Woodrow Wilson stood on the wrong side of history

The preamble to the Declaration of Independence has been fundamental to American identity, even if the United States hasn’t always fulfilled the promise of Thomas Jefferson’s words. It’s jarring to learn that Woodrow Wilson, the 28th president, dismissed the preamble’s significance altogether.

In “Woodrow Wilson: The Light Withdrawn,” Christopher Cox summarizes a speech that Wilson delivered in 1911, the year before he was elected president: “This foundational American document, Wilson claimed, is better understood if one excises its first two paragraphs – those setting forth the idea that ‘all men are created equal’ and ‘endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.’ This is mere verbiage, Wilson told his audience, a ‘rhetorical introduction’ only, ‘the least part of it.’ ‘If you want to understand the real Declaration of Independence,’ he insisted, ‘do not repeat the preface.’”

Southern Democrats used this argument to justify denying voting rights to the Black men who had been given the franchise by the 15th Amendment. And although Wilson was president of Princeton University and governor of New Jersey before ascending to America’s highest office, he was a loyal son of the South. 

Born in Virginia in 1856, Wilson, whose father was a pro-slavery minister, spent his formative years in Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina, and he remained convinced of the righteousness of the Confederate cause throughout his life. Even in middle age, as president of Princeton, he opined that “slavery itself was not so dark a thing as it was painted” and that enslaved men and women “were happy and well cared for.”

Cox begins his riveting biography by summarizing Wilson’s progressive legislative accomplishments as president, which include the graduated income tax and the creation of the Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Reserve. The book covers Wilson’s leadership during World War I and his passion for establishing the League of Nations after the war ended in 1918. But the author is primarily interested in Wilson’s long-standing opposition to suffrage for women, which was rooted in his deeply held prejudices about both gender and race. By making suffrage central to the story of Wilson’s presidency, Cox reaches devastating conclusions. 

Cox, a senior scholar in residence at the University of California, Irvine, was a Republican congressman for 17 years and served as chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission under George W. Bush. He understands that historical figures must be understood within the social contexts of their times. Even so, he argues that Wilson was “superbly unsuited for the moment.” 

For instance, the federal government was the largest employer of Black Americans when Wilson took office in 1913. The federal workforce had been integrated for years, but the new president quickly authorized the Southern Democratic members of his Cabinet to segregate workers and to designate bathrooms as “colored” or “white.” “Methodically, the Wilson administration removed Black appointees and replaced them with white men,” Cox writes. 

Wilson was also strongly opposed to expanding the vote to women, believing that their place was in the home. He couched his opposition in the language of states’ rights. Such language also signaled his support for Jim Crow and for allowing Southern states to deny Black women the vote.

Cox’s book does a terrific job of documenting the long, difficult road to the 1920 ratification of the 19th Amendment, also known as the Susan B. Anthony Amendment, which enshrined the right of women to vote. He highlights the divisions within the suffrage movement. The National American Woman Suffrage Association was solicitous of Wilson, who counseled its members to be patient even as he did nothing to help advance the cause. NAWSA was also willing to accept proposed changes to the Anthony Amendment that would effectively limit voting rights to white women in order to convince Southern Democrats to support it. 

The more militant suffragists belonged to the rival National Woman’s Party, led by Alice Paul. In January 1917, the NWP began organizing “silent sentinels” to picket the White House for the right to vote. Once the U.S. entered World War I, Wilson promised to meet “disloyalty” with “a firm hand of stern repression,” and he clearly considered the peaceful protesters disloyal. The book’s most wrenching passages describe his administration’s treatment of the women, who were often assaulted by mobs while police looked on. 

The suffragists were arrested, given monthslong sentences for misdemeanor charges, and detained in terrible conditions. Women who mounted hunger strikes in protest were force-fed, a painful procedure. 

“Woodrow Wilson: The Light Withdrawn” is, as its title suggests, a dark portrayal. But the book has plenty of heroes, from well-known suffragists to forgotten members of Congress who worked tirelessly for the Anthony Amendment’s passage. While the book removes the luster from the 28th president’s reputation, it reminds us of many others who illuminated the path forward.