National and Community Service

History

In a 1910 essay titled “The Moral Equivalent to War,” the noted philosopher and psychologist William James originated the concept of national service in the United States. Wishing to promote an alternative to military service, James outlined national service as an activity available to all youth and benefiting the entire nation. As part of his efforts to combat the Great Depression of the 1930s, President Franklin D. Roosevelt created the first national service program in 1933. Called the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), the CCC represented an early New Deal program geared toward relieving unemployment by offering young, unemployed men the opportunity to engage in conservation work that ranged from reforestation to historic preservation.

Building on scientific philanthropy, particularly its belief that welfare policies should offer a chance instead of charity, Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins promoted the CCC concept with similar language: “The man gets a chance to keep healthfully occupied in return for the relief funds, and … the government gets something valuable in return” (Miss Perkins 1933). Thus, CCC members signed on for a service term of six to eighteen months, lived in work camps, earned $30 in cash a month, and received (among other benefits) food and health care. From 1933 to 1942, 3 million Americans subsequently improved their lives and the United States through the CCC.

Although media reports and others continually lauded the CCC for offering men an improved outlook [Page 955][Page 956]and for developing improved citizenship, the CCC ended during World War II, and national service did not reemerge until the 1960s. In 1961, President John F. Kennedy established the Peace Corps as one measure to arrest the growth of communism in underdeveloped countries. After providing extensive training, this program placed American volunteers in foreign countries for two-year tours. Three years later, President Lyndon Baines Johnson's War on Poverty developed a domestic volunteer program more akin to the CCC. Known as Volunteers in Service to America (VISTA), participants served one-year terms, received subsistence support, [Page 957]and worked to ameliorate the wide variety of social problems experienced by poor Americans. In this same decade, the federal government also created episodic, part-time volunteer opportunities for older Americans. In what later became known as Senior Corps, these programs encompassed the Retired and Senior Volunteering Program (RSVP), Foster Grandparents, and Senior Companions. In the early 1970s, President Richard M. Nixon and the U.S. Congress created the Action Agency (inspired by the War on Poverty phrase “community action”) to house all volunteer programs, including the Peace Corps.

...