Overriding an earlier presidential veto, Congress approves the Immigration Act of 1917, barring all Asian workers other than Japanese from the United States and requiring all other immigrants to pass a literacy test. Word reaches the United States that Czar Nicholas II has abdicated in Russia in the face of the revolution there. In the wake of repeated submarine attacks on American merchant ships, the United States declares war on Germany, entering the Great War in Europe. The first Pulitzer Prizes, created by a bequeathal of New York newspaper tycoon Joseph Pulitzer, are awarded. The Wilson administration institutes Daylight Savings Time in an attempt to cut electricity needs to help the war effort.
Critics call it an attack on free speech.
U.S. troops join the French and British in fighting off the Germans' spring offensive along the Marne. By June they're driving the Germans back. In July, U.S. Marines fight valiantly to win the Battle of Belleau Wood, and by September an American force of nearly 1 million men under Gen. John Pershing is helping turn the tide of the war. A dog is the only known survivor. A worldwide epidemic of deadly Spanish flu is infecting one of four Americans.