THE WAR AT HOME ★^749democracy.” A Progressive journalist, Creel believed the war would acceler-
ate the movement toward solving the “ age- old problems of poverty, inequal-
ity, oppression, and unhappiness.” He took to heart a warning from historian
Carl Becker that a simple contrast between German tyranny and American
democracy would not seem plausible to the average worker: “You talk to him
of our ideals of liberty and he thinks of the shameless exploitation of labor
and of the ridiculous gulf between wealth and poverty.” CPI pamphlets fore-
saw a postwar society complete with a “universal eight- hour day” and a living
wage for all.
While “democracy” served as the key term of wartime mobilization, “free-
dom” also took on new significance. The war, a CPI advertisement proclaimed,
was being fought in “the great cause of freedom.” Thousands of persons, often
draftees, were enlisted to pose in giant human tableaus representing symbols
of liberty. One living representation of the Liberty Bell at Fort Dix, New Jersey,
included 25,000 people. The most common visual image in wartime propa-
ganda was the Statue of Liberty, employed especially to rally support among
immigrants. “You came here seeking Freedom,” stated a caption on one Statue
How did the United States mobilize resources and public opinion for the war effort?All combatants issued propaganda posters. The American poster uses an image of the
Statue of Liberty to sell war bonds. The German one, satirically entitled We Are Barbarians,
refutes the charge of barbarism hurled at Germans by the Allies. It relates that Germany
outstrips England and France in Nobel Prizes, provision for the elderly, book publication,
education, and literacy.