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They appointed a program of an international relations transparency, freedom of the sea, free trade, national self-determinations, among others. However, most importantly, they envisioned an international organization to guarantee the independence and territorial integrity of all member countries.

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Once the war was over in 1918, a treaty was negotiated to decide what to do with Germany and benefit the allied powers. The Treaty of Versailles was signed in January of 1919. It also established the League of Nations, mentioned in Wilson's Fourteen Points speech, in with the principles the  United Nations was based.

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In 1909, after the end of his presidency, he went on a safari to Africa where he spent 11 months hunting all kinds of specimens for the American Museum of National History.
It followed a tour of Europe with his wife where he met with political leaders and kings, returning to the US in 1910 to continue working in politics.

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At age 50 a stroke left him blind in one eye. Another one, while seeking the US public's support of the Treaty of Versailles in 1919, left him completely paralyzed on his left side. With the 25th Amendment not yet in place, the American Constitution did not contain guidelines on what to do if the President became ill. His wife Edith essentially became the nation's unofficial chief executive until the end of Wilson's 2nd term in office.

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TR won a convincing victory in November. However, following his triumph he unwisely announced his decision to not seek a third term. A statement he would come to regret. He was the first president not originally elected to the office that retained the presidency.

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While Roosevelt made a distinction between a good trust, which benefited the nation and should be left alone and allowed to operate freely, and a bad trust, which should be heavily regulated because it hurt the nation with its treatment of workers and crashing competition through monopolies, Taft, a judge, had more of a legal vision. While in office William H. Taft busted more trusts than Teddy Roosevelt.

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As Taft decided to adapt Roosevelt's foreign policy philosophy to one that expressed the U.S economic power, he created the "Dollar Diplomacy", a strategy to secure markets and financial opportunities for the U.S.

In his message to the Congress on December 3, 1912, Taft expressed his decision to "substitute dollars for bullets". That meant to use the U.S. economic influence to force Latin American countries (Central America and the Caribbean) to make agreements which benefited the U.S.

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Wilson's Fourteen Points, 1918

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Woodrow Wilson wasn’t good at foreign affairs. When Europe plunged into war in 1914, Wilson, who believed in neutrality, saw America's role as that of peace broker. The sinking of the passenger liner Lusitania by a German U-boat helped to change his mind.

Wilson demanded an apology from Germany and stayed his neutral course as long as possible, but Germany's unrestricted submarine warfare, however, was an intolerable affront to America's dignity and honor. On April 2, 1917, Wilson finally asked Congress for a formal declaration of war.

Wilson proved to be a surprisingly effective war president. Recognizing what he did not know, he delegated military decisions to professional soldiers.
The boost given to the Allies by American money, supplies, and manpower tipped the scales against the Germans, who sued for peace and laid down their arms with the Armistice of November 11, 1918.

On the Eastern Front, Russia compounded the problem. Lenin ordered to publish the Tsar's secret treaties, agreements on how possessions of Germany were to be divided. To many it was evidence that the war not only wasn’t about democracy, but about the expansion of the imperial ambitions of the Allied countries.

To contrarrest this impression, President Wilson created his Fourteen Points, a program for a world without imperialism or secret treaties,  outlining his vision for ending World War 1 in a way that would prevent such a conflagration from occurring again.

Half of the Fourteen Points were related to specific issues between the combatant countries, the other half were a vision for peace.

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not actually be segregated on account of the nature of his work [and who] consequently had a cage built around him to separate him from his white companions of many years." Wilson’s administration fired several black federal employees and jobs applications started to require photos. In 1914 he famously threw civil rights leader William Monroe Trotter out of the Oval Office.
President Wilson, a supporter of the “Lost Cause” narrative, was against black suffrage. His foreign policies helped subjugate African and South Asian people, killing a proposal to recognize the principle of racial equality in the Versailles Convention. He also refused to appoint black ambassadors in the Caribbean.
In recent years, there have been petitions by students and alumni to rename the school in Princeton named after him.

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US naval leaders had dreamed of building a passage between the Atlantic and the Pacific oceans through Central America.

In 1901, the US negotiated with Britain for the support of an American-controlled canal. The Senate approved a route through Panama (owned by Colombia). When Colombia disagreed with the terms of the arrangement, US  supported a Panamian revolution.

In 1903, the Hay Bunau Varilla Treaty with Panama gave the US perpetual control of the canal for a price of $ 10 million and an annual payment of $ 250.000.

TR visited the building of the canal in 1906. He became the first US President to leave the country during his term.

After years of struggles the Panama Canal was finally completed in 1914.

It became known as the world's greatest engineering construction but also converted the area into a huge staging area for American military forces. The US became the dominant military power in Central America.

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How the Panama Canal was built - BBC News

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In 1904 when he Russo-Japanese war erupted, TR initially supported the Japanese position. But when the Japanese fleet achieved several victories, TR grew concerned over the Japanese influence in the region, representing a threat to America and China access to those markets.
In 1905 arranged then a secret peace conference between diplomats of both nations.
The resultant negotiations not only secured peace in the region but also granted the Nobel Peace Prize for Roosevelt, the first American to receive the award.
In the following years, Japan intended to force American business interests out of Manchuria (whose control had gained after the end of the war) and TR sent the US Great White Fleet to the Pacific Ocean. He had several reasons to do that:

to send the Japanese government a message, a show of force.

to send the US Navy (one of the largest in the world) on a world tour, gaining experience of worldwide travel.

to show off the Great White Fleet and impress other countries with US naval power.

It was described as a goodwill tour.

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Foreign Policy

TR was an imperialist. He wanted to increase the influence of prestige of the US on the world and make it a global power, acting aggressively and often without the consent of the Congress.

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Then, the unexpected happened. President McKinley was shot at a public exhibition in NY. He died in hospital a week later.TR ascended as President in September 14, 1901.
At 42 years old, he was the youngest President in America's history

Home Policies
The Square Deal: his domestic program consisted of the "Three Cs": Consumer Protection, Control of Corporations and Conservation.
Control of corporations: the Trust Buster

Prosecuted "bad trusts" for charging unfair prices.

Broke up the Northern Securities, largest railroad monopoly.

Regulated Standard Oil.

Proposed the creation of the US Department of Commerce and Labor.

Limited working hours for women and children.

Changed rules in football.

Revisioned disciplinary rules at the Navy Academy.

The 1902 Coal Strike

Coal miners in Pennsylvania went on a strike, threatening a national energy shortage.

The coal operators were informed that if no settlement was reached, the army would seize the mines and make coal available to the public.

TR had no constitutional authority to do any such thing.

With this threat hanging over their heads, the mine operators agreed to arbitration of the dispute by a commission.

The arbitration succeeded in stopping the strike.

An agreement was reached to improve miners better working conditions and getting more paid for fewer hours.

TR was the first President to arbitrate a labor dispute, although the workers didn't get union recognition.

TR proclaimed the settlement was good for labor and good for management and that it supported his goal of a "square deal for every man".

Consumer protection

After the publication of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle which exposed the abuses in the meat packing industry, Roosevelt pushed Congress to pass the Meat Inspection Act of 1906 and the Pure Food and Drug Act.

The Meat Inspection Act of 1906 banned misleading labels and preservatives that contained harmful chemicals.

The Pure Food and Drug Act banned impure or falsely labeled food and drugs from being made, sold, and shipped.

Conservation

The first measure he backed was the Newlands Reclamation Act of 1902 to encourage developers and homesteaders to inhabit lands that were useless without massive irrigation works.

The lands were sold at a cheap price if the buyer assumed the cost of irrigation and lived on the land for at least five years.

The government then used the revenue to irrigate additional lands. Over a million barren acres were rejuvenated under this program.

He began to preserve wilderness areas. By the time he left office, 150,000,000 acres had been declared national forests.

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Most historians believe Wilson’s time to be a low point in post-Civil War race relations in the US. The reconstruction era in the late XIXth century brought along racial integration policies in the federal government. Years later, under Wilson’s administration, it was segregated again.
The Railway Service, the Department of Treasury and the Post Office Department implemented separate lunchroom and bathrooms under Wilson’s administration. In an open letter to the President,  African American rights advocate W.E.D. DuBois denounced “one colored clerk who could

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When Woodrow Wilson, who had little foreign policy experience, became president, he attempted to expand on Roosevelt’s philosophy by applying a more “moral” tone to US relations with the Caribbean and Latin America. His approach would become known as “missionary diplomacy”. He argued that the USA had a moral responsibility to avoid recognizing any Latin American government that was “hostile” to US interests -if a foreign government were oppressive, undemocratic, or unfriendly toward the American values, the US government would not recognize it as a legitimate government. Wilson believed that such an approach would pressure America’s neighbors to establish more democratic forms of government. The first test to Wilson’s policy came in 1911 when a group of peasants under the leadership of Medero overthrew Diaz’s government in Mexico. Later, in 1913 Mexico came under the rule of the counterrevolutionary General Huerta, who clamped a bloody authoritarian rule on the country. Most European nations welcomed the order and friendly climate for foreign investments that Huerta offered, but Wilson refused to recognize “a government of butchers” that obviously did not reflect the wishes of the Mexican people.

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After returning from Cuba in 1898 he was elected Governor. In that position he worked hard to protect people in need, to regulate the railroad rates, pushing bills, protecting forest preserves, and improving labor relations.
When in late 1899 Vice President Hobart died of a heart attack, he was nominated for that position and embarked himself in an energetic and passionate campaign around 24 states.
He took office as Vice President in 1901.

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Taft went to private school and, like his father, attended Yale University. There, he joined the now-notorious secret society Skull and Bones, which his father co-founded in 1832. Taft graduated from Yale in 1878. Departing from tradition, he went on to attend the University of Cincinnati College of Law, and was admitted to the Ohio State Bar Association in 1880.

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The Birth of a Nation (1915), D.W. Griffith's infamous feature. W. Wilson approved its screening in the White House to "teach history with lightning"

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Later in 1897, President McKinley appointed him Assistant Secretary of the Navy. He focused then on the country's naval strength and in the construction of battleships. This position allowed him to push on the idea of interfering in the Caribbean, ejecting Spain from Cuba. He had two main motives to suggest this, firstly he believed in freeing America from European dominion and secondly, he saw it as a great opportunity to try the Navy and the Army.
An explosion in the harbor of Havana, was TR's excuse to direct his vessels to prepare for war, originating the Spanish-American War.
Following, he resigned as Assistant Secretary of the Navy and formed the First US Volunteer Cavalry Regiment, later called by the press the "Rough Riders". All sorts of Americans joined the regiment and under TR's command they had their pinnacle at the Battle of Kettle Hill.
Eventually, Cuba was liberated and TR made himself an american hero.

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1888 - He served in the US Civil Service Commission until 1895 demanding enforcement of civil service laws.

1894 - He became the President of the Board of Commissioners of the NY City Police Department reforming the police force, dealing with corruption and implementing inspections.

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Future president Theodore Roosevelt returned to the city of his birth in 1895 to take on a task that might have intimidated other people, the reform of the notoriously corrupt police department. His appointment was front-page news and he obviously saw the job a chance to clean up New York City while reviving his own political career, which had stalled.

As the president of the police commission, Roosevelt, true to form, vigorously threw himself into the task. His trademark zeal, when applied to the complexities of urban politics, tended to generate a cascade of problems.

Roosevelt's time at the top of the New York Police Department brought him into conflict with powerful factions, and he did not always emerge triumphantly. In one notable example, his widely publicized crusade to close saloons on Sunday, the only day when many workingmen could socialize in them, provoked a lively public backlash.

When he left the police job, after only two years, the department had been changed for the better. But Roosevelt's time as New York City's top cop had been raucous, and the clashes he found himself in had nearly brought his political career to an end.

Theodore Roosevelt was born into a wealthy New York City family on October 27, 1858. A sickly child who overcame illness through physical exertion, he went on to Harvard and entered New York politics by winning a seat in the state assembly at the age of 23.

In 1886 he lost an election for mayor of New York City. He then stayed out of government for three years until he was appointed by President Benjamin Harrison to the United States Civil Service Commission. For six years Roosevelt served in Washington, D.C., overseeing the reform of the nation's civil service, which had been tainted by decades of adherence to the spoils system.

Roosevelt was respected for his work reforming the federal civil service, but he wished to return to New York City and something more challenging. A new reform mayor of the city, William L. Strong, offered him the job of sanitation commissioner in early 1895. Roosevelt turned it down, thinking the job of literally cleaning up the city was beneath his dignity.

A few months later, after a series of public hearings exposed widespread graft in the New York Police Department, the mayor came to Roosevelt with a far more attractive offer: a post on the board of police commissioners. Enthused by the chance to bring much-needed reforms to his hometown, and in a very public post, Roosevelt took the job.

A crusade to clean up New York City, led by a reform-minded minister, Rev. Charles Parkhurst, had prompted the state legislature to create a commission to investigate corruption. Chaired by state senator Clarence Lexow, what became known as the Lexow Commission held public hearings which exposed the startling depth of police corruption.

In weeks of testimony, saloon owners and prostitutes detailed a system of payoffs to police officials. And it became apparent that the thousands of saloons in the city functioned as political clubs which perpetuated the corruption.

Mayor Strong's solution was to replace the four-member board that oversaw the police. And by putting an energetic reformer like Roosevelt on the board as its president, there was cause for optimism.

Roosevelt took the oath of office on the morning of May 6, 1895, at City Hall. The New York Times lauded Roosevelt the next morning but expressed skepticism about the other three men named to the police board. They must have been named for "political considerations," said an editorial. Problems were obvious at the outset of Roosevelt's term at the top of the police department.

In early June 1895 Roosevelt and a friend, the crusading newspaper reporter Jacob Riis, ventured out into the streets of New York late one night, just after midnight. For hours they wandered through the darkened Manhattan streets, observing the police, at least when and where they could actually find them.

The New York Times carried a story on June 8, 1895 with the headline, "Police Caught Napping." The report referred to "President Roosevelt," as he was president of the police board, and detailed how he had found policemen asleep on their posts or socializing in public when they should have been patrolling alone.

Several officers were ordered to report to police headquarters the day after Roosevelt's late night tour. They received a strong personal reprimand from Roosevelt himself. The newspaper account noted: "The action of Mr. Roosevelt, when it became known, made a sensation throughout the department and as a consequence, more faithful patrol duty may be performed by the force for some time to come."

Roosevelt also came into conflict with Thomas Byrnes, a legendary detective who had come to epitomize the New York Police Department. Byrnes had amassed a suspiciously large fortune, with the apparent help of Wall Street characters such as Jay Gould, but had managed to keep his job. Roosevelt forced Byrnes to resign, though no public reason for the ouster of Byrnes was ever disclosed.

Though Roosevelt was at heart a politician, he soon found himself in a political bind of his own making. He was determined to shut down saloons, which generally operated on Sundays in defiance of local law.

The problem was that many New Yorkers worked a six-day week, and Sunday was the only day when they could gather in saloons and socialize. To the community of German immigrants, in particular, the Sunday saloon gatherings were considered an important facet of life. The saloons were not merely social but often served as political clubs, frequented by an actively engaged citizenry.

Roosevelt's crusade to shutter saloons on Sundays brought him into heated conflict with large segments of the population. He was denounced and viewed as being out of touch with the common people. The Germans in particular rallied against him, and Roosevelt's campaign against saloons cost his Republican Party in the city-wide elections held in the fall of 1895.

The next summer, New York City was hit by a heat wave, and Roosevelt gained back some public support by his smart action in dealing with the crisis. He had made an effort to familiarize himself with slum neighborhoods, and he saw that the police distributed ice to people who desperately needed it.

By the end of 1896, Roosevelt was thoroughly tired of his police job. Republican William McKinley had won the election that fall, and Roosevelt began concentrating on finding a post within the new Republican administration. He was eventually appointed an assistant secretary of the Navy and left New York to return to Washington.

Theodore Roosevelt spent less than two years with the New York Police Department, and his tenure was marked with nearly constant controversy. While the job burnished his credentials as a reformer, most of what he tried to accomplish ended in frustration. The campaign against corruption proved essentially hopeless. New York City remained much the same after he left.

However, in later years Roosevelt's time at police headquarters on Mulberry Street in lower Manhattan took on legendary status. He would be remembered as a police commissioner who cleaned up New York, even though his accomplishments on the job didn't live up to the legend.

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In 1890s Theodore Roosevelt Struggled to Clean Up the New York Police

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Future president Theodore Roosevelt returned to the city of his birth in 1895 to take on a task that might have intimidated other people, the reform of the notoriously corrupt police department. His appointment was front-page news and he obviously saw the job a chance to clean up New York City while reviving his own political career, which had stalled.

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He was born in 1857.  Son of a distinguished judge, he graduated from Yale, and returned to Cincinnati to study and practice law. He rose in politics through Republican judiciary appointments, through his own competence and availability.  However,  he preferred law to politics. He was appointed a Federal circuit judge at 34. He aspired to be a member of the Supreme Court, but his wife, Helen Herron Taft, held other ambitions for him. His route to the White House was via administrative posts. President McKinley sent him to the Philippines in 1900 as chief civil administrator. Sympathetic toward the Filipinos, he improved the economy, built roads and schools, and gave the people at least some participation in government.

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1. Payne-Aldrich Tariff Act:  it was a law passed by the U.S. Congress in 1909 in answer to a call from Taft for lower tariffs. This was the beginning of his troubles.
2. Children's Bureau: in 1912, the President signed a law which established to "investigate and report ... upon all matter pertaining to the welfare of children and child life among all classes of our people".
3. Eight Hour Work Day: for all government employees.
4. National Wildlife Refuge System: Taft continued and backed the conservation of natural resources, which was an important element of the progressive reform program.
5. The 16th Amendment - Federal Income -Tax: it was introduced in 1909 to regulate all income taxes to be distributed among the states, according to their populations.

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In December 1886, Theodore married Edith Carow and his daughter Alice came back to live with them. The couple had 5 more children over the next decade.
In 1888, he turned to writing to make up for the lost of half his inherited fortune in the West. "The winning of the West", a 4 volume history work, soon became a best seller.

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In 1916, and partly to appeal to Roosevelt's progressive base, Wilson pushed for more reforms. Even when the 1914 election reduced the Democratic majority in Congress, he built up more accomplishments:

Regulation of overseas shipping

Approval of loans for farmers

Prohibition of child labor

Increment of income and inheritance taxes

8-hour workday for railroad workers

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In 1913 - 14 and for the first time ever, Wilson kept Congress in session. During this period he counted several victories:

Reduction of import duties

Income tax (now permitted by the new 13th Amendment to the Constitution)

Creation of the Federal Reserve System and the Federal Trade Commission

Strengthening laws against anticompetitive business practice

Inability to stop unions via court orders

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Devastated, TR handed his new born baby Alice to his sister to raise as if she were her own and hurried back to Committee work. However, soon needed to get away and headed West where he dedicated himself to ranching and hunting buffalos, soon gaining the cowboys' respect.
The time spent in Dakota, in between 1883 and 1887, changed him enormously physically as well as emotionally because action enabled him to overcome the grief.
But also he proved himself that he could hold his own among men of every class.
By the time he was ready to come back, he got understanding of the common people of the country, their strengths and their needs.

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For future president Theodore Roosevelt, the year 1884 was a very bad year indeed; he lost both his mother and his wife in just a matter of hours. To soothe his soul, he headed to North Dakota, which is where Mo Rocca takes us on a visit to what was once the site of Roosevelt's fabled Elkhorn Ranch.

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For future president Theodore Roosevelt, the year 1884 was a very bad year indeed; he lost both his mother and his wife in just a matter of hours. To soothe his soul, he headed to North Dakota, which is where Mo Rocca takes us on a visit to what was once the site of Roosevelt's fabled Elkhorn Ranch.

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https://www.britannica.com/biography/Woodrow-Wilson
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/woodrow-wilson-stroke
https://www.whitehouse.gov/about-the-white-house/presidents/william-howard-taft/
https://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/another-open-letter-to-woodrow-wilson/
https://millercenter.org/president/wilson/foreign-affairs
https://www.pbs.org/show/roosevelts/

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1876 - He entered Harvard.

1878 - His father died all of a sudden, leaving Theodore devastated.

1880 - He started at Columbia Law School but also it was the year when he fell in love with Alice Hathaway, marrying her some months later in Massachutes.

1884 - His first daughter Alice was born. Two days after the birth, his wife Alice and his mother died the same day with just hours difference

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Wilson began his career teaching political science and history in college. In 1902, while a faculty member in Princeton, he was chosen President. Most of his proposed reforms were opposed by conservative faculty and alumni, but his work at Princeton called the attention of the Democratic Party. Wilson became governor of New Jersey in 1910.
As a governor, Wilson pushed for anti-corruption laws, election reforms, workers' compensation and regulation of corporations.
In 1912, Wilson won the national election against Republicans Roosevelt and Taft, campaigning on "New Freedom".

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The only president since Jackson with foreign parents, Wilson was born in Virginia, in a Presbyterian family, in 1856. His father, a minister, served in the Civil War in the Confederate army.
Recent historians believe Wilson had dyslexia. Once he learned to read at age 10 he became a rapid reader. He attended Princeton University, became interested in literature and politics and went on to become a lawyer. Wilson became the first US president to earn a Ph.D. when he received his degree in Government and History.

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Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far

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Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far

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Big Stick Policy. Image by William Allen Rogers, 1904.

The African proverb was associated with his foreign policy (also known as the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine).
The Monroe Doctrine (1823) stated that the US would not accept European intervention in the Americas. However, TR thought that if nations continue to have problems, they would become targets of European intervention. His solution was that the US would intervene in any Latin American country with serious economic problems.
TR believed that it was unnecessary to use force to gain foreign policy goals, so long as the military could threaten force.

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He was born in his wealthy family's Manhattan townhouse in 1858, the second of 4 children. He was a sick and delicate boy suffering with asthma from a very early age.
His father was his hero and a philanthropist who used to work for several charitable organizations. Theodore would remember him as "the best man I ever knew".
He developed a curious mind and worked hard to overcome his lack of strength and to improve his poor health. As an adolescent, he became interested in science and nature and trained himself to conquer asthma through a tough physical regime of rowing, hunting and swimming.

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1913 - 1921
Introduction

Woodrow Wilson's presidential terms were marked by major events. He led the US into World War I and won a Nobel Peace Prize for his work in creating the League of Nations. During his second term the 19th Amendment was passed, giving women the right to vote.
While several laws were passed to benefit a big portion of the population during his presidency, the period also saw a step taken back in matters of Civil Rights.

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1909 - 1913
Introduction

When T. Roosevelt chose Taft to run as his successor, he saw him as the candidate who would carry on his agenda and reforms. While good friends, their perspectives were different, especially when it came to corporations. Taft ended up taking a more conservative approach than his predecessor.

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1901 - 1909
Introduction

Fifth cousin of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Theodore Roosevelt ascended the presidency of the United States in 1909, after the assassination of William McKinley. He was the youngest and perhaps the most popular president in American history. Between them Franklin and Theodore would occupy the White House 19 of the first 45 years of the XX Century.