US president whose Fourteen Points and League of Nations failed to win the Senate’s ratification
Born in Virginia, he was president of Princeton University and governor of New Jersey before winning the presidency in 1912, and in his first year imposed racial segregation across the federal bureaucracy. In April 1917 he asked Congress to declare war over unrestricted submarine warfare, and in January 1918 set out the Fourteen Points, with a League of Nations and self-determination. At the Paris Peace Conference he presided over the drafting of the League Covenant but conceded much to the other powers to get it. A stroke in October 1919 incapacitated him, and his refusal of a compromise sank the Senate’s ratification of the treaty. The Palmer Raids of the Red Scare came in the same years. He received the 1919 Nobel Peace Prize and died in 1924.
Career timeline
- 1902–1910President of Princeton University
- 1911–1913Governor of New Jersey
- 1913–1921President of the United States
- 1918Announced the Fourteen Points
- 1919Paris Peace Conference; chaired the League Covenant committee
An American diplomat who pressed for free trade and international institutions
On November 26, 1941, he delivered the Outline of Proposed Basis for Agreement Between the United States and Japan to the Japanese ambassador.
Cordell Hull was a Democratic politician and diplomat who helped shape U.S. free-trade policy and a multilateral international order. He promoted lower trade barriers and the Good Neighbor policy in the 1930s, while often working in tension with Franklin D. Roosevelt, who retained final control over foreign policy. In the 1941 negotiations with Japan, Hull delivered the November 26 Outline of Proposed Basis for Agreement, the last major diplomatic document before the Pacific War. Afterward, his work for the United Nations earned him the 1945 Nobel Peace Prize.
Career timeline
- 1893–1897Member, Tennessee House of Representatives
- 1907–1921U.S. Representative
- 1921–1924Chairman, Democratic National Committee
- 1923–1931U.S. Representative
- 1931–1933U.S. Senator from Tennessee
- 1933–1944United States Secretary of State
- 1945Delegate, United Nations Conference on International Organization
An international relief commander amid famine
In October 1921, Haskell cabled Hoover that starvation would peak in winter and strike sixteen million people.
William N. Haskell was a U.S. Army officer who combined military command with postwar international relief administration. Appointed by Herbert Hoover, he directed the American Relief Administration’s operations in Soviet Russia from 1921 to 1923, organizing the large-scale distribution of food and medical supplies during the famine. His task required negotiating both the controls and the cooperation of Bolshevik officials while sustaining the speed and administrative accountability of relief. He later held senior commands in the New York National Guard and directed civilian-defense work, extending his career across military and state administration.
Career timeline
- 1901Graduated from West Point; cavalry officer
- 1905Graduated from the Army Staff College
- 1906–1907Served in U.S. operations in the Philippines
- 1916–1917Temporary colonel, 69th New York Infantry
- 1918–1919Field artillery with the AEF; temporary colonel and Distinguished Service Medal recipient
- 1919–1921Chief of the ARA Armenia Mission
- 1921–1923Director for Russia, ARA; directed famine relief
- 1926–1940Major general and commander of the New York National Guard
- 1944–1945Director of the U.S. Office of Civilian Defense
The only four-term president, who carried America through depression and war and spent his last strength at Yalta
Returning from Yalta, Roosevelt addressed Congress on March 1, 1945 seated — the first time he publicly conceded to the disability he had hidden all his public life.
Roosevelt was the 32nd president of the United States, the only one elected to four terms, who led the country through the Great Depression and the Second World War. His New Deal redefined the role of the federal government, and after Pearl Harbor he drove the Allied war effort under a Europe-first strategy. At the Yalta Conference in February 1945, already gravely weakened by congestive heart failure and hypertension, he staked his personal diplomacy with Stalin on two overriding goals: Soviet entry into the Pacific war and the founding of the United Nations. He died of a cerebral hemorrhage two months later, and his Yalta agreements (praised for securing the UN and criticized for conceding Eastern Europe) remained a flashpoint of Cold War historiography.
Career timeline
- 1882Born into the wealthy Roosevelt and Delano families in Hyde Park, New York
- 1913–1920Assistant Secretary of the Navy, drove naval expansion during the First World War
- 1921Diagnosed with polio, permanently paralyzed from the waist down
- 1929–1932Governor of New York, pioneered unemployment relief during the Depression
- 1933–194532nd president, led the New Deal and the US war effort
- 1943.11Met Stalin for the first time at the Tehran Conference
- 1945.02.04–11Yalta Conference: secured Soviet entry into the Pacific war and the UN Security Council framework
- 1945.04.12Died of a cerebral hemorrhage at Warm Springs, Georgia
