James Wilson

(noun)

One of the US Founding Fathers and signers of the Declaration of Independence.

Related Terms

Examples of James Wilson in the following topics:

  • The Debate over Slavery

    • Delegates James Wilson and Robert Sherman proposed the Three-Fifths Compromise, which the convention eventually adopted.
    • After proposed compromises of one-half by Benjamin Harrison of Virginia and three-fourths by several New Englanders failed to gain sufficient support, Congress finally settled on the three-fifths ratio James Madison proposed.

  • The Roosevelt Administration

    • He was born in 1882 in Hyde Park, New York, to James Roosevelt, a businessman and land-owner, and Sara Ann Delano.
    • Both James and Sara Ann came from affluent New York families and were able to provide their only child with considerable opportunities.
    • In 1913, he became an assistant secretary of the Navy under Woodrow Wilson.
    • In 1920, when James Cox run as the Democratic presidential candidate, FDR served as a vice-presidential candidate.
    • Following the steps of Theodore Roosevelt (his distant cousin) and Woodrow Wilson, FDR turned the executive branch into the center of the national government.

  • The Election of 1920

    • Harding soundly defeated Democratic Governor James M.
    • Irish- and German-American voters who had backed Wilson and peace in 1916 now voted against Wilson and Versailles.
    • This was four times the amount spent by his Democratic opponent, James M.
    • This set up a hard road for the next Democratic presidential hopeful, James M.
    • His 26.2% is the largest margin of victory in the popular vote since James Monroe ran unopposed in 1820.

  • Postwar Politics and the Election of 1920

    • Harding, a former newspaper man; in turn, the Democrats chose newspaper publisher and Governor James M.
    • Wilson won them over in 1917 by promising to ask Britain to give Ireland its independence.
    • This satisfied Wilson.
    • Wilson had hoped for a "solemn referendum" on the League of Nations, but did not get one.
    • Irish- and German-American voters who had backed Wilson and peace in 1916 now voted against Wilson and Versailles.

  • The Retreat from Progressivism

    • The 1920s saw a rejection of the Progressive ideology of Woodrow Wilson; however progressive ideals continued in various ways.
    • La Follette, Sr., Charles Evans Hughes, and Herbert Hoover on the Republican side, and William Jennings Bryan, Woodrow Wilson and Al Smith on the Democratic side .
    • Harding ran against Democratic Ohio Governor James M.
    • The election was seen, in part, as a rejection of the "progressive" ideology of the Woodrow Wilson Administration in favor of the "laissez-faire" approach of the William McKinley era.
    • Clifford Berryman's Progressive Era cartoon shows Woodrow Wilson priming the pump, representing prosperity.

  • Woodrow Wilson and Race

    • Thomas Woodrow Wilson, a Progressive Democrat, was the 28th President of the United States, from 1913 to 1921.
    • Numerous black people voted for Democrat Woodrow Wilson in the 1912 election based on his promise to work for them.
    • Black leaders who supported Wilson were angered when segregationist white Southerners took control of Congress and Wilson appointed many Southerners to his cabinet; Wilson and his cabinet members fired a large number of black Republican office holders in political-appointee positions, though they also appointed a few black Democrats to such posts.
    • In 1914, Wilson told The New York Times, "If the colored people made a mistake in voting for me, they ought to correct it."
    • Quotation from Woodrow Wilson's History of the American People as reproduced in the 1915 film The Birth of a Nation.

  • Populism and Religion

    • He served in Congress briefly as a Representative from Nebraska and was the 41st United States Secretary of State under President Woodrow Wilson from 1913 to 1915, taking a pacifist position on the World War.
    • President Wilson appointed him Secretary of State in 1913, but Wilson's strong demands on Germany after the Lusitania was torpedoed in 1915 caused Bryan to resign in protest.
    • The major study which seemed to convince Bryan of this was James H.
    • The campaign kicked off in October 1921, when the Union Theological Seminary in Richmond, Virginia invited Bryan to deliver the James Sprunt Lectures.

  • The Wilson Administration

    • Wilson's plan passed in December 1913, and the new system began operations in 1915.
    • In 1916, under threat of a national railroad strike, Wilson approved the Adamson Act.
    • In April 1917, Wilson asked Congress to declare war.
    • For his sponsorship of the League of Nations, Wilson received the 1919 Nobel Peace Prize.
    • Summarize Wilson's Progressive Democratic agenda and his involvement in World War I

  • Roosevelt, Wilson, and Race

    • Both Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson are criticized for their treatment of African-Americans during their tenures as president.
    • Wilson was also criticized by such hard-line segregationists as Georgia's Thomas E.
    • Watson, who believed Wilson did not go far enough in restricting black employment in the federal government.
    • Quotation from Woodrow Wilson's History of the American People as reproduced in the film The Birth of a Nation.
    • Describe the Brownsville Affair during Roosevelt's administration, and Wilson's perpetuation of Jim Crow laws.

  • The Fight for the Treaty

    • The Senate did not ratify the Treaty of Versailles; despite Wilson's efforts, Republicans and Democrats were unable to reach a compromise.
    • Wilson, however, had a series of debilitating strokes and had to cancel his trip.
    • A second group of Democrats supported the Treaty, but followed Wilson in opposing any amendments or reservations.
    • Woodrow Wilson with the American Peace Commissioners at the Paris Peace Conference.
    • Discuss Wilson's attempts to rally the nation in support of the Treaty of Versailles.