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Transcription: [00:19:12]
Shouldn't have happened,
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and it barely happened.
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There was no mandate.
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Wilson, I think it was, won by 47 percent of the vote.
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Taft and Roosevelt split the difference of what was left of 53,
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And Woodrow Wilson becomes President of the United States.
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Along with that, however,
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A Democratic House and a Democratic Senate-- Senate.
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Which brings us back to, what was the title of Wilson's thesis?
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Congressional government, Congressional government.
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Wilson now has the opportunity to put his thesis into play.
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On the first day after his Inauguration, Woodrow Wilson schedules an address before a joint session of Congress,
[00:20:07]
And he lays out his plan, the new freedom, perhaps, from his political planks that he ran on
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A list of progressive reforms that he said he wanted Congress to do their part in enacting.
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They were all spelled out, the legislation was all practically written
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And he asked Congress, therefore, to do their part.
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Wilson returned to the Senate-- the President's room in the Senate,
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four or five times during the course of his first tho--hund--thousand days in office,
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And carefully watched as the Federal Reserve Act, child labor laws, the eight hour day, railroad reform, the federal trade commission,
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were all enacted step by step. Because he knew that the Presidents, sort of after the fight between Thomas Jefferson and John Adams
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over the role of a strong central government and the role of a strong President as chief executive,
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said "No, no no no no" we have it all wrong. The Founders did not want the President to sit forlorn,
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down Pennsylvania Avenue waiting for pieces of legislation to sort of drift his way.
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It was the Chief Executive's role to go before Congress, lay out an agenda,
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and then wait for Congress to act,
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and then certainly complete the circle by signing those pieces of legislation into law.