Manipulating the Masses: Woodrow Wilson and the Birth of American Propaganda

In this massive, extensively researched, and engagingly written book, John Maxwell Hamilton presents an exceedingly detailed examination of how President Woodrow Wilson's administration “revolutionized” relations between the U.S. government and the press (p. 126). This was not an early phase in the development of a benign republic of spin, according to Hamilton, but rather the birth of an “Information State” that is “a profound and enduring threat to American democracy” (p. 4). Concentrating on the Committee on Public Information (Cpi) headed by the pugnacious muckraker George Creel, Hamilton argues that during the crusade to make the world safe for democracy in the 1917–1918 period the Cpi subverted democratic ideals. By distorting facts, bribing journalists overseas, publishing forged documents, censoring the press without direct legal authority, and suppressing open deliberation, the Cpi took a significant step toward creating an imperial presidency. In contrast to the Progressive Era faith that...