Wilson, strokes, and zebras.

Abstract

WOODROW Wilson is ranked among the great presidents of the United States, but he is an enigmatic figure to historians and political scientists because his career repeated a pattern of brilliant success followed by acrimonious battle with rivals and ultimate defeat. As president of Princeton University (1902–1910) he was an effective leader at first, accomplishing much-needed reforms to strengthen the undergraduate educational system. But in 1907 he became embroiled in controversy with another powerful Princeton figure, Dean Andrew F. West, over the site for the construction of a proposed graduate college, and he became so intransigent that he alienated a . . .