Japan's relationship with the United States Germany's Far East possessions Entente racial equality segregationist policies Arthur Balfour William Hughes White Australia policy Africa Versailles League of Nations Europe
Versailles represented a chance to overturn this imposed inferiority, whose tensions were strengthened particularly in Japan's relationship with the United States during WW1. Confidence in their growing industrial strength, and conquest of Germany's Far East possessions, together with their proven fidelity to the Entente would, it was thought, allow them finally to take their rightful place among the victorious Great Powers. They solicited support especially from the American delegation to obtain recognition for the principle of racial equality at the League of Nations Commission. Their proposals to this end were consistently rebuffed by British, French, American and Australian diplomats, who were all sensitive to their respective countries' internal pressures. Wilson himself was an enactor of segregationist policies in the United States, Clemenceau openly ridiculed them, Arthur Balfour considered Africans inferior to Europeans – equality was only true of people within particular nations – while William Hughes, adopting a "slap the Jap" attitude, was a vocal defender of a White Australia policy.
