On December 4, 1917, U.S. Secretary of War Newton D. Baker, who had received numerous complaints from Black soldiers regarding their widespread mistreatment while serving in the military, publicly denied that Black soldiers were subjected to discrimination or an “unfair share of manual labor” while serving in the U.S. Army. He dismissed the soldiers’ complaints as “overworked hysteria” and “German propaganda.”

SOURCE: https://calendar.eji.org