The Film Archives: Nicholas Patler- 'Jim Crow and The Wilson Administration: An Enduring Legacy'

Source: The Film Archives- The American Civil War?

Source:The Daily View

"Woodrow Wilson was a Democrat elected from New Jersey, but he was the first Southern-born president of the post-Civil War period. He appointed Southerners to his Cabinet. Some quickly began to press for segregated workplaces, although Washington, D.C., and federal offices had been integrated since after the Civil War. In 1913, for instance, Secretary of the Treasury William Gibbs McAdoo – an appointee of the President – was heard to express his opinion of black and white women working together in one government office: "I feel sure that this must go against the grain of the white women. Is there any reason why the white women should not have only white women working across from them on the machines?"[13]

Wilson introduced segregation in federal offices, despite much protest from African-American leaders and groups. He appointed segregationist Southern politicians because of his own firm belief that racial segregation was in the best interest of black and European Americans alike.[14] At Gettysburg on July 4, 1913, the semi-centennial of Abraham Lincoln's declaration that "all men are created equal", Wilson addressed the crowd:

How complete the union has become and how dear to all of us, how unquestioned, how benign and majestic, as state after state has been added to this, our great family of free men![15]

In sharp contrast to Wilson, a Washington Bee editorial wondered if the "reunion" of 1913 was a reunion of those who fought for "the extinction of slavery" or a reunion of those who fought to "perpetuate slavery and who are now employing every artifice and argument known to deceit" to present emancipation as a failed venture.[15] One historian notes that the "Peace Jubilee" at which Wilson presided at Gettysburg in 1913 "was a Jim Crow reunion, and white supremacy might be said to have been the silent, invisible master of ceremonies."[15] (See also: Great Reunion of 1913)

In Texas, several towns adopted residential segregation laws between 1910 and the 1920s. Legal strictures called for segregated water fountains and restrooms.[15] Jim Crow laws were a product of what became the solidly Democratic South. White Southern Democrats, exploiting racial fear, attacking the corruption (real or perceived) of Reconstruction Republican governments, and suppressing the black vote by violence and intimidation, had taken over state governments in the South in the 1870s and essentially dominated them for nearly 100 years. They disenfranchised most blacks through voter registration laws and new constitutions by the end of the nineteenth century. In 1956, Southern resistance to the Supreme Court's ruling in Brown v. Board of Education resulted in a resolution called the Southern Manifesto. It was read into the Congressional Record and supported by 96 Southern Congressmen and senators, all but two of them Southern Democrats."

From The Film Archives

Woodrow Wilson is a mix bag to me, because he is the father of American liberal internationalism: this idea that America should always be strong and fight authoritarianism around the world ( even if we promote it at home ) and work with our allies around the world to defend liberal democracy and fight against authoritarianism. Whether it's communism, or religious theocracy, monarchy, nationalism, whatever the authoritarian philosophy might be. Which has been the governing foreign policy inside the Democratic Party going all the way though the Barack Obama Administration. George McGovern’s 1972 presidential campaign might be the only exception to this. So on this score I give President Woodrow Wilson very high marks.

President Woodrow Wilson was also an economic Progressive: he believed in things like a public safety net things like Unemployment Insurance for people who are unemployed. That every America ( at least European-Americans ) should have an opportunity to succeed in America. He believed in a regulatory state not to run private industry, but to protect employees and consumers from predators in the economy. Perhaps not as progressive as Theodore Roosevelt ( but most American politicians weren’t back then ) but an economic Progressive. Even though he was very regressive when it came to race relations and promoted segregation and separating African-Americans from European-Americans.

But if you want to know why we had segregation and Jim Crow laws in the 1920s and going all the way up to the mid-1960s, look no further than President Woodrow Wilson and his administration of the 19 teens. Where President Wilson even segregated the races in the Federal Government. And not allowing African-Americans to get good Federal jobs simply because of their race. Which gave life to Dixiecrats and Dixiecrat governors in the South, as well as local government’s own there to pass their own segregation laws.

Southern predominately Anglo-Saxon European-Americans, knew they lost the Civil War and that slavery would no longer be tolerated. But there’s that old saying that the Confederates lost the Civil War but won the battles and the reconstruction. Jim Crow laws were Confederates chance at revenge. Acknowledging that slavery was history but that since Africans would no longer be slaves for anyone in America, that instead they would be treated like second-class citizens in America and in some cases not even be treated like American citizens at all. Be treated like criminals, terrorists, and even animals, by Southern racists. And Jim Crow laws and segregation, is obviously a huge part of the negative legacy of President Woodrow Wilson. Just like Watergate is a big part of President Richard Nixon’s negative legacy.