America in WWI

Profiteering?

• In 1897 foreign investment in US = $700 Million
• By 1914 foreign investment in US = $3.5 Billion
• In 1916 US Steel makes $348 Million in profit

[President Wilson] "was forced to find legal reasons for policies that were based not upon law but upon the balance of power and economic necessities." -Hofstadter

Getting Desperate

• In 1916-17 out of 112 French divisions, 68 mutinied; 629 men were convicted and 50 were shot by firing squad.
• The British lost 300,000 dead/wounded in the Battle of the Somme.

WHAT CAN I DO?
How the Civilian May Help in the Crisis.
Be cheerful...
Write encouragingly to friends at the front...
Don't repeat foolish gossip.
Don't listen to idle rumors.
Don't think you know better than [General] Haig.

America's Tepid Entrance

• Socialist spoke out against the war.
• 1 Million men were needed - only 73,000 volunteered
• Congress passed the draft, and the Espionage Act

Espionage, Really?

• Anyone who speaks out against the war can go to prison - 900
• Was used to attack Socialists and the IWW
• "The women of the US were nothing more nor less than brood sows, to raise children to get into the army and be made fertilizer." = 5 years

What's in your cargo?

• The Lusitania actually had 1248 cases of 3-inch shells, 4927 boxes of cartridges, and 2000 more cases of small-arms ammo.
• The ship's manifests were falsified to hide this and the British and American governments lied to cover it up.