Selective Service Act of 1917

Uncle Sam says "I Want You for U.S. Army," this recruitment propaganda poster became popular during World War I.

U.S. Secretary of War Newton D. Baker, blindfolded and drawing registration numbers for 1917 draft lottery.

THE SELECTIVE SERVICE ACT OF 1917

                 With the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in June 1914, the world was pushed into ‘the Great War.’ Through pre-war conscription the major European powers, with the exception of the United Kingdom, had huge armies which began to quickly occupy trenches across the continent. In his “Appeal for Neutrality,” President Woodrow Wilson established an American policy that would last through to April 1917. During the 32-month period Wilson’s rhetoric evolved from “neutrality” to “the world made safe for democracy.” One month after America officially joined the Allies, a legal draft of able-bodied American men, the first since the Civil War, was created to support the thousands of men who volunteered.

                Not wanting to revive the negative reactions to the ‘draft,’ like that of the New York Anti-Draft Riots in 1863 and the massive resistance movements across the Confederacy, the government named the legislation the “Selective Service Act” to create the idea that the best men America had to offer were chosen to serve and protect American democracy. The act established a federal policy that would be administered by local governments and “volunteers so that a man’s neighbors rather than the federal government sent him into the army or deferred him.”¹ Some immediate reactions were negative as a leading voice of the anti-conscription movement was Speaker of the House James Beauchamp “Champ” Clark of Missouri. The major concern was that Clark and his allies would inspire movements to block registration for the draft.² At the same time, President Wilson said this “was in no sense a conscription of the unwilling” but rather “a selection from a nation which has volunteered in mass.” Secretary of War Newton D. Baker added that draft registration would be a “festival and patriotic occasion.”³ 

Draft Registration in North Georgia

                In Georgia, the local sheriff and his staff were in charge of managing the Selective Service Act. And, although in northern Georgia, men did not run off and sign-up to fight in the war like those who, in Gone with the Wind, enthusiastically left a gathering at Ashley Wilkes’ plantation to volunteer for the war, thousands of Georgia men did show up on June 5, 1917, the first day of registration, at their appointed location. Ultimately, across the United States, 24 million men, including 2.2 million African-Americans, were registered for the draft by the war’s end. Among the first was John Lewis Tate of Cumming, Georgia, one of thousands of northern Georgians to register for the draft on June 5, 1917. Along with his two brothers, Tate, a young, married farmer registered at the Cumming District of Forsyth County.⁴