118 e lusive v ictories
elites. Many on the left, though, also opposed the war and became the
targets of political repression by the Wilson administration, various
state and local prosecutors, and deputized vigilantes. Meanwhile, con-
servatives used the left’s opposition to the war to discredit not just rad-
icalism but the very idea of reform. By the time they had completed
their work, which took a more frenzied form as fears of Bolshevism
spread after the war, they had shattered Progressivism and its more
radical manifestations beyond repair.
Nor was political repression the only factor that curtailed the possi-
bilities for continuing the reform wave that Wilson had ridden into
offi ce. Th e administration’s preferred approach to mobilization empow-
ered conservative elements across the board. In part to satisfy the dom-
inant southern wing of the Democratic Party, which distrusted a
vigorous central state, the administration opted at fi rst to encourage the
voluntary cooperation of the private sector. Business leaders thus
became key insiders in the mobilization eff orts. When mobilization
faltered and Wilson sought stronger executive authority, Congress
cooperated but also made certain that enhanced presidential power
would expire and the private sector would be fully restored. Th us, in
the case of the railroads, I noted earlier that the 1918 Federal Control
Act not only gave railroad owners a fair return as the price of national
control but also guaranteed that nationalization would be strictly tem-
porary. Mobilization might also be threatened by labor disruptions.
Accordingly, even as radical elements of the labor movement faced per-
secution, the administration reached out to the labor mainstream, the
American Federation of Labor (AFL) under Samuel Gompers. In
exchange for a no-strike pledge for the duration of the war, the AFL
received government backing in its eff orts to organize workers. Mem-
bership rose sharply during the brief period of cooperation, but the
gains were quickly reversed in the reactionary postwar climate. ^
Th e brief time of American involvement in the First World War—by
far the shortest of any of the confl icts examined in this book—makes it
diffi cult to assess the eff ectiveness of the Wilson administration’s eff orts
to sustain popular support for the war. American doughboys were in
combat in France for only about six months before the armistice.
Despite heavy losses in that short time, public support was not tested as
it was during the Civil War or would be later in long conflicts in