How a stroke of the pen changed the Army forever.
Cornelius L. Bynum says Truman’s order showed that rationalizations of discrimination can be stripped by basic inclusion.
Sixty-nine years ago, civil rights activist A. Philip Randolph celebrated as President HarryExecutive Order 9981 to desegregate the military. It had been along journey for Randolph and civil rights advocates on this front. Initially, Truman questioned Randolph’ s patriotism and loyalty to the nation when, as founder of the League for Non-Violent Civil Disobedience Against Military Segregation, Randolph pressured him to issue this order. But Randolph’ s refusal to yield, and Truman’ s calculated look at the political landscape, ultimately convinced the president to take what would be one of the most toward achieving a more equal society.
Randolph’ s efforts have continued to pay off. Unlike other more acclaimed civil rightshave faced set backs and successful resistance, E. O. 9981 has proven durable andscuttle. It directly ended segregation in the armed forces, and the U.S. military slowly began to deploy integrated combat regimen ts during the Korean War two years later.
In fact, both the speed of with Truman’ s directive and the overallJim Crow in every other aspect American society makes the order all the more remarkable. Its fundamental transformation of the U.S. military makes clear that, when racist rationalizations of discrimination, in justice and inequality are stripped away, American institutions can be strengthened by en acting basic principles of inclusion.
In 1947, with tensions ratcheting up between the United States and the Soviet Union, Randolph intensifiedhis demands to dismantle racial segregation in the armed forces. U.S. military leaders, as well as Truman, initially resisted, fearing the ramifications of Randolph’ s advice to young men, both black and white, to resist the draft in the midst of the evolving Cold War.
But Randolph understood how much of a difference presidentialaction could make. His 1941 March On Washington Movement had successfully pressured President Franklin D. Roosevelt into issuing an executive order banning racial discrimination in war industry employment. But it failed to achieve its second goal of desegregating military service and training. As the Fair EmploymentPractice Committee created by Roosevelt’ s executive order collapsed under pressure from Southern Democrats in Congress, Randolph and other African Americans were determined to see the problem of military segregation addressed.
Truman also recognized the need to take some sort of action in response to this growing grass roots pressure. In 1946, he authorized the first presidential committee on civil rights. This body, which included civil rights activists and labor and religious leaders among others, developed a blue print for dismantling the nation’ s racial ca ste system that specifically called for measures like federal anti-lynching legislation, abolishingpoll taxes, ending ballot box discrimination and desegregating the military.
For Truman, though, E. O .9981 was as much political calculation as it was a display of personal principle. He recognized the difficult electoral landscape he faced in the 1948 presidential election. He had challenge rs across the political and partisan spectrum. Henry Wallace, the former Secretary of Commerce and Roosevelt’ s Vice President from 1941-45, was on his left. The popular and well financed governor of New York, Thomas Dewey, ran as the Republicancandidate. And Southern Democrats bolted the party to support their own candidate, St rom Thurmond.
Convinced by Randolph and others that African Americans would no longer accept Jim Crow in the military and desperate to shore up political support among urban African Americans, Truman issued a directive man dating “equality of treatment and opportunityfor all people in the armed services without regard to race, color, religion, or national origin .” Though the pace of full-scale change was slow, the executive order was one of the most significant steps toward equal justice since the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 and the ratification of the 13 th Amendment to the U.S. Constitutionthat abolished slavery in 1865.
Indeed, when considered alongside other milestone civil rights achievements, E. O .9981 is remarkable for its effectiveness and durability. The 14 th Amendment intended to confer citizenship on freed men. It ultimately faltered, prompting enactment of the 15 th Amendment banning racial exclusions from voting. However, grandfather clause sand other methods of disenfranchising African Americans largelyin some parts of the South well into the 1960s.
Even the momentous civil rights actions that we collectively recognize as modern land marks of racial progress fail to match the fundamental and lasting institutional change wrought by E. O .9981. The Supreme Court’ s decision in Brownv. Board of Education outlawed racial discrimination in public education, but the nation’ s public schools have never fully met the Court’ s mandate to desegregate. Even today in schools, neighborhoods, churches and restaurants, there is still a the Warren court’ s assertion and the lived reality of racial ly-divided social spaces.
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 that intended to prevent voter suppression andplaces that had historically denied African Americans the right to vote has been under a steady assault almost from the day Lyndon Johnson signed it into law. Modern voter suppression efforts across the country and in parts of the South, in particular, are only the recent examples of the long standing effort to blunt the impact of this milestone legislation from the civil rights era.
In this context, E. O .9981 stands as a profound and lasting achievement. Regardlessof Truman’ s motivations for issuing this directive and th emili tar y’ s initial resistance to it, no other institution in has been as successful or effective in making systemic racial integration work. The military, with its clear hierarchy and commitment to discipline, made racial inclusion a direct order, and it then became a reality for troops. This success revealed how inclusion could become an organizational strength, ultimatelyestablishing an institutional blue print for other branches of government, organizations and corporations. Though there are still serious racial problems that the nation’s armed forces need to address, it is undeniable that E. O .9981 effected the kind of broad and sustained change rivaled by few other civil rights actions.
As the nation continues to struggle with problems of racial justice and equality reflecting back on E. O .9981 seems more than timely. Its wholesale transformation of the U.S. military illustrates the potential for institutions to usher in social change. E. O .9981 should serve as a bright beacon for making equally important improvements with regard to race, justice and equality in other face ts of Americanlife.