Among the measures left over to the next Congress were the Immigration Bill (p. [454]), the Philippine Government Bill, and the Rural Credits Bill (p. [453]), which had not passed the Senate; a Bill empowering the Treasury to deposit $250,000,000 in banks in the tobacco and cotton States (to facilitate loans to the planters); constitutional amendments respectively establishing women's suffrage throughout the Union, which had been reintroduced after its failure in the Senate, and prohibiting throughout the Union the sale or manufacture of intoxicants "for beverage" (p. [455]); and the Bill empowering the regulation of railroad stock issues by the Interstate Commission. So were the treaties with Colombia and Nicaragua, which the Senate had not yet ratified, and Peace Commission treaties with China, Panama, the Dominican Republic, and Russia.
The President and the Democratic majority in Congress had thus held together—except, to some extent, on the Panama Tolls Bill—and had carried much of their programme. But the November Congressional and State elections showed a very marked reaction against the Administration, and a rally in the Republican party, emphasised by the disappearance of the semi-independent "Progressive Republicans," and a general return of the Progressives to the Republican fold. The Democratic majority over all the other parties in the House together fell from 141 to 31; and in some of the Eastern and Middle-Western States there was a Republican "landslide." New York State, New Jersey (the President's own State), Illinois, Wisconsin, and eleven other States which had been Democratic in 1912 went Republican; Michigan, Pennsylvania and Washington reverted from the Progressives to the Republicans; New York, to the general surprise, elected a Republican Governor. The Progressive numbers in the House fell from fifteen to seven, though Governor Hiram Johnson secured a personal triumph by his re-election in California. Women's suffrage was voted on in seven States and defeated in five, in spite of much agitation just before the election. A Socialist was elected to Congress from New York City, the first from any Eastern State.
This sixty-third Congress, however, would not assemble earlier than the following spring in any case, and meanwhile the sixty-second met on December 7. Besides the legislative programme just mentioned, the European War forced on its attention the question of national defence. The Army League and the Navy League were agitating for an increase, and Congressman Gardner (Republican), of Massachusetts, was pressing for an inquiry into the "preparedness" of the nation for war. Before the session opened President Wilson let it be known that he deprecated such an inquiry, as likely to create an unfavourable impression abroad; and he took the same line in his Message (Dec. 8). He dealt mainly with the war, declaring the dearest hope of the nation to be that its own character as the champion of peace and concord would shortly, in God's providence, bring it an opportunity such as had seldom been vouchsafed to any nation—"an opportunity to counsel and obtain peace in the world and the reconciliation and healing settlement of many matters that have hitherto cooled and interrupted the friendship of nations." He urged the country to develop its resources so as to supply the needs set up by the appalling destruction wrought by the war; and he specially recommended the Ship Purchase Bill. He urged also a larger measure of self-government for the Philippines, and a survey of the Alaska coasts. He declared that, as regarded national defence, they must depend, not on a standing army or a reserve army, "but upon the citizenry, trained and accustomed to arms." They must, in short, develop the Volunteer National Guard—the State militia system. "More than this would merely mean that we had lost our self-possession, been thrown off our balance by a war with which we have nothing to do. A powerful Navy we have always regarded as our proper and natural means of defence, but who shall tell us now what sort of Navy to build?... We have not been negligent of national defence." They would profit by current experience, and what was needed would be adequately done.
The War Secretary's annual Report next day, however, declared the Army inadequate. The total maximum force available—Regulars and National Guard—would be but 158,000, and it would take six months to train additional volunteers; the delay, with a prepared enemy, would be fatal. He recommended the immediate filling up of the existing organisation, and fresh legislation dealing with enlistment and the reserve, both in the Union and in the States. Artillery ammunition was inadequate, and the aviation corps should be largely increased. The Secretary of the Navy recommended a building programme for the coming year of two Dreadnoughts, six destroyers, eight or more submarines, one gunboat, and one oil fuel ship; he declared that expert opinion favoured the continuance of building Dreadnoughts, and recommended that five million dollars should be spent on the air service.
A vigorous agitation was now started for and against the increase of armaments, but more interest was taken in the debate and division in the Lower House of Congress (Dec. 22) on the constitutional amendment, imposing "nation-wide prohibition" of the sale or transport of alcoholic liquors for "beverage purposes" in the United States and all territory subject to the jurisdiction thereof. Provision, however, was made for continuing the supply of intoxicants for sacramental, medicinal, and industrial purposes. The resolution proposing this amendment (which would have had to be ratified by the legislatures of two-thirds of the States to become valid) opened with a preamble strongly denunciatory of alcohol as demonstrated by scientific research to be a narcotic poison, imposing a "staggering economic burden" on the people, and leading to crime, pauperism, insanity, disease, and national degeneracy. The resolution was moved by Mr. Hobson, of Alabama, and received 197 votes against 189, but it required the support of a two-thirds majority of those present, or 258, and therefore fell through. It divided all the parties; the Ayes comprised 114 Democrats, 67 Republicans, 12 Progressives, and 4 Independent Republicans, the Noes 141 Democrats, 46 Republicans, 1 Independent Republican, and 1 Progressive. Two alternatives were defeated, one to submit the amendment to the States instead of the Legislatures, the other prohibiting the importation of liquor into any State, thus localising liquor manufacture. Both sides professed themselves satisfied with the result.
The celebration of the completion of a century of peace with Great Britain fell through, owing to the war. Committees for its promotion had been established in both countries, and the Sulgrave Manor House, the old house of the Washington family in Northamptonshire, had been purchased in January by the British Committee. The persistent British refusal to participate officially in the Panama Exhibition at San Francisco hampered the movement, and on June 30 the House of Representatives refused by 187 to 52 to vote money for the celebration.
In State politics—a subject of great interest to students of political science—very few points can be mentioned here. The "eugenic" marriage law in Wisconsin, requiring a medical certificate of sound health as a condition of marriage, was declared unconstitutional by a State Court; so was an ordinance of a North Carolina city (Winston-Salem) segregating the coloured population. The November elections showed the activity of reformers: twenty-three States voted on one or more amendments to their Constitutions; seven on women's suffrage; six on liquor traffic prohibition; in each of the two latter cases five States decided against change.
Throughout the year the mining region of Colorado was almost in a state of civil war, owing to a coal-miners' strike. In September, 1913, the Miners' Union had called out some 11,000 men, on the masters refusing their demands, which included liberty to buy provisions and supplies where they pleased, and to choose their own doctors, the right to elect their own check-weighers, better working conditions and pay, an eight hours' day, and recognition of the union. Strike-breakers had been imported and the State militia (which was said to be controlled by the owners) called out to preserve order, and in April it destroyed and burnt tent colonies sheltering the strikers and erected on land leased by the union; women and children were killed, and order was restored by Federal troops. Congress attempted to promote a settlement, but ineffectually; President Wilson (May 10) ordered the disarmament of all civilians; the State Legislature did nothing beyond authorising a bond issue to pay the militia, closing saloons, and forbidding the carrying of arms; mediation failed; and in September President Wilson wrote to both sides urging a settlement on specified conditions—the enforcement of the mining laws, the prohibition of intimidation whether of union or of non-union labour, the continuance of work during the investigation of grievances, and an elaborate plan for such investigation with an ultimate appeal to a Commission of three which was to see that the conditions were maintained. The owners made difficulties, but the President appointed the Commission, and the unions ended the strike. In connexion with it, the Industrial Workers of the World raised a disturbance in New York, and Mr. John D. Rockefeller, junior, one of the leading owners, had his residence picketed by Socialists.
Strikes of engineers and firemen on the Western and Eastern railways was averted respectively at the end of July, when President Wilson induced both sides to accept a plan proposed by the Federal Board of Mediation, and in December by arbitration. The murderers of Rosenthal in New York were executed on April 13, and Becker was again convicted after a second trial (A.R., 1913, p. 467). Their lives had been prolonged by the ingenuity of their lawyers. Thaw's extradition was also confirmed in December by the Supreme Court (A.R., 1913, p. 468).
The Cape Cod Ship Canal, connecting Buzzard's Bay with Barnstable Bay, was opened on July 29. It was a joint-stock undertaking, and had cost $12,000,000. [For the Panama Canal see post, p. 486.]