Woodrow Wilson’s Fight for the League of Nations
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Woodrow Wilson’s Fight for the League of Nations
One of Wilson’s major foreign policy objectives that he campaigned for, although while attempting to establish the institution, was after World War I during the Paris Peace Conference of 1919. Some essential facets that will be addressed in the paper include Wilson’s conceptions about the creation of the League of Nations, the fight for the idea, the internal conflict, the external fight, and the persistent tenacity of his or her fight for the League of Nations. Despite different views on the character of Wilson’s internationalism and the nature of its impact on 20th-century diplomacy, it is possible to draw certain conclusions, considering historical perspectives.
Wilson’s Vision for the League
As early as before America entered the First World War, Wilson was already appealing for the formation of an international organization that would serve as the custodian of world peace in the post-war era. As noted in “Wilsonianism: the ‘’Dynamics of a Conflicted Concept’’ (Thompson, 2010), Wilson made a clear shift between old, deceptive alliances, which he despised, and the new association, or League of Nations, which he started to endorse. The distinction was very important for Wilson and became the key to his conception of international relations.
Wilson had considered the League as a new form of fellowship media with the old idea of opposed alliances and sovereignty politics. The United States President, Woodrow Wilson, in his speech before the Senate on January 22, 1917, delivered what later became known as the “Peace Without Victory” speech to advocate diplomacy that would avoid the power shift as a result of a balance of powers that led to the start of many wars (Thompson, 2010). Wilson’s League concept was a reaction to European international relations and an attempt to form a collective security union and resolve conflicts between nations without the use of force. Based on liberal internationalist principles, it was an effort made to avoid wars and to search for solutions to conflicts before they turned into wars. From Wilson’s perspective, the League was the mechanism through which the Monroe Doctrine became internationalized and through which the world was made safe for American democracy.
The fight at the Paris Peace Conference
As Wilson stated in his war message to Congress on January 8, 1918, making the League of Nations a reality was his main goal when he arrived in Paris in December 1918 for the peace conference. Using the information provided in the “World Affairs” article by Khodnev, it is possible to state that Wilson met resistance and demands from the other leaders of the allied forces, Georges Clemenceau, the Prime Minister of France, and David Lloyd George, the British Prime Minister, who were more interested in punishing Germany and enlarging their territories. Thus, Wilson was torn between the alliances’ and the League’s interests, fought fiercely, and made concessions during the conference. Clemenceau still wanted guarantees against the Germans, while Lloyd George was after some privileges. Wilson’s power was now even further lessened by the unfavorable outcome of the 1918 midterm elections to balance different factions. Still, Wilson did not give up on the formation of the League, as the above points demonstrate. He managed to maintain the League as the driving force in the negotiations, cleverly using his position as the leader of the emergent United States. He also sought the support of the public, which he got from Europe and America because the majority of them supported Wilson’s vision of a safer world.
This led future President Wilson to accept concessions to get support for the League of Nations; for instance, the Treaty of Versailles had harsh terms for Germany. As Ma Jianbiao (2021) observes, Wilson’s ideals of negotiation were tackled by Allied selfish national interests, resulting in doctrines such as Article 231 that blamed the war on Germany. Nevertheless, Wilson incorporated the League Covenant into the peace treaty, so the League would be in parallel with the new world structure and there would be provisions for some kind of protection. But at the same time, it saved national sovereignty and also demanded that all important decisions be unanimous, which restrained the League of Nations (Ma, 2021). Such restrictions were inevitable to gain consensus with the other nations, but they led to the League’s inefficiency in averting further wars.
The Battle for U.S. Ratification
Wilson’s biggest trial in fulfilling his vision for the League was probably when he went back to the United States to seek the ratification of the Treaty of Versailles. Examining the article “Woodrow Wilson, Alliances, and the League of Nations” by Ambrosius (2006), it can be recalled that Wilson had sworn emphatic resistance from the isolationist Republicans led by Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, who rejected what was contained in Article ten of the League Covenant, assuring that its members would use their best effort to protect the territorial integrity of fellow members from external aggression.
The debate caused by ratification stressed the sharp conflict in American society and the political lifecycle of the USA about America’s position in the world. The isolationists knew that by joining the League, the US would be dragged into external conflicts, and the sovereignty of the country would be altered. The continued participation of America in international affairs as dictated by the League Covenant, especially Article X, asserted that the United States would be engaged in wars. But for President Wilson, American participation was necessary for making world peace as well as for the national interest. Still, he went on a nationwide speaking tour to muster support for his cause since his health became a major issue.
In October 1919, Wilson got a crippling stroke that confined him to a wheelchair and rendered him unable to physically press for his senators’ support (Ambrosius, 2006). The personal tragedy queer had significant consequences for the future of the League. Namely, Wilson was an active leader, and his absence, as well as the lack of his negotiating and compromise skills, hindered the treaty’s chances in the Senate.
His illness also again precipitated a situation verging on a constitutional crisis, since for several months his wife and the circle closest to him really governed the country and kept the true state of Wilson’s disability hidden from the American public and even the cabinet (Khodnev, 1995). The situation resulted in difficulties in ratification and provided more grounds for people to oppose the treaty. Even though he suffered from paralysis, Wilson did not agree to bring any changes or alterations to the treaty that could destroy the League. For example, in Accord in the Following: Ambassador John Milton Cooper’s Book on Woodrow Wilson, Cooper asserts, “Wilson’s unwillingness to bend cost the treaty” (Ambrosius, 2006, p. 150). The president’s inability to work with Republican senators and his all-or-nothing approach hindered U.S. ratification of the League of Nations treaty, leading to a shift in U.S. foreign policy towards isolationism.
Legacy and Impact
A major setback to the League of Nations right from its formation was the non-membership of the United States of America. The League of Nations failed to put a stop to the Italian and Japanese invasions during the 1930s, but the fight for unity remained its major trait (Ma, 2021, Wilsonianism and the Shaping of Modern International Relations). Ideas proposed by Wilson, such as national self-determination and collective security, remained effective after his presidency. I was able to learn that the idea of having an organization of global significance with the mandate to preserve peace existed and was continued in the formation of the United Nations after the Second World War.
Thus, Wilson’s internationalist vision, which remained unimplemented during his presidency, governed the American foreign policy discourse for decades. Thus, the conflict between Wilsonianism and more cynical approaches to international relations has persisted as a prominent characteristic of the American political tradition. Concerning the contention about the role of America and its enhancement of the international participation of liberal democracy and human rights, the present and future discussions are traced with tension. Wilson’s stressing the principle of national self-determination plunged the world into a process of decolonization, which changed the structure of the world in the mid-20th century.
Conclusion
For Wilson, the League of Nations awoke his ambition, which became his final victory but also the main cause of his powerful political failure. Wilson finally achieved the creation of the League as part of the postwar settlement at the Paris Peace Conference, but American participation did not materialize because of the opposition both at home and due to Wilson’s rigidity. Although the contribution of the League was not operative without the involvement of America, Wilson’s concept of collective security and international cooperation to support peace had a positive impact on the diplomacy of the 20th century, along with the framework of the United Nations.
While Wilson’s questions on the Americans’s correct participation in maintaining world peace are still under debate today concerning international relations, that is why, concerning the Ambrosius (2006) article ‘The Rise in Police Misconduct Lawsuits’, one can derive that the notion of ‘idealism and pragmatism’ in American foreign policy, perfected by Wilson, remains applicable in an attempt to understand how the U.S. copes with international institutions or acts overseas. Wilson leaves what some would consider a mixed legacy at Brandeis. For Baldwin’s opponents, it is claimed that his idealism was naïve and that the repetition he made between the League of Nations Covenant and the Treaty of Versailles weakened the two. On the other hand, people have benefited from his ideas, describing Wilson as progressive, whose ideas are still relevant in current global politics.
Thus, the make-believe fight by Woodrow Wilson in support of the League of Nations is truly commendable for possessing eternal values about those ideals that define history, although it is most often far from their realization. Collective security and peaceable settlement, in which nations refrain from intimidating others and work together to prevent aggression by any nation, remain the basis of global governance in a world within the twenty-first century, leaving Wilson’s impact, while problematic, present.
References
Ambrosius, L. E. (2006). Woodrow Wilson, alliances, and the League of Nations. The Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, 5(2), 139-165.
Khodnev, A. S. (1995). The legacies of Woodrow Wilson and the League of Nations in Russia. World Affairs, 158(1), 55-59.
Ma, J. (2021). “At Gethsemane”: The Shandong decision at the Paris Peace Conference and Wilson’s identity crisis. Chinese Studies in History, 54(1), 45-62.
Thompson, J. A. (2010). Wilsonianism: The dynamics of a conflicted concept. International Affairs, 86(1), 27-48.