Disfranchisement of African American voters in Virginia, 1901Giles B. Jackson to R.C. Burrow, June 22, 1901. (Gilder Lehrman Collection)In February 1901, the Virginia General Assembly authorized a constitutional convention to draft election reforms. The convention, supported vehemently by Democrats, aimed to disfranchise African Americans without violating the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments of the US Constitution. The delegates to the convention considered poll taxes and literacy tests as requirements for voting, and African American organizations were alarmed by the implications of the proposed changes to the state constitution.

In June 1901, Giles Jackson of Virginia’s Negro Business League wrote to the Commissioner of Revenue of Virginia to ask for information on black businessmen in Virginia. “The Negro Business League of Va. is endeavoring to do whatever they can to assist the constitutional convention in deriving at a just and proper solution,” Jackson wrote. He asked for “the names and as near as you can the post-office addresses of all the colored people engaged in business . . . [a]nd . . . how much the colored people pay to the state in the way of taxes on deeds.” The organization hoped to determine which African Americans would be qualified to vote under the proposed constitution and to appeal to the convention not to limit black suffrage.

The convention passed a new constitution in 1902 that required voters to pay a poll tax or pass a literacy text. It successfully disfranchised large numbers of African Americans, as well as some poor white residents.

A full transcript is available.

Transcript

Dear Sir:-

The Negro Business League of Va. is endeavoring to do whatever they can to assist the constitutional convention in deriving at a just and proper solution of the Negro problem in its deliberation. We are now engaged in gathering such statistics for their information and we find that the Auditor’s office does not give us all the information we desire. We are therefore compelled to call upon you for the information we could not otherwise obtain. Now will you kindly send us the names and as near as you can the post-office addresses of all the colored people engaged in business; I mean license business, in your county, and the amount he pays for such license. And also send as near as you can approximate how much the colored people pay to the state in the way of taxes on deeds. Your early reply to this will greatly oblige us as we are anxious to have it printed with the other matter we have collected and lay the same before the convention as soon as possible.

Very Respectfully,

Giles B. Jackson.Secretary.

Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, 1911Joseph Rumshinsky, “Mamenu” or “The Triangle Victims” (in Yiddish), 1911. (Gilder Lehrman Collection)On March 25, 1911, a devastating fire started at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory in New York City. Workers had been locked in the factory to discourage theft and prevent labor organization, and they were unable to escape when the fire began. The fire killed 146 people, many of whom jumped to their deaths from the sixth and seventh floor workrooms. Most of the victims were immigrant women from eastern Europe. The worst

industrial tragedy in the United States to that date led to an outcry over the factory’s conditions and to factory labor safety reforms.

This booklet of sheet music features a song about the Triangle Shirtwaist fire. Written and printed in Yiddish, pointing to the largely immigrant Jewish heritage of the victims, the song commemorates the workers and laments their deaths.

Birth of a Nation, 1915Blank Advice sheet for The Birth of a Nation, 1915. (Gilder Lehrman Collection)This “Advice Sheet” flyer was distributed with D. W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation to theaters when the film was released in 1915. Significantly, the distributors are adamant that “NEGROES MUST NOT BE ADMITTED . . . under any circumstance.” The film was a treatment of a novel and play, The Clansman, which depicted the Ku Klux Klan as heroes and African Americans as villains during Reconstruction. The deeply racist film attracted a wide audience and stirred controversy and protests from the newly created NAACP.

A full transcript is available.

Women’s suffrage poster, 1915Woman Suffrage Party of the City of New York, Women in the Home broadside, ca. 1915. (Gilder Lehrman Collection)Opponents to women’s suffrage argued that voting would be detrimental to women’s character and to their families. This broadside, published around 1915 refutes those accusations. It declares that if a woman is responsible for taking care of her family, then she must have a voice in politics to protect them.

A full transcript is available.

Excerpt

She can clean her own rooms, BUT if the neighbors are allowed to live in filth, she cannot keep her rooms from being filled with bad air and smells, or from being infested with vermin.

She can cook her food well, BUT if dealers are permitted to sell poor food, unclean milk or stale eggs, she cannot make the food wholesome for her children.

She can care for her own plumbing and the refuse of her own home, BUT if the plumbing in the rest of the house is unsanitary, if garbage accumulates and the halls and stairs are left dirty, she cannot protect her children from the sickness and infection that these conditions bring.

She can take every care to avoid fire, BUT if the house has been badly built, if the fire-escapes are insufficient or not fire-proof, she cannot guard her children from the horrors of being maimed or killed by fire.

She can open her windows to give her children the air that we are told is so necessary, BUT if the air is laden with infection, with tuberculosis and other contagious diseases, she cannot protect her children from this danger.

She can send her children out for air and exercise, BUT if the conditions that surround them on the streets are immoral and degrading, she cannot protect them from these dangers.

World War I poems: “In Flanders Fields” & “The Answer,” 1918A page from WWI nurse Ella Osborn’s diary in which she wrote out the poem “In Flanders Fields,” July 29, 1918 (Gilder Lehrman Collection)Ella Osborn’s 1918 diary provides insight into the experiences of an American nurse serving in France at the end of World War I. In addition to her notes about the men under her care and events in France, Osborn jotted down two popular World War I poems, “In Flanders Fields,” by Canadian surgeon Lt. Col. John D. McCrae, and “The Answer,” by Lt. J. A. Armstrong of Wisconsin.

McCrae composed “In Flanders Fields” on May 3, 1915, during the Second Battle of Ypres, Belgium. It was published in Punch magazine on December 8, 1915, and became one of the most popular and frequently quoted poems about the war. It was used for recruitment, in propaganda efforts, and to sell war bonds. Today the red poppy of McCrae’s poem has become a symbol for soldiers who have died in combat.

In Flanders Fields the poppies growBetween the crosses, row on row,That mark our place.

“The Answer” is one of many poems written in response to “In Flanders Fields”:

Sleep peacefully, for all is well.Your flaming torch aloft we bear,With burning heart an oath we swearTo keep the faith to fight it throughTo crush the foe, or sleep with you     In Flanders Field

Osborn’s transcripts of the poems contain some textual differences from the published versions. Based on the ink used in the diary entries and the ink used in the verses, it appears she went back in her diary to find empty pages to include the poems.

Transcripts

[The poems as transcribed in Osborn’s diary contain some textual differences from the published versions.]

              In Flanders Fields

In Flanders Fields the poppies growBetween the crosses, row on row,That mark our place. While in the SkyThe larks still bravely singing, flyUnheard, amid the guns below.We are the dead, Short days agoWe lived, felt dawns, saw sunsets glow;Loved and were loved – but now we lie        In Flanders Field

Take up our quarrel with the foe!To you from falling hands we throw

The torch, Be yours to bear it high!If ye break faith with us who dieWe shall not sleep tho’ poppies blow       In Flanders Field.

 

                 The Answer –

In Flanders Field the cannon boomAnd fitful flashes light the gloom;While up above, like Eagles, flyThe fierce destroyers of the sky;With stains the earth wherein you lieIs redder than the poppy bloom       In Flanders Field.

Sleep on ye brave! The shrieking shell,The quaking trench, the startling yell,The fury of the battle hellShall wake you not; for all is well.

Sleep peacefully, for all is well.Your flaming torch aloft we bear,With burning heart an oath we swearTo keep the faith to fight it throughTo crush the foe, or sleep with you       In Flanders Field

Theodore Roosevelt on the sinking of the Lusitania, 1915Theodore Roosevelt to Oscar King Davis, June 23, 1915. (Gilder Lehrman Collection)On May 7, 1915, the British passenger ship Lusitania, sailing from New York to Liverpool, was torpedoed by a German U-boat. The Lusitania sank, killing 1,195 people on board, including 123 Americans. The incident created sharp reactions among Americans, many of whom believed that the United States should inflict an immediate reprisal upon Germany. President Woodrow Wilson, however, took a cautious approach to responding to the attack, demanding from Germany an apology, compensation for American victims, and a pledge to discontinue unannounced submarine warfare.

Former President Theodore Roosevelt disagreed with Wilson’s diplomatic response to the sinking of the Lusitania. Roosevelt believed that the attack warranted a military reprisal and that the United States had little choice but to enter the war. In June 1915, Roosevelt wrote to an aquaintance criticizing Wilson’s handling of the incident, writing, “If Lincoln had acted after the firing of Sumter in the way that Wilson did about the sinking of the Lusitania, in one month the North would have been saying they were so glad he kept them out of the war.” Criticizing both the government’s response and the American peoples’ apathy over the attack, Roosevelt wrote that he was “pretty well disgusted with our government and with the way our people acquiesce in and support it.”

A full transcript is available.

Excerpt

Wilson and Bryan have quarreled over what seems to me an entirely insignificant point, that is, as to the percentage of water they shall put into a policy of mere milk and water. Both of them are agreed that this is what the policy shall consist of. I am pretty well disgusted with our government and with the way our people acquiesce in and support it. I suppose, however, in a democracy like ours the people will always do well or ill largely in proportion to their leadership. If Lincoln had acted after the firing of Sumter in the way that Wilson did about the sinking of the Lusitania, in one month the North would have been saying they were so glad he kept them out of the war and that they were too proud to fight and that at all hazards fratricidal war must be averted.

“Food Will Win the War,” 1917

Food Will Win the War, US Food Administration, ca. 1917. (Gilder Lehrman Collection)When most people think of wartime food rationing, they often think of World War II. However, civilians were encouraged to do their part for the war effort during World War I as well. This colorful poster by artist Charles E. Chambers was issued by the United States Food Administration to encourage voluntary food conservation. “Food Will Win the War” was the name of the campaign initiated by the newly appointed head of the agency, Herbert Hoover. Food was necessary not only to feed America’s growing Army, but to help relieve famine in Europe, in part to prevent the overthrow of European governments and the spread of communism. On April 25, 1919, Hoover wrote: “Of course, the prime objective of the United States in undertaking the fight against famine in Europe is to save the lives of starving people. The secondary object, however, and of hardly less importance, [is] to defeat Anarchy, which is the handmaiden of Hunger.” (http://www.hoover.org/publications/hoover-digest/article/6135)

This poster calls on immigrants to do their part in the war effort. It depicts recent immigrants standing near a sailing ship with the Statue of Liberty and a rainbow stretched across the New York City skyline in the background. The text reads:

You came here seeking Freedom.You must now help preserve it.Wheat is needed by the allies.Waste nothing.

Though this poster focuses on the conservation of wheat, other food categories such as corn, barley, meat, and vegetables were no less important. In order to effectively reach immigrant populations, the poster was also produced in such languages as Yiddish, Italian, Spanish, and Hungarian. Using the incentives of price and patriotism, the United States was successful in its mission to feed the Allies.

Recruiting posters for African American soldiers, 1918

Colored Man Is No Slacker, print by E.G. Renesch, Chicago, Illinois, 1918. (Gilder Lehrman Collection)

True Sons of Freedom, broadside by Charles Gustrine, Chicago, Illinois, 1918. (Gilder Lehrman Collection)These two World War I recruiting posters aim to encourage African Americans to enlist. In the first poster, “Colored Man Is No Slacker,” against a background of African American patriotism, self-sacrifice, and courage, a black soldier takes his leave. The second, “True Sons of Freedom,” invokes the memory of Abraham Lincoln and the bravery of black troops to inspire African Americans to sign up. It frames the war as a struggle for freedom akin to the Civil War. Both posters position the war as an opportunity for African Americans to prove their patriotism and serve their country.

More than 350,000 African Americans, trained and deployed in segregated units, served in the US military during the war, of whom 42,000 saw action in Europe.

Treaty of Versailles and President Wilson, 1919 and 1921Peace Congress, Versailles 1919, Session of 28 June 1919: Agenda. (Gilder Lehrman Collection)The Treaty of Versailles, which ended World War I, was drafted at the Paris Peace Conference in the spring of 1919 and shaped by the Big Four powers—Great Britain, France, Italy, and the United States. This souvenir copy of the Paris Peace Conference program is signed by President Woodrow Wilson and other world leaders.

The treaty would largely come to be seen as a failure for Wilson, however. Congress, concerned about conceding individual power in order to become a member of the League of Nations, refused to ratify it. Wilson had been the driving force behind the League of Nations, and while the other signatories of the treaty embraced the League, American isolationism quashed enthusiasm for it at home. This press statement, released as Wilson left office in 1921 by William Gibbs McAdoo—who was both Wilson’s son-in-law and his treasury secretary—defends the President’s handling of the Treaty of Versailles. McAdoo argued that Wilson had “laid the foundations of world peace and a new order” and made a “matchless contribution to his time” in the treaty. “Whatever may be the imperfections of the Treaty from a political or economic standpoint,” McAdoo wrote, “Woodrow Wilson did not fail.”

A full transcript is available.

Excerpt

I do not agree with those who hastily and inconsiderately adjudge the President’s work at the Peace Conference a failure. Whatever may be the imperfections of the Treaty from a political or economic standpoint, Woodrow Wilson did not fail. The outstanding thing for which he fought, the thing that transcends political and economic considerations, is the permanent peace of the world. Unless this is secured all else is failure; without this the sublimest hope of humanity is sunk in the black abyss; without this all political and economic adjustments are unstable and sooner or later will disappear.

The Supreme Court upholds national prohibition, 1920The Supreme Court Decision on National Prohibition, by Wayne B. Wheeler, advocate for the Anti-Saloon League, explaining the Supreme Court's decision in the National Prohibition Cases, 1920. (Library of Congress Printed Ephemera Collection)After more than a century of activism, the temperance movement achieved its signal victory with the ratification of the Eighteenth Amendment to the US Constitution in 1919. The amendment abolished “the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors,” and provided for “concurrent” federal and state authority to enforce the ban. It was controversial from its inception: it did not define “intoxicating liquors,” it did not specifically forbid the purchase of alcohol, it established “concurrent” state and federal enforcement but did not provide any means for enforcement, and its constitutionality was in question.

To provide for enforcement of the amendment, a powerful lobbying group called the Anti-Saloon League, led by its top lawyer, Wayne B. Wheeler, devised the National Prohibition Act, also known as the Volstead Act. Though the law’s wording was confusing, it defined intoxicating liquors as anything over 0.5% alcohol by volume. It also laid the groundwork for federal and state responsibility to prosecute violators. President Woodrow Wilson’s veto of the law was swiftly overridden by Congress in October 1919. The constitutionality of the new law and the amendment itself were challenged in a series of legal cases that were brought before the US Supreme Court as the National Prohibition Cases (1920). In this document, Wheeler reviewed the meaning of the Court’s decision to uphold the law:

The decision will go down in history as one of the great judicial landmarks in the progress of our civilization. There will be an effort in Congress and in the State Legislatures to nullify the law, and we will meet the practical problem of law enforcement for years to come, but this decision will be the judicial foundation upon which prohibition will rest through the ages.

Thirteen years later, the Twenty-first Amendment was ratified, overturning the Eighteenth Amendment and ending national prohibition in 1933.

Lynching in America, ca. 1926NAACP, “For the Good of America” broadside, ca. 1926. (Gilder Lehrman Collection)The number of violent acts against African Americans accelerated during the first quarter of the twentieth century. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) began compiling lynching statistics in 1912, thirty years after the Chicago Tribune and twenty years after the Tuskegee Institute started tracking such crimes. In November 1922, the NAACP ran full page ads in newspapers pressing for the passage of the Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill. Entitled “The Shame of America,” the ad laid out the shocking statistics of lynching from 1899 through 1922. The bill was passed by a two-to-one majority in the House of

Representatives but was defeated in the Senate. A few years later, the NAACP issued the statistics as a broadside. Entitled “For the Good of America,” it encouraged citizens to “aid the organization which has been fighting for ten years to wipe out our shame.” Despite the NAACP’s vigorous efforts through the 1930s and the introduction of several subsequent bills, the US Congress never outlawed lynching.

Herbert Hoover’s Inaugural Address, 1929Inaugural Address of President Herbert Hoover, March 4, 1929 (Gilder Lehrman Collection)In November 1928, Republican Herbert Hoover was elected president over the Democratic nominee Al Smith. Hoover had served in the Harding and Coolidge administrations and won the nomination after Coolidge declined to run for a third term. Hoover would eventually come to be remembered for the Great Depression and “Hoovervilles,” and as a leader blind to the plight of the common man.

When he was inaugurated in March 1929, however, Hoover was still seen as a progressive and energetic heir to the Republican Party. His inaugural speech focused on what he called the “ideals and aspirations of America.” He proposed criminal justice reform and stronger enforcement of prohibition, declaring that “a large responsibility rests directly upon our citizens. There would be little traffic in illegal liquor if only criminals patronized it.” He also touched on issues of education and public health, saying, “Public health service should be as fully organized and as universally incorporated into our governmental system as is public education.”

Taking office, he said, “Ours is a land rich in resources; stimulating in its glorious beauty; filled with millions of happy homes; blessed with comfort and opportunity.” Hoover continued, “I have no fears for the future of our country. It is bright with hope,” words that would stand in stark contrast to the sense of desperation that would pervade the nation during and after his presidency. Nothing in Hoover’s address foretold the coming economic crisis.

Excerpt

The questions before our country are problems of progress to higher standards; they are not the problems of degeneration. They demand thought and they serve to quicken the conscience and enlist our sense of responsibility for their settlement. And that responsibility rests upon you, my countrymen, as much as upon those of us who have been selected for office. 

Ours is a land rich in resources; stimulating in its glorious beauty; filled with millions of happy homes; blessed with comfort and opportunity. In no nation are the institutions of progress more advanced. In no nation are the fruits of accomplishment more secure. In no nation is the government more worthy of respect. No country is more loved by its people. I have an abiding faith in their capacity, integrity and high purpose. I have no fears for the future of our country. It is bright with hope. 

In the presence of my countrymen, mindful of the solemnity of this occasion, knowing what the task means and the responsibility which it involves, I beg your tolerance, your aid, and your cooperation. I ask the help of Almighty God in this service to my country to which you have called me.

The origins of FDR’s New Deal, 1932Franklin D. Roosevelt to Frederick S. Greene on federal appropriations to New York State, July 28, 1932. (Gilder Lehrman Collection)When the nation fell into the Great Depression following the stock market crash of 1929, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was serving as New York’s governor and was responsible for shaping the state’s response to the

crisis. The origins of the Roosevelt’s New Deal can be seen in this letter of July 28, 1932, addressed to New York’s superintendent of public works, Frederick S. Greene. Roosevelt describes his plan to appropriate federal emergency relief to highway projects that would both benefit the state’s infrastructure and combat unemployment. Since the funds were given with an expiration date, Roosevelt instructed Greene to work swiftly and “impose conditions therein which will insure the employment of the greatest number of men.”

He allotted $2,000,000 to the Northern, Grand Central, and Eastern Parkways projects for paving and other improvements. The work ultimately led to the development of Long Island and other outlying areas of New York City while securing employment for many who were out of work. Roosevelt’s view of government intervention as an agent for change was taken to the national stage less than one year later when he implemented his New Deal policies as the nation’s 32nd president.

View images of the entire document here.

Excerpts

By a recent act of the Congress, approved by the President, there is available to this State an emergency relief advance of $6,059,000 for expenditure upon highway projects. . . . It has been suggested, and I am thoroughly in accord with the proposal, that upwards of not more than $2,000,000 of this sum be expended on the Northern, Grand Central and Easter Parkways. These three projects readily lend themselves to the purposes for which this advance of Federal funds is being made. First, they are situated in areas where thousands of men are unemployed; second, sections of these parkways are graded and ready to have pavements laid; third, plans and specifications are ready so that contracts may be immediately advertised and let, and the work completed within the allotted time, and fourth, the completion of these parkway projects will afford to hundreds of thousands of people outlets from the Greater City to Long Island on the east and through the Eastern Parkway on the north.

May I not urge that you facilitate with all possible speed the advertising and awarding of these contracts, and that you impose conditions therein which will insure the employment of the greatest number of men on these projects?

Franklin D. Roosevelt’s First Inauguration, 1933First Inaugural Address of Franklin D. Roosevelt, March 4, 1933, published by the Government Printing Office, Washington DC, 1933. (Gilder Lehrman Collection)When Franklin Delano Roosevelt gave his first inaugural address on March 4, 1933, the nation was reeling from the Great Depression and was dissatisfied with the previous administration’s reluctance to fight it. Roosevelt declared that, by electing him, the American people had “registered a mandate that they want direct, vigorous action.”

The address is most remembered for FDR’s statement that “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself,” but it is also a declaration of war against economic hardship, a call to Americans to work together to face “the dark hour,” and a notice of his intention to reorganize and redirect government action. In laying out his approach to rescuing the economy and tempering the steadily rising rate of unemployment, he is realistic about the future, but remains hopeful: “Only a foolish optimist can deny the dark realities of the moment. Yet our distress comes from no failure of substance. . . . Compared with the perils which our forefathers conquered because they believed and were not afraid, we have still much to be thankful for.”

The New Deal began almost immediately. The Emergency Banking Relief Act was signed five days after the inauguration and was joined by numerous programs and agencies, some more successful than others.

A pdf of the document is available.

Excerpt

This is preeminently the time to speak the truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly. Nor need we shrink from honestly facing conditions in our country to-day. This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper. So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. In every dark hour of our national life a leadership of frankness and vigor has met with that understanding and support of the people themselves which is essential to victory. . . .

The Nation asks for action, and action now.

Our greatest primary task is to put people to work. This is no unsolvable problem if we face it wisely and courageously. It can be accomplished in part by direct recruiting by the Government itself, treating the task as we would treat the emergency of a war, but at the same time, through this employment, accomplishing greatly needed projects to stimulate and reorganize the use of our national resources. . . .

. . . in the event that the national emergency is still critical, I shall not evade the clear course of duty that will then confront me. I shall ask the Congress for the one remaining instrument to meet the crisis—broad Executive power to wage a war against the emergency, as great as the power that would be given to me if we were in fact invaded by a foreign foe.

“Reelect Roosevelt—Friend of Labor,” 1936Campaign poster, Democratic National Campaign Committee, 1936. (Gilder Lehrman Collection)This Democratic Party campaign poster from 1936 outlines some of the agencies and regulations Franklin Roosevelt put in place to try to solve the most urgent problems of the Great Depression. While it reminds laborers of how they have benefitted from the New Deal and encourages them to support Roosevelt’s reelection, it acknowledges that the Depression is not over and that “the unemployed still look for jobs.” The “printer’s bug” in the lower left indicates that the poster was printed by a union shop. 

 

Excerpt

DEEDS—NOT WORDS

President Roosevelt has not given lip service to Labor. He did not promise a chicken in every pot and 2 cars in every garage. But he is doing all in his power to make life easier, safer, and happier for the average man and woman.

The “standpatters” and the greedy interests are “ganging up” against the President. They want a return to Republican prosperity—for the few at the top. President Roosevelt stands for lasting prosperity—in which all share, for “higher wages for workers, more income for farmers, more goods produced, more and better food eaten, fewer unemployed, and lower taxes.” (Franklin D. Roosevelt, April, 1936.)

Civilian Conservation Corps poster, 1938

Enlistment poster for the Arizona Civilian Conservation Corps., September 24, 1938. (Gilder Lehrman Collection)The Civilian Conservation Corps directly addressed two of the most pressing problems during the Depression: male youth unemployment and environmental degradation. The CCC, based on a military model of everyday life, put thousands of young men to work planting trees, improving national and state parks, and creating infrastructure. They were paid $30 a month and received room and board while they worked for the program.

Photograph of an abandoned farm in the Dust Bowl, 1938

Abandoned farm in the Dust Bowl, Coldwater District, near Dalhart Texas, photograhed by Dorothea Lange, June 1938. (Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division)When a severe drought in the early 1930s left the crops of the Great Plains stunted, the relentless winds of the plains picked up the soil and brewed up horrific, roiling storms that gave this time its name: the Dust Bowl. Thousands of farmers saw their livelihoods literally blown away.

By 1938 when this farm was photographed by Dorothea Lange, its owners had abandoned it and it became covered by the blowing sands.

Japan declares war, 1941Declaration of War against the United States and Britain [in Japanese], December 8, 1941. (Gilder Lehrman Collection)On December 7, 1941, two hours after the Japanese attack on American military installations at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, Japan declared war on the United States and Great Britain, marking America’s entry into World War II. The Japanese government had originally intended to deliver the declaration thirty minutes before the attack, but the Japanese embassy in Washington took too long to decode the 5,000-word document.

The declaration read, in part, that Japanese “officers and men of our army and navy will concentrate their strength in engaging in battles, the members of our government will endeavor to carry out their assigned duties, our subjects throughout the empire will employ full strength to perform their respective tasks. Thus uniting one hundred million hearts and discharging the fullest strength of the nation, we expect all our subjects to strive to attain the ultimate objective of this expedition.” It was printed on the front page of Japanese newspapers on December 8, 1941, and again on the 8th of every month until the end of the war.

This copy of the declaration of war folds into an original blue cloth box imprinted with the document’s title.

A full translation is available.

Excerpt

We, the Emperor of Japan, having acceded to the throne of the unbroken line of emperors which is for ages eternal, with the divine providence of the heavenly god, hereby proclaim unto our loyal and valorous subjects:

That we, the emperor, have now declared war upon the United States of America and Great Britain. The officers and men of our army and navy will concentrate their strength in engaging in battles, the members of our government will endeavor to carry out their assigned duties, our subjects throughout the empire will employ full strength to perform their respective tasks. Thus uniting one hundred million hearts and discharging the fullest strength of the nation, we expect all our subjects to strive to attain the ultimate objective of this expedition.

Civilian defense on the home front, 1942“Official Civilian Defense Insignia, United States Citizens Defense Corps,” US Office of Civilian Defense, 1942 (Gilder Lehrman Institute, GLC09520.36)In the early days of World War II, air raids and other attacks on populated areas in Europe generated fears that similar attacks could happen in the United States. On May 20, 1941, more than six months before the United States entered the war, President Franklin Roosevelt set up the Office of Civilian Defense (OCD) to coordinate state and federal measures to protect civilians in a war-related emergency. The OCD organized the United States Citizens Defense Corps to recruit and train volunteers to perform essential tasks.

The insignia in the poster featured here, published in 1942, illustrate the numerous jobs assigned to civilian volunteers. Enrolled and trained volunteers displayed their insignia on arm bands and on uniforms or civilian dress. The OCD also published a handbook, The United States Citizens Defense Corps, to explain the duties and responsibilities of various positions:

Who Should Join.—All able-bodied, responsible persons in the community—men and women, housewives, laborers, business and professional people—for the mutual protection of all. Boys and girls, and elderly people too, have work to do. The program is broad; the tasks are many; the time is now! . . .

Qualifications for membership require enrollment, physical and mental aptitude, recognition of obligation to study duties, take required training courses, and subsequently attend periodical group practice.

Japanese internment, 1942Responding to fears of Japanese spies within the United States, President Roosevelt signed an order authorizing the forced relocation and confinement of more than 110,000 Japanese nationals and Japanese Americans living in the West. This broadside, distributed in Los Angeles, ordered “all persons of Japanese ancestry” to assemble for transport to detention camps. The document gives specific directions to families about what they could take

with them—household and personal items limited to “that which can be carried by the individual or family group.” Although some Japanese families had sympathetic friends who held their property and ran their businesses in their absence, most lost their homes and livelihoods as they followed government orders.

Eleanor Roosevelt’s four basic rights, 1944Eleanor Roosevelt to Addie Frizielle, May 13, 1944 (Gilder Lehrman Collection)First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, a lifelong advocate of equal rights, used her position as First Lady to advocate against discrimination in the United States. However, Mrs. Roosevelt’s ideas were not embraced by everyone in the pre-civil rights era when segregation and racism were institutionalized in American economics, politics, and society. In this letter from 1944 Mrs. Roosevelt responded to one of her critics, Addie Frizielle, who worried about the desegregation of restrooms and forced social interaction between the races in the government’s movement toward racial equality in some spheres.

The First Lady deftly responded to the woman, dismissing her concerns about socialization and desegregation, while enumerating the “four basic rights which I believe every citizen in a democracy must enjoy. These are the right for equal education, the right to work for equal pay according to ability, the right to justice under the law, the right to participate in the making of the laws by use of the ballot.”

 

Transcript

Eleanor Roosevelt to Addie Frizielle, May 13, 1944.

May 13, 1944

Dear Miss Frizielle:

I have not advocated social equality between colored and white people. That is a personal thing which nobody can advocate. Nobody can tell me whom I shall have inside my house, any more than I can tell others.

The only things which I have advocated are four basic rights which I believe every citizen in a democracy must enjoy. These are the right for equal education, the right to work for equal pay according to ability, the right to justice under the law, the right to participate in the making of the laws by use of the ballot.

Questions beyond that are personal things and people must decide them for themselves.

I am sure it is true that here in Washington you have found some discourteous colored people. I have found colored people who were discourteous, and I have also found white people who were discourteous. As a matter of fact, I doubt if it does any people anywhere any harm to tell them that you believe they are entitled to certain rights and you are willing to see them obtain those rights.

If you have to use the same toilets and wash basins where you work, then all of you must have to take physical examinations, in which case I think you are as safe as you would be in any place where a great many people are coming and going. If you are nervous, there are certain precautions which you can always take.

Sincerely yours,                         Eleanor Roosevelt