4 - “You’re in the army now”

Summary

Prior to Congressional approval of selective service, Baker had ordered the printing of some 10 million registration forms, hiding them in the basement of a post office in the capital, stacked from floor to ceiling. He now secretly shipped them to some 40,000 sheriffs, who served ex-officio as representatives of the national government in conducting the registration and subsequent drafting of young men into the armed services. The government avoided the word “conscript,” using “selective service” instead because draftees were chosen through a selective system administered by the local draft boards. As opposed to the existing Regular Army and National Guard, both composed of volunteers, the government euphemistically called this new army raised by selective “coercion” the “National Army.”

The Wilson administration also sought to soften the reality of forcing almost 10 million young American males to register as a preliminary step toward possible induction into the armed forces. Using the Committee on Public Information (CPI), which had been created by an executive order on April 13, 1917, Wilson attempted to mobilize the nation through an extensive and unprecedented government propaganda campaign. “Carried in all our hearts as a great day of patriotic devotion and obligation,” he proclaimed, “when the duty shall lie upon every man to see to it that the name of every male person of the designated ages is written on these lists of honor.” He then published this “Call to Arms” throughout the United States. Threats accompanied the President’s appeals to patriotism. On the eve of registration the US attorney general, Thomas Watt Gregory, instructed all US attorneys and marshals to arrest anyone attempting to disrupt the registration drive. Within the next few days, the government arrested twenty-one people and threatened them with imprisonment.