In 1919, there was a nationwide, hysteria caused by mounting fears of a Bolshevik revolution coming to America, and the fear of communism reached a fever pitch in what became known as the first "Red Scare". Desperate to find a peaceful middle ground between the rights of workers, and the fears of anarchist revolutions coming to America, President Woodrow Wilson spoke out against those using the power to strike as a weapon. Wilson promised, the right of individuals to strike would not be interfered with, but also warned that the power of the strike should not be used to hurt the American people or "usurp a power that only the Government itself has a right to exercise". The dispute between capital and labor, was in Wilson's mind was the great test of the time, yet Wilson believed that America could find some way to bring together peacefully these two great interests.
In the first years following World War I, social tensions rose over conflicts between capital and labor. By 1919, labor unions had already won an 8-hour day and a 48-hour work week, but now that the war had ended, labor was demanding recognition, shorter hours and raises exceeding the inflation rate. Over 4 million workers, or one-fifth of America's workforce participated in strikes that year. Many began to fear that the labor unions had been infiltrated by anarchists, and Bolsheviks. Just two years earlier, a pair of anarchist revolutions in Russia dismantled the Tsarist autocracy and led to the rise of the Soviet Union. One of these revolutions was led by Vladimir Lenin and the Communist Bolshevik party. Now, as tensions in America over labor unrest and high inflation met the intensely patriotism surrounding the war years, the country became a breeding ground for xenophobia or fear of the foreigner. It was the beginning of the first "Red Scare". This was a nationwide, hysteria caused by mounting fear that a Bolshevik revolution was imminent in America. These fears were further exasperated by anarchists bombings and plots of more bombing. First, in April of 1919, authorities discovered a plot for mailing 36 bombs to prominent members of government and financial world including men like J.P. Morgan, John D. Rockefeller, and Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes. Then on June, 8 bombs simultaneously exploded in eight cities, including one that targeted the house of U.S. Attorney General Palmer.
Earlier in 1918, Woodrow Wilson had pressured congress to pass the anti-immigrant, anti-anarchist Sedition act of 1918, but now Woodrow Wilson the man with a "priestly vision" intent on expanding economic opportunity for people at the bottom, the man fighting for the 8 hour work-week, was urging congress to give the federal government to limit the American worker's power to strike. The right of individuals to strike would not be interfered with, but the power of the strike should not be used to hurt the American people or "usurp a power that only the Government itself has a right to exercise". In his seventh annual address to congress, Woodrow Wilson was desperate to find a peaceful middle ground.
"The right of individuals to strike is inviolate and ought not to be interfered with by any process of Government, but there is a predominant right and that is the right of the Government to protect all of its people and to assert its power and majesty against the challenge of any class. The Government, when it asserts that right, seeks not to antagonize a class but simply to defend the right of the whole people as against the irreparable harm and injury that might be done by the attempt by any class to usurp a power that only Government itself has a right to exercise as a protection to all."
"Certainly human intelligence can devise some acceptable tribunal for adjusting the differences between capital and labor. This is the hour of test and trial for America. By her prowess and strength, and the indomitable courage of her soldiers, she demonstrated her power to vindicate on foreign battlefields her conceptions of liberty and justice. Let not her influence as a mediator between capital and labor be weakened and her own failure to settle matters of purely domestic concern be proclaimed to the world. There are those in this country who threaten direct action to force their will, upon a majority. Russia today, with its blood and terror, is a painful object lesson of the power of minorities. It makes little difference what minority it is; whether capital or labor, or any other class; no sort of privilege will ever be permitted to dominate this country. We are a partnership or nothing that is worth while. We are a democracy, where the majority are the masters, or all the hopes and purposes of the men who founded this government have been defeated and forgotten. In America there is but one way by which great reforms can be accomplished and the relief sought by classes obtained, and that is through the orderly processes of representative government. Those who would propose any other method of reform are enemies of this country. America will not be daunted by threats nor lose her composure or calmness in these distressing times. We can afford, in the midst of this day of passion and unrest, to be self - contained and sure. The instrument of all reform in America is the ballot. The road to economic and social reform in America is the straight road of justice to all classes and conditions of men. Men have but to follow this road to realize the full fruition of their objects and purposes. Let those beware who would take the shorter road of disorder and revolution. The right road is the road of justice and orderly process.
War Powers
The U.S. did not sign a peace treaty until 1921, two years after WWI officially ended. Because the U.S. Senate did not ratify the Treaty of Versailles. America was constitutionally at war with Germany until 1921. This gave Woodrow Wilson and his successor war powers for two additional years after the war. As part of the 'Palmer Raids', Attorney General Palmer hired a 24-year-old J. Edgar Hoover to head a new division of the Justice Department's Bureau of Investigation, with responsibility for investigating the programs of radical groups and identifying their members. The war on anarchists, communists, and Bolsheviks raged on.References
Digitalhistory.uh.edu. (2017). Digital History. [online] Available at: http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/disp_textbook.cfm?smtid=2&psid=3382 [Accessed 19 Dec. 2017].En.wikipedia.org. (2017). Red Scare. [online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Scare [Accessed 19 Dec. 2017].
Miller Center. (2017). Woodrow Wilson: Domestic Affairs | Miller Center. [online] Available at: http://millercenter.org/president/biography/wilson-domestic-affairs [Accessed 19 Dec. 2017].
Presidency.ucsb.edu. (2017). Woodrow Wilson: 7th Annual Message. [online] Available at: http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=29560 [Accessed 19 Dec. 2017].
United States Department of Labor. (2017). Chapter 1: Start-up of the Department and World War I 1913-1921. [online] Available at: http://www.dol.gov/dol/aboutdol/history/dolchp01.htm [Accessed 19 Dec. 2017].
No comments:
Post a Comment