Committee on Public Information

On April 13, 1917, shortly after Congress declared war on Germany, Pres. Woodrow Wilson created the Committee on Public Information (CPI) by Executive Order 2594, and appointed George Creel, the muckraking journalist, its civilian chairman. President Wilson believed that the nation was divided over the American entry into the war and hoped that the CPI, or Creel Committee as it became known, would mobilize public opinion in the United States behind the war effort and also gain international support. The CPI became the nation's first large-scale propaganda agency with Robert Lansing, the secretary of state, Newton Baker, the secretary of war, and Josephus Daniels, the secretary of the Navy, serving as associate chairs. By the end of the war, the CPI had found a way to exploit virtually all forms of mass communication.

The CPI eventually had two large divisions. The Foreign Section coordinated work abroad, and the Domestic Section sought to inspire the home front. Many of the records of the former division were either lost or destroyed after World War I and, hence, less is known about its operations than about the work of CPI's Domestic Section. Historians do know, though, that the Foreign Section had offices in more than 30 countries. As one of the CPI's feature-length films, America's Answer, explained, “‘Old Glory’ knows no alien soil when there is work to do in Freedom's name.” The Foreign Section used the business offices of American firms abroad to distribute propaganda. In Latin America, for example, Edward L. Bernays, who later helped to establish the field of public relations, enlisted Remington Typewriter, International Harvester, Ford, Studebaker, and many other corporations to support the CPI's efforts. To help send news stories, feature articles, and pictures worldwide, the CPI created a Foreign Press Bureau and a Wireless and Cable Service. The Foreign Section did not close its operations until June 1919.

On the home front, Creel and his associates created bureaus that targeted a wide variety of groups in American society, including laborers, women, industrialists, farmers, and the foreign born. By bringing its messages to such groups, the CPI attempted to make every man, woman, and child a participant in the war effort.

Because of his background in journalism, Creel turned instinctively to the world of print, persuading journalists, intellectuals, and other writers to support the war. One of the earliest subdivisions created in the Domestic Section was a Division of News, first headed by editorial writer J. W. McConaughy and later by Chicago Herald editor Leigh Reilly. Its initial goal was to coordinate the often confusing and conflicting news accounts that came from the U.S. Army and Navy. Its scope expanded rapidly to cover many other areas and, by the end of the war, it had issued approximately 6,000 news releases. Creel estimated that material from this bureau found its way into 20,000 newspaper columns each week, and boasted that even his harshest critics received a “daily diet” of information from the CPI in the morning newspapers.

A separate Foreign Language Newspaper Division, created in April 1917, monitored the hundreds of foreign-language publications in the United States. Starting in May 1917, and running through March 1919, the CPI published a newspaper, the Official Bulletin. Published Monday through Saturday, it carried pronouncements from the government and was distributed free to public officials, newspapers, post offices, and other agencies that disseminated information. Its circulation peaked at about 115,000.

...