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THE HOME
FRONT
THE GOVERNMENT’S ROLE
Before the war the government played a small
role in the day to day lives of Americans
 It regulated industrial and agricultural products.
 Attempted to manipulate the public’s opinion
(propaganda)

MOBILIZATION AT HOME.
Mobilization
 Economic
 Emotional
 Troops
AMERICA MOBILIZES FOR WAR



US Army was originally a fraction of
the size of European armies.
Wilson encouraged Americans to
volunteer and pushed congress to
pass “Selective Services Act”
Passed in 1917




Authorized a draft of young men for
military service in Europe.
9.6 million registered for the draft
and were assigned a number.
Gov’t held a “great national lottery”
to decide the order in which the
draftees would be called into service.
Over course of war 24 million
registered 2.8 actually drafted. 4
million total served including
volunteers.
AMERICA MOBILIZES FOR WAR
Wilson also worked to
shift the economy to
wartime production
 Council of National
Defense


Created to oversee
different agencies.


Food production, coal,
petroleum distribution,
and railway use.
Government
determined what
crops grew and how
supplies moved
around on nation’s
trains.
WAR INDUSTRIES BOARD (WIB)

Bernard Baruch

WIB regulated all
industries
engaged in war
effort.

System of free
enterprise was
curtailed to fulfill
the nations need
for war materials.
TO KEEP WORKERS WORKING…
WHAT DID FACTORIES PRODUCE?
Women's blouse
factories made signal
flags
 Radiator manufacturers
made guns
 Automobile factories
made airplane engines
 Piano companies made
airplane wings.

COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC INFORMATION (CPI)
Had to convince
Americans that war was
a just cause
 Distributed 75 million
pamphlets
 Millions of posters that
dramatized the needs of
America and its allies
 Stressed cruelty of
Germans

PROPAGANDA:
WILSON FORMED THE COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC
INFORMATION (CPI).
What do
these
posters say
about
Germany?
DOES PROPAGANDA EXIST IN THE
21ST CENTURY?
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The
cafeteria menus in the three House
office buildings changed the name of
"french fries" to "freedom fries," in a
culinary rebuke of France stemming
from anger over the country's
refusal to support the U.S. position
on Iraq.
http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/03/11/sprj.irq.fries/
THE HOME FRONT
 Censorship
Not told about high
death toll
 Romanticized the
battlefields
“soldiers have died a
beautiful death, in
noble battle, we shall
rediscover
poetry…epic and
chivalrous”

THE HOME FRONT
 Impossible
to
hide death
Women in
mourning
 Badly wounded
soldiers returned
home
 Opposition began
to emerge

OPPOSITION TO THE WAR

German Americans and Irish Americans opposed
the allies

Sometimes treated with prejudice
Draft created controversy
 Some refused and often court-martialed and
imprisoned.


12% of men who received draft notices didn’t respond.
CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTORS
Moral or religious beliefs
forbid them to fight in
wars.
 Exempted from combat


“any well recognized
religious sect or
organization… whose
existing creed or
principles forbid its
members to participate in
war.
WOMEN WORK FOR PEACE
Many American
women opposed the
war.
 Jeanette Rankin,
first women to serve
in the US House of
Representative voted
against declaration of
war.
 Jane AddamsWomen’s Peace Party

GOVERNMENT CRACKS DOWN ON DISSENT

Espionage Act


Ban treasonable or
seditious newspapers,
magazines, or printed
materials from the
mail.
Limited freedom of
Speech further with
the Sedition Act

Unlawful to use
“disloyal, profane,
scurrilous or abusive
language.”
WOMEN EMBRACE NEW OPPORTUNITIES
Many women moved
into the workforce for
the first time.
 Women filled jobs that
were vacated by men
who had gone to fight.
 By their efforts during
the war women
convinced President
Wilson to support
their suffrage
demands.


1919 right to vote.
AFRICAN-AMERICAN



Presented new
opportunities to AfricanAmericans
“If this is our country this
is our war”
Movement from the rural
South to the industrial
North

Great Migration



Escape the violent racism of
the south
Others desired better jobs
“I beg you, my brother, to
leave the benighted land . .
. Get out of the South…
Come north then, all you
folks, both good and bad…
The Defender says come”

Push from the
South by…
Jim Crow
Segregation laws
 Lynching and
other racial
violence
 Low-paying jobs as
sharecroppers or
servants
 Ruined cotton
crops due to weevil
infestation


Pulled to the
North by…
Economic
prosperity in
northern cities
 Job openings due
to reduced
immigration
 Aid from African
Americans in the
North

MEXICAN AMERICANS MOVE NORTH
Some of the same
reasons AfricanAmericans moved
north
 Many settled in
the West working
on large farms.
 Barrios- Hispanic
neighborhoods.

SCHENCK V. UNITED STATES 1919
The Facts
The Issue
The Decision
•During World War I,
Charles Schenck was
convicted of violating
the Espionage Act of
1917, which made it
a crime to cause
refusal of duty in the
military.
•Schenck’s appeal to
the Supreme Court
argued that his
actions were
protected by the First
Amendment
•The Court
unanimously upheld
Schenck’s conviction
and said that in
times of war the
government may
place reasonable
limitations on
freedom of speech.
•Schenck had
distributed
pamphlets urging
men to resist the
military draft
•“Clear and Present
Danger”