assistance of such important actors forced the Czechs to look for ways to resolve the conflict with the Slovaks, which undoubtedly led to the mainstreaming of the Slovak question. However, the cessions of 1915–1916 failed to resolve the conflict. Drawing on new archival sources and current historiography, the author concludes that the presence of multiple conflicts contributed to the formation of the Czech-Slovak national idea, which was free from asymmetry, and made Slovaks equal partners.

Political Developments in Germany, 1917–1918

1919 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 115-119
Author(s):  
Frederic A. Ogg
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Political Reform ◽  
The United States ◽  
Russian Revolution ◽  
Great War ◽  
The Great War

A former issue of the REVIEW (November, 1917) contained a résumé of German political affairs from the outbreak of the great war to the accession of Chancellor Michaelis, July 14, 1917. The summary will here be continued to the abdication of Emperor William II in November, 1918.The appointment of Michaelis came at a time when the imperial government was under fire, both in the Reichstag and throughout the country. The Russian revolution and the entrance into the war by the United States had given a new impetus to the movement for political reform.

scholarly journals CULTURE VS.KULTUR, OR A CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS: PUBLIC INTELLECTUALS IN THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR, 1917–1918

2015 ◽  
Vol 58 (1) ◽  
pp. 157-182
Author(s):  
MOSHIK TEMKIN
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Public Attitudes ◽  
The United States ◽  
Great War ◽  
Public Intellectuals ◽  
Clash Of Civilizations ◽  
Economic Context ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Great War ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractThis article analyses the historical conditions for, and implications of, the attitudes and conduct of a number of prominent or influential public intellectuals in the United States during the Great War. It argues that many intellectuals, particularly those who supported American entry to the war, shared a general lack of concern with the realities of full-scale warfare. Their response to the war had little to do with the war itself – its political and economic causes, brutal and industrial character, and human and material costs. Rather, their positions were often based on their views of culture and philosophy, or on their visions of the post-war world. As a result, relatively few of these intellectuals fully considered the political, social, and economic context in which the catastrophe occurred. The war, to many of them, was primarily a clash of civilizations, a battle of good versus evil, civilized democracy versus barbaric savagery, progress versus backwardness, culture versus kultur. The article describes several manifestations of American intellectual approaches to the war, discusses the correlation between intellectual and general public attitudes, and concludes with some implications for thinking about the relationship between intellectuals and war in more recent American history.

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