April 2 · This Day in America
It is night, and it is raining, when Woodrow Wilson rides to the Capitol with a cavalry escort. He had run on keeping the country out. Now German submarines are sinking American ships, and a peaceful man has decided the peace cannot hold. He stands before a joint session and speaks the sentence that will define a century of American power: "The world must be made safe for democracy." He does not pretend it is glory. "It is a fearful thing," he tells them, "to lead this great peaceful people into war." The chamber roars. Four days later Congress votes yes. The United States, long content behind two oceans, steps onto the world stage — and never fully steps back off it. The American century begins in a rainstorm with a reluctant man.
Source: www.archives.gov
Also on this day · 1792
With the Coinage Act, Congress establishes a national mint in Philadelphia and decrees that America will have its own money — the dollar, divided into a hundred cents, struck in gold, silver, and copper. A young country, deep in debt and short on coin, declares it will mint its own. The first building the federal government ever owned was a place to make money, honestly, with an eagle on it.
Source: www.usmint.gov
“The world must be made safe for democracy.”Woodrow Wilson, 1917