SCAFFOLDING 19: WORLD WAR I
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1 When war broke out in Europe, William Jennings Bryan was serving as President Wilson’s Secretary of State. On August 10, 1914 (only two weeks after the outbreak of the war), Secretary Bryan sent President Wilson the following message.
Morgan Company of New York [a large Wall Street investment bank] have asked whether there would be any objection to their making a loan to the French Government. ... [I would question] whether it would be advisable for this Government to ... approve . . . any loan to a belligerent nation. . . . Money is the worst of all contraband because it commands everything else. ... I know of nothing that would do more to prevent war than an international agreement that neutral nations would not loan to belligerents. . . . The powerful financial interests which would be connected with these loans would be tempted to use their influence through the newspapers to support the interests of the Government to which they had loaned because the value of the [loan] would be directly affected by the result of the war. . . . All of this influence would make it all the more difficult for us to maintain neutrality [with] powerful financial interests . . . thrown into the balance. . . .
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3 President Wilson’s First Warning to the Germans on unrestricted submarine warfare. April 19, 1915.
To declare or exercise a right to attack and destroy any vessel entering a prescribed area of the high seas without first certainly determining its belligerent nationality and the contraband character of its cargo would be an act so unprecedented in naval warfare that this government is reluctant to believe that the Imperial Government of Germany in this case contemplates it as possible… The suspicion that enemy ships are using neutral flags improperly can create no just presumption that all ships traversing a prescribed area are subject to the same suspicion. It is to determine exactly such questions that this Government understands the right of visit and search to have been recognized.
If such a deplorable situation should arise, the Imperial German Government can readily appreciate that the Government of the United States would be constrained to hold the Imperial Government of Germany to a strict accountability for such acts of their naval authorities, and to take any steps it might be necessary to take to safeguard American lives and property and to secure to American citizens the full enjoyment of their acknowledged rights on the high seas.
It is stated for the information of the Imperial Government that representations have been made to his Britannic Majesty's Government in respect to the unwarranted use of the American flag for the protection of British ships.
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4 In January 1917, British intelligence agencies intercepted this message being sent from the German Foreign minister to the government of Mexico. It was turned over to the United States Department of State and released to newspapers in mid-March.
We intend to begin on the 1st of February unrestricted submarine warfare. We shall endeavor in spite of this to keep the United States of America neutral. In the event of this not succeeding, we make Mexico a proposal of alliance on the following basis: make war together, make peace together, generous financial support and an understanding on our part that Mexico is to reconquer the lost territory in Texas, New Mexico and Arizona. The settlement in detail is left to you. You will inform the President of the above most secretly as soon as the outbreak of war with the United States of
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5 These are excerpts from Wilson’s war message to Congress on April 2, 1917.
On the 3d of February last I officially laid before you the extraordinary announcement of the Imperial German Government that on and after the 1st day of February it was its purpose to put aside all restraints of law or of humanity and use its submarines to sink every vessel that sought to approach the ports of Great Britain … or the western coasts of Europe … The new policy has swept every restriction aside… The present German submarine warfare against commerce is a warfare against mankind.
Neutrality is no longer feasible or desirable where the peace of the world is involved and the freedom of its peoples, and the menace to that peace and freedom lies in the existence of autocratic
governments backed by organized force which is controlled wholly by their will, not by the will of their people. We have seen the last of neutrality in such circumstances… We are accepting this challenge of hostile purpose because we know that in such a government… there can be no assured security for the democratic governments of the world. We are now about to accept gauge of battle with this natural foe to liberty…We are glad… to fight thus for the ultimate peace of the world and for the liberation of its peoples, the German peoples included: for the rights of nations great and small and the privilege of men everywhere to choose their way of life... The world must be made safe for democracy. Its peace must be planted upon the tested foundations of political liberty. We have no selfish ends to serve. We desire no conquest, no dominion. We seek no indemnities for ourselves, no material compensation for the sacrifices we shall freely make. We are but one of the champions of the rights of mankind. We shall be satisfied when those rights have been made as secure as the faith and the freedom of nations can make them.
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6 During the four days of Congressional debates following President Wilson’s war message, Senator George Norris of Nebraska spoke against voting for war. In this excerpt from his speech of April 4, 1917, he suggested a cause of America’s entrance into the war.
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7 Here is an excerpt from a secondary source, a major study of the factors that eventually led the United States to abandon neutrality. The excerpt describes President Wilson’s thinking during the weeks following Germany’s January 31, 1917 resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare. (from Ernest R. May, The World & American Isolation, 1914-1917. Harvard University Press, 1959. P. 430, 432-33)
. . . chauvinism [pro-war nationalism] was visibly on the rise. The Zimmerman telegram and the sinking of the Cunard liner Laconia, with three Americans among the lost, had created a spreading excitement. The Literary Digest [a popular magazine] reported newspapers all over the country to be joining in a clamor for war. . . . Future incidents would meanwhile strengthen and embitter the chauvinists. Other Laconias were certain to sink. Even as Wilson sat meditating in the White House, five American ships went down.
On March 19 he emerged from his solitude, still anxious and troubled but apparently satisfied that the alternatives of acquiescence [submission] and armed neutrality were impossible. ... On March 20 he conferred with the cabinet. No one had any alternatives to suggest. The neutralist members . . . were now . . . sure that war was the only course. The Attorney General and the Secretary of Labor seconded the arguments for it. When the President asked the Postmaster General to speak, Bureleson said quietly: "We are at war. I am in favour of asking Congress at the earliest possible moment.”... The cabinet was one. On the following day the President summoned Congress to meet on April 2.
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8 The First Amendment, 1791
Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
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9 Woodrow Wilson, State of the Union Address, 1915
I am sorry to say that the gravest threats against our national peace and safety have been uttered within our own borders. There are citizens of the United States, I blush to admit, born under other flags but welcomed under our generous naturalization laws to the full freedom and opportunity of America, who have poured the poison of disloyalty into the very arteries of our national life…The ugly and incredible thing has actually come about and we are without adequate federal laws to deal with it.
I urge [Congress] to enact such laws at the earliest possible moment and feel that in doing so I am urging you to do nothing less than save the honor and self-respect of the nation. Such creatures of passion, disloyalty, and anarchy must be crushed out…
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10 Section 3 of the Espionage Act, 1917
Whoever, when the United States is at war, shall willfully make or convey false reports or false statements with intent to interfere with the operation or success of the military or naval forces of the United States or to promote the success of its enemies and whoever when the United States is at war, shall willfully cause or attempt to cause insubordination, disloyalty, mutiny, refusal of duty, in the military or naval forces of the United States, or shall willfully obstruct the recruiting or enlistment service of the United States, to the injury of the service or of the United States, shall be punished by a fine of not more than $10,000 or imprisonment for not more than twenty years, or both.
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12 Unanimous Majority Opinion, Schenck v. United States, 1919
The document in question upon its first printed side recited the first section of the Thirteenth Amendment, said that the idea embodied in it was violated by the conscription act and that a conscript is little better than a convict.
Of course the document would not have been sent unless it had been intended to have some effect, and we do not see what effect it could be expected to have upon persons subject to the draft except to influence them to obstruct the carrying of it out.
But it is said, suppose that that was the tendency of this circular, it is protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution....
We admit that in many places and in ordinary times the defendants in saying all that was said in the circular would have been within their constitutional rights. But the character of every act depends upon the circumstances in which it is done. The most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man in falsely shouting fire in a theatre and causing a panic. It does not even protect a man from an injunction against uttering words that may have all the effect of force.
The question in every case is whether the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent. It is a question of proximity and degree. When a nation is at war many things that might be said in time of peace are such a hindrance to its effort that their utterance will not be endured so long as men fight and that no Court could regard them as protected by any constitutional right....
