Issued on July 26, 1948, Harry Truman’s Executive Order 9981 eradicated segregation in military. The response from the military units, however, ranged from muted to outright hostility. This was no surprise. Truman’s decision & the reactions to it symbolized Black Americans’ broad struggle for dignity, respect, opportunity, and freedom in the United States of America.
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In the final days of the 1948 election, President Harry S. Truman made an historic campaign appearance in Harlem, becoming the first U.S. president to visit the symbolic capital of Black America. The invitation came from Anna Arnold Hedgeman, a Black American political operative who led his campaign's efforts to connect with the Black community.
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Truman's victory in the race was secured by a narrow margin nationwide, partly due to the support from the Black electorate and Hedgeman's efforts. However, his civil rights program faced significant obstacles and failed to gain traction. To effect change, Truman had to resort to executive orders, cajoling, and arm-twisting from that point onward.
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After issuing Executive Order 9981 to desegregate the armed forces, Truman began the hard work. To achieve full integration, Truman needed cooperation from the military's four branches.
In early 1949, he emphasized his desire for collaboration, stating, "I want the job done... and I want it done in a way so that everyone will be happy to cooperate to get it done."
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Citing concerns about national security and the potential impact on enlistments, reenlistments, and soldier morale. Kenneth Royall, the Secretary of the Army, asserted:
"The Army is not an instrument for social evolution."
Truman, steadfast in his commitment to full desegregation, forced Royall into retirement after he refused to comply with the order.
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Gen. Omar Bradley, the Army chief of staff, stated, "The Army is not out to make any social reforms. The Army will put men of different races in different companies. It will change that policy when the nation as a whole changes it."
As the Army resisted, Truman's efforts could not take full effect immediately, and the implementation rolled out uneven across the services.
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By March of 1950, the U.S. Army tentatively agreed to integration across the entire service. In 1950, the Army abolished the enlistment quota on Black Americans, which had originally limited Black enlistment to 10 percent, and also agreed that all jobs within the Army would be opened based on qualifications, not race.
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Beginning in September 1950, there were some limited experiments in integration within the Army. Black tank commanders, gunners, gun loaders, and drivers started serving with the 89th Medium Tank Battalion, while Black infantrymen were integrated into the 27th and 35th regiments of the 25th Division.
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The demand for manpower also fueled a stronger push for integration from politicians in Washington, who increasingly viewed the Army's segregation as inefficient and costly. General Douglass MacArthur rebuffed such demands, arguing that such drastic changes during wartime were impractical. However, his dismissal by Truman in April 1951 for insubordination removed the final obstacle to integration.
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His successor, Lt. Gen. Matthew Ridgway, viewed segregation as "wholly inefficient" for military effectiveness and deemed it "both un-American and un-Christian." He promptly disbanded all-Black units and reassigned their men.
While Black troops supported integration, they were disheartened that only their divisions were disbanded, with all Black soldiers assigned to previously all-white units.
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The historic all-Black regiments created after the Civil War—the famed Buffalo Soldier units—suffered deactivation, with the all-Black 9th and 10th Cavalry Regiments retired in late 1950 and the 25th Infantry Regiment broken up into battalions before being inactivated.
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Finally, in October 1951, the last of the all-Black units, the 24th Infantry Regiment, was disbanded, and its members were reassigned. The decision to retire the historic all-Black regiments instead of integrating them was seen as a final insult by Black American soldiers. They contested the Army's rationale, disputing claims of incompetence on the battlefield.
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Curtis Bolton, a former member of the 24th Infantry Regiment and a prisoner of war for three years, expressed,
“I know that we fought as well as any other unit did, and the information has been distorted and stories too that are not true... I would like for the records to reveal and tell the true story of the 24th."
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Meanwhile, W. Stuart Symington, the first Secretary of the Air Force, wholeheartedly supported President Truman's initiative, leading to the Air Force becoming the first fully integrated branch of the military. The Air Force made remarkable progress, with the number of integrated units doubling between June and August 1949, as reported by December of the same year.
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The desegregation efforts in the Air Force marked a swift and extraordinary overturning of racial policies in the history of the U.S. military. In several bases located in the Jim Crow South, the Air Force disregarded local segregation laws, establishing integrated housing, schools, stores, and recreation facilities for airmen and their families.
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In the Navy, Secretary James V. Forrestal declared:
“Effective immediately, all restrictions governing the types of assignments for which Negro naval personnel are eligible are hereby lifted. In the utilization of housing, messing and other facilities, no special or unusual provisions will be made for the accommodations of Negroes.”
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Despite Forrestal's viewpoint, there existed a significant disparity between Navy policy and actual practice. The majority of Black Americans in the Navy continued to serve as stewards and messmen. However, in 1949, Wesley A. Brown became the 1st Black American to graduate from the Naval Academy in Annapolis, MD. His graduation marked a historic moment as he became the 1st Black officer in the Navy.
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The United States Marine Corps staunchly defended its segregated practices at the time of Truman's 1948 executive order. During World War II, Black Marines underwent training at Montfort Point, a segregated facility in North Carolina. After the war, the Marine Corps experienced a significant reduction in personnel due to demobilization.
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By 1947, Black Marines were compelled to choose between retirement or accepting the role of stewards, with change progressing slowly within the Marine Corps. However, a notable shift occurred in 1949 when Black and White recruits began training together. In response to losses in the Korean War, the Marine Corps gradually integrated units in 1952.
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Ultimately, it took six contentious years to achieve the desegregation of America's armed forces.
The United States Army was the most resistant and, in 1954, was the last military unit to fully integrate.
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When he sought reelection in 1948, Harry Truman aimed to compensate for the loss of Southern support by appealing to Black American voters. He emphasized his executive actions despite congressional resistance and pledged to champion the civil rights agenda 'with every ounce of strength and determination I have.'
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Nine years later, upon accepting a human rights award, Truman stated:
“Let’s make sure we preserve the greatest inspiration we can give the world, the liberties and the rights we profess through one of the most wonderful documents in the world – the Constitution of the United States.”
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Executive Order 9981 is as one of the highlights of Truman's eight-year tenure, representing a courageous choice that put him at odds with the Southern wing of his party on various civil rights matters. As postwar American society progressed, the armed forces served as a crucial example for desegregation and equal opportunities for Black Americans.
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In 1998, on the 50th anniversary of Executive Order 9981, General Colin Powell, who would later become America's first Black secretary of state, reflected on the profound impact Truman's decision had on his life:
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“The military was the only institution in all of America—because of Harry Truman—where a young Black kid, now 21 years old, could dream the dream he dared not think about at age 11. It was the one place where the only thing that counted was courage, where the color of your guts and the color of your blood was more important than the color of your skin.”
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Harry Truman wrote:
“Discrimination is a disease, we must attack it wherever it appears.”
Through his efforts as President, he did his part to improve the opportunity of Black Americans to lead successful lives with basic guarantees of freedom.
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While some critics argue he could have done more and others felt he went too far, Truman's time in the White House showcased remarkable personal growth and political courage, especially when considering his upbringing and the prevailing climate of the era.
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Although Harry Truman never fully shed his racist heritage, he achieved a historic milestone as the president of the United States by committing the government to the pursuit of civil rights for Black Americans, marking the first such dedication since Reconstruction.
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Thank you! This was very informative
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