A rennaiasance
1. Discuss the ways life changed in America in the post-WWI era.
To the victor…
On April 2, 1917, President Wilson gave http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/4943/. In the speech, he promised that the United States would “make the world safe for democracy”:
We shall fight for the things which we have always carried nearest our hearts—for democracy, for the right of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own governments, for the rights and liberties of small nations, for a universal dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the world itself at last free.
To such a task we can dedicate our lives and our fortunes, everything that we are and everything that we have, with the pride of those who know that the day has come when America is privileged to spend her blood and her might for the principles that gave her birth and happiness and the peace which she has treasured. God helping her, she can do no other.
2. How does that ideal compare to the reality of American society during this time?
Readings
Yawp, Chapter 21 “World War I and Its Aftermath” and Chapter 22 “A New Era”
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/11/11/when-america-tried-to-deport-its-radicals
