Fighting for Their Country—and Equality

More than 350,000 Black American soldiers served in the war, defending democracy abroad while being denied its full benefits at home. Military units were segregated by race. And when Black soldiers returned from the war, they encountered a nation still largely opposed to racial equality. But Black veterans began pushing for equal rights more forcefully, and their demands helped bring about the civil rights movement.

Though not considered American citizens, about 11,500 Native Americans fought for the U.S. in World War I. Some helped in special ways: The U.S. government discouraged and even punished people for speaking Native languages, but the military relied on Cherokee and Choctaw troops to use their languages to transmit communications that the Germans couldn’t decipher. On the home front, Native Americans continued to lose land to White settlers, backed by the U.S. government. But their bravery in the war helped convince Congress to grant citizenship to Native veterans in 1919 and to all Native Americans in 1924—and paved the way for other Native American “code talkers” in World War II (1939-45).

Women officially served in the military for the first time in World War I, in noncombat roles. Female telephone operators served overseas with the Army, and 10,000 nurses were stationed near the front in Europe. In the U.S., many women filled jobs that had been held by men but left vacant because of the draft. Though most women lost their jobs once men returned from the war, their efforts further fueled the women’s suffrage movement, which led to the 19th Amendment in 1920, granting women the right to vote.