Reading: Campaign Promises

President Wilson’s

Campaign Promises vs. Presidential Reality

The United States must be neutral in fact, as well as in name, during these days that are to try men's souls. We must be impartial in thought, as well as action, must put a curb upon our sentiments, as well as upon every transaction that might be construed as a preference of one party to the struggle before another.”

--Woodrow Wilson, Message to Congress Declaration of Neutrality, August 19, 1914

“I thought that it would suffice to assert our neutral rights…But…neutrality, it now appears, is impracticable… There is one choice we cannot make…we will not choose the path of submission and suffer the most sacred rights of our Nation and our people to be ignored or violated. The wrongs against which we now array ourselves are no common wrongs; they cut to the very roots of human life.”

--Woodrow Wilson, “Address of The President of the United States Delivered at a Joint Session of The Two Houses of Congress,” April 2, 1917 (He was asking for a declaration of war)