Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965
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Title: Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965
Author: Morris J. MacGregor
Release date: February 15, 2007 [eBook #20587]
Language: English
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INTEGRATION OF THE ARMED FORCES
1940-1965
_DEFENSE STUDIES SERIES_
INTEGRATION
OF THE ARMED FORCES
1940-1965
_by_
_Morris J. MacGregor, Jr._
_Defense Historical Studies Committee_
(as of 6 April 1979)
Alfred Goldberg
Office of the Secretary of Defense
Robert J. Watson
Historical Division, Joint Chiefs of Staff
Brig. Gen. James L. Collins, Jr.
Chief of Military History
Maj. Gen. John W. Huston
Chief of Air Force History
Maurice Matloff
Center of Military History
Stanley L. Falk
Office of Air Force History
Rear Adm. John D. H. Kane, Jr.
Director of Naval History
Brig. Gen. (Ret.) Edwin H. Simmons
Director of Marine Corps History and
Museums
Dean C. Allard
Naval Historical Center
Henry J. Shaw, Jr.
Marine Corps Historical Center
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
MacGregor, Morris J
Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965
(Defense studies series)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Supt. of Docs. no.: D 114.2:In 8/940-65
1. Afro-American soldiers. 2. United States--Race
Relations. I. Title. II. Series.
UB418.A47M33 335.3'3 80-607077
_Department of the Army_
_Historical Advisory Committee_
(as of 6 April 1979)
Otis A. Singletary
University of Kentucky
Maj. Gen. Robert C. Hixon
U.S. Army Training and Doctrine
Command
Brig. Gen. Robert Arter
U.S. Army Command and
General Staff College
Sara D. Jackson
National Historical Publications
and Records Commission
Harry L. Coles
Ohio State University
Maj. Gen. Enrique Mendez, Jr.
Deputy Surgeon General, USA
Robert H. Ferrell
Indiana University
James O'Neill
Deputy Archivist of the United States
Cyrus H. Fraker
The Adjutant General Center
Benjamin Quarles
Morgan State College
William H. Goetzmann
University of Texas
Brig. Gen. Alfred L. Sanderson
Army War College
Col. Thomas E. Griess
U.S. Military Academy
Russell F. Weigley
Temple University
Foreword
The integration of the armed forces was a momentous event in our
military and national history; it represented a milestone in the
development of the armed forces and the fulfillment of the democratic
ideal. The existence of integrated rather than segregated armed forces
is an important factor in our military establishment today. The
experiences in World War II and the postwar pressures generated by the
civil rights movement compelled all the services--Army, Navy, Air
Force, and Marine Corps--to reexamine their traditional practices of
segregation. While there were differences in the ways that the
services moved toward integration, all were subject to the same
demands, fears, and prejudices and had the same need to use their
resources in a more rational and economical way. All of them reached
the same conclusion: traditional attitudes toward minorities must give
way to democratic concepts of civil rights.
If the integration of the armed services now seems to have been
inevitable in a democratic society, it nevertheless faced opposition
that had to be overcome and problems that had to be solved through the
combined efforts of political and civil rights leaders and civil and
military officials. In many ways the military services were at the
cutting edge in the struggle for racial equality. This volume sets
forth the successive measures they and the Office of the Secretary of
Defense took to meet the challenges of a new era in a critically
important area of human relationships, during a period of transition
that saw the advance of blacks in the social and economic order as
well as in the military. It is fitting that this story should be told
in the first volume of a new Defense Studies Series.
The Defense Historical Studies Program was authorized by the then
Deputy Secretary of Defense, Cyrus Vance, in April 1965. It is
conducted under the auspices of the Defense Historical Studies Group,
an _ad hoc_ body chaired by the Historian of the Office of the
Secretary of Defense and consisting of the senior officials in the
historical offices of the services and of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Volumes produced under its sponsorship will be interservice histories,
covering matters of mutual interest to the Army, Navy, Air Force,
Marine Corps, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The preparation of each
volume is entrusted to one of the service historical sections, in this
case the Army's Center of Military History. Although the book was
written by an Army historian, he was generously given access to the
pertinent records of the other services and the Office of the
Secretary of Defense, and this initial volume in the Defense Studies
Series covers the experiences of all components of the Department of
Defense in achieving integration.
Washington, D.C. JAMES L. COLLINS, Jr.
14 March 1980 Brigadier General, USA
Chief of Military History
The Author
Morris J. MacGregor, Jr., received the A.B. and M.A. degrees in
history from the Catholic University of America. He continued his
graduate studies at the Johns Hopkins University and the University of
Paris on a Fulbright grant. Before joining the staff of the U.S. Army
Center of Military History in 1968 he served for ten years in the
Historical Division of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He has written
several studies for military publications including "Armed Forces
Integration--Forced or Free?" in _The Military and Society:
Proceedings of the Fifth Military Symposium of the U.S. Air Force
Academy_. He is the coeditor with Bernard C. Nalty of the
thirteen-volume _Blacks in the United States Armed Forces: Basic
Documents_ and with Ronald Spector of _Voices of History:
Interpretations in American Military History_. He is currently working
on a sequel to _Integration of the Armed Forces_ which will also
appear in the Defense Studies Series.
Preface (p. ix)
This book describes the fall of the legal, administrative, and social
barriers to the black American's full participation in the military
service of his country. It follows the changing status of the black
serviceman from the eve of World War II, when he was excluded from
many military activities and rigidly segregated in the rest, to that
period a quarter of a century later when the Department of Defense
extended its protection of his rights and privileges even to the
civilian community. To round out the story of open housing for members
of the military, I briefly overstep the closing date given in the
title.
The work is essentially an administrative history that attempts to
measure the influence of several forces, most notably the civil rights
movement, the tradition of segregated service, and the changing
concept of military efficiency, on the development of racial policies
in the armed forces. It is not a history of all minorities in the
services. Nor is it an account of how the black American responded to
discrimination. A study of racial attitudes, both black and white, in
the military services would be a valuable addition to human knowledge,
but practically impossible of accomplishment in the absence of
sufficient autobiographical accounts, oral history interviews, and
detailed sociological measurements. How did the serviceman view his
condition, how did he convey his desire for redress, and what was his
reaction to social change? Even now the answers to these questions are
blurred by time and distorted by emotions engendered by the civil
rights revolution. Few citizens, black or white, who witnessed it can
claim immunity to the influence of that paramount social phenomenon of
our times.
At times I do generalize on the attitudes of both black and white
servicemen and the black and white communities at large as well. But I
have permitted myself to do so only when these attitudes were clearly
pertinent to changes in the services' racial policies and only when
the written record supported, or at least did not contradict, the
memory of those participants who had been interviewed. In any case
this study is largely history written from the top down and is based
primarily on the written records left by the administrations of five
presidents and by civil rights leaders, service officials, and the
press.
Many of the attitudes and expressions voiced by the participants in
the story are now out of fashion. The reader must be constantly on
guard against viewing the beliefs and statements of many civilian and
military officials out of context of the times in which they were
expressed. Neither bigotry nor stupidity was the monopoly of some of
the people quoted; their statements are important for what they tell
us about certain attitudes of our society rather than for what they
reveal about any individual. If the methods or attitudes of some (p. x)
of the black spokesmen appear excessively tame to those who have
lived through the 1960's, they too should be gauged in the context of
the times. If their statements and actions shunned what now seems the
more desirable, albeit radical, course, it should be given them that
the style they adopted appeared in those days to be the most promising
for racial progress.
The words _black_ and _Negro_ have been used interchangeably in the
book, with Negro generally as a noun and black as an adjective. Aware
of differing preferences in the black community for usage of these
words, the author was interested in comments from early readers of the
manuscript. Some of the participants in the story strongly objected to
one word or the other. "Do me one favor in return for my help," Lt.
Comdr. Dennis D. Nelson said, "never call me a black." Rear Adm.
Gerald E. Thomas, on the other hand, suggested that the use of the
term Negro might repel readers with much to learn about their recent
past. Still others thought that the historian should respect the usage
of the various periods covered in the story, a solution that would
have left the volume with the term _colored_ for most of the earlier
chapters and Negro for much of the rest. With rare exception, the term
black does not appear in twentieth century military records before the
late 1960's. Fashions in words change, and it is only for the time
being perhaps that black and Negro symbolize different attitudes. The
author has used the words as synonyms and trusts that the reader will
accept them as such. Professor John Hope Franklin, Mrs. Sara Jackson
of the National Archives, and the historians and officials that
constituted the review panel went along with this approach.
The second question of usage concerns the words _integration_ and
_desegregation_. In recent years many historians have come to
distinguish between these like-sounding words. Desegregation they see
as a direct action against segregation; that is, it signifies the act
of removing legal barriers to the equal treatment of black citizens as
guaranteed by the Constitution. The movement toward desegregation,
breaking down the nation's Jim Crow system, became increasingly
popular in the decade after World War II. Integration, on the other
hand, Professor Oscar Handlin maintains, implies several things not
yet necessarily accepted in all areas of American society. In one
sense it refers to the "leveling of all barriers to association other
than those based on ability, taste, and personal preference";[1] in
other words, providing equal opportunity. But in another sense
integration calls for the random distribution of a minority throughout
society. Here, according to Handlin, the emphasis is on racial balance
in areas of occupation, education, residency, and the like.
[Footnote 1: Oscar Handlin, "The Goals of Integration,"
_Daedalus 95_ (Winter 1966): 270.]
From the beginning the military establishment rightly understood that
the breakup of the all-black unit would in a closed society
necessarily mean more than mere desegregation. It constantly used the
terms integration and equal treatment and opportunity to describe its
racial goals. Rarely, if ever, does one find the word desegregation in
military files that include much correspondence from the various (p. xi)
civil rights organizations. That the military made the right choice,
this study seems to demonstrate, for the racial goals of the Defense
Department, as they slowly took form over a quarter of a century,
fulfilled both of Professor Handlin's definitions of integration.
The mid-1960's saw the end of a long and important era in the racial
history of the armed forces. Although the services continued to
encounter racial problems, these problems differed radically in
several essentials from those of the integration period considered in
this volume. Yet there is a continuity to the story of race relations,
and one can hope that the story of how an earlier generation struggled
so that black men and women might serve their country in freedom
inspires those in the services who continue to fight discrimination.
This study benefited greatly from the assistance of a large number of
persons during its long years of preparation. Stetson Conn, chief
historian of the Army, proposed the book as an interservice project.
His successor, Maurice Matloff, forced to deal with the complexities
of an interservice project, successfully guided the manuscript through
to publication. The work was carried out under the general supervision
of Robert R. Smith, chief of the General History Branch. He and Robert
W. Coakley, deputy chief historian of the Army, were the primary
reviewers of the manuscript, and its final form owes much to their
advice and attention. The author also profited greatly from the advice
of the official review panel, which, under the chairmanship of Alfred
Goldberg, historian, Office of the Secretary of Defense, included
Martin Blumenson; General J. Lawton Collins (USA Ret.); Lt. Gen.
Benjamin O. Davis, Jr. (USAF Ret.); Roy K. Davenport, former Deputy
Assistant Secretary of the Army; Stanley L. Falk, chief historian of
the Air Force; Vice Adm. E. B. Hooper, Chief of Naval History;
Professor Benjamin Quarles; Paul J. Scheips, historian, Center of
Military History; Henry I. Shaw, chief historian of the U.S. Marine
Corps; Loretto C. Stevens, senior editor of the Center of Military
History; Robert J. Watson, chief historian of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff; and Adam Yarmolinsky, former assistant to the Secretary of
Defense.
Many of the participants in this story generously shared their
knowledge with me and kindly reviewed my efforts. My footnotes
acknowledge my debt to them. Nevertheless, two are singled out here
for special mention. James C. Evans, former counselor to the Secretary
of Defense for racial affairs, has been an endless source of
information on race relations in the military. If I sometimes
disagreed with his interpretations and assessments, I never doubted
his total dedication to the cause of the black serviceman. I owe a
similar debt to Lt. Comdr. Dennis D. Nelson (USN Ret.) for sharing his
intimate understanding of race relations in the Navy. A resourceful
man with a sure social touch, he must have been one hell of a sailor.
I want to note the special contribution of several historians. Martin
Blumenson was first assigned to this project, and before leaving the
Center of Military History he assembled research material that proved
most helpful. My former colleague John Bernard Corr prepared a study
on the National Guard upon which my account of the guard is based.
In addition, he patiently reviewed many pages of the draft (p. xii)
manuscript. His keen insights and sensitive understanding were
invaluable to me. Professors Jack D. Foner and Marie Carolyn
Klinkhammer provided particularly helpful suggestions in conjunction
with their reviews of the manuscript. Samuel B. Warner, who before his
untimely death was a historian in the Joint Chiefs of Staff as well as
a colleague of Lee Nichols on some of that reporter's civil rights
investigations, also contributed generously of his talents and lent
his support in the early days of my work. Finally, I am grateful for
the advice of my colleague Ronald H. Spector at several key points in
the preparation of this history.
I have received much help from archivists and librarians, especially
the resourceful William H. Cunliffe and Lois Aldridge (now retired) of
the National Archives and Dean C. Allard of the Naval Historical
Center. Although the fruits of their scholarship appear often in my
footnotes, three fellow researchers in the field deserve special
mention: Maj. Alan M. Osur and Lt. Col. Alan L. Gropman of the U.S.
Air Force and Ralph W. Donnelly, former member of the U.S. Marine
Corps Historical Center. I have benefited from our exchange of ideas
and have had the advantage of their reviews of the manuscript.
I am especially grateful for the generous assistance of my editors,
Loretto C. Stevens and Barbara H. Gilbert. They have been both friends
and teachers. In the same vein, I wish to thank John Elsberg for his
editorial counsel. I also appreciate the help given by William G. Bell
in the selection of the illustrations, including the loan of two rare
items from his personal collection, and Arthur S. Hardyman for
preparing the pictures for publication. I would like to thank Mary Lee
Treadway and Wyvetra B. Yeldell for preparing the manuscript for panel
review and Terrence J. Gough for his helpful pre-publication review.
Finally, while no friend or relative was spared in the long years I
worked on this book, three colleagues especially bore with me through
days of doubts and frustrations and shared my small triumphs: Alfred
M. Beck, Ernest F. Fisher, Jr., and Paul J. Scheips. I also want
particularly to thank Col. James W. Dunn. I only hope that some of
their good sense and sunny optimism show through these pages.
Washington, D.C. MORRIS J. MACGREGOR, Jr.
14 March 1980
Contents (p. xiii)
_Chapter_ _Page_
1. INTRODUCTION............................................. 3
_The Armed forces Before 1940_............................ 3
_Civil Rights and the Law in 1940_........................ 8
_To Segregate Is To Discriminate_........................ 13
2. WORLD WAR II: THE ARMY.................................. 17
_A War Policy: Reaffirming Segregation_.................. 17
_Segregation and Efficiency_............................. 23
_The Need for Change_.................................... 34
_Internal Reform: Amending Racial Practices_............. 39
_Two Exceptions_......................................... 46
3. WORLD WAR II: THE NAVY.................................. 58
_Development of a Wartime Policy_........................ 59
_A Segregated Navy_...................................... 67
_Progressive Experiments_................................ 75
_Forrestal Takes the Helm_............................... 84
4. WORLD WAR II: THE MARINE CORPS AND THE COAST GUARD...... 99
_The First Black Marines_............................... 100
_New Roles for Black Coast Guardsmen_................... 112
5. A POSTWAR SEARCH....................................... 123
_Black Demands_......................................... 123
_The Army's Grand Review_............................... 130
_The Navy's Informal Inspection_........................ 143
6. NEW DIRECTIONS......................................... 152
_The Gillem Board Report_............................... 153
_Integration of the General Service_.................... 166
_The Marine Corps_...................................... 170
7. A PROBLEM OF QUOTAS.................................... 176
_The Quota in Practice_................................. 182
_Broader Opportunities_................................. 189
_Assignments_........................................... 194
_A New Approach_........................................ 198
_The Quota System: An Assessment_....................... 202
8. SEGREGATION'S CONSEQUENCES............................. 206
_Discipline and Morale Among Black Troops_.............. 206
_Improving the Status of the Segregated Soldier_........ 215
_Discrimination and the Postwar Army_................... 223 (p. xiv)
_Segregation in Theory and Practice_.................... 226
_Segregation: An Assessment_............................ 231
9. THE POSTWAR NAVY....................................... 234
_The Steward's Branch_.................................. 238
_Black Officers_........................................ 243
_Public Image and the Problem of Numbers_............... 248
10. THE POSTWAR MARINE CORPS.............................. 253
_Racial Quotas and Assignments_......................... 253
_Recruitment_........................................... 257
_Segregation and Efficiency_............................ 261
_Toward Integration_.................................... 266
11. THE POSTWAR AIR FORCE................................. 270
_Segregation and Efficiency_............................ 271
_Impulse for Change_.................................... 280
12. THE PRESIDENT INTERVENES.............................. 291
_The Truman Administration and Civil Rights_............ 292
_Civil Rights and the Department of Defense_............ 297
_Executive Order 9981_.................................. 309
13. SERVICE INTERESTS VERSUS PRESIDENTIAL INTENT.......... 315
_Public Reaction to Executive Order 9981_............... 315
_The Army: Segregation on the Defensive_................ 318
_A Different Approach_.................................. 326
_The Navy: Business as Usual_........................... 331
_Adjustments in the Marine Corps_....................... 334
_The Air Force Plans for Limited Integration_........... 338
14. THE FAHY COMMITTEE VERSUS THE DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE... 343
_The Committee's Recommendations_....................... 348
_A Summer of Discontent_................................ 362
_Assignments_........................................... 368
_Quotas_................................................ 371
_An Assessment_......................................... 375
15. THE ROLE OF THE SECRETARY OF DEFENSE, 1949-1951....... 379
_Overseas Restrictions_................................. 385
_Congressional Concerns_................................ 389
16. INTEGRATION IN THE AIR FORCE AND THE NAVY............. 397
_The Air Force, 1949-1951_.............................. 397
_The Navy and Executive Order 9981_..................... 412
17. THE ARMY INTEGRATES................................... 428
_Race and Efficiency: 1950_............................. 428
_Training_.............................................. 434
_Performance of Segregated Units_....................... 436
_Final Arguments_....................................... 440
_Integration of the Eighth Army_........................ 442
_Integration of the European and Continental Commands_.. 448 (p. xv)
18. INTEGRATION OF THE MARINE CORPS....................... 460
_Impetus for Change_.................................... 461
_Assignments_........................................... 466
19. A NEW ERA BEGINS...................................... 473
_The Civil Rights Revolution_........................... 474
_Limitations on Executive Order 9981_................... 479
_Integration of Navy Shipyards_......................... 483
_Dependent Children and Integrated Schools_............. 487
20. LIMITED RESPONSE TO DISCRIMINATION.................... 501
_The Kennedy Administration and Civil Rights_........... 504
_The Department of Defense, 1961-1963_.................. 510
_Discrimination Off the Military Reservation_........... 511
_Reserves and Regulars: A Comparison_................... 517
21. EQUAL TREATMENT AND OPPORTUNITY REDEFINED............. 530
_The Secretary Makes a Decision_........................ 530
_The Gesell Committee_.................................. 535
_Reaction to a New Commitment_.......................... 545
_The Gesell Committee: Final Report_.................... 552
22. EQUAL OPPORTUNITY IN THE MILITARY COMMUNITY........... 556
_Creating a Civil Rights Apparatus_..................... 558
_Fighting Discrimination Within the Services_........... 566
23. FROM VOLUNTARY COMPLIANCE TO SANCTIONS................ 581
_Development of Voluntary Action Programs_.............. 581
_Civil Rights, 1964-1966_............................... 586
_The Civil Rights Act and Voluntary Compliance_......... 590
_The Limits of Voluntary Compliance_.................... 593
24. CONCLUSION............................................ 609
_Why the Services Integrated_........................... 609
_How the Services Integrated, 1946-1954_................ 614
_Equal Treatment and Opportunity_....................... 619
NOTE ON SOURCES........................................... 625
INDEX..................................................... 635
Illustrations
Crewmen of the USS _Miami_ During the Civil War............. 4
Buffalo Soldiers............................................ 5
Integration in the Army of 1888............................. 9
Gunner's Gang on the USS _Maine_........................... 10 (p. xvi)
General John J. (Black Jack) Pershing Inspects Troops...... 11
Heroes of the 369th Infantry, February 1919................ 13
Judge William H. Hastie.................................... 20
General George C. Marshall and Secretary of War Henry
L. Stimson............................................... 21
Engineer Construction Troops in Liberia, July 1942......... 26
Labor Battalion Troops in the Aleutian Islands, May 1943... 27
Sergeant Addressing the Line............................... 28
Pilots of the 332d Fighter Group........................... 29
Service Club, Fort Huachuca................................ 35
93d Division Troops in Bougainville, April 1944............ 44
Gun Crew of Battery B, 598th Field Artillery,
September 1944........................................... 47
Tankers of the 761st Medium Tank Battalion Prepare for
Action................................................... 48
WAAC Replacements.......................................... 50
Volunteers for Combat in Training.......................... 53
Road Repairmen............................................. 56
Mess Attendant, First Class, Dorie Miller Addressing
Recruits at Camp Smalls.................................. 60
Admiral Ernest J. King and Secretary of the Navy Frank
Knox..................................................... 61
Crew Members of USS _Argonaut_, Pearl Harbor, 1942......... 62
Messmen Volunteer as Gunners, July 1942.................... 65
Electrician Mates String Power Lines....................... 68
Laborers at Naval Ammunition Depot......................... 73
Seabees in the South Pacific............................... 74
Lt. Comdr. Christopher S. Sargent.......................... 76
USS _Mason_................................................ 78
First Black Officers in the Navy........................... 81
Lt. (jg.) Harriet Ida Pickens and Ens. Frances Wills....... 88
Sailors in the General Service............................. 89
Security Watch in the Marianas............................. 90
Specialists Repair Aircraft................................ 93
The 22d Special Construction Battalion Celebrates V-J Day.. 97
Marines of the 51st Defense Battalion, Montford
Point, 1942............................................. 102
Shore Party in Training, Camp Lejeune, 1942............... 105
D-day on Peleliu.......................................... 106
Medical Attendants at Rest, Peleliu, October 1944......... 107
Gun Crew of the 52d Defense Battalion..................... 110
Crewmen of USCG Lifeboat Station, Pea Island, North
Carolina................................................ 112
Coast Guard Recruits at Manhattan Beach Training
Station, New York....................................... 113
Stewards at Battle Station on the Cutter _Campbell_....... 117
Shore Leave in Scotland................................... 118
Lt. Comdr. Carlton Skinner and Crew of the USS
_Sea Cloud_............................................. 120
Ens. Joseph J. Jenkins and Lt. (jg.) Clarence Samuels..... 121
President Harry S. Truman Addressing the NAACP
Convention.............................................. 127
Assistant Secretary of War John J. McCloy................. 130
Civilian Aide to the Secretary of War Truman K. Gibson.... 131 (p. xvii)
Company I, 370th Infantry, 92d Division, Advances
Through Cascina, Italy.................................. 134
92d Division Engineers Prepare a Ford for Arno River
Traffic................................................. 136
Lester Granger Interviewing Sailors....................... 146
Granger With Crewmen of a Naval Yard Craft................ 147
Lt. Gen. Alvan C. Gillem, U.S. Army....................... 154
Secretary of War Robert P. Patterson...................... 162
Admiral Louis E. Denfeld, U.S. Navy....................... 167
General Gerald C. Thomas, U.S. Marine Corps............... 172
Lt. Gen. Willard S. Paul.................................. 178
Adviser to the Secretary of War Marcus Ray................ 184
Lt. Gen. Robert L. Eichelberger Inspects 24th Infantry
Troops.................................................. 191
Army Specialists Report for Airborne Training............. 200
Bridge Players, Seaview Service Club, Tokyo,
Japan, 1948............................................. 203
24th Infantry Band, Gifu, Japan, 1947..................... 214
Lt. Gen. Clarence R. Huebner Inspects the 529th
Military Police Company................................. 216
Reporting to Kitzingen.................................... 218
Inspection by the Chief of Staff.......................... 228
Brig. Gen. Benjamin O. Davis, Sr.......................... 230
Shore Leave in Korea...................................... 236
Mess Attendants, USS _Bushnell_, 1918..................... 239
Mess Attendants, USS _Wisconsin_, 1953.................... 240
Lt. Comdr. Dennis D. Nelson II............................ 244
Naval Unit Passes in Review, Naval Advanced Base,
Bremerhaven, Germany.................................... 249
Submariner................................................ 251
Marine Artillery Team..................................... 254
2d Lt. and Mrs. Frederick C. Branch....................... 267
Training Exercises........................................ 269
Damage Inspection......................................... 272
Col. Noel F. Parrish...................................... 274
Officers' Softball Team................................... 276
Checking Ammunition....................................... 278
Squadron F, 318th AAF Battalion, in Review................ 281
Col. Benjamin O. Davis, Jr., Commander, 477th Composite
Group, 1945............................................. 285
Lt. Gen. Idwal H. Edwards................................. 287
Col. Jack F. Marr......................................... 288
Walter F. White........................................... 295
Truman's Civil Rights Campaign............................ 297
A. Philip Randolph........................................ 300
National Defense Conference on Negro Affairs, 26 April
1948.................................................... 306
MP's Hitch a Ride......................................... 320
Secretary of the Army Kenneth C. Royall Reviews
Military Police Battalion............................... 323
Spring Formal Dance, Fort George G. Meade,
Maryland, 1952.......................................... 327
Secretary of Defense James V. Forrestal................... 330
General Clifton B. Cates.................................. 335 (p. xviii)
1st Marine Division Drill Team on Exhibition.............. 337
Secretary of the Air Force W. Stuart Symington............ 340
Secretary of Defense Louis C. Johnson..................... 347
Fahy Committee With President Truman and Armed Services
Secretaries............................................. 349
E. W. Kenworthy........................................... 353
Charles Fahy.............................................. 354
Roy K. Davenport.......................................... 355
Press Notice.............................................. 361
Secretary of the Army Gordon Gray......................... 370
Chief of Staff of the Army J. Lawton Collins.............. 371
"No Longer a Dream"....................................... 377
Navy Corpsman in Korea.................................... 382
25th Division Troops in Japan............................. 388
Assistant Secretary of Defense Anna M. Rosenberg.......... 391
Assistant Secretary of the Air Force Eugene M. Zuckert.... 402
Music Makers.............................................. 408
Maintenance Crew, 462d Strategic Fighter Squadron......... 410
Jet Mechanics............................................. 411
Christmas in Korea, 1950.................................. 417
Rearming at Sea........................................... 418
Broadening Skills......................................... 419
Integrated Stewards Class Graduates, Great Lakes, 1953.... 423
WAVE Recruits, Naval Training Center, Bainbridge,
Maryland, 1953.......................................... 425
Rear Adm. Samuel L. Gravely, Jr........................... 426
Moving Up................................................. 431
Men of Battery A, 159th Field Artillery Battalion......... 433
Survivors of an Intelligence and Reconnaissance
Platoon, 24th Infantry.................................. 438
General Matthew B. Ridgway, Far East Commander............ 444
Machine Gunners of Company L, 14th Infantry, Hill 931,
Korea................................................... 446
Color Guard, 160th Infantry, Korea, 1952.................. 448
Visit With the Commander.................................. 454
Brothers Under the Skin................................... 455
Marines on the Kansas Line, Korea......................... 465
Marine Reinforcements..................................... 466
Training Exercises on Iwo Jima, March 1954................ 469
Marines From Camp Lejeune................................. 470
Lt. Col. Frank E. Petersen, Jr............................ 471
Sergeant Major Edgar R. Huff.............................. 472
Clarence Mitchell......................................... 475
Congressman Adam Clayton Powell........................... 484
Secretary of the Navy Robert B. Anderson.................. 486
Reading Class in the Military Dependents School, Yokohama. 495
Civil Rights Leaders at the White House................... 503
President John F. Kennedy and President Jorge Allessandri. 509 (p. xix)
Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara................... 516
Adam Yarmolinsky.......................................... 532
James C. Evans............................................ 533
The Gesell Committee Meets With the President............. 541
Alfred B. Fitt............................................ 547
Arriving in Vietnam....................................... 560
Digging In................................................ 562
Listening to the Squad Leader............................. 567
Supplying the Seventh Fleet............................... 576
USAF Ground Crew, Tan Son Nhut Air Base, Vietnam.......... 580
Fighter Pilots on the Line................................ 583
Medical Examination....................................... 589
Auto Pilot Shop........................................... 594
Submarine Tender Duty..................................... 600
First Aid................................................. 606
Vietnam Patrol............................................ 611
Marine Engineers in Vietnam............................... 613
Loading a Rocket Launcher................................. 615
American Sailors Help Evacuate a Vietnamese Child......... 618
Booby Trap Victim from Company B, 47th Infantry........... 619
Camaraderie............................................... 622
All illustrations are from the files of the Department of Defense and
the National Archives and Records Service with the exception of the
pictures on pages 6 and 10, courtesy of William G. Bell; on page 20,
by Fabian Bachrach, courtesy of Judge William H. Hastie; on page 120,
courtesy of Carlton Skinner; on page 297, courtesy of the Washington
_Star_, on page 361, courtesy of the _Afro-American_ Newspapers; on
page 377, courtesy of the Sengstacke Newspapers; and on page 475,
courtesy of the Washington Bureau of the National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People.
Tables
_No._
1. Classification of All Men Tested From March 1941 Through
December 1942........................................... 25
2. AGCT Percentages in Selected World War II Divisions.... 138
3. Percentage of Black Enlisted Men and Women............. 395
4. Disposition of Black Personnel at Eight Air Force
Bases, 1949............................................ 403
5. Racial Composition of Air Force Units.................. 404
6. Black Strength in the Air Force........................ 405
7. Racial Composition of the Training Command,
December 1949.......................................... 406
8. Black Manpower, U.S. Navy.............................. 416 (p. xx)
9. Worldwide Distribution of Enlisted Personnel by Race,
October 1952........................................... 458
10. Distribution of Black Enlisted Personnel by Branch
and Rank, 31 October 1952............................. 458
11. Black Marines, 1949-1955.............................. 463
12. Defense Installations With Segregated Public Schools.. 491
13. Black Strength in the Armed Forces for Selected Years. 522
14. Estimated Percentage Distribution of Draft-Age
Males in U.S. Population by AFQT Groups............... 523
15. Rate of Men Disqualified for Service in 1962.......... 523
16. Rejection Rates for Failure To Pass Armed Forces
Mental Test, 1962..................................... 524
17. Nonwhite Inductions and First Enlistments, Fiscal
Years 1953-1962....................................... 525
18. Distribution of Enlisted Personnel in Each Major
Occupation, 1956...................................... 525
19. Occupational Group Distribution by Race, All DOD,
1962.................................................. 525
20. Occupational Group Distribution of Enlisted
Personnel by Length of Service, and Race.............. 526
21. Percentage Distribution of Navy Enlisted Personnel
by Race, AFQT Groups and Occupational Areas, and
Length of Service, 1962............................... 526
22. Percentage Distribution of Blacks and Whites by Pay
Grade, All DOD, 1962.................................. 527
23. Percentage Distribution of Navy Enlisted Personnel
by Race, AFQT Groups, Pay Grade, and Length of
Service, 1962......................................... 528
24. Black Percentages, 1962-1968.......................... 568
25. Rates for First Reenlistments, 1964-1967.............. 569
26. Black Attendance at the Military Academies, July 1968. 569
27. Army and Air Force Commissions Granted at
Predominately Black Schools........................... 570
28. Percentage of Negroes in Certain Military Ranks,
1964-1966............................................. 571
29. Distribution of Servicemen in Occupational Groups
by Race, 1967......................................... 573
INTEGRATION OF THE ARMED FORCES (p. 001)
1940-1965
CHAPTER 1 (p. 003)
Introduction
In the quarter century that followed American entry into World War II,
the nation's armed forces moved from the reluctant inclusion of a few
segregated Negroes to their routine acceptance in a racially
integrated military establishment. Nor was this change confined to
military installations. By the time it was over, the armed forces had
redefined their traditional obligation for the welfare of their
members to include a promise of equal treatment for black servicemen
wherever they might be. In the name of equality of treatment and
opportunity, the Department of Defense began to challenge racial
injustices deeply rooted in American society.
For all its sweeping implications, equality in the armed forces
obviously had its pragmatic aspects. In one sense it was a practical
answer to pressing political problems that had plagued several
national administrations. In another, it was the services' expression
of those liberalizing tendencies that were permeating American society
during the era of civil rights activism. But to a considerable extent
the policy of racial equality that evolved in this quarter century was
also a response to the need for military efficiency. So easy did it
become to demonstrate the connection between inefficiency and
discrimination that, even when other reasons existed, military
efficiency was the one most often evoked by defense officials to
justify a change in racial policy.
_The Armed Forces Before 1940_
Progress toward equal treatment and opportunity in the armed forces
was an uneven process, the result of sporadic and sometimes
conflicting pressures derived from such constants in American society
as prejudice and idealism and spurred by a chronic shortage of
military manpower. In his pioneering study of race relations, Gunnar
Myrdal observes that ideals have always played a dominant role in the
social dynamics of America.[1-1] By extension, the ideals that helped
involve the nation in many of its wars also helped produce important
changes in the treatment of Negroes by the armed forces. The
democratic spirit embodied in the Declaration of Independence, for
example, opened the Continental Army to many Negroes, holding out to
them the promise of eventual freedom.[1-2]
[Footnote 1-1: Gunnar Myrdal, _The American Dilemma:
The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy_, rev. ed.
(New York: Harper Row, 1962), p. lxi.]
[Footnote 1-2: Benjamin Quarles, _The Negro in the
American Revolution_ (Chapel Hill: University of
North Carolina Press, 1961), pp. 182-85. The
following brief summary of the Negro in the
pre-World War II Army is based in part on the
Quarles book and Roland C. McConnell, _Negro Troops
of Antebellum Louisiana: A History of the
Battalion of Free Men of Color_ (Baton Rouge:
Louisiana State University Press, 1968); Dudley T.
Cornish, _Sable Arm: Negro Troops in the Union
Army, 1861-1865_ (New York: Norton, 1966); William
H. Leckie, _The Buffalo Soldiers: A Narrative of
the Negro Cavalry in the West_ (Norman: University
of Oklahoma Press, 1969); William Bruce White, "The
Military and the Melting Pot: The American Army and
Minority Groups, 1865-1924" (Ph.D. dissertation,
University of Wisconsin, 1968); Marvin E. Fletcher,
_The Black Soldier and Officer in the United States
Army, 1891-1917_ (Columbia: University of Missouri
Press, 1974); Arthur E. Barbeau and Florette Henri,
_Unknown Soldiers: Black American Troops in World
War I_ (Philadelphia: Temple University Press,
1974). For a general survey of black soldiers in
America's wars, see Jack Foner, _Blacks and the
Military in American History: A New Perspective_
(New York: Praeger, 1974).]
Yet the fact that the British themselves were taking large numbers (p. 004)
of Negroes into their ranks proved more important than revolutionary
idealism in creating a place for Negroes in the American forces. Above
all, the participation of both slaves and freedmen in the Continental
Army and the Navy was a pragmatic response to a pressing need for
fighting men and laborers. Despite the fear of slave insurrection
shared by many colonists, some 5,000 Negroes, the majority from New
England, served with the American forces in the Revolution, often in
integrated units, some as artillerymen and musicians, the majority as
infantrymen or as unarmed pioneers detailed to repair roads and
bridges.
Again, General Jackson's need for manpower at New Orleans explains the
presence of the Louisiana Free Men of Color in the last great battle
of the War of 1812. In the Civil War the practical needs of the Union
Army overcame the Lincoln administration's fear of alienating the
border states. When the call for volunteers failed to produce the
necessary men, Negroes were recruited, generally as laborers at first
but later for combat. In all, 186,000 Negroes served in the Union
Army. In addition to those in the sixteen segregated combat regiments
and the labor units, thousands also served unofficially as laborers,
teamsters, and cooks. Some 30,000 Negroes served in the Navy, about 25
percent of its total Civil War strength.
The influence of the idealism fostered by the abolitionist crusade
should not be overlooked. It made itself felt during the early months
of the war in the demands of Radical Republicans and some Union
generals for black enrollment, and it brought about the postwar
establishment of black units in the Regular Army. In 1866 Congress
authorized the creation of permanent, all-black units, which in 1869
were designated the 9th and 10th Cavalry and the 24th and 25th
Infantry.
[Illustration: CREWMEN OF THE USS MIAMI DURING THE CIVIL WAR]
Military needs and idealistic impulses were not enough to guarantee
uninterrupted racial progress; in fact, the status of black servicemen
tended to reflect the changing patterns in American race relations.
During most of the nineteenth century, for example, Negroes served in
an integrated U.S. Navy, in the latter half of the century averaging
between 20 and 30 percent of the enlisted strength.[1-3] But the
employment of Negroes in the Navy was abruptly curtailed after
1900. Paralleling the rise of Jim Crow and legalized segregation (p. 005)
in much of America was the cutback in the number of black sailors, who
by 1909 were mostly in the galley and the engine room. In contrast to
their high percentage of the ranks in the Civil War and Spanish-American
War, only 6,750 black sailors, including twenty-four women reservists
(yeomanettes), served in World War I; they constituted 1.2 percent of
the Navy's total enlistment.[1-4] Their service was limited chiefly to
mess duty and coal passing, the latter becoming increasingly rare as
the fleet changed from coal to oil.
[Footnote 1-3: Estimates vary; exact racial
statistics concerning the nineteenth century Navy
are difficult to locate. See Enlistment of Men of
Colored Race, 23 Jan 42, a note appended to
Hearings Before the General Board of the Navy,
1942, Operational Archives, Department of the Navy
(hereafter OpNavArchives). The following brief
summary of the Negro in the pre-World War II Navy
is based in part on Foner's _Blacks and the
Military in American History_ as well as Harold D.
Langley, "The Negro in the Navy and Merchant
Service, 1798-1860," _Journal of Negro History_ 52
(October 1967):273-86; Langley's _Social Reform in
the United States Navy 1798-1862_, (Urbana:
University of Illinois Press, 1967) Peter Karsten,
_The Naval Aristocracy: The Golden Age of Annapolis
and the Emergence of Modern American Navalism_ (New
York: The Free Press, 1972); Frederick S. Harrod,
_Manning the New Navy: The Development of a Modern
Naval Enlisted Force, 1899-1940_ (Westport:
Greenwood Press, 1978).]
[Footnote 1-4: Ltr, Rear Adm C. W. Nimitz, Actg
Chief, Bureau of Navigation, to Rep. Hamilton Fish,
17 Jun 37, A9-10, General Records of the Department
of the Navy (hereafter GenRecsNav).]
[Illustration: BUFFALO SOLDIERS. (_Frederick Remington's 1888
sketch._)]
When postwar enlistment was resumed in 1923, the Navy recruited
Filipino stewards instead of Negroes, although a decade later it
reopened the branch to black enlistment. Negroes quickly took
advantage of this limited opportunity, their numbers rising from 441
in 1932 to 4,007 in June 1940, when they constituted 2.3 percent of
the Navy's 170,000 total.[1-5] Curiously enough, because black (p. 006)
reenlistment in combat or technical specialties had never been barred,
a few black gunner's mates, torpedomen, machinist mates, and the like
continued to serve in the 1930's.
[Footnote 1-5: Memo, H. A. Badt, Bureau of
Navigation, for Officer in Charge, Public
Relations, 24 Jul 40, sub: Negroes in U.S. Navy,
Nav-641, Records of the Bureau of Naval Personnel
(hereafter BuPersRecs).]
Although the Army's racial policy differed from the Navy's, the
resulting limited, separate service for Negroes proved similar. The
laws of 1866 and 1869 that guaranteed the existence of four black
Regular Army regiments also institutionalized segregation, granting
federal recognition to a system racially separate and theoretically
equal in treatment and opportunity a generation before the Supreme
Court sanctioned such a distinction in _Plessy_ v. _Ferguson_.[1-6] So
important to many in the black community was this guaranteed existence
of the four regiments that had served with distinction against the
frontier Indians that few complained about segregation. In fact, as
historian Jack Foner has pointed out, black leaders sometimes
interpreted demands for integration as attempts to eliminate black
soldiers altogether.[1-7]
[Footnote 1-6: 163 U.S. 537 (1896). In this 1896 case
concerning segregated seating on a Louisiana
railroad, the Supreme Court ruled that so long as
equality of accommodation existed, segregation
could not in itself be considered discriminatory
and therefore did not violate the equal rights
provision of the Fourteenth Amendment. This
"separate but equal" doctrine would prevail in
American law for more than half a century.]
[Footnote 1-7: Foner, _Blacks and the Military in
American History_, p. 66.]
The Spanish-American War marked a break with the post-Civil War
tradition of limited recruitment. Besides the 3,339 black regulars,
approximately 10,000 black volunteers served in the Army during (p. 007)
the conflict. World War I was another exception, for Negroes made up
nearly 11 percent of the Army's total strength, some 404,000 officers
and men.[1-8] The acceptance of Negroes during wartime stemmed from
the Army's pressing need for additional manpower. Yet it was no means
certain in the early months of World War I that this need for men
would prevail over the reluctance of many leaders to arm large groups
of Negroes. Still remembered were the 1906 Brownsville affair, in
which men of the 25th Infantry had fired on Texan civilians, and the
August 1917 riot involving members of the 24th Infantry at Houston,
Texas.[1-9] Ironically, those idealistic impulses that had operated in
earlier wars were operating again in this most Jim Crow of
administrations.[1-10] Woodrow Wilson's promise to make the world safe
for democracy was forcing his administration to admit Negroes to the
Army. Although it carefully maintained racially separate draft calls,
the National Army conscripted some 368,000 Negroes, 13.08 percent of
all those drafted in World War I.[1-11]
[Footnote 1-8: Ulysses Lee, _The Employment of Negro
Troops_, United States Army in World War II
(Washington: Government Printing Office, 1966), p.
5. See also Army War College Historical Section,
"The Colored Soldier in the U.S. Army," May 1942,
p. 22, copy in CMH.]
[Footnote 1-9: For a modern analysis of the two
incidents and the effect of Jim Crow on black units
before World War I, see John D. Weaver, _The
Brownsville Raid_ (New York: W. W. Norton Co.,
1970); Robert V. Haynes, _A Night of Violence: The
Houston Riot of 1917_ (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State
University Press, 1976).]
[Footnote 1-10: On the racial attitudes of the Wilson
administration, see Nancy J. Weiss, "The Negro and
the New Freedom: Fighting Wilsonian Segregation,"
_Political Science Quarterly_ 84 (March
1969):61-79.]
[Footnote 1-11: _Special Report of the Provost
Marshal General on Operations of the Selective
Service System to December 1918_ (Washington:
Government Printing Office, 1919), p. 193.]
Black assignments reflected the opinion, expressed repeatedly in Army
staff studies throughout the war, that when properly led by whites,
blacks could perform reasonably well in segregated units. Once again
Negroes were called on to perform a number of vital though unskilled
jobs, such as construction work, most notably in sixteen specially
formed pioneer infantry regiments. But they also served as frontline
combat troops in the all-black 92d and 93d Infantry Divisions, the
latter serving with distinction among the French forces.
Established by law and tradition and reinforced by the Army staff's
conviction that black troops had not performed well in combat,
segregation survived to flourish in the postwar era.[1-12] The familiar
practice of maintaining a few black units was resumed in the Regular
Army, with the added restriction that Negroes were totally excluded
from the Air Corps. The postwar manpower retrenchments common to all
Regular Army units further reduced the size of the remaining black
units. By June 1940 the number of Negroes on active duty stood at
approximately 4,000 men, 1.5 percent of the Army's total, about the
same proportion as Negroes in the Navy.[1-13]
[Footnote 1-12: The development of post-World War I
policy is discussed in considerable detail in Lee,
_Employment of Negro Troops_, Chapters I and II.
See also U.S. Army War College Miscellaneous File
127-1 through 127-23 and 127-27, U.S. Army Military
History Research Collection, Carlisle Barracks
(hereafter AMHRC).]
[Footnote 1-13: The 1940 strength figure is
extrapolated from Misc Div, AGO, Returns Sec, 9 Oct
39-30 Nov 41. The figures do not include some 3,000
Negroes in National Guard units under state
control.]
_Civil Rights and the Law in 1940_ (p. 008)
The same constants in American society that helped decide the status
of black servicemen in the nineteenth century remained influential
between the world wars, but with a significant change.[1-14] Where once
the advancing fortunes of Negroes in the services depended almost
exclusively on the good will of white progressives, their welfare now
became the concern of a new generation of black leaders and emerging
civil rights organizations. Skilled journalists in the black press and
counselors and lobbyists presenting such groups as the National
Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), the
National Urban League, and the National Negro Congress took the lead
in the fight for racial justice in the United States. They represented
a black community that for the most part lacked the cohesion,
political awareness, and economic strength which would characterize it
in the decades to come. Nevertheless, Negroes had already become a
recognizable political force in some parts of the country. Both the
New Deal politicians and their opponents openly courted the black vote
in the 1940 presidential election.
[Footnote 1-14: This discussion of civil rights in
the pre-World War II period draws not only on Lee's
_Employment of Negro Troops_, but also on Lee
Finkle, _Forum for Protest: The Black Press During
World War II_ (Cranbury: Fairleigh Dickinson
University Press, 1975); Harvard Sitkoff, "Racial
Militancy and Interracial Violence in the Second
World War," _Journal of American History_ 58
(December 1971):661-81; Reinhold Schumann, "The
Role of the National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People in the Integration of
the Armed Forces According to the NAACP Collection
in the Library of Congress" (1971), in CMH; Richard
M. Dalfiume, _Desegregation of the United States
Armed Forces: Fighting on Two Fronts, 1939-1953_
(Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1969).]
These politicians realized that the United States was beginning to
outgrow its old racial relationships over which Jim Crow had reigned,
either by law or custom, for more than fifty years. In large areas of
the country where lynchings and beatings were commonplace, white
supremacy had existed as a literal fact of life and death.[1-15] More
insidious than the Jim Crow laws were the economic deprivation and
dearth of educational opportunity associated with racial
discrimination. Traditionally the last hired, first fired, Negroes
suffered all the handicaps that came from unemployment and poor jobs,
a condition further aggravated by the Great Depression. The "separate
but equal" educational system dictated by law and the realities of
black life in both urban and rural areas, north and south, had proved
anything but equal and thus closed to Negroes a traditional avenue to
advancement in American society.
[Footnote 1-15: The Jim Crow era is especially well
described in Rayford W. Logan's _The Negro in
American Life and Thought: The Nadir, 1877-1901_
(New York: Dial, 1954) and C. Vann Woodward's _The
Strange Career of Jim Crow_, 3d ed. rev. (New York:
Oxford University Press, 1974)]
In these circumstances, the economic and humanitarian programs of the
New Deal had a special appeal for black America. Encouraged by these
programs and heartened by Eleanor Roosevelt's public support of civil
rights, black voters defected from their traditional allegiance to the
Republican Party in overwhelming numbers. But the civil rights leaders
were already aware, if the average black citizen was not, that despite
having made some considerable improvements Franklin Roosevelt never,
in one biographer's words, "sufficiently challenged Southern (p. 009)
traditions of white supremacy to create problems for himself."[1-16]
Negroes, in short, might benefit materially from the New Deal, but
they would have to look elsewhere for advancement of their civil
rights.
[Footnote 1-16: Frank Freidel, _F.D.R. and the South_
(Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press,
1965), pp. 71-102. See also Bayard Rustin,
_Strategies for Freedom: The Changing Patterns of
Black Protest_ (New York: Columbia University
Press, 1976), p. 16.]
Men like Walter F. White of the NAACP and the National Urban League's
T. Arnold Hill sought to use World War II to expand opportunities for
the black American. From the start they tried to translate the
idealistic sentiment for democracy stimulated by the war and expressed
in the Atlantic Charter into widespread support for civil rights in
the United States. At the same time, in sharp contrast to many of
their World War I predecessors, they placed a price on black support
for the war effort: no longer could the White House expect this
sizable minority to submit to injustice and yet close ranks with other
Americans to defeat a common enemy. It was readily apparent to the
Negro, if not to his white supporter or his enemy, that winning
equality at home was just as important as advancing the cause of
freedom abroad. As George S. Schuyler, a widely quoted black
columnist, put it: "If nothing more comes out of this emergency than
the widespread understanding among white leaders that the Negro's
loyalty is conditional, we shall not have suffered in vain."[1-17] The
NAACP spelled out the challenge even more clearly in its monthly
publication, _The Crisis_, which declared itself "sorry for brutality,
blood, and death among the peoples of Europe, just as we were sorry
for China and Ethiopia. But the hysterical cries of the preachers of
democracy for Europe leave us cold. We want democracy in Alabama,
Arkansas, in Mississippi and Michigan, in the District of Columbia--in
the _Senate of the United States_."[1-18]
[Footnote 1-17: Pittsburgh _Courier_, December 21,
1940.]
[Footnote 1-18: _The Crisis_ 47 (July 1940):209.]
This sentiment crystallized in the black press's Double V campaign, a
call for simultaneous victories over Jim Crow at home and fascism
abroad. Nor was the Double V campaign limited to a small group of
civil rights spokesmen; rather, it reflected a new mood that, as
Myrdal pointed out, was permeating all classes of black society.[1-19]
The quickening of the black masses in the cause of equal treatment and
opportunity in the pre-World War II period and the willingness of
Negroes to adopt a more militant course to achieve this end might well
mark the beginning of the modern civil rights movement.
[Footnote 1-19: Myrdal, _American Dilemma_, p. 744.]
[Illustration: INTEGRATION IN THE ARMY OF 1888. _The Army Band at Fort
Duchesne, Utah, composed of soldiers from the black 9th Cavalry and
the white 21st Infantry._]
Historian Lee Finkle has suggested that the militancy advocated by
most of the civil rights leaders in the World War II era was merely a
rhetorical device; that for the most part they sought to avoid
violence over segregation, concentrating as before on traditional
methods of protest.[1-20] This reliance on traditional methods was
apparent when the leaders tried to focus the new sentiment among
Negroes on two war-related goals: equality of treatment in the armed
forces and equality of job opportunity in the expanding defense
industries. In 1938 the Pittsburgh _Courier_, the largest and one (p. 010)
of the most influential of the nation's black papers, called upon the
President to open the services to Negroes and organized the Committee
for Negro Participation in the National Defense Program. These moves
led to an extensive lobbying effort that in time spread to many other
newspapers and local civil rights groups. The black press and its
satellites also attracted the support of several national
organizations that were promoting preparedness for war, and these
groups, in turn, began to demand equal treatment and opportunity in
the armed forces.[1-21]
[Footnote 1-20: Lee Finkle, "The Conservative Aims of
Militant Rhetoric: Black Protest During World War
II," _Journal of American History_ 60 (December
1973):693.]
[Footnote 1-21: Some impression of the extent of this
campaign and its effect on the War Department can
be gained from the volume of correspondence
produced by the Pittsburgh _Courier_ campaign and
filed in AG 322.99 (2-23-38)(1).]
The government began to respond to these pressures before the United
States entered World War II. At the urging of the White House the Army
announced plans for the mobilization of Negroes, and Congress amended
several mobilization measures to define and increase the military
training opportunities for Negroes.[1-22] The most important of these
legislative amendments in terms of influence on future race relations
in the United States were made to the Selective Service Act of 1940.
The matter of race played only a small part in the debate on this
highly controversial legislation, but during congressional hearings on
the bill black spokesmen testified on discrimination against Negroes
in the services.[1-23] These witnesses concluded that if the draft law
did not provide specific guarantees against it, discrimination would
prevail.
[Footnote 1-22: The Army's plans and amendments are
treated in great detail in Lee, _Employment of
Negro Troops_.]
[Footnote 1-23: Hearings Before the Committee on
Military Affairs. House of Representatives, 76th
Cong., 3d sess., on H.R. 10132, _Selective
Compulsory Military Training and Service_, pp.
585-90.]
[Illustration: GUNNER'S GANG ON THE USS MAINE.]
A majority in both houses of Congress seemed to agree. During (p. 011)
floor debate on the Selective Service Act, Senator Robert F. Wagner of
New York proposed an amendment to guarantee to Negroes and other
racial minorities the privilege of voluntary enlistment in the armed
forces. He sought in this fashion to correct evils described some ten
days earlier by Rayford W. Logan, chairman of the Committee for Negro
Participation in the National Defense, in testimony before the House
Committee on Military Affairs. The Wagner proposal triggered critical
comments and questions. Senators John H. Overton and Allen J. Ellender
of Louisiana viewed the Wagner amendment as a step toward "mixed"
units. Overton, Ellender, and Senator Lister Hill of Alabama proposed
that the matter should be "left to the Army." Hill also attacked the
amendment because it would allow the enlistment of Japanese-Americans,
some of whom he claimed were not loyal to the United States.[1-24]
[Footnote 1-24: _Congressional Record_, 76th Cong.,
3d sess., vol. 86, p. 10890.]
[Illustration: GENERAL PERSHING, AEF COMMANDER, INSPECTS TROOPS _of
the 802d (Colored) Pioneer Regiment in France, 1918_.]
No filibuster was attempted, and the Wagner amendment passed the
Senate easily, 53 to 21. It provided
that any person between the ages of eighteen and thirty-five
regardless of race or color shall be afforded an opportunity
voluntarily to enlist and be inducted into the land and naval
forces (including aviation units) of the United States for the
training and service prescribed in subsection (b), if he is
acceptable to the land or naval forces for such training and
service.[1-25]
[Footnote 1-25: 54 _U.S. Stat._ 885(1940).]
The Wagner amendment was aimed at _volunteers_ for military service.
Congressman Hamilton Fish, also of New York, later introduced a
similar measure in the House aimed at _draftees_. The Fish (p. 012)
amendment passed the House by a margin of 121 to 99 and emerged intact
from the House-Senate conference. The law finally read that in the
selection and training of men and execution of the law "there shall be
no discrimination against any person on account of race or color."[1-26]
[Footnote 1-26: Ibid. Fish commanded black troops in
World War I. Captain of Company K, Fifteenth New
York National Guard (Colored), which subsequently
became the 369th Infantry, Fish served in the much
decorated 93d Division in the French sector of the
Western Front.]
[Illustration: HEROES OF THE 369TH INFANTRY. _Winners of the Croix de
Guerre arrive in New York Harbor, February 1919._]
The Fish amendment had little immediate impact upon the services'
racial patterns. As long as official policy permitted separate draft
calls for blacks and whites and the officially held definition of
discrimination neatly excluded segregation--and both went unchallenged
in the courts--segregation would remain entrenched in the armed
forces. Indeed, the rigidly segregated services, their ranks swollen
by the draft, were a particular frustration to the civil rights forces
because they were introducing some black citizens to racial
discrimination more pervasive than any they had ever endured in
civilian life. Moreover, as the services continued to open bases
throughout the country, they actually spread federally sponsored
segregation into areas where it had never before existed with the
force of law. In the long run, however, the 1940 draft law and
subsequent draft legislation had a strong influence on the armed
forces' racial policies. They created a climate in which progress
could be made toward integration within the services. Although not
apparent in 1940, the pressure of a draft-induced flood of black (p. 013)
conscripts was to be a principal factor in the separate decisions of
the Army, Navy, and Marine Corps to integrate their units.
_To Segregate Is To Discriminate_
As with all the administration's prewar efforts to increase
opportunities for Negroes in the armed forces, the Selective Service
Act failed to excite black enthusiasm because it missed the point of
black demands. Guarantees of black participation were no longer
enough. By 1940 most responsible black leaders shared the goal of an
integrated armed forces as a step toward full participation in the
benefits and responsibilities of American citizenship.
The White House may well have thought that Walter White of the NAACP
singlehandedly organized the demand for integration in 1939, but he
was merely applying a concept of race relations that had been evolving
since World War I. In the face of ever-worsening discrimination,
White's generation of civil rights advocates had rejected the idea of
the preeminent black leader Booker T. Washington that hope for the
future lay in the development of a separate and strong black (p. 014)
community. Instead, they gradually came to accept the argument of one
of the founders of the National Association for the Advancement of
Colored People, William E. B. DuBois, that progress was possible only
when Negroes abandoned their segregated community to work toward a
society open to both black and white. By the end of the 1930's this
concept had produced a fundamental change in civil rights tactics and
created the new mood of assertiveness that Myrdal found in the black
community. The work of White and others marked the beginning of a
systematic attack against Jim Crow. As the most obvious practitioner
of Jim Crow in the federal government, the services were the logical
target for the first battle in a conflict that would last some thirty
years.
This evolution in black attitudes was clearly demonstrated in
correspondence in the 1930's between officials of the NAACP and the
Roosevelt administration over equal treatment in the armed forces. The
discussion began in 1934 with a series of exchanges between Chief of
Staff Douglas MacArthur and NAACP Counsel Charles H. Houston and
continued through the correspondence between White and the
administration in 1937. The NAACP representatives rejected MacArthur's
defense of Army policy and held out for a quota guaranteeing that
Negroes would form at least 10 percent of the nation's military
strength. Their emphasis throughout was on numbers; during these first
exchanges, at least, they fought against disbandment of the existing
black regiments and argued for similar units throughout the
service.[1-27]
[Footnote 1-27: See especially Ltr, Houston to CofS,
1 Aug and 29 Aug 34; Ltr, CofS to Houston, 20 Aug
34; Ltr, Maj Gen Edgar T. Conley, Actg AG, USA, to
Walter White, 25 Nov 35; Ltr, Houston to Roosevelt,
8 Oct 37; Ltr, Houston to SW, 8 Oct 37. See also
Elijah Reynolds, _Colored Soldiers and the Regular
Army_ (NAACP Pamphlet, December 10, 1934). All in
C-376, NAACP Collection, Library of Congress.]
Yet the idea of integration was already strongly implied in Houston's
1934 call for "a more united nation of free citizens,"[1-28] and in
February 1937 the organization emphasized the idea in an editorial in
_The Crisis_, asking why black and white men could not fight side by
side as they had in the Continental Army.[1-29] And when the Army
informed the NAACP in September 1939 that more black units were
projected for mobilization, White found this solution unsatisfactory
because the proposed units would be segregated.[1-30] If democracy was
to be defended, he told the President, discrimination must be
eliminated from the armed forces. To this end, the NAACP urged
Roosevelt to appoint a commission of black and white citizens to
investigate discrimination in the Army and Navy and to recommend the
removal of racial barriers.[1-31]
[Footnote 1-28: Ibid. Ltr, Houston to CofS, 1 Aug
34.]
[Footnote 1-29: _The Crisis_ 46 (1939):49, 241, 337.]
[Footnote 1-30: Ltr, Presley Holliday to White, 11
Sep 39; Ltr, White to Holliday, 15 Sep 39. Both in
C-376, NAACP Collection, LC.]
[Footnote 1-31: Ltr, White to Roosevelt, 15 Sep 39,
in C-376, NAACP Collection, LC. This letter was
later released to the press.]
The White House ignored these demands, and on 17 October the secretary
to the President, Col. Edwin M. Watson, referred White to a War
Department report outlining the new black units being created under
presidential authorization. But the NAACP leaders were not to be
diverted from the main chance. Thurgood Marshall, then the head of (p. 015)
the organization's legal department, recommended that White tell the
President "that the NAACP is opposed to the separate units existing in
the armed forces at the present time."[1-32]
[Footnote 1-32: Memo, Marshall for White, 28 Oct 39;
Ltr, Secy to the President to White, 17 Oct 39.
Both in C-376, NAACP Collection, LC.]
When his associates failed to agree on a reply to the administration,
White decided on a face-to-face meeting with the President.[1-33]
Roosevelt agreed to confer with White, Hill of the Urban League, and
A. Philip Randolph, head of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters,
the session finally taking place on 27 September 1940. At that time
the civil rights officials outlined for the President and his defense
assistants what they called the "important phases of the integration
of the Negro into military aspects of the national defense program."
Central to their argument was the view that the Army and Navy should
accept men without regard to race. According to White, the President
had apparently never considered the use of integrated units, but after
some discussion he seemed to accept the suggestion that the Army could
assign black regiments or batteries alongside white units and from
there "the Army could 'back into' the formation of units without
segregation."[1-34]
[Footnote 1-33: Memo, White for Roy Wilkins et al.,
Oct 39; Ltr, Houston to White, Oct 39; Memo,
Wilkins to White, 23 Oct 39. All in C-376, NAACP
Collection, LC.]
[Footnote 1-34: Walter White, "Conference at White
House, Friday, September 27, 11:35 A.M.," Arthur B.
Spingarn Papers, Library of Congress. See also
White's _A Man Called White_ (New York: Viking
Press, 1948), pp. 186-87.]
Nothing came of these suggestions. Although the policy announced by
the White House subsequent to the meeting contained concessions
regarding the employment and distribution of Negroes in the services,
it did not provide for integrated units. The wording of the press
release on the conference implied, moreover, that the administration's
entire program had been approved by White and the others. To have
their names associated with any endorsement of segregation was
particularly infuriating to these civil rights leaders, who
immediately protested to the President.[1-35] The White House later
publicly absolved the leaders of any such endorsement, and Press
Secretary Early was forced to retract the "damaging impression" that
the leaders had in any way endorsed segregation. The President later
assured White, Randolph, and Hill that further policy changes would be
made to insure fair treatment for Negroes.[1-36]
[Footnote 1-35: Ltr, White to Stephen Early, 21 Oct
40. See also Memo, White for R. S. W. [Roy
Wilkins], 18 Oct 40. Both in C-376, NAACP
Collection, LC. See also Ltr, S. Early to White, 18
Oct 40, Incl to Ltr, White to Spingarn, 24 Oct 40,
Spingarn Papers, LC.]
[Footnote 1-36: White, _A Man Called White_, pp.
187-88.]
Presidential promises notwithstanding, the NAACP set out to make
integration of the services a matter of overriding interest to the
black community during the war. The organization encountered
opposition at first when some black leaders were willing to accept
segregated units as the price for obtaining the formation of more
all-black divisions. The NAACP stood firm, however, and demanded at
its annual convention in 1941 an immediate end to segregation.
In a related move symbolizing the growing unity behind the campaign to
integrate the military, the leaders of the March on Washington
Movement, a group of black activists under A. Philip Randolph, (p. 016)
specifically demanded the end of segregation in the Army and Navy. The
movement was the first since the days of Marcus Garvey to involve the
black masses; in fact Negroes from every social and economic class
rallied behind Randolph, ready to demonstrate for equal treatment and
opportunity. Although some black papers objected to the movement's
militancy, the major civil rights organization showed no such hesitancy.
Roy Wilkins, a leader of the NAACP, later claimed that Randolph could
supply only about 9,000 potential demonstrators and that the NAACP had
provided the bulk of the movement's participants.[1-37]
[Footnote 1-37: Roy Wilkins Oral History Interview,
Columbia University Oral History Collection. See
also A. Philip Randolph, "Why Should We March,"
_Survey Graphic_ 31 (November 1942), as reprinted
in John H. Franklin and Isidore Starr, eds., _The
Negro in Twentieth Century America_ (New York:
Random House, 1967).]
Although Randolph was primarily interested in fair employment
practices, the NAACP had been concerned with the status of black
servicemen since World War I. Reflecting the degree of NAACP support,
march organizers included a discussion of segregation in the services
when they talked with President Roosevelt in June 1941. Randolph and
the others proposed ways to abolish the separate racial units in each
service, charging that integration was being frustrated by prejudiced
senior military officials.[1-38]
[Footnote 1-38: White, _A Man Called White_, pp.
190-93.]
The President's meeting with the march leaders won the administration
a reprieve from the threat of a mass civil rights demonstration in the
nation's capital, but at the price of promising substantial reform in
minority hiring for defense industries and the creation of a federal
body, the Fair Employment Practices Committee, to coordinate the
reform. While it prompted no similar reform in the racial policies of
the armed forces, the March on Washington Movement was nevertheless a
significant milestone in the services' racial history.[1-39] It signaled
the beginning of a popularly based campaign against segregation in the
armed forces in which all the major civil rights organizations, their
allies in Congress and the press, and many in the black community
would hammer away on a single theme: segregation is unacceptable in a
democratic society and hypocritical during a war fought in defense of
the four freedoms.
[Footnote 1-39: Herbert Garfinkle, _When Negroes
March: The March on Washington Movement in the
Organizational Politics of FEPC_ (Glencoe: The Free
Press, 1959), provides a comprehensive account of
the aims and achievements of the movement.]
CHAPTER 2 (p. 017)
World War II: The Army
Civil rights leaders adopted the "Double V" slogan as their rallying
cry during World War II. Demanding victory against fascism abroad and
discrimination at home, they exhorted black citizens to support the
war effort and to fight for equal treatment and opportunity for
Negroes everywhere. Although segregation was their main target, their
campaign was directed against all forms of discrimination, especially
in the armed forces. They flooded the services with appeals for a
redress of black grievances and levied similar demands on the White
House, Congress, and the courts.
Black leaders concentrated on the services because they were public
institutions, their officials sworn to uphold the Constitution. The
leaders understood, too, that disciplinary powers peculiar to the
services enabled them to make changes that might not be possible for
other organizations; the armed forces could command where others could
only persuade. The Army bore the brunt of this attention, but not
because its policies were so benighted. In 1941 the Army was a fairly
progressive organization, and few institutions in America could match
its record. Rather, the civil rights leaders concentrated on the Army
because the draft law had made it the nation's largest employer of
minority groups.
For its part, the Army resisted the demands, its spokesmen contending
that the service's enormous size and power should not be used for
social experiment, especially during a war. Further justifying their
position, Army officials pointed out that their service had to avoid
conflict with prevailing social attitudes, particularly when such
attitudes were jealously guarded by Congress. In this period of
continuous demand and response, the Army developed a racial policy
that remained in effect throughout the war with only superficial
modifications sporadically adopted to meet changing conditions.
_A War Policy: Reaffirming Segregation_
The experience of World War I cast a shadow over the formation of the
Army's racial policy in World War II.[2-1] The chief architects of the
new policy, and many of its opponents, were veterans of the first war
and reflected in their judgments the passions and prejudices of that
era.[2-2] Civil rights activists were determined to eliminate the (p. 018)
segregationist practices of the 1917 mobilization and to win a
fair representation for Negroes in the Army. The traditionalists of
the Army staff, on the other hand, were determined to resist any
radical change in policy. Basing their arguments on their evaluation
of the performance of the 92d Division and some other black units in
World War I, they had made, but not publicized, mobilization plans
that recognized the Army's obligation to employ black soldiers yet
rigidly maintained the segregationist policy of World War I.[2-3] These
plans increased the number of types of black units to be formed and
even provided for a wide distribution of the units among all the arms
and services except the Army Air Forces and Signal Corps, but they did
not explain how the skilled Negro, whose numbers had greatly increased
since World War I, could be efficiently used within the limitations of
black units. In the name of military efficiency the Army staff had, in
effect, devised a social rather than a military policy for the
employment of black troops.
[Footnote 2-1: This survey of the Army and the Negro
in World War II is based principally on Lee's
_Employment of Negro Troops_. A comprehensive
account of the development of policy, the
mobilization of black soldiers, and their use in
the various theaters and units of World War II,
this book is an indispensable source for any
serious student of the subject.]
[Footnote 2-2: For examples of how World War I
military experiences affected the thinking of the
civil rights advocates and military traditionalists
of World War II, see Lester B. Granger Oral History
Interview, 1960, Columbia University Oral History
Collection; Interview, Lee Nichols with Lt. Gen.
John C. H. Lee (c. 1953). For the influence of
World War II on a major contributor to postwar
racial policy, see Interview, Lee Nichols with
Harry S. Truman, 24 Jun 53. Last two in Nichols
Collection, CMH. These interviews are among many
compiled by Nichols as part of his program
associated with the production of _Breakthrough on
the Color Front_ (New York: Random House, 1954).
Nichols, a journalist, presented this collection of
interviews, along with other documents and
materials, to the Center of Military History in
1972. The interviews have proved to be a valuable
supplement to the official record. They capture the
thoughts of a number of important participants,
some no longer alive, at a time relatively close to
the events under consideration. They have been
checked against the sources whenever possible and
found accurate.]
[Footnote 2-3: Memo, ACofS, G-3, for CofS, 3 Jun 40,
sub: Employment of Negro Manpower, G-3/6541-527.]
The White House tried to adjust the conflicting demands of the civil
rights leaders and the Army traditionalists. Eager to placate and
willing to compromise, President Franklin D. Roosevelt sought an
accommodation by directing the War Department to provide jobs for
Negroes in all parts of the Army. The controversy over integration
soon became more public, the opponents less reconcilable; in the weeks
following the President's meeting with black representatives on 27
September 1940 the Army countered black demands for integration with a
statement released by the White House on 9 October. To provide "a fair
and equitable basis" for the use of Negroes in its expansion program,
the Army planned to accept Negroes in numbers approximate to their
proportion in the national population, about 10 percent. Black
officers and enlisted men were to serve, as was then customary, only
in black units that were to be formed in each major branch, both
combatant and noncombatant, including air units to be created as soon
as pilots, mechanics, and technical specialists were trained. There
would be no racial intermingling in regimental organizations because
the practice of separating white and black troops had, the Army staff
said, proved satisfactory over a long period of time. To change would
destroy morale and impair preparations for national defense. Since
black units in the Army were already "going concerns, accustomed
through many years to the present system" of segregation, "no
experiments should be tried ... at this critical time."[2-4]
[Footnote 2-4: Memo, TAG for CG's et al., 16 Oct 40,
sub: War Department Policy in Regard to Negroes, AG
291.21 (10-9-40) M-A-M.]
The President's "OK, F.D.R." on the War Department statement (p. 019)
transformed what had been a routine prewar mobilization plan into a
racial policy that would remain in effect throughout the war. In fact,
quickly elevated in importance by War Department spokesmen who made
constant reference to the "Presidential Directive," the statement
would be used by some Army officials as a presidential sanction for
introducing segregation in new situations, as, for example, in the
pilot training of black officers in the Army Air Corps. Just as
quickly, the civil rights leaders, who had expected more from the tone
of the President's own comments and more also from the egalitarian
implications of the new draft law, bitterly attacked the Army's
policy.
Black criticism came at an awkward moment for President Roosevelt, who
was entering a heated campaign for an unprecedented third term and
whose New Deal coalition included the urban black vote. His opponent,
the articulate Wendell L. Willkie, was an unabashed champion of civil
rights and was reportedly attracting a wide following among black
voters. In the weeks preceding the election the President tried to
soften the effect of the Army's announcement. He promoted Col.
Benjamin O. Davis, Sr., to brigadier general, thereby making Davis the
first Negro to hold this rank in the Regular Army. He appointed the
commander of reserve officers' training at Howard University, Col.
Campbell C. Johnson, Special Aide to the Director of Selective
Service. And, finally, he named Judge William H. Hastie, dean of the
Howard University Law School, Civilian Aide to the Secretary of War.
A successful lawyer, Judge Hastie entered upon his new assignment with
several handicaps. Because of his long association with black causes,
some civil rights organizations assumed that Hastie would be their man
in Washington and regarded his duties as an extension of their crusade
against discrimination. Hastie's War Department superiors, on the
other hand, assumed that his was a public relations job and expected
him to handle all complaints and mobilization problems as had his
World War I predecessor, Emmett J. Scott. Both assumptions proved
false. Hastie was evidently determined to break the racial logjam in
the War Department, yet unlike many civil rights advocates he seemed
willing to pay the price of slow progress to obtain lasting
improvement. According to those who knew him, Hastie was confident
that he could demonstrate to War Department officials that the Army's
racial policies were both inefficient and unpatriotic.[2-5]
[Footnote 2-5: The foregoing impressions are derived
largely from Interviews, Lee Nichols with James C.
Evans, who worked for Judge Hastie during World War
II, and Ulysses G. Lee (c. 1953). Both in Nichols
Collection, CMH.]
Judge Hastie spent his first ten months in office observing what was
happening to the Negro in the Army. He did not like what he saw. To
him, separating black soldiers from white soldiers was a fundamental
error. First, the effect on black morale was devastating. "Beneath the
surface," he wrote, "is widespread discontent. Most white persons are
unable to appreciate the rancor and bitterness which the Negro, as a
matter of self-preservation, has learned to hide beneath a smile, a
joke, or merely an impassive face." The inherent paradox of trying to
inculcate pride, dignity, and aggressiveness in a black soldier while
inflicting on him the segregationist's concept of the Negro's (p. 020)
place in society created in him an insupportable tension. Second,
segregation wasted black manpower, a valuable military asset. It was
impossible, Hastie charged, to employ skilled Negroes at maximum
efficiency within the traditionally narrow limitations of black units.
Third, to insist on an inflexible separation of white and black
soldiers was "the most dramatic evidence of hypocrisy" in America's
professed concern for preserving democracy.
Although he appreciated the impossibility of making drastic changes
overnight, Judge Hastie was disturbed because he found "no apparent
disposition to make a beginning or a trial of any different plan." He
looked for some form of progressive integration by which qualified
Negroes could be classified and assigned, not by race, but as
individuals, according to their capacities and abilities.[2-6]
[Footnote 2-6: Memo, William H. Hastie for SW, with
attachment, 22 Sep 41, sub: Survey and
Recommendations Concerning the Integration of the
Negro Soldiers Into the Army, G-1/15640-120. See
also Intervs, Nichols with Evans and Lee.]
[Illustration: JUDGE HASTIE.]
Judge Hastie gained little support from the Secretary of War, Henry L.
Stimson, or the Chief of Staff, General George C. Marshall, when he
called for progressive integration. Both considered the Army's
segregated units to be in accord with prevailing public sentiment
against mixing the races in the intimate association of military life.
More to the point, both Stimson and Marshall were sensitive to
military tradition, and segregated units had been a part of the Army
since 1863. Stimson embraced segregation readily. While conveying to
the President that he was "sensitive to the individual tragedy which
went with it to the colored man himself," he nevertheless urged
Roosevelt not to place "too much responsibility on a race which was
not showing initiative in battle."[2-7] Stimson's attitude was not
unusual for the times. He professed to believe in civil rights for
every citizen, but he opposed social integration. He never tried to
reconcile these seemingly inconsistent views; in fact, he probably did
not consider them inconsistent. Stimson blamed what he termed Eleanor
Roosevelt's "intrusive and impulsive folly" for some of the criticism
visited upon the Army's racial policy, just as he inveighed against
the "foolish leaders of the colored race" who were seeking "at (p. 021)
bottom social equality," which, he concluded, was out of the question
"because of the impossibility of race mixture by marriage."[2-8]
Influenced by Under Secretary Robert P. Patterson, Assistant Secretary
John J. McCloy, and Truman K. Gibson, Jr., who was Judge Hastie's
successor, but most of all impressed by the performance of black
soldiers themselves, Stimson belatedly modified his defense of
segregation. But throughout the war he adhered to the traditional
arguments of the Army's professional staff.
[Footnote 2-7: Stimson, a Republican, had been
appointed by Roosevelt in 1940, along with
Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox, in an effort to
enlist bipartisan support for the administration's
foreign policy in an election year. Stimson brought
a wealth of experience with him to the office,
having served as Secretary of War under William
Howard Taft and Secretary of State under Herbert
Hoover. The quotations are from Stimson Diary, 25
October 1940, Henry L. Stimson Papers, Yale
University Library.]
[Footnote 2-8: Henry L. Stimson and McGeorge Bundy,
_On Active Service in Peace and War_ (New York:
Harper and Brothers, 1947), pp. 461-64. The
quotations are from Stimson Diary, 24 Jan 42.]
[Illustration: GENERAL MARSHALL AND SECRETARY STIMSON.]
General Marshall was a powerful advocate of the views of the Army
staff. He lived up to the letter of the Army's regulations,
consistently supporting measures to eliminate overt discrimination in
the wartime Army. At the same time, he rejected the idea that the Army
should take the lead in altering the racial mores of the nation. Asked
for his views on Hastie's "carefully prepared memo,"[2-9] General
Marshall admitted that many of the recommendations were sound but said
that Judge Hastie's proposals
would be tantamount to solving a social problem which has
perplexed the American people throughout the history of this
nation. The Army cannot accomplish such a solution and (p. 022)
should not be charged with the undertaking. The settlement of
vexing racial problems cannot be permitted to complicate the
tremendous task of the War Department and thereby jeopardize
discipline and morale.[2-10]
[Footnote 2-9: Memo, USW for CofS, 6 Oct 41,
G-1/15640-120.]
[Footnote 2-10: Memo, CofS for SW, 1 Dec 41, sub:
Report of Judge William H. Hastie, Civilian Aide to
the Secretary of War, dated 22 Sep 41, OCS
20602-219.]
As Chief of Staff, Marshall faced the tremendous task of creating in
haste a large Army to deal with the Axis menace. Since for several
practical reasons the bulk of that Army would be trained in the south
where its conscripts would be subject to southern laws, Marshall saw
no alternative but to postpone reform. The War Department, he said,
could not ignore the social relationship between blacks and whites,
established by custom and habit. Nor could it ignore the fact that the
"level of intelligence and occupational skill" of the black population
was considerably below that of whites. Though he agreed that the Army
would reach maximum strength only if individuals were placed according
to their abilities, he concluded that experiments to solve social
problems would be "fraught with danger to efficiency, discipline, and
morale." In sum, Marshall saw no reason to change the policy approved
by the President less than a year before.[2-11]
[Footnote 2-11: Ibid. See also Forrest C. Pogue,
_George C. Marshall: Organizer of Victory_ (New
York: The Viking Press, 1973), pp. 96-99.]
The Army's leaders and the secretary's civilian aide had reached an
impasse on the question of policy even before the country entered the
war. And though the use of black troops in World War I was not
entirely satisfactory even to its defenders,[2-12] there appeared to be
no time now, in view of the larger urgency of winning the war, to plan
other approaches, try other solutions, or tamper with an institution
that had won victory in the past. Further ordering the thoughts of
some senior Army officials was their conviction that wide-scale mixing
of the races in the services might, as Under Secretary Patterson
phrased it, foment social revolution.[2-13]
[Footnote 2-12: The Army staff's mobilization
planning for black units in the 1930's generally
relied upon the detailed testimony of the
commanders of black units in World War I. This
testimony, contained in documents submitted to the
War Department and the Army War College, was often
critical of the Army's employment of black troops,
although rarely critical of segregation. The
material is now located in the U.S. Army's Military
History Research Collection, Carlisle Barracks,
Pennsylvania. For discussion of the post-World War
I review of the employment of black troops, see
Lee's _Employment of Negro Troops_, Chapter I, and
Alan M. Osur's _Blacks in the Army Air Forces
During World War II: The Problem of Race Relations_
(Washington: Government Printing Office, 1977),
Chapter I.]
[Footnote 2-13: Memo, USW for Maj Gen William Bryden
(principal deputy chief of staff), 10 Jan 42, OCS
20602-250.]
These opinions were clearly evident on 8 December 1941, the day the
United States entered World War II, when the Army's leaders met with a
group of black publishers and editors. Although General Marshall
admitted that he was not satisfied with the department's progress in
racial matters and promised further changes, the conference concluded
with a speech by a representative of The Adjutant General who
delivered what many considered the final word on integration during
the war.
The Army is made up of individual citizens of the United States
who have pronounced views with respect to the Negro just as they
have individual ideas with respect to other matters in their
daily walk of life. Military orders, fiat, or dicta, will not
change their viewpoints. The Army then cannot be made the (p. 023)
means of engendering conflict among the mass of people
because of a stand with respect to Negroes which is not
compatible with the position attained by the Negro in civil
life.... The Army is not a sociological laboratory; to be
effective it must be organized and trained according to the
principles which will insure success. Experiments to meet the
wishes and demands of the champions of every race and creed for
the solution of their problems are a danger to efficiency,
discipline and morale and would result in ultimate defeat.[2-14]
[Footnote 2-14: Col Eugene R. Householder, TAGO,
Speech Before Conference of Negro Editors and
Publishers, 8 Dec 41, AG 291.21 (12-1-41) (1).]
The civil rights advocates refused to concede that the discussion was
over. Judge Hastie, along with a sizable segment of the black press,
believed that the beginning of a world war was the time to improve
military effectiveness by increasing black participation in that
war.[2-15] They argued that eliminating segregation was part of the
struggle to preserve democracy, the transcendent issue of the war, and
they viewed the unvarying pattern of separate black units as consonant
with the racial theories of Nazi Germany.[2-16] Their continuing efforts
to eliminate segregation and discrimination eventually brought Hastie
a sharp reminder from John J. McCloy. "Frankly, I do not think that
the basic issues of this war are involved in the question of whether
colored troops serve in segregated units or in mixed units and I doubt
whether you can convince people of the United States that the basic
issues of freedom are involved in such a question." For Negroes, he
warned sternly, the basic issue was that if the United States lost the
war, the lot of the black community would be far worse off, and some
Negroes "do not seem to be vitally concerned about winning the war."
What all Negroes ought to do, he counseled, was to give unstinting
support to the war effort in anticipation of benefits certain to come
after victory.[2-17]
[Footnote 2-15: Lee, _Employment of Negro Troops_,
ch. VI.]
[Footnote 2-16: Noteworthy is the fact that for
several reasons not related to race (for instance,
language and nationality) the German Army also
organized separate units. Its 162d Infantry
Division was composed of troops from Turkestan and
the Caucasus, and its 5th SS Panzer Division had
segregated Scandinavian, Dutch, and Flemish
regiments. Unlike the racially segregated U.S.
Army, Germany's so-called Ost units were only
administratively organized into separate divisions,
and an Ost infantry battalion was often integrated
into a "regular" German infantry regiment as its
fourth infantry battalion. Several allied armies
also had segregated units, composed, for example,
of Senegalese, Gurkhas, Maoris, and Algerians.]
[Footnote 2-17: Memo, ASW for Judge Hastie, 2 Jul 42,
ASW 291.2, NT 1942.]
Thus very early in World War II, even before the United States was
actively engaged, the issues surrounding the use of Negroes in the
Army were well defined and the lines sharply drawn. Was segregation, a
practice in conflict with the democratic aims of the country, also a
wasteful use of manpower? How would modifications of policy
come--through external pressure or internal reform? Could traditional
organizational and social patterns in the military services be changed
during a war without disrupting combat readiness?
_Segregation and Efficiency_
In the years before World War II, Army planners never had to consider
segregation in terms of manpower efficiency. Conditioned by the
experiences of World War I, when the nation had enjoyed a surplus of
untapped manpower even at the height of the war, and aware of the
overwhelming manpower surplus of the depression years, the staff (p. 024)
formulated its mobilization plans with little regard for the
economical use of the nation's black manpower. Its decision to use
Negroes in proportion to their percentage of the population was the
result of political pressures rather than military necessity. Black
combat units were considered a luxury that existed to indulge black
demands. When the Army began to mobilize in 1940 it proceeded to honor
its pledge, and one year after Pearl Harbor there were 399,454 Negroes
in the Army, 7.4 percent of the total and 7.95 percent of all enlisted
troops.[2-18]
[Footnote 2-18: Strength of the Army, 1 Jan 46,
STM-30, p. 61.]
The effect of segregation on manpower efficiency became apparent only
as the Army tried to translate policy into practice. In the face of
rising black protest and with direct orders from the White House, the
Army had announced that Negroes would be assigned to all arms and
branches in the same ratio as whites. Several forces, however, worked
against this equitable distribution. During the early months of
mobilization the chiefs of those arms and services that had
traditionally been all white accepted less than their share of black
recruits and thus obliged some organizations, the Quartermaster Corps
and the Engineer Corps in particular, to absorb a large percentage of
black inductees. The imbalance worsened in 1941. In December of that
year Negroes accounted for 5 percent of the Infantry and less than 2
percent each of the Air Corps, Medical Corps, and Signal Corps. The
Quartermaster Corps was 15 percent black, the Engineer Corps 25
percent, and unassigned and miscellaneous detachments were 27 percent
black.
The rejection of black units could not always be ascribed to racism
alone. With some justification the arms and services tried to restrict
the number and distribution of Negroes because black units measured
far below their white counterparts in educational achievement and
ability to absorb training, according to the Army General
Classification Test (AGCT). The Army had introduced this test system
in March 1941 as its principal instrument for the measurement of a
soldier's learning ability. Five categories, with the most gifted in
category I, were used in classifying the scores made by the soldiers
taking the test (_Table 1_). The Army planned to take officers and
enlisted specialists from the top three categories and the semiskilled
soldiers and laborers from the two lowest.
Table 1--Classification of All Men Tested From March 1941 Through
December 1942
White Black
AGCT Category Number Percentage Number Percentage
I 273,626 6.6 1,580 0.4
II 1,154,700 28.0 14,891 3.4
III 1,327,164 32.1 54,302 12.3
IV 1,021,818 24.8 152,725 34.7
V 351,951 8.5 216,664 49.2
Total 4,129,259 100.0 440,162 100.0
_Source_: Tab A, Memo, G-3 for CofS, 10 Apr 43, AG 201.2 (19 Mar 43)(1).
Although there was considerable confusion on the subject, basically
the Army's mental tests measured educational achievement rather than
native intelligence, and in 1941 educational achievement in the United
States hinged more on geography and economics than color. Though black
and white recruits of comparable educations made comparable scores,
the majority of Negroes came from areas of the country where inferior
schools combined with economic and cultural poverty to put them at a
significant disadvantage.[2-19] Many whites suffered similar (p. 025)
disadvantages, and in absolute numbers more whites than blacks appeared
in the lower categories. But whereas the Army could distribute the
low-scoring white soldiers throughout the service so that an
individual unit could easily absorb its few illiterate and
semiliterate white men, the Army was obliged to assign an almost equal
number of low-scoring Negroes to the relatively few black units where
they could neither be absorbed nor easily trained. By the same token,
segregation penalized the educated Negro whose talents were likely to
be wasted when he was assigned to service units along with the
unskilled.
[Footnote 2-19: Lee, _Employment of Negro Troops_,
pp. 241-57. For an extended discussion of Army test
scores and their relation to education, see
Department of the Army, _Marginal Man and Military
Service: A Review_ (Washington: Government Printing
Office, 1966). This report was prepared for the
Deputy Under Secretary of the Army for Personnel
Management by a working group under the leadership
of Dr. Samuel King, Office of the Chief of Research
and Development.]
Segregation further hindered the efficient use of black manpower by
complicating the training of black soldiers. Although training
facilities were at a premium, the Army was forced to provide its
training and replacement centers with separate housing and other
facilities. With an extremely limited number of Regular Army Negroes
to draw from, the service had to create cadres for the new units and
find officers to lead them. Black recruits destined for most arms and
services were assured neither units, billets, nor training cadres. The
Army's solution to the problem: lower the quotas for black inductees.
The use of quotas to regulate inductees by race was itself a source of
tension between the Army and the Bureau of Selective Service.[2-20]
Selective Service questioned the legality of the whole procedure
whereby white and black selectees were delivered on the basis of
separate calls; in many areas of the country draft boards were under
attack for passing over large numbers of Negroes in order to fill
these racial quotas. With the Navy depending exclusively on
volunteers, Selective Service had by early 1943 a backlog of 300,000
black registrants who, according to their order numbers, should have
been called to service but had been passed over. Selective Service
wanted to eliminate the quota system altogether. At the very least it
demanded that the Army accept more Negroes to adjust the racial
imbalance of the draft rolls. The Army, determined to preserve the
quota system, tried to satisfy the Selective Service's minimum
demands, making room for more black inductees by forcing its arms (p. 026)
and services to create more black units. Again the cost to efficiency
was high.
[Footnote 2-20: For discussion of how Selective
Service channeled manpower into the armed forces,
see Selective Service System, Special Monograph
Number 10, _Special Groups_ (Washington: Government
Printing Office, 1953), ch. VIII, and Special
Monograph Number 12, _Quotas, Calls, and
Inductions_ (Washington: Government Printing
Office, 1948), chs. IV-VI.]
Under the pressure of providing sufficient units for Negroes, the
organization of units for the sake of guaranteeing vacancies
became a major goal. In some cases, careful examination of the
usefulness of the types of units provided was subordinated to the
need to create units which could receive Negroes. As a result,
several types of units with limited military value were formed in
some branches for the specific purpose of absorbing otherwise
unwanted Negroes. Conversely, certain types of units with
legitimate and important military functions were filled with
Negroes who could not function efficiently in the tasks to which
they were assigned.[2-21]
[Footnote 2-21: Lee, _Employment of Negro Troops_, p.
113.]
[Illustration: ENGINEER CONSTRUCTION TROOPS IN LIBERIA, JULY 1942.]
The practice of creating units for the specific purpose of absorbing
Negroes was particularly evident in the Army Air Forces.[2-22] Long
considered the most recalcitrant of branches in accepting Negroes, (p. 027)
the Air Corps had successfully exempted itself from the allotment of
black troops in the 1940 mobilization plans. Black pilots could not be
used, Maj. Gen. Henry H. Arnold, Chief of the Air Corps, explained,
"since this would result in having Negro officers serving over white
enlisted men. This would create an impossible social problem."[2-23]
And this situation could not be avoided, since it would take several
years to train black mechanics; meanwhile black pilots would have to
work with white ground crews, often at distant bases outside their
regular chain of command. The Air Corps faced strong opposition (p. 028)
when both the civil rights advocates and the rest of the Army attacked
this exclusion. The civil rights organizations wanted a place for
Negroes in the glamorous Air Corps, but even more to the point the
other arms and services wanted this large branch of the Army to absorb
its fair share of black recruits, thus relieving the rest of a
disproportionate burden.
[Footnote 2-22: The Army's air arm was reorganized
several times. Designated as the Army Air Corps in
1926 (the successor to the historic Army Air
Service), it became the Army Air Forces in the
summer of 1941. This designation lasted until a
separate U.S. Air Force was created in 1947.
Organizationally, the Army was divided in March
1942 into three equal parts: the Army Ground
Forces, the Army Service Forces (originally
Services of Supply), and the Army Air Forces. This
division was administrative. Each soldier continued
to be assigned to a branch of the Army, for
example, Infantry, Artillery, or Air Corps, a title
retained as the name of an Army branch.]
[Footnote 2-23: Memo, CofAC for G-3, 31 May 40, sub:
Employment of Negro Personnel in Air Corps Units,
G-3/6541-Gen-527.]
[Illustration: LABOR BATTALION TROOPS IN THE ALEUTIAN ISLANDS, MAY
1943. _Stevedores pause for a hot meal at Massacre Bay._]
[Illustration: SERGEANT ADDRESSING THE LINE. _Aviation squadron
standing inspection, 1943._]
When the War Department supported these demands the Army Air Forces
capitulated. Its 1941 mobilization plans provided for the formation of
nine separate black aviation squadrons which would perform the
miscellaneous tasks associated with the upkeep of airfields. During
the next year the Chief of Staff set the allotment of black recruits
for the air arm at a rate that brought over 77,500 Negroes into the
Air Corps by 1943. On 16 January 1941 Under Secretary Patterson
announced the formation of a black pursuit squadron, but the Army Air
Forces, bowing to the opposition typified by General Arnold's comments
of the previous year, trained the black pilots in separate facilities
at Tuskegee, Alabama, where the Army tried to duplicate the expensive
training center established for white officers at Maxwell Field, just
forty miles away.[2-24] Black pilots were at first trained exclusively
for pursuit flying, a very difficult kind of combat for which a Negro
had to qualify both physically and technically or else, in Judge (p. 029)
Hastie's words, "not fly at all."[2-25] The 99th Fighter Squadron was
organized at Tuskegee in 1941 and sent to the Mediterranean theater in
April 1943. By then the all-black 332d Fighter Group with three
additional fighter squadrons had been organized, and in 1944 it too
was deployed to the Mediterranean.
[Footnote 2-24: USAF Oral History Program, Interv
with Maj Gen Noel F Parrish (USAF, Ret.), 30 Mar
73.]
[Footnote 2-25: William H. Hastie, _On Clipped Wings:
The Story of Jim Crow in the Army Air Corps_ (New
York: NAACP, 1943). Based on War Department
documents and statistics, this famous pamphlet was
essentially an attack on the Army Air Corps. For a
more comprehensive account of the Negro and the
Army Air Forces, see Osur, _Blacks in the Army Air
Forces During World War II_.]
[Illustration: PILOTS OF THE 332D FIGHTER GROUP BEING BRIEFED _for
combat mission in Italy_.]
These squadrons could use only a limited number of pilots, far fewer
than those black cadets qualified for such training. All applicants in
excess of requirements were placed on an indefinite waiting list where
many became overage or were requisitioned for other military and
civilian duties. Yet when the Army Air Forces finally decided to
organize a black bomber unit, the 477th Bombardment Group, in late
1943, it encountered a scarcity of black pilots and crewmen. Because
of the lack of technical and educational opportunities for Negroes in
America, fewer blacks than whites were included in the manpower pool,
and Tuskegee, already overburdened with its manifold training
functions and lacking the means to train bomber crews, was unable to
fill the training gap. Sending black cadets to white training schools
was one obvious solution; the Army Air Forces chose instead to
postpone the operational date of the 477th until its pilots could be
trained at Tuskegee. In the end, the 477th was not declared (p. 030)
operational until after the war. Even then some compromise with the
Army Air Forces' segregation principles was necessary, since Tuskegee
could not accommodate B-25 pilot transition and navigator-bombardier
training. In 1944 black officers were therefore temporarily assigned
to formerly all-white schools for such training. Tuskegee's position
as the sole and separate training center for black pilots remained
inviolate until its closing in 1946, however, and its graduates, the
"Tuskegee Airmen," continued to serve as a powerful symbol of armed
forces segregation.[2-26]
[Footnote 2-26: For a detailed discussion of the
black training program, see Osur, _Blacks in the
Army Air Forces During World War II_, ch. III; Lee,
_Employment of Negro Troops_, pp. 461-66; Charles
E. Francis, _The Tuskegee Airmen: The Story of the
Negro in the U.S. Air Force_ (Boston Bruce
Humphries, 1955).]
Training for black officer candidates other than flyers, like that of
most officer candidates throughout the Army, was integrated. At first
the possibility of integrated training seemed unlikely, for even
though Assistant Secretary of War for Air Robert A. Lovett had assured
Hastie that officer candidate training would be integrated, the
Technical Training Command announced plans in 1942 for a segregated
facility. Although the plans were quickly canceled the command's
announcement was the immediate cause for Hastie's resignation from the
War Department. The Air staff assured the Assistant Secretary of War
in January of 1943 that qualified Negroes were being sent to officer
candidate schools and to training courses "throughout the school
system of the Technical Training Command."[2-27] In fact, Negroes did
attend the Air Forces' officer candidate school at Miami Beach,
although not in great numbers. In spite of their integrated training,
however, most of these black officers were assigned to the
predominantly black units at Tuskegee and Godman fields.
[Footnote 2-27: Memo, CofAS for ASW, 12 Jan 43, ASW
291.2.]
The Army Air Forces found it easier to absorb the thousands of black
enlisted men than to handle the black flying squadrons. For the
enlisted men it created a series of units with vaguely defined duties,
usually common labor jobs operating for the most part under a bulk
allotment system that allowed the Air Forces to absorb great numbers
of new men. Through 1943 hundreds of these aviation training
squadrons, quartermaster truck companies, and engineer aviation and
air base security battalions were added to the Air Forces'
organization tables. Practically every American air base in the world
had its contingent of black troops performing the service duties
connected with air operations.
The Air Corps, like the Armor and the Artillery branches, was able to
form separate squadrons or battalions for black troops, but the
Infantry and Cavalry found it difficult to organize the growing number
of separate black battalions and regiments. The creation of black
divisions was the obvious solution, although this arrangement would
run counter to current practice, which was based in part on the Army's
experience with the 92d Division in World War I. Convinced of the poor
performance of that unit in 1918, the War Department had decided in
the 1920's not to form any more black divisions. The regiment would
serve as the basic black unit, and from time to time these regiments
would be employed as organic elements of divisions whose other
regiments and units would be white. In keeping with this decision, the
black 9th and 10th Cavalry regiments were combined in October (p. 031)
1940 with white regiments to form the 2d Cavalry Division.
Before World War II most black leaders had agreed with the Army's
opposition to all-black divisions, but for different reasons. They
considered that such divisions only served to strengthen the
segregation pattern they so opposed. In the early weeks of the war a
conference of black editors, including Walter White, pressed for the
creation of an experimental integrated division of volunteers. White
argued that such a unit would lift black morale, "have a tremendous
psychological effect upon white America," and refute the enemy's
charge that "the United States talks about democracy but practices
racial discrimination and segregation."[2-28] The NAACP organized a
popular movement in support of the idea, which was endorsed by many
important individuals and organizations.[2-29] Yet this experiment was
unacceptable to the Army. Ignoring its experience with all-volunteer
paratroopers and other special units, the War Department declared that
the volunteer system was "an ineffective and dangerous" method of
raising combat units. Admitting that the integrated division might be
an encouraging gesture toward certain minorities, General Marshall
added that "the urgency of the present military situation necessitates
our using tested and proved methods of procedure, and using them with
all haste."[2-30]
[Footnote 2-28: Ltr, Walter White to Gen Marshall, 22
Dec 41, AG 291.21 (12-22-41).]
[Footnote 2-29: See C-279, 2, Volunteer Division
Folder, NAACP Collection, Manuscripts Division,
LC.]
[Footnote 2-30: Ltr, CofS to Dorothy Canfield Fisher,
16 Feb 42, OCS 20602-254.]
Even though it rejected the idea of a volunteer, integrated division,
the Army staff reviewed in the fall of 1942 a proposal for
the assignment of some black recruits to white units. The
Organization-Mobilization Group of G-3, headed by Col. Edwin W.
Chamberlain, argued that the Army General Classification Test scores
proved that black soldiers in groups were less useful to the Army than
white soldiers in groups. It was a waste of manpower, funds, and
equipment, therefore, to organize the increasingly large numbers of
black recruits into segregated units. Not only was such organization
wasteful, but segregation "aggravated if not caused in its entirety"
the racial friction that was already plaguing the Army. To avoid both
the waste and the strife, Chamberlain recommended that the Army halt
the activation of additional black units and integrate black recruits
in the low-score categories, IV and V, into white units in the ratio
of one black to nine whites. The black recruits would be used as
cooks, orderlies, and drivers, and in other jobs which required only
the minimum basic training and which made up 10 to 20 percent of those
in the average unit. Negroes in the higher categories, I through III,
would be assigned to existing black units where they could be expected
to improve the performance of those units. Chamberlain defended his
plan against possible charges of discrimination by pointing out that
the Negroes would be assigned wholly on the basis of native capacity,
not race, and that this plan would increase the opportunities for
Negroes to participate in the war effort. To those who objected on the
grounds that the proposal meant racial integration, Chamberlain
replied that there was no more integration involved than in "the (p. 032)
employment of Negroes as servants in a white household."[2-31]
[Footnote 2-31: Draft Memo (initialed E.W.C.) for Gen
Edwards, G-3 Negro File, 1942-44. See also Lee,
_Employment of Negro Troops_, pp. 152-57.]
The Chamberlain Plan and a variant proposed the following spring
prompted discussion in the Army staff that clearly revealed general
dissatisfaction with the current policy. Nonetheless, in the face of
opposition from the service and ground forces, the plan was abandoned.
Yet because something had to be done with the mounting numbers of
black draftees, the Army staff reversed the decision made in its
prewar mobilization plans and turned once more to the concept of the
all-black division. The 93d Infantry Division was reactivated in the
spring of 1942 and the 92d the following fall. The 2d Cavalry Division
was reconstituted as an all-black unit and reactivated in February
1943. These units were capable of absorbing 15,000 or more men each
and could use men trained in the skills of practically every arm and
service.
This absorbency potential became increasingly important in 1943 when
the chairman of the War Manpower Commission, Paul V. McNutt, began to
attack the use of racial quotas in selecting inductees. He considered
the practice of questionable legality, and the commission faced
mounting public criticism as white husbands and fathers were drafted
while single healthy Negroes were not called.[2-32] Secretary Stimson
defended the legality of the quota system. He did not consider the
current practice "discriminatory in any way" so long as the Army
accepted its fair percentage of Negroes. He pointed out that the
Selective Service Act provided that no man would be inducted "_unless
and until_" he was acceptable to the services, and Negroes were
acceptable "only at a rate at which they can be properly
assimilated."[2-33] Stimson later elaborated on this theme, arguing that
the quota system would be necessary even after the Army reached full
strength because inductions would be limited to replacement of losses.
Since there were few Negroes in combat, their losses would be
considerably less than those of whites. McNutt disagreed with
Stimson's interpretation of the law and announced plans to abandon it
as soon as the current backlog of uninducted Negroes was absorbed, a
date later set for January 1944.[2-34]
[Footnote 2-32: Ltr, Paul V. McNutt to SW, 17 Feb 43,
AG 327.31 (9-19-40) (1) sec. 12.]
[Footnote 2-33: Ltr, SW to McNutt, 20 Feb 43, AG
327.31 (9-19-40) (1) sec. 12.]
[Footnote 2-34: Ltr, McNutt to SW, 23 Mar 43, AG
327.31 (9-19-40) (1) sec. 12.]
A crisis over the quota system was averted when, beginning in the
spring of 1943, the Army's monthly manpower demands outran the ability
of the Bureau of Selective Service to provide black inductees. So long
as the Army requested more Negroes than the bureau could supply,
little danger existed that McNutt would carry out his threat.[2-35] But
it was no victory for the Army. The question of the quota's legality
remained unanswered, and it appeared that the Army might be forced to
abandon the system at some future time when there was a black surplus.
[Footnote 2-35: The danger was further reduced when,
as part of a national manpower allocation reform,
President Roosevelt removed the Bureau of Selective
Service from the War Manpower Commission's control
and restored it to its independent status as the
Selective Service System on 5 December 1943. See
Stimson and Bundy, _On Active Service_, pp. 483-86;
Theodore Wyckoff, "The Office of the Secretary of
War Under Henry L. Stimson," in CMH.]
There were many reasons for the sudden shortage of black inductees (p. 033)
in the spring of 1943. Since more Negroes were leaving the service for
health or other reasons, the number of calls for black draftees had
increased. In addition, local draft boards were rejecting more
Negroes. But the basic reason for the shortage was that the magnitude
of the war had finally turned the manpower surpluses of the 1930's
into manpower shortages, and the shortages were appearing in black as
well as white levies for the armed forces. The Negro was no longer a
manpower luxury. The quota calls for Negroes rose in 1944, and black
strength stood at 701,678 men in September, approximately 9.6 percent
of the whole Army. [2-36] The percentage of black women in the Army
stayed at less than 6 percent of the Women's Army Auxiliary
Corps--after July 1943 the Women's Army Corps--throughout the war.
Training and serving under the same racial policy that governed the
employment of men, the women's corps also had a black recruitment goal
of 10 percent, but despite the active efforts of recruiters and
generally favorable publicity from civil rights groups, the volunteer
organization was unable to overcome the attitude among young black
women that they would not be well received at Army posts.[2-37]
[Footnote 2-36: Strength of the Army, 1 Jan 46,
STM-30, p. 60.]
[Footnote 2-37: Memo, Dir of Mil Pers, SOS, for G-1,
12 Sep 42, SPGAM/322.5 (WAAC) (8-24-42). See also
Edwin R. Embree, "Report of Informal Visit to
Training Camp for WAAC's Des Moines, Iowa" (c.
1942), SPWA 291.21. For a general description of
Negroes in the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps, see
Mattie E. Treadwell, _The Women's Army Corps_,
United States Army in World War II (Washington:
Government Printing Office, 1954), especially
Chapter III. See also Lee, _Employment of Negro
Troops_, pp. 421-26.]
Faced with manpower shortages, the Army began to reassess its plan to
distribute Negroes proportionately throughout the arms and services.
The demand for new service units had soared as the size of the
overseas armies grew, while black combat units, unwanted by overseas
commanders, had remained stationed in the United States. The War
Department hoped to ease the strain on manpower resources by
converting black combat troops into service troops. A notable example
of the wholesale conversion of such combat troops and one that
received considerable notice in the press was the inactivation of the
2d Cavalry Division upon its arrival in North Africa in March 1944.
Victims of the change included the 9th and 10th Cavalry regiments,
historic combat units that had fought with distinction in the Indian
wars, with Teddy Roosevelt in Cuba, and in the Philippine
Insurrection.[2-38]
[Footnote 2-38: Inactivation of the 2d Cavalry
Division began in February 1944, and its
headquarters completed the process on 10 May. The
9th Cavalry was inactivated on 7 March, the 10th
Cavalry on 20 March 1944.]
By trying to justify the conversion, Secretary Stimson only aggravated
the controversy. In the face of congressional questions and criticism
in the black press, Stimson declared that the decision stemmed from a
study of the relative abilities and status of training of the troops
in the units available for conversion. If black units were
particularly affected, it was because "many of the Negro units have
been unable to master efficiently the techniques of modern
weapons."[2-39] Thus, by the end of 1944, the Army had abandoned its
attempt to maintain a balance between black combat and service units,
and during the rest of the war most Negroes were assigned to service
units.
[Footnote 2-39: Ltr, SW to Rep. Hamilton Fish, 19 Feb
44, reprinted in U.S. Congress, House,
_Congressional Record_, 78th Cong., 2d sess., pp.
2007-08.]
According to the War Department, the relationship between Negroes (p. 034)
and the Army was a mutual obligation. Negroes had the right and duty
to serve their country to the best of their abilities; the Army had
the right and the duty to see that they did so. True, the use of black
troops was made difficult because their schooling had been largely
inferior and their work therefore chiefly unskilled. Nevertheless, the
Army staff concluded, all races were equally endowed for war and most
of the less mentally alert could fight if properly led.[2-40] A manual
on leadership observed:
War Department concern with the Negro is focused directly and
solely on the problem of the most effective use of colored troops
... the Army has no authority or intention to participate in
social reform as such but does view the problem as a matter of
efficient troop utilization. With an imposed ceiling on the
maximum strength of the Army it is the responsibility of all
officers to assure the most efficient use of the manpower
assigned.[2-41]
[Footnote 2-40: War Department Pamphlet 20-6,
_Command of Negro Troops_, 29 February 1944.]
[Footnote 2-41: Army Service Forces Manual M-5,
_Leadership and the Negro Soldier_, October 1944,
p. iv.]
But the best efforts of good officers could not avail against poor
policy. Although the Army maintained that Negroes had to bear a
proportionate share of the casualties, by policy it assigned the
majority to noncombat units and thus withheld the chance for them to
assume an equal risk. Subscribing to the advantage of making full use
of individual abilities, the Army nevertheless continued to consider
Negroes as a group and to insist that military efficiency required
racially segregated units. Segregation in turn burdened the service
with the costly provision of separate facilities for the races.
Although a large number of Negroes served in World War II, their
employment was limited in opportunity and expensive for the service.
_The Need for Change_
If segregation weakened the Army's organization for global war, it had
even more serious effects on every tenth soldier, for as it deepened
the Negro's sense of inferiority it devastated his morale. It was a
major cause of the poor performance and the disciplinary problems that
plagued so many black units. And it made black soldiers blame their
personal difficulties and misfortunes, many the common lot of any
soldier, on racial discrimination.[2-42]
[Footnote 2-42: Lee, _Employment of Negro Troops_, p.
84; for a full discussion of morale, see ch. XI.
See also David G. Mandelbaum, _Soldier Groups and
Negro Soldiers_ (Berkeley: University of California
Press, 1952); Charles Dollard and Donald Young, "In
the Armed Forces," _Survey Graphic_ 36 (January
1947):66ff.]
Deteriorating morale in black units and pressure from a critical
audience of articulate Negroes and their sympathizers led the War
Department to focus special attention on its race problem. Early in
the war Secretary Stimson had agreed with a General Staff
recommendation that a permanent committee be formed to evaluate racial
incidents, propose special reforms, and answer questions involving the
training and assignment of Negroes.[2-43] On 27 August 1942 he
established the Advisory Committee on Negro Troop Policies, with
Assistant Secretary McCloy as chairman.[2-44] Caught in the cross (p. 035)
fire of black demands and Army traditions, the committee contented
itself at first with collecting information on the racial situation
and acting as a clearinghouse for recommendations on the employment of
black troops.[2-45]
[Footnote 2-43: Memo, G-1 for CofS, 18 Jul 42; DF,
G-1 to TAG, 11 Aug 42. Both in AG 334 (Advisory
Cmte on Negro Trp Policies, 11 Jul 42) (1).]
[Footnote 2-44: The committee included the Assistant
Chiefs of Staff, G-1, of the War Department General
Staff, the Air Staff, and the Army Ground Forces;
the Director of Personnel, Army Service Forces;
General Davis, representing The Inspector General,
and an acting secretary. The Civilian Aide to the
Secretary of War was not a member, although Judge
Hastie's successor was made an _ex officio_ member
in March 1943. See Min of Mtg of Advisory Cmte, Col
J. S. Leonard, 22 Mar 43, ASW 291.2 NTC.]
[Footnote 2-45: See, for example, Memo, Recorder,
Cmte on Negro Troop Policies (Col John H.
McCormick), for CofS, sub: Negro Troops, WDCSA
291.2 (12-24-42).]
[Illustration: SERVICE CLUB, FORT HUACHUCA.]
Serious racial trouble was developing by the end of the first year of
the war. The trouble was a product of many factors, including the
psychological effects of segregation which may not have been so
obvious to the committee or even to the black soldier. Other factors,
however, were visible to all and begged for remedial action. For
example, the practice of using racially separated facilities on
military posts, which was not sanctioned in the Army's basic plan for
black troops, took hold early in the war. Many black units were
located at camps in the south, where commanders insisted on applying
local laws and customs inside the military reservations. This (p. 036)
practice spread rapidly, and soon in widely separated sections of the
country commanders were separating the races in theaters, post
exchanges, service clubs, and buses operating on posts. The
accommodations provided Negroes were separate but rarely equal, and
substandard recreational and housing facilities assigned to black
troops were a constant source of irritation. In fact the Army, through
the actions of local commanders, actually introduced Jim Crow in some
places at home and abroad. Negroes considered such practices in
violation of military regulations and inconsistent with the announced
principles for which the United States was fighting. Many believed
themselves the victims of the personal prejudices of the local
commander. Judge Hastie reported their feelings: "The traditional
mores of the South have been widely accepted and adopted by the Army
as the basis of policy and practice affecting the Negro soldier.... In
tactical organization, in physical location, in human contacts, the
Negro soldier is separated from the white soldier as completely as
possible."[2-46]
[Footnote 2-46: Memo, Hastie for SW, 22 Sep 41, sub:
Survey and Recommendations Concerning the
Integration of the Negro Soldier Into the Army,
G-1/15640-120.]
In November 1941 another controversy erupted over the discovery that
the Red Cross had established racially segregated blood banks. The Red
Cross readily admitted that it had no scientific justification for the
racial separation of blood and blamed the armed services for the
decision. Despite the evidence of science and at risk of demoralizing
the black community, the Army's Surgeon General defended the
controversial practice as necessary to insure the acceptance of a
potentially unpopular program. Ignoring constant criticism from the
NAACP and elements of the black press, the armed forces continued to
demand segregated blood banks throughout the war. Negroes appreciated
the irony of the situation, for they were well aware that a black
doctor, Charles R. Drew, had been a pioneer researcher in the plasma
extraction process and had directed the first Red Cross blood
bank.[2-47]
[Footnote 2-47: On 16 January 1942 the Navy announced
that "in deference to the wishes of those for whom
the plasma is being provided, the blood will be
processed separately so that those receiving
transfusions may be given blood of their own race."
Three days later the Chief of the Bureau of
Medicine, who was also the President's personal
physician, told the Secretary of the Navy, "It is
my opinion that at this time we cannot afford to
open up a subject such as mixing blood or plasma
regardless of the theoretical fact that there is no
chemical difference in human blood." See Memo, Rear
Adm Ross T. McIntire for SecNav, 19 Jan 42,
GenRecsNav. See also Florence Murray, ed., _Negro
Handbook, 1946-1947_ (New York: A. A. Wyn, 1948),
pp. 373-74. For effect of segregated blood banks on
black morale, see Mary A. Morton, "The Federal
Government and Negro Morale," _Journal of Negro
Education_ (Summer 1943): 452, 455-56.]
Black morale suffered further in the leadership crisis that developed
in black units early in the war. The logic of segregated units
demanded a black officer corps, but there were never enough black
officers to command all the black units. In 1942 only 0.35 percent of
the Negroes in the Army were officers, a shortcoming that could not be
explained by poor education alone.[2-48] But when the number of black
officers did begin to increase, obstacles to their employment
appeared: some white commanders, assuming that Negroes did not
possess leadership ability and that black troops preferred white (p. 037)
officers, demanded white officers for their units. Limited segregated
recreational and living facilities for black officers prevented their
assignment to some bases, while the active opposition of civilian
communities forced the Army to exclude them from others. The Army
staff practice of forbidding Negroes to outrank or command white
officers serving in the same unit not only limited the employment and
restricted the rank of black officers but also created invidious
distinctions between white and black officers in the same unit. It
tended to convince enlisted men that their black leaders were not
full-fledged officers. Thus restricted in assignment and segregated
socially and professionally, his ability and status in question, the
black officer was often an object of scorn to himself and to his men.
[Footnote 2-48: Eli Ginzberg, _The Negro Potential_
(New York: Columbia University Press, 1956), p. 85.
Ginzberg points out that only about one out of ten
black soldiers in the upper two mental categories
became an officer, compared to one out of four
white soldiers.]
The attitude and caliber of white officers assigned to black units
hardly compensated for the lack of black officers. In general, white
officers resented their assignment to black units and were quick to
seek transfer. Worse still, black units, where sensitive and patient
leaders were needed to create an effective military force, often
became, as they had in earlier wars, dumping grounds for officers
unwanted in white units.[2-49] The Army staff further aggravated black
sensibilities by showing a preference for officers of southern birth
and training, believing them to be generally more competent to
exercise command over Negroes. In reality many Negroes, especially
those from the urban centers, particularly resented southern officers.
At best these officers appeared paternalistic, and Negroes disliked
being treated as a separate and distinct group that needed special
handling and protection. As General Davis later circumspectly
reported, "many colored people of today expect only a certain line of
treatment from white officers born and reared in the South, namely,
that which follows the southern pattern, which is most distasteful to
them."[2-50]
[Footnote 2-49: Memo, DCofS to CG, AAF, 10 Aug 42,
sub: Professional Qualities of Officers Assigned to
Negro Units, WDGAP 322.99; Memo, CG, VII Corps, to
CG, AGF, 28 Aug 42, same sub, GNAGS 210.31.]
[Footnote 2-50: Brig Gen B. O. Davis, "History of a
Special Section Office of the Inspector General (29
June 1941 to 16 November 1944)," p. 8, in CMH.]
Some of these humiliations might have been less demeaning had the
black soldier been convinced that he was a full partner in the crusade
against fascism. As news of the conversion of black units from combat
to service duties and the word that no new black combat units were
being organized became a matter of public knowledge, the black press
asked: Will any black combat units be left? Will any of those left be
allowed to fight? In fact, would black units ever get overseas?
Actually, the Army had a clear-cut plan for the overseas employment of
both black service and combat units. In May 1942 the War Department
directed the Army Air Forces, Ground Forces, and Service Forces to
make sure that black troops were ordered overseas in numbers not less
than their percentage in each of these commands. Theater commanders
would be informed of orders moving black troops to their commands, but
they would not be asked to agree to their shipment beforehand. Since
troop shipments to the British Isles were the chief concern at (p. 038)
that time, the order added that "there will be no positive
restrictions on the use of colored troops in the British Isles, but
shipment of colored units to the British Isles will be limited,
initially, to those in the service categories."[2-51]
[Footnote 2-51: Ltr, TAG to CG, AAF, et al., 13 May
42, AG 291.21 (3-31-42).]
The problem here was not the Army's policy but the fact that certain
foreign governments and even some commanders in American territories
wanted to exclude Negroes. Some countries objected to black soldiers
because they feared race riots and miscegenation. Others with large
black populations of their own felt that black soldiers with their
higher rates of pay might create unrest. Still other countries had
national exclusion laws. In the case of Alaska and Trinidad, Secretary
Stimson ordered, "Don't yield." Speaking of Iceland, Greenland, and
Labrador, he commented, "Pretty cold for blacks." To the request of
Panamanian officials that a black signal construction unit be
withdrawn from their country he replied, "Tell them [the black unit]
they must complete their work--it is ridiculous to raise such
objections when the Panama Canal itself was built with black labor."
As for Chile and Venezuela's exclusion of Negroes he ruled that "As we
are the petitioners here we probably must comply."[2-52] Stimson's
rulings led to a new War Department policy: henceforth black soldiers
would be assigned without regard to color except that they would not
be sent to extreme northern areas or to any country against its will
when the United States had requested the right to station troops in
that country.[2-53]
[Footnote 2-52: Stimson's comments were not limited
to overseas areas. To a request by the Second Army
commander that Negroes be excluded from maneuvers
in certain areas of the American south he replied:
"No, get the Southerners used to them!" Memo,
ACofS, WPD, for CofS, 25 Mar 42, sub: The Colored
Troop Problem, OPD 291.2. Stimson's comments are
written marginally in ink and initialed "H.L.S."]
[Footnote 2-53: Memo, G-1 for TAG, 4 Apr 42, and
Revised Proposals, 22 Apr and 30 Apr 42. All in
G-1/15640-2.]
Ultimately, theater commanders decided which troops would be committed
to action and which units would be needed overseas; their decisions
were usually respected by the War Department where few believed that
Washington should dictate such matters. Unwilling to add racial
problems to their administrative burdens, some commanders had been
known to cancel their request for troops rather than accept black
units. Consequently, very few Negroes were sent overseas in the early
years of the war.
Black soldiers were often the victims of gross discrimination that
transcended their difficulties with the Army's administration. For
instance, black soldiers, particularly those from more integrated
regions of the country, resented local ordinances governing
transportation and recreation facilities that put them at a great
disadvantage in the important matters of leave and amusement.
Infractions of local rules were inevitable and led to heightened
racial tension and recurring violence.[2-54] At times black soldiers
themselves, reflecting the low morale and lack of discipline in their
units, instigated the violence. Whoever the culprits, the Army's files
are replete with cases of discrimination charged, investigations
launched, and exonerations issued or reforms ordered.[2-55] An
incredible amount of time and effort went into handling these cases
during the darkest days of the war--cases growing out of a policy (p. 039)
created in the name of military efficiency.
[Footnote 2-54: Memo, Civilian Aide to SW, 17 Nov 42,
ASW 291.2 NT.]
[Footnote 2-55: See, for example, AAF Central Decimal
Files for October 1942-May 1944 (RG 18). For an
extended discussion of this subject, see Lee,
_Employment of Negro Troops_, ch XI-XIII.]
Nor was the violence limited to the United States. Racial friction
also developed in Great Britain where some American troops, resenting
their black countrymen's social acceptance by the British, tried to
export Jim Crow by forcing the segregation of recreational facilities.
Appreciating the treatment they were receiving from the British, the
black soldiers fought back, and the clashes grew at times to riot
proportions. General Davis considered discrimination and prejudice the
cause of trouble, but he placed the immediate blame on local
commanders. Many commanders, convinced that they had little
jurisdiction over racial disputes in the civilian community or simply
refusing to accept responsibility, delegated the task of keeping order
to their noncommissioned officers and military police.[2-56] These men,
rarely experienced in handling racial disturbances and often
prejudiced against black soldiers, usually managed to exacerbate the
situation.
[Footnote 2-56: Memo, Brig Gen B. O. Davis for the
IG, 24 Dec 42, IG 333.9-Great Britain.]
In an atmosphere charged with rumors and counterrumors, personal
incidents involving two men might quickly blow up into riots involving
hundreds. In the summer of 1943 the Army began to reap what Ulysses
Lee called the "harvest of disorder." Race riots occurred at military
reservations in Mississippi, Georgia, California, Texas, and Kentucky.
At other stations, the Advisory Committee on Negro Troop Policies
somberly warned, there were indications of unrest ready to erupt into
violence.[2-57] By the middle of the war, violence over racial issues at
home and abroad had become a source of constant concern for the War
Department.
[Footnote 2-57: Memo, ASW for CofS, 3 Jul 43, sub:
Negro Troops, ASW 291.2 NT. The Judge Advocate
General described disturbances of this type as
military "mutiny." See The Judge Advocate General,
_Military Justice, 1 July 1940 to 31 December
1945_, p. 60, in CMH.]
_Internal Reform: Amending Racial Practices_
Concern over troop morale and discipline and the attendant problem of
racial violence did not lead to a substantial revision of the Army's
racial policy. On the contrary, the Army staff continued to insist
that segregation was a national issue and that the Army's task was to
defend the country, not alter its social customs. Until the nation
changed its racial practices or until Congress ordered such changes
for the armed forces, racially separated units would remain.[2-58] In
1941 the Army had insisted that debate on the subject was closed,[2-59]
and, in fact, except for discussion of the Chamberlain Plan there was
no serious thought of revising racial policy in the Army staff until
after the war.
[Footnote 2-58: Lee, _Employment of Negro Troops_, p.
83.]
[Footnote 2-59: Ltr, TAG to Dr. Amanda V. G. Hillyer,
Chmn Program Cmte, D.C. Branch, NAACP, 12 Apr 41,
AG 291.21 (2-28-41) (1).]
Had the debate been reopened in 1943, the traditionalists on the Army
staff would have found new support for their views in a series of surveys
made of white and black soldiers in 1942 and 1943. These surveys
supported the theory that the Army, a national institution (p. 040)
composed of individual citizens with pronounced views on race, would
meet massive disobedience and internal disorder as well as national
resistance to any substantial change in policy. One extensive survey,
covering 13,000 soldiers in ninety-two units, revealed that 88 percent
of the whites and 38 percent of the Negroes preferred segregated
units. Among the whites, 85 percent preferred separate service clubs
and 81 percent preferred separate post exchanges. Almost half of the
Negroes thought separate service clubs and post exchanges were a good
idea.[2-60] These attitudes merely reflected widely held national
views as suggested in a 1943 survey of five key cities by the Office
of War Information.[2-61] The survey showed that 90 percent of the
whites and 25 percent of the blacks questioned supported segregation.
[Footnote 2-60: Research Branch, Special Service
Division, "What the Soldier Thinks," 8 December
1942, and "Attitudes of the Negro Soldier," 28 July
1943. Both cited in Lee, _Employment of Negro
Troops_, pp. 304-06. For detailed analysis, see
Samuel A. Stouffer et al., _Studies in Social
Psychology in World War II_, vol. I, _The American
Soldier: Adjustment During Army Life_ (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1949), pp. 556-80. For
a more personal view of black experiences in World
War II service clubs, see Margaret Halsey's _Color
Blind: A White Woman Looks at the Negro_ (New York:
Simon and Schuster, 1946). For a comprehensive
expression of the attitudes of black soldiers, see
Mary P. Motley, ed., _The Invisible Soldier: The
Experience of the Black Soldier, World War II_
(Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1975), a
compilation of oral histories by World War II
veterans. Although these interviews were conducted
a quarter of a century after the event and in the
wake of the modern civil rights movement, they
provide useful insight to the attitude of black
soldiers toward discrimination in the services.]
[Footnote 2-61: Office of War Information, The
Negroes' Role in the War: A Study of White and
Colored Opinions (Memorandum 59, Surveys Division,
Bureau of Special Services), 8 Jul 43, in CMH.]
Some Army officials considered justification by statistics alone a
risky business. Reviewing the support for segregation revealed in the
surveys, for example, the Special Services Division commented: "Many
of the Negroes and some of the whites who favor separation in the Army
indicate by their comments that they are opposed to segregation in
principle. They favor separation in the Army to avoid trouble or
unpleasantness." Its report added that the longer a Negro remained in
the Army, the less likely he was to support segregation.[2-62] Nor did
it follow from the overwhelming support for segregation that a policy
of integration would result in massive resistance. As critics later
pointed out, the same surveys revealed that almost half the
respondents expressed a strong preference for civilian life, but the
Army did not infer that serious disorders would result if these men
were forced to remain in uniform.[2-63]
[Footnote 2-62: Special Services Division, "What the
Soldier Thinks," Number 2, August 1943, pp. 58-59,
SSD 291.2.]
[Footnote 2-63: Dollard and Young, "In the Armed
Forces," p. 68.]
By 1943 Negroes within and without the War Department had just about
exhausted arguments for a policy change. After two years of trying,
Judge Hastie came to believe that change was possible only in response
to "strong and manifest public opinion." He concluded that he would be
far more useful as a private citizen who could express his views
freely and publicly than he was as a War Department employee, bound to
conform to official policy. Quitting the department, Hastie joined the
increasingly vocal black organizations in a sustained attack on the
Army's segregation policy, an attack that was also being translated
into political action by the major civil rights organizations. In
1943, a full year before the national elections, representatives of
twenty-five civil rights groups met and formulated the demands (p. 041)
they would make of the presidential candidates: full integration (some
groups tempered this demand by calling for integrated units of
volunteers); abolition of racial quotas; abolition of segregation in
recreational and other Army facilities; abolition of blood plasma
segregation; development of an educational program in race relations
in the Army; greater black participation in combat forces; and the
progressive removal of black troops from areas where they were subject
to disrespect, abuse, and even violence.[2-64]
[Footnote 2-64: New York _Times_, December 2, 1943.]
The Army could not afford to ignore these demands completely, as
Truman K. Gibson, Jr., Judge Hastie's successor, pointed out.[2-65] The
political situation indicated that the racial policy of the armed
forces would be an issue in the next national election. Recalling the
changes forced on the Army as a result of political pressures applied
before the 1940 election, Gibson predicted that actions that might now
seem impolitic to the Army and the White House might not seem so
during the next campaign when the black vote could influence the
outcome in several important states, including New York, Pennsylvania,
Illinois, and Michigan. Already the Chicago _Tribune_ and other
anti-administration groups were trying to encourage black protest in
terms not always accurate but nonetheless believable to the black
voter. Gibson suggested that the Army act before the political
pressure became even more intense.[2-66]
[Footnote 2-65: Gibson, a lawyer and a graduate of
the University of Chicago, became Judge Hastie's
assistant in 1940. After Hastie's resignation on 29
January 1943, Gibson served as acting civilian aide
and assumed the position permanently on 21
September 1943. See Memo, ASW for Admin Asst (John
W. Martyn), 21 Sep 43, ASW 291.2 NT-Civ Aide.]
[Footnote 2-66: Memo, Gibson to ASW, 3 Nov 43, ASW
291.2 NT. See also New York _Times_, December 2,
1943.]
Caught between the black demands and War Department traditions, the
Advisory Committee on Negro Troop Policies launched an attack--much
too late and too weak, its critics agreed--on what it perceived as the
causes of the Army's racial disorders. Some of the credit for this
attack must go to Truman Gibson. No less dedicated to abolition of
racial segregation than Hastie, Gibson eschewed the grand gesture and
emphasized those practical changes that could be effected one step at
a time. For all his zeal, Gibson was admirably detached.[2-67] He knew
that his willingness to recognize that years of oppression and
injustice had marred the black soldier's performance would earn for
him the scorn of many civil rights activists, but he also knew that
his fairness made him an effective advocate in the War Department. He
worked closely with McCloy's committee, always describing with his
alternatives for action their probable effect upon the Army, the
public, and the developing military situation. As a result of the
close cooperation between the Advisory Committee and Gibson, the Army
for the first time began to agree on practical if not policy changes.
[Footnote 2-67: For discussion of Gibson's attitude
and judgments, see Interv, author with Evans, 3 Jun
73.]
The Advisory Committee's first campaign was directed at local commanders.
After a long review of the evidence, the committee was convinced that
the major cause of racial disorder was the failure of commanders in
some echelons to appreciate the seriousness of racial unrest and their
own responsibility for dealing with the discipline, morale, and (p. 042)
welfare of their men. Since it found that most disturbances began with
real or fancied incidents of discrimination, the committee concluded
that there should be no discrimination against Negroes in the matter
of privileges and accommodations and none in favor of Negroes that
compromised disciplinary standards. The committee wanted local
commanders to be reminded that maintaining proper discipline and good
order among soldiers, and between soldiers and civilians, was a
definite command responsibility.[2-68]
[Footnote 2-68: Memo, Chmn, Advisory Cmte, for CofS,
3 Jul 43, sub: Negro Troops, ASW 291.2 NT. This was
not sent until 6 July.]
General Marshall incorporated the committee's recommendations in a
letter to the field. He concluded by saying that "failure on the part
of any commander to concern himself personally and vigorously with
this problem will be considered as evidence of lack of capacity and
cause for reclassification and removal from assignment."[2-69] At the
same time, the Chief of Staff did not adopt several of the committee's
specific recommendations. He did not require local commanders to
recommend changes in War Department policy on the treatment of Negroes
and the organization and employment of black units. Nor did he require
them to report on steps taken by them to follow the committee's
recommendations. Moreover, he did not order the dispatch of black
combat units to active theaters although the committee had pointed to
this course as "the most effective means of reducing tension among
Negro troops."
[Footnote 2-69: Memo, CofS for CG, AAF, et al., 13
Jul 43, sub: Negro Troops, WDCSA 291.21.]
Next, the Advisory Committee turned its attention to the black press.
Judge Hastie and the representatives of the senior civil rights
organizations were judicious in their criticism and accurate in their
charges, but this statement could not be made for much of the black
press. Along with deserving credit for spotlighting racial injustices
and giving a very real impetus to racial progress, a segment of the
black press had to share the blame for fomenting racial disorder by
the frequent publication of inaccurate and inflammatory war stories.
Some field commanders charged that the constant criticism was
detrimental to troop morale and demanded that the War Department
investigate and even censor particular black newspapers. In July 1943
the Army Service Forces recommended that General Marshall officially
warn the editors against printing inciting and untrue stories and
suggested that if this caution failed sedition proceedings be
instituted against the culprits.[2-70] General Marshall followed a more
moderate course suggested by Assistant Secretary McCloy.[2-71] The Army
staff amplified and improved the services of the Bureau of Public
Relations by appointing Negroes to the bureau and by releasing more
news items of special interest to black journalists. The result was a
considerable increase in constructive and accurate stories on (p. 043)
black participation in the war, although articles and editorials
continued to be severely critical of the Army's segregation policy.
[Footnote 2-70: Memo, Advisory Cmte for CofS, 16 Mar
43, sub: Inflammatory Publications, ASW 291.2 NT
Cmte; Memo, CG, 4th Service Cmd, ASF, to CG, ASF,
12 Jul 43, sub: Disturbances Among Negro Troops,
with attached note initialed by Gen Marshall, WDCSA
291.2 (12 Jul 43).]
[Footnote 2-71: Memo, J. J. McC (John J. McCloy) for
Gen Marshall, 21 Jul 43, with attached note signed
"GCM," ASW 291.2 NT.]
The proposal to send black units into combat, rejected by Marshall
when raised by the Advisory Committee in 1943, became the preeminent
racial issue in the Army during the next year.[2-72] It was vitally
necessary, the Advisory Committee reasoned, that black troops not be
wasted by leaving them to train endlessly in camps around the country,
and that the War Department begin making them a "military asset." In
March 1944 it recommended to Secretary Stimson that black units be
introduced into combat and that units and training schedules be
reorganized if necessary to insure that this deployment be carried out
as promptly as possible. Elaborating on the committee's
recommendation, Chairman McCloy added:
There has been a tendency to allow the situation to develop where
selections are made on the basis of efficiency with the result
that the colored units are discarded for combat service, but
little is done by way of studying new means to put them in shape
for combat service.
With so large a portion of our population colored, with the
example of the effective use of colored troops (of a much lower
order of intelligence) by other nations, and with the many
imponderables that are connected with the situation, we must, I
think, be more affirmative about the use of our Negro troops. If
present methods do not bring them to combat efficiency, we should
change those methods. That is what this resolution purports to
recommend.[2-73]
[Footnote 2-72: Min of Mtg of Advisory Cmte on Negro
Troop Policies, 29 Feb 44, ASW 291.2 Negro Troops
Cmte; Lee, _Employment of Negro Troops_, pp.
449-50.]
[Footnote 2-73: Memo, ASW for SW, 2 Mar 44, inclosing
formal recommendations, WDCSA 291.2/13 Negroes
(1944).]
Stimson agreed, and on 4 March 1944 the Advisory Committee met with
members of the Army staff to decide on combat assignments for
regimental combat teams from the 92d and 93d Divisions. In order that
both handpicked soldiers and normal units might be tested, the team
from the 93d would come from existing units of that division, and the
one from the 92d would be a specially selected group of volunteers.
General Marshall and his associates continued to view the commitment
of black combat troops as an experiment that might provide
documentation for the future employment of Negroes in combat.[2-74] In
keeping with this experiment, the Army staff suggested to field
commanders how Negroes might be employed and requested continuing
reports on the units' progress.
[Footnote 2-74: Pogue, _Organizer of Victory_, p.
99.]
The belated introduction of major black units into combat helped
alleviate the Army's racial problems. After elements of the 93d
Division were committed on Bougainville in March 1944 and an advanced
group of the 92d landed in Italy in July, the Army staff found it
easier to ship smaller supporting units to combat theaters, either as
separate units or as support for larger units, a course that reduced
the glut of black soldiers stationed in the United States. Recognizing
that many of these units had poor leaders, Lt. Gen. Lesley J. McNair,
head of the Army Ground Forces, ordered that, "if practicable," all
leaders of black units who had not received "excellent" or higher (p. 044)
in their efficiency ratings would be replaced before the units were
scheduled for overseas deployment.[2-75] Given the "if practicable"
loophole, there was little chance that all the units would go overseas
with "excellent" commanders.
[Footnote 2-75: Memo, CG, AGF, for CG's, Second Army,
et al., n.d., sub: Efficiency Ratings of Commanders
of Negro Units Scheduled for Overseas Shipment,
GNGAP-L 201.61/9.]
[Illustration: 93D DIVISION TROOPS IN BOUGAINVILLE, APRIL 1944. _Men,
packing mortar shells, cross the West Branch Texas River._]
A source of pride to the black community, the troop commitments also
helped to reduce national racial tensions, but they did little for the
average black soldier who remained stationed in the United States. He
continued to suffer discrimination within and without the gates of the
camp. The committee attributed that discrimination to the fact that
War Department policy was not being carried out in all commands. In
some instances local commanders were unaware of the policy; in others
they refused to pay sufficient attention to the seriousness of what
was, after all, but one of many problems facing them. For some time
committee members had been urging the War Department to write special
instructions, and finally in February 1944 the department issued a
pamphlet designed to acquaint local commanders with an official
definition of Army racial policy and to improve methods of developing
leaders in black units. _Command of Negro Troops_ was a landmark (p. 045)
publication.[2-76] Its frank statement of the Army's racial problems,
its scholarly and objective discussion of the disadvantages that
burdened the black soldier, and its outline of black rights and
responsibilities clearly revealed the committee's intention to foster
racial harmony by promoting greater command responsibility. The
pamphlet represented a major departure from previous practice and
served as a model for later Army and Navy statements on race.[2-77]
[Footnote 2-76: WD PAM 20-6, _Command of Negro
Troops_, 29 Feb 44.]
[Footnote 2-77: The Army Service Forces published a
major supplement to War Department Pamphlet 20-6 in
October 1944, see Army Service Forces Manual M-5,
_Leadership and the Negro Soldier_.]
But pamphlets alone would not put an end to racial discrimination; the
committee had to go beyond its role of instructor. Although the War
Department had issued a directive on 10 March 1943 forbidding the
assignment of any recreational facility, "including theaters and post
exchanges," by race and requiring the removal of signs labeling
facilities for "white" and "colored" soldiers, there had been little
alteration in the recreational situation. The directive had allowed
the separate use of existing facilities by designated units and camp
areas, so that in many places segregation by unit had replaced
separation by race, and inspectors and commanders reported that
considerable confusion existed over the War Department's intentions.
On other posts the order to remove the racial labels from facilities
was simply disregarded. On 8 July 1944 the committee persuaded the War
Department to issue another directive clearly informing commanders
that facilities could be allocated to specific areas or units, but
that all post exchanges and theaters must be opened to all soldiers
regardless of race. All government transportation, moreover, was to be
available to all troops regardless of race. Nor could soldiers be
restricted to certain sections of government vehicles on or off base,
regardless of local customs.[2-78]
[Footnote 2-78: Ltr, TAG to CG, AAF, et al., 8 Jul
44, sub: Recreational Facilities, AG 353.8 (5 Jul
44) OB-S-A-M.]
Little dramatic change ensued in day-to-day life on base. Some
commanders, emphasizing that part of the directive which allowed the
designation of facilities for units and areas, limited the degree of
the directive's application to post exchanges and theaters and ignored
those provisions concerned with individual rights. This interpretation
only added to the racial unrest that culminated in several incidents,
of which the one at the officers' club at Freeman Field, Indiana, was
the most widely publicized.[2-79] After this incident the committee
promptly asked for a revision of WD Pamphlet 20-6 on the command of
black troops that would clearly spell out the intention of the authors
of the directive to apply its integration provisions explicitly to
"officers' clubs, messes, or similar social organizations."[2-80] In
effect the War Department was declaring that racial separation applied
to units only. For the first time it made a clear distinction (p. 046)
between Army race policy to be applied on federal military reservations
and local civilian laws and customs to be observed by members of the
armed forces when off post. In Acting Secretary Patterson's words:
The War Department has maintained throughout the emergency and
present war that it is not an appropriate medium for effecting
social readjustments but has insisted that all soldiers,
regardless of race, be afforded equal opportunity to enjoy the
recreational facilities which are provided at posts, camps and
stations. The thought has been that men who are fulfilling the
same obligation, suffering the same dislocation of their private
lives, and wearing the identical uniform should, within the
confines of the military establishment, have the same privileges
for rest and relaxation.[2-81]
[Footnote 2-79: Actually, the use of officers' clubs
by black troops was clearly implied if not ordained
in paragraph 19 of Army Regulation 210-10, 20
December 1940, which stated that any club operating
on federal property must be open to all officers
assigned to the post, camp, or station. For more on
the Freeman Field incident, see Chapter 5, below.]
[Footnote 2-80: Memo, Secy, Advisory Cmte, for
Advisory Cmte on Special Troop Policies, 13 Jun 45,
sub: Minutes of Meeting, ASW 291.2 NT.]
[Footnote 2-81: Ltr, Actg SW to Gov. Chauncey Sparks
of Alabama, 1 Sep 44, WDCSA 291.2 (26 Aug 44).]
Widely disseminated by the black press as the "anti-Jim Crow law," the
directive and its interpretation by senior officials produced the
desired result. Although soldiers most often continued to frequent the
facilities in their own base areas, in effect maintaining racial
separation, they were free to use any facilities, and this knowledge
gradually dispelled some of the tensions on posts where restrictions
of movement had been a constant threat to good order.
With some pride, Assistant Secretary McCloy claimed on his Advisory
Committee's first birthday that the Army had "largely eliminated
discrimination against the Negroes within its ranks, going further in
this direction than the country itself."[2-82] He was a little
premature. Not until the end of 1944 did the Advisory Committee
succeed in eliminating the most glaring examples of discrimination
within the Army. Even then race remained an issue, and isolated racial
incidents continued to occur.
[Footnote 2-82: Ltr, ASW to Herbert B. Elliston,
Editor, Washington _Post_, 5 Aug 43, ASW 291.2 NT
(Gen).]
_Two Exceptions_
Departmental policy notwithstanding, a certain amount of racial
integration was inevitable during a war that mobilized a biracial army
of eight million men. Through administrative error or necessity,
segregation was ignored on many occasions, and black and white
soldiers often worked and lived together in hospitals,[2-83] rest camps,
schools, and, more rarely, units. But these were isolated cases,
touching relatively few men, and they had no discernible effect on
racial policy. Of much more importance was the deliberate integration
in officer training schools and in the divisions fighting in the
European theater in 1945. McCloy referred to these deviations from
policy as experiments "too limited to afford general conclusions."[2-84]
But if they set no precedents, they at least challenged the Army's
cherished assumptions on segregation and strengthened the postwar
demands for change.
[Footnote 2-83: Ltr, USW to Roane Waring, National
Cmdr, American Legion, 5 May 43, SW 291.2 NT.
Integrated hospitals did not appear until 1943. See
Robert J. Parks, "The Development of Segregation in
U.S. Army Hospitals, 1940-1942," _Military Affairs_
37 (December 1973): 145-50.]
[Footnote 2-84: Ltr, ASW to SecNav, 22 Aug 45, ASW
291.2 NT (Gen).]
The Army integrated its officer candidate training in an effort to
avoid the mistakes of the World War I program. In 1917 Secretary of
War Newton D. Baker had established a separate training school for (p. 047)
black officer candidates at Fort Des Moines, Iowa, with disappointing
results. To fill its quotas the school had been forced to lower its
entrance standards, and each month an arbitrary number of black
officer candidates were selected and graduated with little regard for
their qualifications. Many World War I commanders agreed that the
black officers produced by the school proved inadequate as troop
commanders, and postwar staff studies generally opposed the future use
of black officers. Should the Army be forced to accept black officers
in the future, these commanders generally agreed, they should be
trained along with whites.[2-85]
[Footnote 2-85: Ltr, William Hastie to Lee Nichols,
15 Jul 53, in Nichols Collection, CMH; see also
Lee, _Employment of Negro Troops_ pp. 15-20; Army
War College Misc File 127-1 through 127-22, AMHRC.]
[Illustration: GUN CREW OF BATTERY B, 598TH FIELD ARTILLERY, _moving
into position near the Arno River, Italy, September 1944_.]
Despite these criticisms, mobilization plans between the wars all
assumed that black officers would be trained and commissioned,
although, as the 1937 mobilization plan put it, their numbers would be
limited to those required to provide officers for organizations
authorized to have black officers.[2-86] No detailed plans were drawn up
on the nature of this training, but by the eve of World War II a
policy had become fixed: Negroes were to be chosen and trained
according to the same standards as white officers, preferably in the
same schools.[2-87] The War Department ignored the subject of race (p. 048)
when it established the officer candidate schools in 1941. "The basic
and predominating consideration governing selections to OCS," The
Adjutant General announced, would be "outstanding qualities of
leadership as demonstrated by actual services in the Army."[2-88]
General Davis, who participated in the planning conferences, reasoned
that integrated training would be vital for the cooperation that would
be necessary in battle. He agreed with the War Department's silence on
race, adding, "you can't have Negro, white, or Jewish officers, you've
got to have American officers."[2-89]
[Footnote 2-86: As published in Mobilization
Regulation 1-2 (1938 and May 1939 versions), par.
11d, and 15 Jul 39 version, par. 13b.]
[Footnote 2-87: Lee, _Employment of Negro Troops_, p.
50.]
[Footnote 2-88: TAG Ltr, 26 Apr 41, AG 352 (4-10-41)
M-M-C.]
[Footnote 2-89: Davis, "History of a Special Section
Office of the Inspector General."]
[Illustration: TANKERS OF THE 761ST MEDIUM TANK BATTALION _prepare for
action in the European theater, August 1944_.]
The Army's policy failed to consider one practical problem: if race
was ignored in War Department directives, would black candidates ever
be nominated and selected for officer training? Early enrollment
figures suggested they would not. Between July 1941, when the schools
opened, and October 1941, only seventeen out of the 1,997 students
enrolled in candidate schools were Negroes. Only six more Negroes
entered during the next two months.[2-90]
[Footnote 2-90: Eleven of these were candidates at
the Infantry School, 2 at the Field Artillery
School, 7 at the Quartermaster School, and 1 each
at the Cavalry, Ordnance, and Finance Schools.
Memo, TAG for Admin Asst, OSW, 16 Sep 41, sub:
Request of the Civ Aide to the SW for Data Relative
to Negro Soldiers, AG 291.21 (9-12-41) M; Memo, TAG
for Civ Aide to SW, 18 Nov 41, sub: Request for
Data Relative to Negro Soldiers Admitted to OCS, AG
291.21 (10-30-41) RB.]
Some civil rights spokesmen argued for the establishment of a (p. 049)
quota system, and a few Negroes even asked for a return to segregated
schools to insure a more plentiful supply of black officers. Even
before the schools opened, Judge Hastie warned Secretary Stimson that
any effective integration plan "required a directive to Corps Area
Commanders indicating that Negroes are to be selected in numbers
exactly or approximately indicated for particular schools."[2-91] But
the planners had recommended the integrated schools precisely to avoid
a quota system. They were haunted by the Army's 1917 experience,
although the chief of the Army staff's Organizations Division did not
allude to these misgivings when he answered Judge Hastie. He argued
that a quota could not be defended on any grounds "except those of a
political nature" and would be "race discrimination against the
whites."[2-92]
[Footnote 2-91: Ltr, Hastie to SW, 8 May 41, ASW
291.2 NT.]
[Footnote 2-92: Memo, ACofS, G-3, for CofS, 12 May
41, sub: Negro Officers; Memo, ACofS, G-3, for
ACofS, G-1 (ATTN: Col Wharton), 12 Jun 41, same
sub. Both in WDGOT 291.2.]
General Marshall agreed that racial parity could not be achieved at
the expense of commissioning unqualified men, but he was equally
adamant about providing equal opportunity for all qualified
candidates, black and white. He won support for his position from some
of the civil rights advocates.[2-93] These arguments may not have swayed
Hastie, but in the end he dropped the idea of a regular quota system,
judging it unworkable in the case of the officer candidate schools. He
concluded that many commanders approached the selection of officer
candidates with a bias against the Negro, and he recommended that a
directive or confidential memorandum be sent to commanders charged
with the selection of officer candidates informing them that a certain
minimum percentage of black candidates was to be chosen. Hastie's
recommendation was ignored, but the widespread refusal of local
commanders to approve or transmit applications of Negroes, or even to
give them access to appropriate forms, halted when Secretary Stimson
and the Army staff made it plain that they expected substantial
numbers of Negroes to be sent to the schools.[2-94]
[Footnote 2-93: Pogue, _Organizer of Victory_, p.
96.]
[Footnote 2-94: Memo, Hastie for ASW, 5 Sep 41,
G-1/15640-120; Ltr, Hastie to Nichols, 15 Jul 53;
Tab C to AG 320.2 (11-24-42).]
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
meanwhile moved quickly to prove that the demand for a return to
segregated schools, made by Edgar G. Brown, president of the United
States Government Employees, and broadcaster Fulton Lewis, Jr.,
enjoyed little backing in the black community. "We respectfully
submit," Walter White informed Stimson and Roosevelt, "that no leader
considered responsible by intelligent Negro or white Americans would
make such a request."[2-95] In support of its stand the NAACP issued a
statement signed by many influential black leaders.
[Footnote 2-95: Telg, Walter White, NAACP, to SW and
President Roosevelt, 23 Oct 41, AG 291.21
(10-23-41) (3); Ltr, Edgar W. Brown to President
Roosevelt and SW, 15 Oct 41, AG 291.2 (10-15-41)
(1). See also Memo, ACofS, G-3, for CofS, 23 Oct
41, sub: Negro Officer Candidate Schools,
G-3/43276.]
[Illustration: WAAC REPLACEMENTS _training at Fort Huachuca, December
1942_.]
The segregationists attacked integration of the officer candidate (p. 050)
schools for the obvious reasons. A group of Florida congressmen, for
example, protested to the Army against the establishment of an
integrated Air Corps school at Miami Beach. The War Department
received numerous complaints when living quarters at the schools were
integrated. The president of the White Supremacy League complained
that young white candidates at Fort Benning "have to eat and sleep
with Negro candidates," calling it "the most damnable outrage that was
ever perpetrated on the youth of the South." To all such complaints
the War Department answered that separation was not always possible
because of the small number of Negroes involved.[2-96]
[Footnote 2-96: Ltr, Horace Wilkinson to Rep. John J.
Sparkman (Alabama), 24 Aug 43; Ltr, TAG to Rep.
John Starnes (Alabama), 15 Sep 43. Both in AG 095
(Wilkinson) (28 Aug 43). See also Interv, Nichols
with Ulysses Lee, 1953.]
In answering these complaints the Army developed its ultimate
justification for integrated officer schools: integration was
necessary on the grounds of efficiency and economy. As one Army
spokesman put it, "our objection to separate schools is based (p. 051)
primarily on the fact that black officer candidates are eligible
from every branch of the Army, including the Armored Force and tank
destroyer battalions, and it would be decidedly uneconomical to
attempt to gather in one school the materiel and instructor personnel
necessary to give training in all these branches."[2-97]
[Footnote 2-97: Ltr, SGS to Sen. Carl Hayden
(Arizona), 12 Dec 41, AG 352 (12-12-41). See also
Memo, ACofS, G-3, for CofS, 23 Oct 41, sub: Negro
Officer Candidate Schools, G-3/43276.]
Officer candidate training was the Army's first formal experiment with
integration. Many blacks and whites lived together with a minimum of
friction, and, except in flight school, all candidates trained
together.[2-98] Yet in some schools the number of black officer
candidates made racially separate rooms feasible, and Negroes were
usually billeted and messed together. In other instances Army
organizations were slow to integrate their officer training. The
Women's Army Auxiliary Corps, for example, segregated black candidates
until late 1942 when Judge Hastie brought the matter to McCloy's
attention.[2-99] Nevertheless, the Army's experiment was far more
important than its immediate results indicated. It proved that even in
the face of considerable opposition the Army was willing to abandon
its segregation policy when the issues of economy and efficiency were
made sufficiently clear and compelling.
[Footnote 2-98: Dollard and Young, "In the Armed
Forces."]
[Footnote 2-99: Memos, Hastie for ASW, 4 Nov 42 and
15 Dec 42; Ltr, Maj Gen A. D. Bruce, Cmdr, Tank
Destroyer Center, to ASW, 31 Dec 42. All in ASW
291.2 NT (12-2-42).]
The Army's second experiment with integration came in part from the
need for infantry replacements during the Allied advance across
Western Europe in the summer and fall of 1944.[2-100] The Ground Force
Replacement Command had been for some time converting soldiers from
service units to infantry, and even as the Germans launched their
counterattack in the Ardennes the command was drawing up plans to
release thousands of soldiers in Lt. Gen. John C. H. Lee's
Communications Zone and train them as infantrymen. These plans left
the large reservoir of black manpower in the theater untapped until
General Lee suggested that General Dwight D. Eisenhower permit black
service troops to volunteer for infantry training and eventual
employment as individual replacements. General Eisenhower agreed, and
on 26 December Lee issued a call to the black troops for volunteers to
share "the privilege of joining our veteran units at the front to
deliver the knockout blow." The call was limited to privates in the
upper four categories of the Army General Classification Test who had
had some infantry training. If noncommissioned officers wanted to
apply, they had to accept a reduction in grade. Although patronizing
in tone, the plan was a bold departure from War Department policy: "It
is planned to assign you without regard to color or race to the units
where assistance is most needed, and give you the opportunity of
fighting shoulder to shoulder to bring about victory.... Your
relatives and friends everywhere have been urging that you be granted
this privilege."[2-101]
[Footnote 2-100: For a detailed discussion, see Lee,
_Employment of Negro Troops_, Chapter XXII.]
[Footnote 2-101: Ltr, Lt Gen John C. H. Lee to
Commanders of Colored Troops, ComZ, 26 Dec 44, sub:
Volunteers for Training and Assignment as
Reinforcements, AG 322X353XSGS.]
The revolutionary nature of General Lee's plan was not lost on (p. 052)
Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Force. Arguing that the
circular promising integrated service would embarrass the Army, Lt.
Gen. Walter Bedell Smith, the chief of staff, recommended that General
Eisenhower warn the War Department that civil rights spokesmen might
seize on this example to demand wider integration. To avoid future
moves that might compromise Army policy, Smith wanted permission to
review any Communications Zone statements on Negroes before they were
released.
General Eisenhower compromised. Washington was not consulted, and
Eisenhower himself revised the circular, eliminating the special call
for black volunteers and the promise of integration on an individual
basis. He substituted instead a general appeal for volunteers, adding
the further qualification that "in the event that the number of
suitable negro volunteers exceeds the replacement needs of negro
combat units, these men wi
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