Opposition to

World War I

Opposition to World War I included

socialist, anarchist, syndicalist, and
Marxist groups on the left, as well as
Christian pacifists, Canadian and Irish
nationalists, women's groups,
intellectuals, and rural folk.
 Opposition to World War I
Part of the Anti-war movement

Protests against World War I at the 1915

Women's Peace Conference in The Hague

Date 1914-1918

Caused by World War I

Goals End of any

participation in
World War I
Resulted in Various mutinies
Revolutions of
1917-1923
The socialist movements had declared
before the war their opposition to a war
which they said could only mean workers
killing each other in the interests of their
bosses. But once the war was declared,
most socialist and trade union bodies
decided to back the government of their
country and support the war. For
example, on 25 July 1914, the executive
of the Social Democratic Party of
Germany (SPD) issued an appeal to its
membership to demonstrate against the
coming war, only to vote on 4 August for
the war credits the German government
wanted. Likewise the French Socialist
Party and its union, the CGT, especially
after the assassination of the pacificist
Jean Jaurès, organised mass rallies and
protests until the outbreak of war, but
once the war began they argued that in
wartime socialists should support their
nations against the aggression of other
nations and also voted for war credits.[1]

Groups opposed to the war included the

Russian Bolsheviks, the Socialist Party of
America, the Italian Socialist Party, and
the socialist faction led by Karl
Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg in
Germany (later to become the
Communist Party of Germany). In
Sweden, the socialist youth leader Zeth
Höglund was jailed for his anti-war
propaganda, even though Sweden did not
participate in the war.

Women
Women across the spectrum were much
less supportive than men.[2][3] Women in
church groups were especially anti-war.
However, women in the suffrage
movement in different countries tended
to support the war effort, asking for the
vote as a reward for that support.

In France, women activists from both the

working-class socialist women's and the
middle-class suffragist movements
formed their own groups to oppose the
war. However, they were unable to
coordinate their efforts because of
mutual suspicion due to class and
political differences. After 1915 the
groups weakened or dissolved entirely as
their leading militants left to work within
nonfeminist organizations opposing the
war.[4]

The women's suffrage movement in

Britain split on the war issue. The main
official groups supported the war, but it
was opposed by a number of prominent
women's rights campaigners, including
Helena Swanwick, Margaret Ashton,
Catherine Marshall, Maude Royden,
Kathleen Courtney and Chrystal
Macmillan.[5] and Sylvia Pankhurst. It
was an early coalition of women's
campaigning with pacifism that led to the
formation of Women's International
League for Peace and Freedom in 1915.

Pacifists

The Deserter (1916) by Boardman Robinson

Although the onset of the First World War

was generally greeted with enthusiastic
patriotism across Europe, peace groups
were still active in condemning the war.
In Britain, the prominent peace activist
Stephen Henry Hobhouse went to prison
for refusing military service, citing his
convictions as an "International Socialist
and a Christian"[6] Many socialist groups
and movements were antimilitarist,
arguing that war by its nature was a type
of governmental coercion of the working
class for the benefit of capitalist elites.
The French socialist pacifist leader Jean
Jaurès was assassinated by a nationalist
fanatic on July 31, 1914. The national
parties in the Second International
increasingly supported their respective
nations in war and the International was
dissolved in 1916.
A World War I-era female peace protester

In 1915 the League of Nations Society

was formed by British Liberal Party
leaders to promote a strong international
organisation that could enforce the
peaceful resolution of conflict. Later that
year the League to Enforce Peace was
established in America to promote
similar goals. Hamilton Holt published an
editorial in his New York City weekly
magazine the Independent called "The
Way to Disarm: A Practical Proposal" on
September 28, 1914. It called for an
international organization to agree upon
the arbitration of disputes and to
guarantee the territorial integrity of its
members by maintaining military forces
sufficient to defeat those of any non-
member. The ensuing debate among
prominent internationalists modified
Holt's plan to align it more closely with
proposals offered in Great Britain by
Viscount James Bryce, a former
ambassador from Britain to the U.S.
These and other initiatives were pivotal in
the change in attitudes that gave birth to
the League of Nations after the war.
Christian pacifists and the traditional
peace churches such as the Religious
Society of Friends (Quakers) opposed the
war. Most American Pentecostal
denominations were critical to the war
and encouraged their members to be
conscientious objectors.[7]

In the United States, some of the many

groups that protested against the war
were the Woman's Peace Party (which
was organized in 1915 and led by noted
reformer Jane Addams), the American
Union Against Militarism, the Fellowship
of Reconciliation, and the American
Friends Service Committee.[8] Jeannette
Rankin, the first woman elected to
Congress, was another fierce advocate of
pacifism, the only person to vote no to
America's entrance into both World Wars.

Great Britain
In Britain, some people resisted
conscription. By 1918 several
distinguished people were imprisoned for
their opposition to it, including "the
nation's leading investigative journalist, a
future winner of the Nobel Prize, more
than half a dozen future members of
Parliament, one future cabinet minister,
and a former newspaper editor who was
publishing a clandestine journal for his
fellow inmates on toilet paper."[9] One of
them was Bertrand Russell - a
mathematician, philosopher and social
critic engaged in pacifist activities, who
was dismissed from Trinity College,
Cambridge following his conviction
under the Defence of the Realm Act in
1916. A later conviction resulted in six
months' of imprisonment in Brixton
prison from which he was released in
September 1918.

Despite mainstream Labour Party's

support for the war effort, the
Independent Labour Party was
instrumental in opposing conscription
through organisations such as the Non-
Conscription Fellowship while a Labour
Party affiliate, the British Socialist Party,
organised a number of unofficial strikes.
Arthur Henderson resigned from the
Cabinet in 1917 amid calls for party unity
to be replaced by George Barnes. Overall,
however, the majority of the movement
continued to support the war for the
duration of the conflict, and the British
Labour Party, unlike most of its
equivalents on the Continent, did not split
over the war.[10]

In the shipyards in and around Glasgow,

Scotland, opposition to the British war
effort became a major aim during the
Red Clydeside era. To mobilise the
workers of Clydeside against World War I,
the Clyde Workers' Committee (CWC)
was formed, with Willie Gallacher as its
head and David Kirkwood its treasurer.
The CWC led the campaign against the
Liberal government of David Lloyd
George and their Munitions Act, which
forbade engineers from leaving the
company they were employed in. The
CWC negotiated with government
leaders, but no agreement could be
reached and consequently both
Gallacher and Kirkwood were arrested
and imprisoned under the Defence of the
Realm Act.

Anti-war activity also took place outside

the workplace and on the streets in
general. The Marxist John Maclean and
Independent Labour Party member
James Maxton were both jailed for their
anti-war propagandizing.

In the British Empire

Australia …

In Australia two referendums in 1916 and

1917 resulted in votes against
conscription, and were seen as
opposition to an all-out prosecution of
the war. In retaliation, the Australian
government used the War Precautions
Act and the Unlawful Associations Act to
arrest and prosecute anti-
conscriptionists such as Tom Barker,
editor of Direct Action and many other
members of the Industrial Workers of the
World. The young John Curtin, at the time
a member of the Victorian Socialist
Party, was also arrested. Anti-
conscriptionist publications were seized
by government censors in police raids.[11]

Other notable opponents to Conscription

included the Catholic Archbishop of
Melbourne Daniel Mannix, the
Queensland Labor Premier Thomas Ryan,
Vida Goldstein and the Women's Peace
Army. Most labor unions actively
opposed conscription.
Many Australians thought positively of
conscription as a sign of loyalty to Britain
and thought that it would also support
those men who were already fighting.
However, trade unions feared that their
members might be replaced by cheaper
foreign or female labour and opposed
conscription. Some groups argued that
the whole war was immoral, and it was
unjust to force people to fight.

In Australia, women had full right to vote

which is rare[12]

Canada …
In Canada opposition to conscription and
involvement in the war centered on
French Canadian nationalists led by
Henri Bourassa. Following the 1917
elections, the government implemented
the Military Service Act 1917 that came
into effect in 1918, which sparked a
weekend of rioting in Quebec city
between March 28 and April 1, 1918.
Invoking the War Measures Act of 1914,
the federal government sent troops to
restore order in the city, which opened
fire on a demonstration on April 1.

Ireland …
Beginning in 1914, anti-war campaigns in
Ireland were led by the pacifist Francis
Sheehy-Skeffington and the Socialist
James Connolly, and by Laurence Ginnell
in the House of Commons. Both Connolly
and Sheehy-Skeffington, however, were
executed by the British Army following
the Easter Rising of 1916. The
Conscription Crisis of 1918 had long-
term repercussions, uniting several
nationalist parties and the Roman
Catholic Hierarchy in opposition to the
draft. This played a major part in the Irish
War of Independence and the creation of
the Irish Free State in 1922.

New Zealand …
In New Zealand, the war (particularly
conscription) was opposed by the New
Zealand Socialist Party and its successor
the New Zealand Labour Party. Several
members were prosecuted for sedition in
1916 and imprisoned, including Peter
Fraser, Bob Semple and Paddy Webb.
Fraser was later Prime Minister of New
Zealand for most of World War II.

In other Allied countries

In Russia, opposition to the war was
originally led by both Marxists and
pacifist Tolstoyans under the leadership
of Valentin Bulgakov. Bulgakov's first
reaction to the outbreak of war was the
appeal "Wake up, all people are brothers!"
which he composed on 28 September
1914.

"Our enemies are - not the

Germans, and - not Russians or
Frenchmen. The common
enemy of us all, no matter
what nationality to which we
belong - is the beast within us.
Nowhere is this truth so clearly
confirmed, as now, when,
intoxicated, and excessively
proud of their false science,
their foreign culture and their
civilization of the machine,
 people of the 20th century have
suddenly realized the true
stage of its development: this
step is no higher than that
which our ancestors were at in
the days of Attila and Genghis
Khan. It is infinitely sad to
know that two thousand years
of Christianity have passed
almost without a trace upon
the people.".[13]

In October, Bulgakov continued

circulating the appeal, collecting
signatures and posting copies which
were confiscated by the Tsarist secret
police, or Okhrana. On 28 October
Bulgakov was arrested together with 27
signatories of the appeal.

In November–December 1915, most

defendants were released from custody
on bail. A trial took place on 1 April 1916
and the defendants were acquitted.

As Russia's involvement in the war

continued anyway, soldiers began to
establish their own revolutionary
tribunals and began to execute officers
en masse. After the October Revolution
of 1917, Lenin's Bolsheviks called for
unilateral armistice, but the other
combatants refused, determined to fight
until the bitter end. The Bolsheviks
agreed a peace treaty with Imperial
Germany, the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk,
despite its harsh conditions. They also
published the secret treaties between
Russia and the Western Allies, hoping
that the revelation of Allied plans for a
vengeful peace would encourage
international opposition to the war.

In 1917, a series of mutinies in the

French army led to dozens of soldiers
being executed and many more
imprisoned. These soldiers were
rehabilitated by the French government in
the 1990s.

In the United States

After the War a Medal and Maybe a Job, antiwar
cartoon by John French Sloan, 1914

Henry Ford …

Industrialist Henry Ford believed that

capitalism could conquer war, and he
organized and funded a major effort of
antiwar leaders traveling to Europe in
1915 to talk to diplomats in major
countries about the need for prosperity
and peace.[14] Ford chartered an ocean
liner and invited prominent peace
activists to join him. He hoped to create
enough publicity to prompt the
belligerent nations to convene a peace
conference and mediate an end the war,
but the mission was widely mocked by
the press, which referred to the liner as
the “Ship of Fools” as well as the “Peace
Ship”.[15] Infighting between the activists,
mockery by the press contingent aboard,
and an outbreak of influenza marred the
voyage.[16] Four days after Oscar II
arrived in Norway, a beleaguered and
physically ill Ford abandoned the mission
and returned to the United States.[17] The
peace mission was unsuccessful, which
reinforced Ford’s reputation as a
supporter of unusual causes.[18]
Religious groups …

Leaders of most religious groups (except

the Episcopalians) tended to pacifism, as
did leaders of the woman's movement. A
concerted effort was made by anti-war
leaders, including Jane Addams, Oswald
Garrison Villard, David Starr Jordan,
Henry Ford, Lillian Wald, and Carrie
Chapman Catt. Their goal was to
convince Wilson to mediate an end of the
war by bringing the belligerents to the
conference table. Wilson indeed made an
energetic, sustained and serious effort to
do so, and kept his administration
neutral, but he was repeatedly rebuffed
by Britain and Germany.[19] Finally in
1917 Wilson convinced some of them
that to be truly anti-war they needed to
support what Wilson promised would be
"a war to end all wars".[20]

Once war was declared, the more liberal

denominations, which had endorsed the
Social Gospel, called for a war for
righteousness that would help uplift all
mankind. The theme—an aspect of
American exceptionalism—was that God
had chosen America as his tool to bring
redemption to the world.[21]

Far-left …
Come on in, America, the Blood's Fine! (1917) by
M.A. Kempf

Anti-war protesters at the US Capitol in April 1917

His Best Customer (1917) by Winsor McCay

Leading up to 1917 and the declaration

of war against Germany, the labor unions,
socialists, members of the Old Right, and
pacifist groups in the United States
publicly opposed participation,[22] the
obvious motive for the 1916
Preparedness Day Bombing stemming
from this. When Woodrow Wilson ran for
reelection in 1916 on the slogan "He Kept
Us Out of War", he received support from
these groups (although the Socialist
Party of America ran its own candidate,
Allan Benson). After Wilson was
reelected, though, events quickly spiraled
into war. The Zimmermann Telegram and
resumption of unrestricted submarine
warfare by Germany provoked outrage in
the U.S., and Congress declared war on
April 6. Conscription was introduced
shortly thereafter, which the anti-war
movement bitterly opposed. Many
socialist, typified by Walter Lippmann,
became enthusiastic supporters of the
war. So too did Samuel Gompers and the
great majority of organized labor unions.
However, the IWW --"Wobblies"—gained
strength by opposing the war.[23]

The Espionage Act of 1917 was passed

to prevent spying but also contained a
section which criminalized inciting or
attempting to incite any mutiny,
desertion, or refusal of duty in the armed
forces, punishable with a fine of not more
than $10,000, not more than twenty years
in federal prison, or both. Thousands of
Wobblies and anti-war activists were
prosecuted on authority of this and the
Sedition Act of 1918, which tightened
restrictions even more. Among the most
famous was Eugene Debs, chairman of
the Socialist Party of the USA for giving
an anti-draft speech in Ohio. The U.S.
Supreme Court upheld these
prosecutions in a series of decisions.

Conscientious objectors were punished

as well, most of them Christian pacifist
inductees. They were placed directly in
the armed forces and court-martialed,
receiving draconian sentences and harsh
treatment. A number of them died in
Alcatraz Prison, then a military facility.
Vigilante groups were formed which
suppressed dissent as well, such as by
rounding up draft-age men and checking
if they were in possession of draft cards
or not.
Ben Salmon was a Catholic
conscientious objector and outspoken
critic of Just War theology. During World
War I, America's Roman Catholic
hierarchy denounced him and The New
York Times described him as a "spy
suspect." The US military (in which he
was never inducted) court-martialed him
for desertion and spreading propaganda,
then sentenced him to death (this was
later revised to 25 years hard labor).[24]

Around 300,000 American men evaded or

refused conscription in World War I.
Aliens such as Emma Goldman were
deported, while naturalized or even
native-born citizens, including Eugene
Debs, lost their citizenship for their
activities. Helen Keller, a socialist, and
Jane Addams, a pacifist, also publicly
opposed the war, but neither was
prosecuted, likely because they were
sympathetic figures (Keller working to
help fellow deaf-blind people and
Addams in charity to benefit the poor).

In 1919, as the soldiers came home,

disturbances continued, with veterans
fighting strikers, the Seattle General
Strike, race riots in the South and the
Palmer Raids following two anarchist
bombings. After the election of Warren G.
Harding in 1920, Americans were eager
to follow his campaign slogan of "Return
to Normalcy." Anti-war dissidents in
federal prison, such as Debs, and
conscientious objectors, had their
sentences commuted to time served or
were pardoned on December 25, 1921.
The Sedition Act was repealed in 1921,
but the Espionage Act remains, and
Richard Nixon attempted to invoke it in
vain to prevent the Pentagon Papers
being published in 1971. Many U.S.
Supreme Court decisions since then have
substantially, but not explicitly, gutted the
provisions used to squelch dissent.
Media withheld much opposition to the
war.

In the African colonies

In many European colonies in Africa, the
recruitment of the indigenous population
to serve in the army or as porters met
widespread opposition and resistance. In
British Nyasaland (modern-day Malawi),
the recruitment of Nyasa to serve in the
East Africa Campaign contributed to the
Chilembwe uprising in 1915.

See also
List of peace activists
List of anti-war organizations
Dulce et Decorum est
Home front during World War I
British propaganda during World War I
 Italian propaganda during World War I
Zimmerwald Conference

References
1. Prelude to Revolution: Class
Consciousness and the First World
War by Megan Trudell
2. Anne Wiltsher, Most Dangerous
Women: Feminist Peace
Campaigners of the Great War.
(Routledge, 1985).
3. Claire M. Tylee, "'Maleness run riot'—
The great war and women's
resistance to militarism." Women's
Studies International Forum 11#3
(1988)
4. Charles Sowerwine, "Women Against
the War: A Feminine Basis for
Internationalism and Pacifism?
Proceedings of the Annual Meeting
of the Western Society for French
History 6#363. (1978).
5. Wiltsher, Anne (1985). Most
dangerous women: feminist peace
campaigners of the Great War (1.
publ. ed.). London: Pandora Press.
p. 2 . ISBN 0863580106.
6. Hochschild, Adam, To end all wars : a
story of loyalty and rebellion, 1914–
1918, p. 277, Boston: Houghton
Mifflin Harcourt, 2011, ISBN 0-618-
75828-3
 7. Beaman, Jay "Pentecostal Pacifism"
2017 .
8. Chatfield, Charles, "Encyclopedia of
American Foreign Policy" 2002 .
9. Hochschild, Adam (2011). To End All
Wars - a story of loyalty and rebellion,
1914-1918 . Boston, New York:
Mariner Books, Houghton Mifflin
Harcourt. pp. xvii. ISBN 978-0-547-
75031-6.
10. David Swift, For Class and Country:
the Patriotic Left and the First World
War (2017)
11. Frank Cain, The Wobblies at War: A
History of the IWW and the Great War
in Australia (Melbourne: Spectrum
Publications, 1993) ISBN 0-86786-
339-0
12. "Opposition to World War I" . World
War I. 2012-06-05. Retrieved
2017-02-07.
13. М. А. Рашковская, Е. Б.
Рашковский. «Милые братья и
сестры…» (Template:Lib.ru)
14. Watts, Steven (2005). The People's
Tycoon: Henry Ford and the
American Century . New York: Alfred
A. Knopf. pp. 228 .
15. Traxel, David (2006). Crusader
Nation: The United States in Peace
and the Great War 1898-1920 . New
York. pp. 206 .
16. Watts, Steven (2005). The People's
Tycoon: Henry Ford and the
American Century . New York: Alfred
A. Knopf. pp. 234 .
17. Watts, Steven (2005). The People's
Tycoon: Henry Ford and the
American Century . New York: Alfred
A. Knopf. pp. 235 .
18. Henry, Jim (June 15, 2003). "Noble
cause becomes a farce ; Peace Ship
cements Henry Ford's image as a
well-meaning but naive do-gooder" .
Automotive News. Retrieved
7 December 2012.
19. Patterson, David S. (1971).
"Woodrow Wilson and the Mediation
Movement 1914–1917". The
Historian. 33 (4): 535–556.
doi:10.1111/j.1540-
6563.1971.tb01164.x .
20. Piper, John F., Jr. (1970). "The
American Churches in World War I".
Journal of the American Academy of
Religion. 38 (2): 147–155.
doi:10.1093/jaarel/XXXVIII.2.147 .
JSTOR 1461171 .
21. Gamble, Richard M. (2003). The War
for Righteousness: Progressive
Christianity, the Great War, and the
Rise of the Messianic Nation.
Wilmington: ISI Books. ISBN 1-
932236-16-3.
22. "World War 1 and the Suppression of
Dissent" . The Future of Freedom
Foundation. Retrieved 22 November
2014.
23. Francis Shor, "The IWW and
oppositional politics in World War I:
Pushing the system beyond its
limits." Radical History Review
1996#64 (1996): 75-94.
24. Staff of the Catholic Peace
Fellowship (2007). "The Life and
Witness of Ben Salmon" . Sign of
Peace. 6.1 (Spring 2007).

Further reading
Chatfield, Charles. For peace and
justice: pacifism in America, 1914-1941
(University of Tennessee Press, 1971).
Farrar Jr, Lancelot L. Divide and
Conquer: German Efforts to Conclude a
Separate Peace, 1914–1918 (London:
East European Quarterly, 1978).
Jarausch, Konrad H. "Armageddon
Revisited: Peace Research
Perspectives on World War One."
Peace & Change 7.1‐2 (1981): 109-118.
Moorehead, Caroline. Troublesome
People: The Warriors of Pacifism (1987)
covers Britain 1914 to 1945.
Patterson, David S. The Search for
Negotiated Peace: Women's Activism
and Citizen Diplomacy in World War I
(Routledge. 2008).
Tylee, Claire M. "'Maleness run riot'—
The great war and women's resistance
 to militarism." Women's Studies
International Forum 11#3 (1988) online
Wiltsher, Anne. Most Dangerous
Women: Feminist Peace Campaigners
of the Great War. (Routledge, 1985).

External links
Patterson, David S.: Pacifism , in:
1914-1918-online. International
Encyclopedia of the First World War .
Wilmers, Annika: Feminist Pacifism ,
in: 1914-1918-online. International
Encyclopedia of the First World War .
Marcobelli, Elisa: Pre-war Socialist
Pacifism , in: 1914-1918-online.
 International Encyclopedia of the First
World War .

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