Fourteen Points

Fourteen Points, name given to the proposals of President Woodrow Wilson designed to establish the basis for a just and lasting peace following the victory of the Allies in World War I. The 14 proposals were contained in Wilson's address to a joint session of the U.S. Congress on January 8, 1918. The idealism expressed in them was widely acclaimed and gave Wilson a position of moral leadership among the Allied leaders. Opposition to various points on the part of the European Allies, however, developed at the conclusion of hostilities, and the attempt at practical application of the 14 points exposed a multilateral system of secret agreements between the European victors. In order to secure support of his 14th, and most important, point, which called for the creating of an “association of nations,” Wilson was compelled to abandon his insistence upon the acceptance of his full program. Wilson's 14th point was realized in the League of Nations, established as a result of the Paris Peace Conference (1919).

In summary, the 14 points were as follows: (1) abolition of secret diplomacy by open covenants, openly arrived at; (2) freedom of the seas in peace and war, except as the seas may be closed in whole or part by international action for enforcement of international covenants; (3) removal of international trade barriers wherever possible and establishment of an equality of trade conditions among the nations consenting to the peace; (4) reduction of armaments consistent with public safety; (5) adjustment of colonial disputes consistent with the interests of both the controlling government and the colonial population; (6) evacuation of Russian territory, with the proviso of self-determination; (7) evacuation and restoration of Belgium; (8) evacuation and restoration of French territory, including Alsace-Lorraine; (9) readjustment of Italian frontiers along clearly recognizable lines of nationality; (10) autonomy for the peoples of Austria-Hungary; (11) evacuation and restoration of territory to Serbia, Montenegro, and Romania, granting of seaports to Serbia, and readjustment and international guarantee of the national ambitions of the Balkan nations; (12) self-determination for non-Turkish peoples under Turkish control and internationalization of the Dardanelles; (13) an independent Poland, with access to the sea; and (14) creation of a general association of nations under specific covenants to give mutual guarantees of political independence and territorial integrity.