When Wilson landed in Europe late in the year, he received rapturous welcomes from the masses who saw him as a champion of democracy and world peace. But the leaders of France and Italy were careful to keep him a safe distance from their people, lest they be swayed into overthrowing them and upsetting their imperialistic plans. The peace conference was dominated by the Big Four powers of the UK, UK, France, and Italy, of whom the most ruthless and hard-edged was France's Georges Clemeanceau. It opened January 18, 1919 and time seemed of an essence for Europe was in a highly unstable and fluid situation and nobody could be sure if the Bolshevik forces in Russia might sweep westward.

On January 10, Wilson received a telegram informing him that former President Theodore Roosevelt had died. When he read the news, "a thin, joyous smile formed on his lips."

The president above all hoped to prevent the victorious Entente powers from engaging in naked territorial grabs--officially, the victors would receive territory only as League of Nations mandates, not direct "colonies." In that spirit, France took Lebanon and Syria from the Ottoman Empire and Britain got Iraq. But in reality, it was just the same old colonialism with a new coat of paint.

The president had to now sail back to the US to take care of domestic spats. The brutal truth was that certain Republican leaders, led by Senator Lodge, had their knives sharpened for Wilson, "that drum major of civilization." The president's New Freedom reforms had trampled heavily on the corns of big business, and many Republicans yearned to go back to the good old days of McKinley standpattism. They considered the League of Nations either totally useless or a dangerous super state that could threaten American sovereignty. Wilson, perish the thought, might even try and run for a third term to see that all of his plans were carried out.

Thirty-nine Republican Senators declared that they would not approve the League of Nations treaty in its existing form. This was good news to the Entente members in Paris as it meant Wilson would have to compromise.

Once he returned to Paris, the curmugeony 78 year old Clemeanceau, who did not forget the Franco-Prussian War when he was a young man, developed severe tunnel vision and could see nothing other than crippling Germany and her ability to wage future wars at all costs. To that end, he demanded French occupation and annexation of the left bank of the Rhine. Wilson strongly opposed this, so in the end the French were forced to settle for giving the Saarland over as an independent territory under League supervision for 15 years, after which the people would vote to determine their fate. France would also get a collective security agreement with the US and Britain where the latter two were bound to come to their aid in the event of future German aggression, but the Senate rejected this and the French felt let down.

Once he returned to Paris, the curmugeony 78 year old Clemeanceau, who did not forget the Franco-Prussian War when he was a young man, developed severe tunnel vision and could see nothing other than crippling Germany and her ability to wage future wars at all costs. To that end, he demanded French occupation and annexation of the left bank of the Rhine. Wilson strongly opposed this, so in the end the French were forced to settle for giving the Saarland over as an independent territory under League supervision for 15 years, after which the people would vote to determine their fate. France would also get a collective security agreement with the US and Britain where the latter two were bound to come to their aid in the event of future German aggression, but the Senate rejected this and the French felt let down.

Italy was another problem. They wanted the Adriatic port of Fiume, which had a mixed Italian and Croatian population. Wilson thought it ought to go to Yugoslavia, naturally infuriating both the Italian government and people in the process.

Japan meanwhile had seized China's Shantung Peninsula and German island territories in the Pacific. The Japanese got to keep the islands which they later illegally fortified and used as military bases, but Wilson would not accept them controlling Shantung. The Japanese delegates threatened to walk, so the president instead accepted a compromise whereby Japan was bound to return the peninsula at a later date. The Chinese were not happy about this compromise.

The finished Treaty of Versailles was given over to Germany at bayonet point in June. Of the 23 original Wilsonian points, only four were honored, and it would lead to ugly recriminations down the road. In truth, many of the Entente powers had already made secret treaties during the war they were now bound to uphold and Wilson had to give in to some of their demands to preserve the League of Nations. He was not happy with things. A triumphant hero in Europe during the winter of 1918-19, by summer he was a fallen god both liberals and imperialists were disillusioned with. Wilson knew the flaws in the Versailles treaty, but hoped the League would iron them out.

The peace settlement was still not without merit; it gave freedom and self-determination to the Poles and numerous other peoples and without Wilson it might have been much worse.

If Europeans were upset with Wilson, the American people were even more so. Isolationists remembering George Washington's statement about opposing "entangling alliances" were ferociously opposed to the League of Nations. Nobody was happy with the Treaty of Versailles. Germanophobes complained it didn't go far enough. Professional liberals like The Nation's chief editor thought it went too far and was a stab in the back. German-Americans, Italian-Americans, and other ethnic minorites felt their homelands didn't get a fair and just settlement. Irish-Americans were angry, too--they felt Britain would have too much weight in the League of Nations and even compel the US to assist them in crushing any Irish independence movements. Crowds of Irish jeered and booed the president.

Still, Wilson had reason to be optimistic. In the summer of 1919, Senate Republicans had no realistic hope of defeating the treaty, only to modify it in a way that might make it more amenable to them and then take credit for the changes. As the summer wore on, Wilson became deeply concerned. The treaty stalled out while the nation was engulfed in chaos with major labor strikes, violence, and race riots. He decided the answer was to go on a speaking tour and take it to the people in person. The president's doctors protested and feared he'd overtax himself. Wilson had always been physically delicate, long suffering from migraines, and the enormous strain of the presidency had worn him down. But he declared he was willing to die on the battlefield like the common soldier in the war for the sake of world peace.

The tour, which began in September, began poorly. Wilson was unpopular in the heavily German-American Midwest and he was tailed by two "irreconcilable" Republican Senators--Idaho's Frank Borah and California's Hiram Johnson, who'd spoken in the same cities two days before. Angry crowds called for the president to be impeached. The Western US was different; they had voted heavily for Wilson in 1916 and gave him a rapturous welcome. In Pueblo, Colorado on September 25, Wilson tearfully called for the League to be approved to ensure world peace. That night, Wilson collapsed of nervous exhaustion. He was rushed back to Washington D.C. where several days later, he was discovering laying in the White House bathroom, collapsed of a massive stroke that left the right side of his body paralyzed. Wilson was bedridden for a couple of weeks and did not meet with his cabinet for 7-1/2 months.

The scheming Lodge was now in charge and after failing to amend the treaty outright, he came up with 14 formal reservations to it, a slap at Wilson's Fourteen Points. The Senators were especially upset by Article X of the League of Nations charter, which obligated the US to assist any member state victimized by outside aggression and Congress did not want to give up their right to declare war.

Wilson was ready to kill Lodge and nearly had another stroke at the mere suggestion of the "reservations", although he had been ok with similar suggestions proposed by fellow Democrats. He was too feeble to lead, but not feeble enough to obstruct. When the treaty was up for a vote, Wilson instructed all Senate Democrats to vote against any treaty with the Lodge reservations attached. If they were discarded, he hoped the path would be open for ratification without reservations or only with Democrat ones. The vote came up on November 19 and the Senate rejected the League treaty 55-39.

Nebraska's Senator Gilbert Hitchcock, the Senate Minority Leader, met the president and proposed compromise with Lodge. "Let Lodge compromise," said Wilson. "Well, of course," replied Hitchcock. "He must compromise also, but we might well hold out the olive branch." Wilson stared fixedly at him and replied "Let Lodge hold out the olive branch." Hitchcock decided to leave it go at that for he had no desire to argue with the stricken president, especially not when his wife and doctor were present in the room.

The result was a shocker and the Senate was forced to try again in March 1920, with the Lodge reservations attached. There was no other choice; without them it would fail to pass. But the ailing Wilson lived in a bubble with no notion of political reality and he merely instructed Senate Democrats to vote against the treaty so long as the reservations were there. The vote was made on March 19 and it went 49-35, a simple majority but not the necessary two-thirds.

what went wrong? A combination of the Lodge-Wilson feud, traditionalism, partisan politics, and isolationism, but mostly it was Wilson himself. One indignant Democrat Senator complained that the president killed the treaty with his own unwillingness to compromise. He wanted everything or nothing, and got nothing.

>Euros mad that Wilson told them they couldn't steal clay