Woodrow Wilson Signed Copy of Fourteen Points

Typed Document Signed, President Wilsons Fourteen Points, [January 8, 1918]. On White House stationery. 3 pp., 8 x 10 1/2 in. "there are serious, very serious, choices of policy to be made, and made immediately, which it was neither right nor constitutionally permissible that I should assume the responsibility of making."President Woodrow Wilson signed this typed copy of the fourteen points in his proposal for peace to follow World War I. The first five points dealt with general principles, such as foreign policy ideals of free trade, open agreements, democracy, and self-determination. The next eight dealt with individual countries or areas, including Russia, Belgium, France, Italy, Austria-Hungary, Romania, Serbia, Montenegro, Turkey, and Poland. The final point looked forward to the League of Nations.On October 3-4, 1918, Prince Maximilian of Baden, the German imperial chancellor, sent a note, via Switzerland, to President Wilson, requesting an immediate armistice and the opening of peace negotiations on the basis of the Fourteen Points. Germans would later argue a "betrayal," when they faced the harsher terms of the Armistice and the Treaty of Versailles, which fed resentments that led to World War II twenty years later. Excerpts"1. Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which there shall be no private international understandings of any kind but diplomacy shall proceed always frankly and in the public view."2. Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas, outside territorial waters, alike in peace and in war, except as the seas may be closed in whole or in part by international action for the enforcement of international covenants."3. The removal, so far as possible, of all economic barriers and the establishment of an equality of trade conditions among all the nations consenting to the peace and associating themselves for its maintenance."4. Adequate guarantees given and taken that national armaments will be reduced to the lowest point consistent with domestic safety."5. A free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment of all colonial claims, based upon a strict observance of the principle that in determining all such questions of sovereignty the interests of the populations concerned must have equal weight with the equitable claims of the government whose title is to be determined.""14. A general association of nations must be formed under specific covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guarantees of political independence and territorial integrity to great and small states alike."Historical BackgroundIn a speech to Congress on January 8, 1918, President Woodrow Wilson outlined his principles for postwar peace. His plan had fourteen points, and the principles soon became known as the "Fourteen Points." The United States joined the Allied Powers on April 6, 1917, to oppose the Central Powers of the German Empire, Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman Empire, and the Kingdom of Bulgaria. Wilson rejected the status quo antebellum and wanted to create a world that would no longer turn to war to resolve international conflicts. The speech promoted the foreign policy ideals of free trade, open agreements, democracy, and self-determination.Wilson's foreign-policy adviser Edward M. House led a team of approximately 150 academic researchers called The Inquiry, which had been established in September 1917 to prepare materials for the peace negotiations that would follow the war. The Inquiry's general secretary Walter Lippmann developed the territorial points in direct response to the secret treaties among the European allies. According to House, Lippmann and his colleagues were "to take the secret treaties, analyze the parts which were tolerable, and separate them from those which were regarded as intolerable, and then develop a position which conceded as much to the Allies as it could, but took away the poison." Their research informed the specifics of the Fourteen Points tha. (See website for full description).…