In this episode, I’m primarily going to cover the effects of entering the war on the United States. Long story short, it was not a good time for civil liberties or the Bill of Rights…
Join Prof CJ as he discusses:
- The events leading up to American entry into the war
- Woodrow Wilson’s speech, and how the reasons he gave for entering the war were B.S., and how the real reasons for US intervention were things for which few average Americans would have been willing to risk their lives
- How most Progressives ardently supported the war
- The government’s mobilization of the nation for total war by 1) seizing control of the economy; 2) implementing mass conscription; and 3) cranking out propaganda (including disseminating the government’s narrative and attempting to silence any competing, dissident narratives)
- How bad the war was for civil liberties and the Bill of Rights
- Some notable Americans who dissented anyway
- A brief look at Wilson’s 14 Points (most of which were implemented only partially, or not at all)
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External links:
- The hit American song “Over There” (by George Cohen, 1917), which was the WWI-era equivalent of “America, Fuck Yeah!” (which came from the wonderfully satirical film Team America: World Police.) [By the way, the opening line of “Over There,” which is, “Johnny get your gun,” later inspired the title of Daltron Trumbo’s antiwar novel Johnny Got His Gun, which in turn inspired the Metallica song “One.”]