For this week’s edition of This Week in History, I would like a moment to commemorate the first female president of the US of A. Now, I know what you’re thinking: “Isabella, what are you talking about?” And perhaps I use the term “first female president” a bit too loosely, but nonetheless, I think the title fits this particular situation. On Oct. 2, 1919, Woodrow Wilson suffered a stroke, and from that moment on, it was Edith Wilson’s world, and we were simply living in it.
Wilson was, on the whole, an interesting president. He brought reform to the country, particularly in labor, through the passage of the Clayton Antitrust Act, the establishment of the Federal Trade Commission and the push for laws that prevented child labor. However, Wilson’s accomplishments in that realm of government were tarnished by his racist beliefs. His policies led to segregation at the federal level, not to mention the well-publicized viewing of “The Birth of a Nation” in the White House, a film that is essentially a racist retelling of the Civil War and Reconstruction.
In his second term, he led the country through World War I. Although he campaigned on peace, Wilson felt he had no choice but to join the war, given the aftermath of the infamous Zimmerman Telegram. American involvement in the war ultimately gave the Allied powers the boost they needed to defeat the Central Powers in 1918. These events led to Wilson’s magnum opus: the League of Nations, an organization of international powers designed to maintain peace.
The League of Nations, or rather its failure, was believed to have contributed to the decline of his health. He ran a dizzying campaign to get the United States to join the league, but alas, no dice. It was shortly after this that he had a debilitating stroke that rendered him unable to move or speak during a portion of his presidency. This is where Edith Wilson comes into play.
Edith Bolling Galt Wilson was Wilson’s second wife, and they quickly fell in love. Throughout his presidency, she had a significant influence on his policy decisions. There was even speculation that Wilson attempted to dispel rumors about this by supporting the suffrage movement, which his anti-suffragist wife opposed.
Edith Wilson truly came into power after her husband’s stroke, as she served as his “steward” in the final duration of his presidency. Extremely protective of him in his delicate state after the stroke, she served as his only means of communication with the outside world, even going so far as to forge his signature.
Ike Hoover, an usher at the White House, even went so far as to say, “If there were some papers requiring his attention, they would be read to him — but only those that Mrs. Wilson thought should be read to him. Likewise, word of any decision the president had made would be passed back through the same channels.”
This brings me back to Edith Wilson being the first female president. Wilson couldn’t talk or move, and she was the only one who knew what happened behind closed doors; she essentially ran the country. While she says in her memoir that she didn’t take control of the presidency and only acted as a “steward,” I think we can all call BS on that one.