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By fall 1922, Germany found itself unable to make reparations payments. ... Inflation was exacerbated when workers in the Ruhr went on a general strike and the German government printed more money to continue paying for their passive resistance. By November 1923, the US dollar was worth 4,210,500,000,000 German marks

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Effects of WW I World War I had many long term effects on the growth and development of the United States and its relationship with other nations in the world. The federal government grew tremendously as a result of the war. Government spending increased at a pace never before witnessed in the US. The government created some 5,000 agencies during the course of the war. Many of the agencies continued after the war. Business and the influence of such businessmen as Herbert Hoover became essential in American economic and monetary planning. The labor movement received concessions from the government that it might not have received without the war. Organized labor began to grow within the economy. The incorporation of labor into federal decision-making processes made the AFL respectable. During the war there was a massive movement of blacks from the rural, segregated areas of the South to the industrial centers in the North. Many black soldiers who went to Europe, especially France, during the war, discovered societies that did not draw the color line so absolute as it was in the United States in the early part of the 1900s. Woman's rights received a boost during the war. Many went to work in occupations that had been the stronghold of men prior to the war. The suffrage movement was victorious in gaining women the right to vote. Perhaps the most important effect was the emergence of the United States into the world as a military and economic power. 

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Effects of WW I World War I had many long term effects on the growth and development of the United States and its relationship with other nations in the world. The federal government grew tremendously as a result of the war. Government spending increased at a pace never before witnessed in the US. The government created some 5,000 agencies during the course of the war. Many of the agencies continued after the war. Business and the influence of such businessmen as Herbert Hoover became essential in American economic and monetary planning. The labor movement received concessions from the government that it might not have received without the war. Organized labor began to grow within the economy. The incorporation of labor into federal decision-making processes made the AFL respectable. During the war there was a massive movement of blacks from the rural, segregated areas of the South to the industrial centers in the North. Many black soldiers who went to Europe, especially France, during the war, discovered societies that did not draw the color line so absolute as it was in the United States in the early part of the 1900s. Woman's rights received a boost during the war. Many went to work in occupations that had been the stronghold of men prior to the war. The suffrage movement was victorious in gaining women the right to vote. Perhaps the most important effect was the emergence of the United States into the world as a military and economic power. 

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The Austrian-Hungarians acted most recklessly, caring little about the possible consequences of a small Balkan War.

The Serbian government knew several days in advance about the assassination plot and, chose not to warn Austria.  (Worried that if true Pan-Slavic sentiment were understood in Austria, Serbia would suffer dire consequences.)

Russia might have negotiated an early peace had she mobilized only against Austria.  But instead, the Russians mobilized against Germany as well.

Britain refused to relinquish any of its imperialist claims and to admit that any other nations might have equally legitimate imperialist claims - especially Germany.

4. Old grievances were exacerbated rather than alleviated.

Germans bitterly resented the victors - its historical enemies France and Britain, as well as its newest enemy, the US.  They were especially resentful of the harsh peace settlement, the war reparations - that eventually totaled over $33 billion - and the fact that they were held responsible for the war itself.

The newly created nations, which had always been appended to other powers, were weak and continued to be dependent upon outsiders for security.

5. Although Americans had escaped widespread damage to our homeland during the 19 months of our involvement, the economic, social, and political consequences upon our people were profound.

The U.S. spent $35.5 billion dollars on the war effort.  More than 4.8 million Americans served in the armed forces.   About 116,000 Americans died and another 204,000 were wounded.  The typical American soldier was a draftee between 21 and 23 years old, white, single, and poorly educated

The status of two groups of previously unempowered persons was temporarily improved - black Americans and women.  Over 260,000 black Americans were drafted or volunteered and a half million Southern blacks moved to the urbanized North where they found decent-paying jobs.  Over 1 million women worked in industry between 1917-1918, but few women actually entered the workplace, moving, instead, to better-paying positions.  Gains of both groups were short-lived.

The war exposed the deep divisions among Americans that had been festering since colonial times: white versus black, nativist versus immigrant, capital versus labor, men versus women.  It also elevated political divisions:  radical versus progressive, pacifist versus interventionalist, nationalist versus internationalist, Republican versus Democrat. This latter point was especially evident in the rejection of Wilson's 14 Points:

All major countries involved in WWI objected to certain points. England and France distrusted Wilson's idealism for a peaceful world - a world made "safe for democracy." What they wanted was

to disarm and cripple Germany,

to take and redistribute all Germany's colonies, and

to put an end to Wilson's ideas about self-determination

However, when peace negotiations began, Wilson insisted that his 14 Points should serve as a basis for the signing of the Armistice. So, what happens with Wilson's vision?

In Versailles, he was forced to compromise. In order to get his most important point passed - #14: The League of Nations - he was only able to get three of his other points fulfilled:

#7 - the evacuation and restoration of Belgium;

#8 - the evacuation and restoration of all French lands lost in the war; and

#9 - the establishment of an independent Poland.

The war's aftermath destroyed the Wilson Presidency. During the elections of November 1918, Wilson had appealed to voters to elect a Democratic Congress saying that any other result would be "a repudiation of my leadership." This alienated many moderate Republicans as well as many of Wilson's fellow democrats. The Democrats lost both the House and the Senate.

When he went to Paris to negotiate the peace treaty, he refused to take any prominent Republicans and purposefully ignored the powerful Republican senator from Massachusetts, Henry Cabot Lodge who was head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

When he came home, was this Congress that had to "buy" his treaty and the revised 14 points.

After a grueling trip across the nation to appeal to the people, Wilson had a stroke and while convalescing, Congress failed to pass the treaty or approve involvement in the League of Nations.

A treaty, without the League of Nations and without accepting the 14 points, was not signed until almost three years after the last shot was fired. Thus, it was not until July 1921 that Congress, acting in concert with the new president, Republican Warren G. Harding, passed a joint resolution officially ending the war.

Wartime powers allowed the federal government to intervene as never before in the lives of Americans.

The U.S. emerged as a greater power; by 1920, it was the world's leading economic power and had shifted from being a debtor to a creditor nation - thus becoming the world's leading banker

The war, as Foner tells us, "cast a long shadow over the following decade" - the U.S. retreated from the international community by rejecting involvement in the League of Nations, Progressivism and progressive reform came to and end, and we failed to ratify the Treaty of Versailles.

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1. Wilson understood that if we did not enter they war, we would not be able to help shape the peace that he envisioned - making the world "safe for democracy" and creating a new world order that would change the balance of power in Europe. This new world order would replace the traditional great power politics that brought Europe into the war and would instead emphasize the need for collective security, democracy, and self-determination in countries throughout the world. These ideas were embedded in his famous "Fourteen Points." The first five points dealt with general principles:

2. Point 1 renounced secret treaties;

3. Point 2 dealt with freedom of the seas;

4. Point 3 wanted removal of world trade barriers;

5. Point 4 advocated arms reductions; and

6. Point 5 suggested the international arbitration of all colonial disputes.

7. Points 6 to 13 were concerned with specific territorial problems, including claims made by Russia, France and Italy. This part:

Raised issues about US and European commitments to territorial requests for self-determination and autonomy for peoples formerly ruled by the Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires.

Suggested the creation of a "general association of nations to ensure peace and resolves conflicts through negotiation" - the League of Nations.

Advocated "collective security" - the idea that in case of external aggression of any League member, the Council would determine how member states would respond.

8. Americans had increased their economic ties with the Allies.  England, especially, becomes a huge market for American goods and for loans at interest.

9. English and German violations of America's neutral rights on the high seas increased the incidents of submarine warfare and led to the January 1917 announcement that Germany would begin sinking all ships in the waters around England and France.

10. The Zimmerman telegram intercepted from the German foreign minister to the German ambassador in Mexico proposed an alliance with Mexico in case of war with the US and offered financial support and recovery of Mexico's "lost territory" in New Mexico, Texas, and Arizona.

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America's rise to superpower status began with its 1917 entry into World War I. President Woodrow Wilson had grand visions for the peace that followed, but failed. The battle he started in the US between idealists and realists continues to this day.

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The consequences for the United States were also enormous.

The war and its aftermath damaged the humanitarian, progressive spirit of the early 20th Century.  Bruising fights over the war and the League of Nations drained the American people's energy and enthusiasm for reform. Thus, progressivism lost its broad popular support among Americans.

The role of the federal government in the lives of ordinary Americans was dramatically strengthened - beginning with the President and Congress's decision to enter into war, to call for a draft, to shape the peace in Europe, and to interfere in the civil liberties of the American people during and after the war.

Wilson's vision to take freedom and democracy to the rest of the world and to create open markets, combined with his willingness to intervene militarily in a war that would promote American interests and values became "the model for 20th-century American international relations." (Foner, Chapter 19)

The consequences of the war, then, "laid the foundation for one of the most conservative decades of the nation's history." (Eric Foner, Give Me Liberty, Chapter 19)

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Whoever Put In The Declaration Of Independence

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Whoever Put In The Declaration Of Independence

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delete yourself

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When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

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One of the central problems nations faced during the war was procuring necessary foodstuffs for military use while ensuring that the civilian population remained adequately fed. The United States proved able to feed its soldiers without enacting a formalized food-rationing programme, instead relying upon a national campaign of financial enticements for producers and collective self-sacrifice for consumers.

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Tension and race riots between African Americans and White Americans increased rapidly during the war years of 1917-1919.

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Before its entry into World War I, the United States of America was a nation of untapped military potential and growing economic might. But the war changed the U.S. in two important ways: the country's military was turned into a large-scale fighting force with the intense experience of modern war, a force that was clearly equal to the old Great Powers; and the balance of economic power began the transfer from the drained nations of Europe to America. However, the toll taken by the war led to decisions by U.S. politicians to retreat from the world and return to isolationism. That isolation initially limited the impact of America's growth, which would only truly come to fruition in the aftermath of World War II. This retreat also undermined the League of Nations and the emerging new political order.

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America's economy boomed during and after the war and set off what is known as the "roaring 20's." This is b/c America was responsible for supplying the European Empires with raw materials such as metal, cotton, wheat etc.

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When war broke out in Europe in the summer of 1914, a sense of dread rippled through the American business community. So great was the fear of contagion from tumbling European markets that the New York Stock Exchange was closed for more than three months, the longest suspension of trade in its history.

At the same time, businesses could see the enormous potential the war might bring to their bottom lines.

The economy was mired in recession in 1914 and war quickly opened up new markets for American manufacturers. In the end, World War I set off a 44-month period of growth for the United States and solidified its power in the world economy.

A War of Production

World War I was the first modern mechanized war, requiring vast amounts of resources to equip and provision massive armies and provide them with the tools of combat. The shooting war was dependent on what historians have termed a parallel "war of production" that kept the military machine running.

During the first 2 ½ years of combat, the U.S. was a neutral party and the economic boom came primarily from exports. The total value of U.S. exports grew from $2.4 billion in 1913 to $6.2 billion in 1917. Most of that went to major Allied powers like Great Britain, France, and Russia, which scrambled to secure American cotton, wheat, brass, rubber, automobiles, machinery, wheat, and thousand of other raw and finished goods.

According to a 1917 study, exports of metals, machines, and automobiles rose from $480 million in 1913 to $1.6 billion in 1916; food exports climbed from $190 million to $510 million in that same period. Gunpower sold for $0.33 a pound in 1914; by 1916, it was up to $0.83 per pound.

America Joins the Fight

Neutrality came to an end when Congress declared war on Germany on April 4, 1917 and the U.S. began a rapid expansion and mobilization of more than 3 million men.

"The long period of U.S neutrality made the ultimate conversion of the economy to a wartime bases easier than it otherwise would have," writes economic historian Hugh Rockoff. "Real plant and equipment were added, and because they were added in response to demands from other countries already at war, they were added in precisely those sectors where they would be needed once the U.S. entered the war."

By the end of 1918, American factories had produced 3.5 million rifles, 20 million artillery rounds, 633 million pounds of smokeless gunpowder,. 376 million pounds of high explosives, 11,000 of toxic gas, and 21,000 airplane engines.

The flood of money into the manufacturing sector from both home and abroad led to a welcome rise in employment for American workers. The U.S. unemployment rate dropped from 16.4% in 1914 to 6.3% in 1916.

This fall in unemployment reflected not only an increase in available jobs, but a shrinking labor pool. Immigration dropped from 1.2 million in 1914 to 300,000 in 1916, and bottomed out at 140,000 in 1919. Once the US entered the war, around 3 million working-age men joined the military.

About 1 million women ended up joining the workforce to compensate for the loss of so many men.

Manufacturing wages increased dramatically, doubling from an average $11 a week in 1914 up to $22 a week in 1919. This increased consumer buying power helped stimulate the national economy in the later stages of the war.

Funding the Fight

The total cost of America's 19 months of combat was $32 billion. Economist Hugh Rockoff estimates that 22% was raised through taxes on corporate profits and high-income earners, 20% was raised through the creation of new money, and 58% was raised through borrowing from the public, mainly through the sale of "Liberty" Bonds.

The government also made its first foray into price controls with the establishment of the War Industries Board (WIB), which attempted to create a priority system for the fulfillment of government contracts, set quotas and efficiency standards, and allocated raw materials based on needs.

American involvement in the War was so short that the impact of the WIB was limited, but the lessons learned in the process would have an impact on future military planning.

A World Power

The war ended on November 11, 1918 and America's economic boom quickly faded. Factories began to ramp down production lines in the summer of 1918, leading to job losses and fewer opportunities for returning soldiers. This led to a short recession in 1918-1919, followed by a stronger one in 1920-21.

In the long term, World War I was a net positive for the American economy. No longer was the U.S. a nation on the periphery of the world stage; it was a cash-rich nation that could transition from a debtor to a global creditor. The U.S. had proved it could fight the war of production and finance and field a modern volunteer military force. All of these factors would come into play at the start of the next global conflict less than a quarter-century later.
Test your knowledge of the homefront during WWI.

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How World War I Changed the U.S. Economy for Good

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When war broke out in Europe in the summer of 1914, a sense of dread rippled through the American business community. So great was the fear of contagion from tumbling European markets that the New York Stock Exchange was closed for more than three months, the longest suspension of trade in its history.

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The effects of WW1 on America were wide-ranging covering the political, economic and social impact the Great War had on the United States. Unlike the countries of Europe, the factories and home of the US had not been destroyed. Manufacturing, production and efficiency had increased through necessity during the Great War. America had emerged as a world industrial leader and the US economy was booming, profits were increasing which led to the period in American history called the Roaring Twenties with a massive rise in consumerism for the wealthy.

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The war changed the economical balance of the world, leaving European countries deep in debt and making the U.S. the leading industrial power and creditor in the world.

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The war changed the economical balance of the world, leaving European countries deep in debt and making the U.S. the leading industrial power and creditor in the world.