Civilian Public Service
From 1941 to 1947, nearly 12,000 draftees, willing to serve their country in some capacity but unwilling to perform any type of military service, accepted assignments in "work of national importance" in 152 CPS camps throughout the United States and Puerto Rico.
CPS made significant contributions to forest fire prevention, erosion and flood control, medical science and reform of the mental health system.
Simultaneously the Justice Department was preparing to indict 181 Mennonite leaders for violating the espionage act because of a statement they adopted against performing military service.
The treatment received by nearly 2,000[4] of these absolute COs included short rations, solitary confinement and physical abuse so severe as to cause the deaths of two Hutterite draftees.
[6] As the United States prepared for another war, the historic peace churches, represented by Friends who understood inner dealings of Washington D.C. politics, attempted to influence new draft bills to ensure their men could fulfill their duty in an alternative, non-military type of service.
The influence of the churches was evident in section 5(g),[citation needed] which says in part: "Any such person claiming such exemption from combatant training and service ... in lieu of such induction, be assigned to work of national importance under civilian direction.
The director managed the needs of the men, oversaw maintenance of the camp facilities, handled community relations and reported to Selective Service officials.
These days could be saved to allow enough time to travel several hundred miles home or in some cases traded to other men in exchange for cash.
Men who felt compelled to protest the restrictions of the conscription law attempted to disrupt the program through the use of various techniques, including the initiation of work slowdowns and labor strikes.
[24] Churches were primarily responsible for financing Civilian Public Service, providing for the men's food, clothes, and other material needs.
[27] The first Civilian Public Service projects were in rural areas where the men performed tasks related to soil conservation, agriculture and forestry.
Later men were assigned to projects in cities where they worked in hospitals, psychiatric wards, and university research centers (as test subjects at times).
From base camps scattered through the forests of Montana, Idaho and Oregon, the men were flown as many as 200 miles to fire sites, carrying firefighting tools and a two-day supply of K-rations.
[31] As the war progressed, a critical shortage of workers in psychiatric hospitals developed, because staff had left for better paying jobs with fewer hours and improved working conditions.
The government balked at initial requests that CPS workers have these positions, believing it better to keep the men segregated in the rural camps to prevent the spread of their philosophy.
Now that was my first introduction to what was badly needed in that institution.The CPS men objected to the mistreatment and abuse of patients and determined to improve conditions in the psychiatric wards.
Frank Olmstead, chairman of the War Resisters League observed:[35] One objector assigned to a violent ward refused to take the broomstick offered by the Charge.
He felt much safer than the Charge who had only his broomstick for company.Outraged workers surveyed CPS men in other hospitals and learned of the degree of abuse throughout the psychiatric care system.
[37] Initially skeptical about the value of Civilian Public Service, Eleanor Roosevelt, impressed by the changes introduced by COs in the mental health system, became a sponsor of the National Mental Health Foundation and actively inspired other prominent citizens including Owen J. Roberts, Pearl Buck and Harry Emerson Fosdick to join her in advancing the organization's objectives of reform and humane treatment of patients.
In July 1942, Dr. Davis and Dr. Wheeler began the experiment with COs at a site in Campton, New Hampshire that became nicknamed “Camp Liceum.” They collected lice from an alcoholic ward of Bellevue Hospital and brought it with them to the facility.
Only a few years after the study, scientists discovered DDT which helped prevent a Typhus epidemic and eliminated the need for the Lice Experiment's results.
Made from the bark of the South American cinchona tree, quinine was in short supply during the war, so scientists began searching for alternative treatments.
[51] CPS men participated in tests in Pinehurst, North Carolina and Gatlinburg, Tennessee during which they drank throat washings contaminated with soldiers' colds and pneumonia.
[54] The research not only documented the men's ability to maintain physical output, but also the psychological effects of the restrictive calorie diet such as introversion, lethargy, irritability and severe depression.
[55][56] The study provided valuable insights into hunger and starvation and the results were made available to all major relief agencies concerned with postwar food and nutrition problems, helping to inspire the Marshall Plan.
At the time the experiments were thought of as “work of national importance” and an overwhelming number of the COs preferred this form of objection to other CPS manual labor tasks.
[53] After this publication, other newspapers and journals including The Washington Post, Cosmopolitan, World-Telegram, Survey Graphic, and Coronet Magazine began discussing these COs positively.
[43] This press coverage tended to focus on the sacrifice the COs were making and the risks they were facing, depicting them as far more patriotic and heroic than prior representations.
[65][66][67][68][69] Civilian Public Service men were released from their assignments and the camps closed during March 1947, nineteen months after the end of the war in the Pacific.
[74] Although the CPS program was not duplicated, the idea of offering men an opportunity to do "work of national importance" instead of military service was established.
