FOREWORD
of the mental forces of America, to have, in lieu of a Committee on Censorship, a Committee on Public Information for the production and dissemination as widely as possible of the truth about America's participation in the war. Undoubtedly for the country to adopt the censorship plan would have been to say, "Now, we must all sit still and breathe cautiously lest we rock the boat." It was an inspiration to say, instead: "Now, this boat is just so many feet long, it is so many feet wide, it weighs just so much, and the sea is just so deep. If, after having all of these facts before you, you think rocking the boat will help the cause, rock." That is what the Committee on Public Information did, and it required a stroke of genius—perhaps not a stroke of genius, but something better than genius—to see that it required faith in democracy, it required faith in the fact; for it is a fact that our democratic institutions over here would enable us to deal with information safely; that, as Mr. Creel believed, if we received the facts we could be trusted.
Now the men who said that, and started out to give the American people all the facts there were, to see that the story was fully told, to dig it up out of hidden places and put it before the people, performed a very distinct service in the war, and, if I may say so, it seems to me a very great service to the future of our development, and in the application of the fruits of the victory which democracy has just won in the world. But it did not stop there. Of course, as the head of the War Department I am committed irrevocably, and no matter what my private opinions may be, to a belief on the much mooted question as to whether the pen is mightier than the sword. I an: obliged to believe that the sword is mightier than the pen. But this war wasn't to be won by the sword alone. It was to be won by the pen as well as by the sword, and I am not speaking now of a purely military victory, because the
xiv
