Committee on Public Information Created: Wilson Establishes Federal Propaganda Machine

One week after Congress declared war on Germany, President Woodrow Wilson created the Committee on Public Information (CPI) by executive order, establishing the first large-scale government propaganda apparatus in American history. Journalist George Creel was appointed chairman, heading a massive operation that would employ 150,000 people and pioneer techniques of psychological manipulation later studied by both democratic and authoritarian governments worldwide.

The CPI mobilized unprecedented resources to manufacture consent for the war. It organized 75,000 “Four Minute Men” who delivered pro-war speeches in theaters, schools, and public gatherings. The Division of Pictorial Publicity produced iconic recruitment posters, while the Division of News distributed 6,000 press releases. The CPI’s foreign language division targeted immigrant communities, and its publications reached millions. Creel explicitly embraced the concept of “thought war,” arguing that public opinion must be mobilized as a weapon.

The CPI’s work extended beyond promoting the war to demonizing dissent. It portrayed German-Americans as potential traitors, socialists as foreign agents, and labor organizers as saboteurs. The committee provided intellectual justification for Espionage Act prosecutions and vigilante attacks on dissenters. While the CPI was dissolved in 1919, its techniques established templates for future government propaganda, public relations, and psychological warfare operations. Edward Bernays, who worked for the CPI, later wrote “Propaganda” (1928), explicitly applying wartime manipulation techniques to commercial and political advertising. The CPI demonstrated that Progressive Era expertise in social science could be weaponized for mass manipulation.