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Exhibition Echoes of the Great War: American Experiences of World War I

Roman decorative certificate bestowing honorary citizenship on Woodrow Wilson, December 23, 1918. Gold leaf and paint on parchment. Woodrow Wilson Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress (167.01.00)
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Europe Honors Wilson

Before the peace conference began in Paris, President Wilson traveled to Britain and Italy. In Rome, he received a tremendous welcome. The king and queen and the Italian cabinet met Wilson at the train station, crowds lined the streets, and the city made Wilson an honorary Roman citizen, as this stunning certificate indicates. Wilson's reception in Rome and other Allied cities reflected gratitude for American military intervention in the war and popular support for the president's peace proposals, including a League of Nations. Yet the president's popularity also alarmed other Allied leaders who had different agendas for the postwar settlement.