Why did the U.S. refuse to ratify the Treaty of Versailles?

Answer 1

The Peace Treaty

Woodrow Wilson entered the war with a very idealistic vision of American’s mission. In his eyes, the purpose of the war was not to punish Germany or to gain wealth or territory for the U.S., but to create a new international order in which nothing like the Great War could ever occur again. Wilson hoped that WWI would be "the war to end all wars." Soon after the U.S. entered the war, however, Wilson learned that the other Allied governments did not share his views. He learned about secret Allied agreements to take territory from the Central Powers at the end of the war and to make Germany to pay enormous indemnities or reparations (payments to the Allies to make up for their losses and expenses).

Wilson responded by trying to make clear to the world what the United States was fighting for. With this in mind, he addressed Congress on Jan. 1, 1918 in a famous speech outlining what came to be known as the Fourteen Points. Here he summarized the ideals that he saw as representing U.S. goals in the war. If these points were established after the war, he believed that the world would be a peaceful and democratic place.

His first five points were general principles aimed at removing the fundamental causes of wars:

1. Peace agreements should be arrived at openly, not secretly. (This is in response to the secret deals he learned about when the U.S. entered the war.)

2. Free use of the seas for all nations in peace or wartime. (A response to U-Boats, mined waters, etc.)

3. Economic barriers to free trade should be removed. (Thus removing the types of trade rivalries that led to wars.)

4. Arms should be reduced to a point that would allow nations to defend themselves, but not threaten their neighbors.

5. The interests of colonial peoples should be considered in settling colonial disputes. (Countries that held colonies – or that were, in other words, "empires" – should pay more attention to the desires of the people who lived in the colonies.)

The next eight points dealt with territorial readjustments that would occur in Europe after the war. Wilson said that all changes should be based upon the principle of self-determination. In other words, the people affected should make the decisions, democratically. To Wilson, point number 14 was by far the most important of all. Here he called for a new world organization – "a general association of nations" – that would be designed to guaranteed the territory and independence of every member nation. In other words, each participating nation would send a representative to a world organization (which would later be named the League of Nations) in which disputes among nations could be settled peacefully, through debate and democratic voting. There would be no more need for war, as countries could settle their problems rationally.

Wilson saw the Fourteen Points as the "moral climax to this final war for human liberty." The Allies weren’t so enthusiastic. They had great empires to protect, they had lost much more in the war than the U.S. had, and were seething with bitterness toward Germany. French President Georges Clemenceau privately remarked of Wilson’s plan that "God gave us the ten commandments and we broke them. Now Mr. Wilson has given us the Fourteen Points. We shall see." But publicly the Allied leaders went along with the points because they were popular and cast the Allies in a noble light.

The Fourteen Points made Wilson a hero among ordinary people around the world. He received a tumultuous welcome when he arrived in France in January 1919 to begin negotiating a peace treaty. His main negotiating partners were Clemenceau of France and Prime Minister David Lloyd George of Great Britain. They met at the palace at Versailles to draw up what would be known as the Treaty of Versailles.

Wilson saw himself as absolutely right, as an unchallenged spokesman for the peoples of the world and for the principles of peace. He felt that he was not simply a political leader representing the interests of a single nation, but a world leader representing ordinary people everywhere. This was dangerous, and made it difficult for Wilson to tolerate disagreement or to compromise. These tendencies in Wilson would only grow worse as time went on.

Another problem Wilson faced in 1919 was political opposition at home. In the Congressional elections of November 1918, Wilson had urged American voters to show support for the war and his leadership by keeping the Democrats in control of Congress. This infuriated the Republicans, who felt that Wilson was trying to turn the war into a partisan, Democratic issue, when in fact Republicans supported the war as well. To make matters worse for Wilson, the Republicans won the election and took control of both houses of Congress. This was important, because according to the U.S. Constitution, the Senate has to approve, by a 2/3 majority, any treaty that the U.S. signed. This meant that when Wilson came home with the Treaty of Versailles, he’d have to ask a bitter Republican Senate to pass it. This would be made more difficult by the fact that although Wilson took a number of men with him to France to help negotiate the treaty, he didn’t ask a single prominent Republican to go. This made Republicans even angrier.

In the negotiations at Versailles, Wilson pushed hard for a treaty that would honor the 14 Points and that would not punish Germany too severely. But Wilson was forced to give in on a number of points in order to get the Allies to agree to create Wilson’s cherished League of Nations. In the end, the treaty was less harsh toward Germany than it would have been had Wilson not taken part in drafting it, but it was still harsh. Germany lost 1/10 of its population and 1/8 of its territory, its colonial empire was stripped away, it was deprived of a navy and its army was limited to 100,000 men, and it was force to pay enormous reparations to the Allies for the cost of the war. The Treaty also included a "war guilt" clause, in which Germany given responsibility for starting the war, in order to justify the harsh terms. Many believe that the treaty was so severe that it planted the seeds of World War II, which would erupt just 20 years later.

Wilson, however, was largely satisfied with the treaty, which was signed in June 1919, because it contained a section known as the "League Covenant" which established and laid out the ground rules for a League of Nations. By joining, each member nation would agree to respect the independence and territory of every other nation, and every nation had the right to bring any threat to peace to the League’s attention and to submit dangerous disputes to arbitration by the League. According to Article 10 of the League Covenant, the League could impose economic sanctions against any aggressive, misbehaving nation, and, as a last resort, the League could request troops from its member nations to impose force on an aggressive country. Article 10 in particular would cause trouble when Wilson came home with the Treaty, because many Senators believed that the article took away Congress’ constitutional authority to declare war -- handing this power over to an international agency -- and risked entangling the U.S. in international conflicts of which they wanted no part.

Wilson, though, believed that the American people would support the treaty and the League and that the Senate would therefore have to ratify the treaty. But when the Republicans took control of the Senate, Sen. Henry Cabot Lodge of Massachusetts became chairman of the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee. This committee would look at the treaty first, then recommend passage, revision, or rejection of the treaty to the Senate as a whole. Lodge despised Wilson (he once remarked that "I never expected to hate anyone in politics with the hatred I feel toward Wilson"), and he was determined to defeat the treaty.

When opponents of the treaty launched a tremendous publicity campaign against it, speaking out in speeches and newspaper editorials, Wilson decided, even though he was exhausted by overwork and illness, to go out and talk to the American people directly to win their support for the treaty. He left Washington on Sept. 3, and in 22 days traveled 9,000 miles by train, giving some 40 speeches along the way. He told his audiences that American troops had not fought to defend American or its interests, but that they had gone to Europe to fight for "the salvation of mankind. It is the noblest errand that troops ever went on." Wilson genuinely believed this, and refused to compromise on what he saw as his sacred mission to win ratification of the treaty and create the League of Nations.

Meanwhile, while Wilson was on his speaking tour, Lodge began proposing changes in the treaty that would weaken it, changes that he knew Wilson would reject. Lodge hoped that this strategy would end up stalemating and killing the treaty in the Senate. Ultimately, this strategy worked. By late September, Wilson was totally worn out. After a speech on Sept. 25, he suffered a total physical and emotional breakdown. He told his doctor that "I just feel as if I am going to pieces," and broke into tears. He was rushed back to Washington, where on Oct. 2 he suffered a massive stroke that paralyzed his left side and left him an invalid the rest of his life. Now, confined to his sickbed, ill, isolated, and virtually cut off from the world by his overly protective wife, Wilson became even more uncompromising, and demanded that the Senate ratify the treaty without changing a word of it.

The Senate voted on the treaty three times. The first time, the Senate voted down the treaty with Lodge’s changes (or "reservations," as they were called). Next, the Senate voted down the treaty without these reservations. There was still enough support for the treaty to bring it up for a vote one more time, with Lodge’s reservations, but once again the treaty failed, this time by 7 votes.

Wilson’s last, desperate hope was that the American people would use the 1920 Presidential election to speak their mind on the treaty, that by voting for the Democratic candidate they would show their support for Wilson’s ideas. But by this point most Americans were sick of the war and Wilson’s crusading, and Republican Warren G. Harding won in a landslide, ending any hope that the treaty would be ratified. The U.S. never joined the League of Nations, and Wilson died a broken man in 1924, his dreams crushed.


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Answer 2

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RE:
Why did the U.S. refuse to ratify the Treaty of Versailles?

Answer 3

It came down to a schism between President Wilson and the Senate Majority Leader Henry Cabot Lodge, who led the Republican-controlled Senate against the ratification of the treaty. Lodge was unhappy with the fact that Wilson did not take any Republicans with him to the bargaining table at Versailles. The closest the treaty had come to ratification was with a number of modifications, all of which Wilson did not agree to. Due to the two sides being able to compromise, the Treaty of Versailles failed to pass within the United States.

Answer 4

The U.S. did indeed ratify the Treaty of Versailles. What the U.S. did not ratify was entry of the U.S. into the League of Nations. As Yogi Berra used to say, "You could look it up!"

Answer 5

after wwi...the us entered in an isolationist mood. many believe that the war was a european war that american businessmen involved the u.s. to protect their overseas interests.

Answer 6

Because Americans aren't supposed to be making treaties and getting entangled with foreign governments.

Answer 7

Because of the isolationists in the US Senate.

Answer 8

Because it was not in our national best interest.