Civilian Public Service

The Civilian Public Service (CPS) was a program of the United States government that provided conscientious objectors with an alternative to military service during World War II. 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. Draftees from the historic peace churches and other faiths worked in areas such as soil conservation, forestry, fire fighting, agriculture, under the supervision of such agencies as the U.S. Forest Service, the Soil Conservation Service, and the National Park Service. Others helped provide social services and mental health services.

The CPS men served without wages and minimal support from the federal government. The cost of maintaining the CPS camps and providing for the needs of the men was the responsibility of their congregations and families. CPS men served longer than regular draftees and were not released until well after the end of the war. Initially skeptical of the program, government agencies learned to appreciate the men's service and requested more workers from the program. CPS made significant contributions to forest fire prevention, erosion and flood control, medical science and reform of the mental health system.

Conscientious objectors (COs) refuse to participate in military service because of belief or religious training. During wartime, this stance conflicts with conscription efforts. Those willing to accept non-combatant roles, such as medical personnel, are accommodated. There are few legal options for draftees who cannot cooperate with the military in any way.

The conscription law of World War I provided for noncombatant service for members of a religious organization whose members were forbidden from participating in war of any form. This exemption effectively limited conscientious objector status to members of the historic peace churches: Mennonites (and other Anabaptist groups such as Hutterites), Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) and Church of the Brethren. The law gave the President authority to assign such draftees to any noncombatant military role.

Conscientious objectors who refused noncombatant service during World War I were imprisoned in military facilities such as Fort Lewis (Washington), Alcatraz Island (California) and Fort Leavenworth (Kansas). The government assumed that COs could be converted into soldiers once they were exposed to life in their assigned military camps. 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 draftees' refusal to put on a uniform or cooperate in any way caused difficulties for both the government and the COs. The treatment received by nearly 2,000 of these absolute COs included short rations, solitary confinement and physical abuse so severe as to cause the deaths of two Hutterite draftees.

After World War I, and with another European war looming, leaders from the historic peace churches met to strategize about how to cooperate with the government to avoid the difficulties of World War I. Holding a common view that any participation in military service was not acceptable, they devised a plan of civilian alternative service, based on experience gained by American Friends Service Committee work in Europe during and after World War I and forestry service done by Russian Mennonites in lieu of military service in Tsarist Russia.

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. On June 20, 1940, the Burke-Wadsworth Bill came before Congress. The arrangements for conscientious objectors were almost identical to the World War I provisions.

The Friends representatives continued attempting to make the bill more favorable to the historic peace churches. The Burke-Wadsworth Bill passed on September 14, 1940, becoming the Selective Training and Service Act of 1940. 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."