Editing Woodrow Wilson (section)

=== Response to racial violence ===
[[File:East St Louis Massacre cartoon, Morris.jpg|thumb|A 1917 political cartoon published in ''[[New York Evening Mail]]'' about the [[East St. Louis riots]] in 1917 with the caption reading, "Mr. President, why not make America safe for democracy?"]]
In response to the demand for industrial labor, the [[Great Migration (African American)|Great Migration]] of African Americans out of the South surged in 1917 and 1918. This migration sparked [[Mass racial violence in the United States|race riots]], including the [[East St. Louis riots]] of 1917. In response to these riots, but only after much public outcry, Wilson asked Attorney General [[Thomas Watt Gregory]] if the federal government could intervene to "check these disgraceful outrages". On the advice of Gregory, Wilson did not take direct action against the riots.<ref>Cooper (2009), pp. 407–408</ref> In 1918, Wilson spoke out against [[lynching in the United States]], stating: "I say plainly that every American who takes part in the action of mob or gives it any sort of continence is no true son of this great democracy but its betrayer, and ... [discredits] her by that single disloyalty to her standards of law and of rights."<ref>Cooper (2009), pp. 409–410</ref>

In 1919, another [[Red Summer of 1919|series of race riots]] occurred in [[Chicago Race Riot of 1919|Chicago]], [[Omaha Race Riot of 1919|Omaha]], and two dozen other major cities in the North. The federal government did not become involved, just as it had not become involved previously.<ref>{{cite book|first1=Walter C.|last1=Rucker|first2=James N.|last2=Upton|title=Encyclopedia of American Race Riots|year=2007|publisher=Greenwood|page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=oLoXHHc_uUkC&pg=PA310 310]|isbn=978-0-313-33301-9}}</ref>