“If you have approved of my leadership and wish me to continue to be your unembarrassed spokesman in affairs at home and abroad, I earnestly beg that you will express yourself unmistakably to that effect by returning a Democratic majority to both the Senate and the House of Representatives.” Such was President Woodrow Wilson’s appeal to voters in late October ahead of the 1918 midterms. He was in the midst of negotiating Germany’s surrender in t…