WWI - The War at Home

What were some things accomplished by the following wartime agencies and laws?

1. War Industries Board
Encouraged companies to use mass production techniques to increase efficiency and to eliminate waste by standardizing products. They set production quotas and and allocated raw materials. They also applied price control only at the wholesale level which resulted in retail prices soaring as well as corporate profits.

2. Railroad Administration
They controlled the railroads.

3. Fuel Administration
They monitored coal supplies and rationed gasoline and heating oil. This resulted with gas less Sundays and light less night. Another effect was day-light savings time being reintroduced.

4. National War Labor Board
The board worked to improve factory conditions and pushed for an eight hour work day, labor ban for children, and better safety conditions.

5. Food Administration
It was set up to help produce and conserve food. This resulted with "the gospel of the clean plate" and certain days in a week in which a certain type of food was not rationed. Also American shipments to the Allies tripled.

6. Committee on Public Information
It was formed to polarize the war and was the nation's first propaganda agency. Led by Creel, they persuaded the nation's artists and advertising agencies to create thousands of works of art promoting the war. He distributed 75 million phamplets and such including the book "How the War Came to America".

7. Espionage and Sedition Acts
Under the Espionage and Sedition Acts a person could be fined up to 10,000 dollars and sentenced to 20 years in jail for interfering with the war effort or saying anything disloyal to the government. or war effort. It targeted socialists and labor leaders.

Briefly explain why Bernard M. Baruch and George Creel are significant historical figures.
Bernard M. Baruch established and reorganized the WIB. He was a prosperous businessman. George Creel was the head of the CPI was a former muckraking journalist. His propaganda campaign was highly effective. While his campaign promoted patriotism, it also inflamed hatred and violations of the civil liberties of certain ethnic groups and opponents of war.