The Institute for Propaganda Analysis (IPA) was a U.S.-based organization operating from 1937 to 1942, composed of social scientists, opinion leaders, historians, educators, and journalists. Created by Kirtley Mather, Edward A. Filene, and Clyde R. Miller, because of the general concern that increased amounts of propaganda were decreasing the public's ability to think critically. The IPA's purpose was to spark rational thinking and provide a guide to help the public have well-informed discussions on current issues. "To teach people how to think rather than what to think." The IPA focused on domestic propaganda issues that might become possible threats to the democratic ways of life. For the IPA, Nazism, communism, the conservative anti-communist movement, England’s foreign policy, and Latin American dictatorships were all undemocratic. By labeling these group as such, the IPA promoted a democratic society based on freedom of speech and citizen participation in government, and also attempted to accomplish concrete goals such as preventing the rise of Nazism in the America. The IPA's great strength stemmed from its particular fusion of academic and practical progressivism into an organized anti-propaganda critique that institutionalized the tradition of muckraking and also applied this characteristically American critical approach to the discontents of the Depression. Genesis Edward A. Filene had amassed a fortune in meeting a mass demand, but he feared that democracy was threatened by propaganda preying upon the unsuspecting citizenry, so he asked Kirtley Mather to help him endow an effort to save democracy. A meeting on "education for democracy" was held March 29, 1937, at the University Club in Boston which attracted Alfred Adler, Lyman Bryson, Edward L. Bernays, and Clyde R. Miller among others. At a second meeting in New York City, Filene provided Miller with a check for $10,000, presumably to finance the Institute in the first year. Filene’s Good Will Fund agreed on June 9 to continue the funding for three years. The Institute was incorporated on September 23, 1937. The initial board of directors was Clyde R. Miller, Robert S. Lynd, E. Ernest Johnson, James E. Mendenhall, and Robert K. Speer. Added to the board later were Charles A. Beard, Hadley Cantril, Ernest O. Melby, James T. Shotwell, and Percy S. Brown. The board elected its officers as follows: President: Cantril, V.P.: Melby, Sec.: Miller, Tr.:Speer In October 1937 the IPA distributed 3,000 copies of an Announcement edition of the Propaganda Analysis bulletin, soliciting subscriptions. The