88 e lusive v ictories
only limited interference with American sovereign rights. W i t h
London determined to curb trade with the Central Powers, Wilson had
reason to anticipate diffi culties with the British again. At the same time,
any accommodation with the British might be perceived as a pro-
Entente policy by their foes. Germany also would not stand by idly
while American goods sustained the Allied war eff ort.
Th e president did have options that would have allowed the country
to avoid the complications inherent to wartime trade, but he was loath
to sidestep what he saw as a matter of principle. Th e administration
might have adopted the prudent recommendation by Secretary of State
William Jennings Bryan that the small American merchant fl eet be kept
in port. Bryan suggested that the combatants be allowed to buy Amer-
ican goods but required to transport them in their own hulls, certainly
no real hardship for Great Britain. But Wilson stubbornly insisted that
warring nations respect the rights of neutrals under international law.
Th e president always sought to identify core principles and proceed
from there, and for Wilson “neutral rights” was the key issue. If Amer-
ican ships plied European waters, confrontations with the belligerents
would be inevitable. Both the Entente and the Central Powers were
determined to prevent the Americans from providing decisive aid to
their adversaries, and both declared blockades of enemy ports, subse-
quently extended to any neutral ports through which goods could be
shipped to their foes.
Although the Royal Navy provoked American ire, just as it had one
hundred years earlier, several elements worked to contain British-American
tensions. Th e British blockade operated in a traditional manner, with
surface ships intercepting merchant vessels and searching them for
contraband. Th is approach posed little threat to civilian passengers. At
times the British tightened the defi nition of contraband to include
American raw materials, a stance that could harm the U.S. economy,
but London also understood how vital American exports were to the
Allies and preferred not to alienate the Wilson administration to the
point at which it might rupture relations. Th us, when London in 1915
declared all raw cotton to be contraband, British purchasing agents also
arranged to buy enough to sustain the price for American growers.
It helped the British, too, that some of Wilson’s senior advisors
favored the Allied cause, though they had to tread carefully around