“Just what is it that Americans stand for? If she stands for one thing more than another it is for the sovereignty of self-governing people,” Woodrow Wilson. After ready Thomas A. Bailey’s article on “Woodrow Wilson Wouldn’t Yield”, I feel this quote best represents what Woodrow Wilson stood for. He was a man who wanted peace and would not yield for anyone or any country unless it was best for him and our country. Thomas A. Bailey does an excellent job explaining who and what Woodrow Wilson stood for in his article.
In Tomas A. Bailey’s article, his argument that Wilson’s fourteen points and most notably the League of Nations wasn’t passed not just because of the points themselves. But because of Wilson’s failure to see little changes and revisions to his plans, the League would have fallen through, instead of pitfall in the Senate like it did. “On March 4, 1919, 39 senators or senators-elect-more then enough to defeat the treaty-published a round robin to the effect that they would not approve the League in it’s existing form”(Bailey 107). Bailey also argues that Wilson’s character, in that his huge desire for morality and idealism, we also much to blame for his stubbornness in keeping the League of Nations unrevised or compromised upon. Something that Bailey really touches on is Wilson’s desire for his League of Nations was so strong that he inevitably handicapped himself in order to get his message out to the public. When he went touring the United States speaking in public places about the League of Nations, he ended up putting his body in such stress that half of his body became paralyzed. “The high point- and the breaking point of the trip came at Pueblo, Colorado, where Wilson, with tears steaming down his cheeks, pleaded for his beloved League of Nations. That night Wilson’s weary body rebelled. He was whisked back to Washington, where he suffered a stroke that paralyzed the left side of his body”(110). Wilson worked incredibly hard and his...