What Led Up To Ww1

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Throughout time, the act of one’s country joining war has been a controversial idea. Some people view war as a patriotic duty to serve one’s country and others view it as unnecessary. Leading up to WW1, there was hesitation about joining the war because there wasn’t a clear reason on why the United States should enter. The Socialist Party emerged as one of the leading groups who opposed entering the war. They tirelessly advocated for peace and the working class, but they still couldn’t stop the war. By dismissing the government’s decision as unnecessary and capitalistic, the socialists made others think why war while implementing their ideals of peace and avocation for the people’s rights. In 1916, the American Socialist Party officially committed to an …show more content…

They thought the war was “ a capitalists quarrel”(Kennedy, 2004). They claimed that America was now fixing the bayonets not for democracy but to repay the loans made to the Allies by Wall Street bankers. These accusations rallied up workers, and their support was increasing by 1917. Morris Hillquit, another anti-socialist candidate for New York, got a 5 times greater vote for the socialists because of this accusation on the government(Kennedy, 2004). Telling the workers they were being used for the government to better the government was the perfect way to attract followers. People liked that a superior recognized their value and worth, so naturally they followed and believed what they said or did. The points the socialists made with capitalism were valid, and people against the socialists, like Samuel Gompers, knew it was working. Gompers had a massive campaign against the socialists saying that they had the souls of the American working class(Kennedy, 2004). The fact that Gompers had a big campaign trying to fault the socialist claim meant that the socialists had a point to their argument and were effective in addressing it to get people to believe