SEPTEMBER 3 — 1919 President Wilson embarks on tour in support for League of Nations; 1833 NY Sun begins publishing; 1835 Frerick Douglass escapes from slavery; 1929 Dow Jones reaches all time high before crash
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SEPTEMBER 3
1919 – President Woodrow Wilson embarks on tour to promote the League of Nations. Why am I talking about an alliance that America wasn’t even part of on a US History show? Because it was the Professor’s idea in the first place and was part of his Fourteen Point program to keep peace in Europe. The Europeans, who had been at total war since 1914, thought it was a great idea. The Big Three, which consisted of Georges Clemenceau from France, David Lloyd George of the United Kingdom, and Phrase maker Wilson himself, drafted Part one of the Treaty of Versailles.
According to this treaty, the League would guarantee the territorial integrity and political independence of member states, authorize the League to take any action to safeguard the peace, establish procedures for arbitration, and create the mechanisms for economic and military sanctions. Whoah woah woah woah wait a minute. The Republicans, notably Senate majority leader and chairman of foreign relations Committee Henry Cabot Lodge, didn’t like the wording of this.
It was vague and open to loopholes. Plus it interfered with the US and its ability to make decisions on how to defend itself, not to mention the complexity of getting involved with Europe’s tangled politics. To promote the idea, the Professor Wilson took his idea to the streets and directly to the American people beginning September 3, 1919, arguing that isolationism is a thing of the past for America, and that the League of Nations embodied American values of self-government and the desire to settle conflicts peacefully. He toured 8,000 in 22 days, but it took its toll on Wilson’s health. He suffered from constant headaches and nearly died from a stroke on October 2. The US never joined an international league until after the Second World War when it joined the United Nations.
1833 – The New York Sun
…begins publishing. After all when a dog bites a man, that is not news because it happens so often. But if a man bites a dog, now that is news. This conservative paper ran until 1950. It’s famous for the Great Moon Hoax of 1835, the 1897 editorial Is there a Santa Claus? And the 1947 editorial crime on the waterfront, which would later win a Pulitzer prizer and and inspired the 1954 movie On the Waterfront.
1838 – Frederick Douglass escapes to freedom.
…Douglass, a former African American slave, was a social reformer, orator, abolitionist, writer and statesmen. His first two attempts to escape slavery failed, but on September 3, 1838, Douglass jumped on a train headed to his sweetheart, Anna Murray in Baltimore, and got off in Delaware, which was a slave state. He disguised himself as a sailor, HOPPED ON A FERRY, THEN A STEAMBOAT, THEN LANDED AT New York City where he was safe. Anne Murray met up with him several days later, they got married, and Douglass began a life he was meant to live.
1929 – Down Jones Industrial Average reached an all time high of 381.17, to be shortly followed by the Crash of 1929.
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