Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940 1965

M >> Morris J. MacGregor Jr. >> Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940 1965

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[Footnote 3-66: BuPers Ltr, P16-3, 12 Jul 43, sub:
The Expanded Use of Negroes, BuPersRecs.]

[Footnote 3-67: Ltr, Chief, NavPers, to Cmdts, All
Naval Districts, 19 Aug 43, sub: Advancement in
Rating re: Negro Personnel, P17-2/MM, BuPersRecs.]

[Footnote 3-68: BuPers Cir Ltr 6-44, 12 Jan 44.]

Despite these evidences of command concern, black promotions continued
to lag in the Navy. Again at the Special Programs Unit's urging, the
Bureau of Naval Personnel began to limit the number of rated men
turned out by the black training schools so that more nonrated men
already on the job might have a better chance to win ratings. The
bureau instituted a specialist leadership course for rated Negroes at
Great Lakes and recommended in January 1944 that two Negroes so
trained be included in each base company sent out of the country. It
also selected twelve Negroes with backgrounds in education and public
relations and assigned them to recruiting duty around the country. The
bureau expanded the black petty officer program because it was
convinced by the end of 1943 that the presence of more black leaders,
particularly in the large base companies, would improve discipline and
raise morale. It was but a short step from this conviction to a
realization that black commissioned officers were needed.

Despite its 100,000 enlisted Negroes, the absence of black
commissioned officers in the fall of 1943 forced the Navy to answer an
increasing number of queries from civil rights organizations and
Congress.[3-69] Several times during 1942 suggestions were made within
the Bureau of Naval Personnel that the instructors at the Hampton
specialist school and seventy-five other Negroes be commissioned (p. 080)
for service with the large black units, but nothing happened.
Secretary Knox himself thought that the Navy would have to develop a
considerable body of black sailors before it could even think about
commissioning black officers.[3-70] But the secretary failed to
appreciate the effect of the sheer number of black draftees that
overwhelmed the service in the spring of 1943, and he reckoned without
the persuasive arguments of his special assistant, Adlai
Stevenson.[3-71]

[Footnote 3-69: News that the Navy had inadvertently
commissioned a black student at Harvard University
in the spring of 1942 produced the following
reaction in one personnel office: "LtCmdr B ...
[Special Activities Branch, BuPers] says this is
true due to a slip by the officer who signed up
medical students at Harvard. Cmdr. B. says this boy
has a year to go in medical school and hopes they
can get rid of him some how by then. He earnestly
asks us to be judicious in handling this matter and
prefers that nothing be said about it." Quoted in a
Note, H. M. Harvey to M Mc (ca. 20 Jun 42), copy on
file in the Dennis D. Nelson Collection, San Diego,
California.]

[Footnote 3-70: Ltr, SecNav to Sen. David I. Walsh
(Massachusetts), 21 May 42, 51-1-26; see also idem
to Sen. William H. Smathers (Florida), 7 Feb 42,
Nav-32-C. Both in GenRecsNav.]

[Footnote 3-71: Interv, Lee Nichols with Lester
Granger, 1953, in Nichols Collection, CMH.]

Secretary Knox often referred to Adlai Stevenson as "my New Dealer,"
and, as the expression suggested, the Illinois lawyer was in an
excellent position to influence the secretary's thinking.[3-72] Although
not so forceful an advocate as Christopher Sargent, Stevenson lent his
considerable intelligence and charm to the support of those in the
department who sought equal opportunity for the Negro. He was an
invaluable and influential ally for the Special Programs Unit.
Stevenson knew Knox well and understood how to approach him. He was
particularly effective in getting Negroes commissioned. In September
1943 he pointed out that, with the induction of 12,000 Negroes a
month, the demand for black officers would be mounting in the black
community and in the government as well. The Navy could not and should
not, he warned, postpone much longer the creation of some black
officers. Suspicion of discrimination was one reason the Navy was
failing to get the best qualified Negroes, and Stevenson believed it
wise to act quickly. He recommended that the Navy commission ten or
twelve Negroes from among "top notch civilians just as we procure
white officers" and a few from the ranks. The commissioning should be
treated as a matter of course without any special publicity. The news,
he added wryly, would get out soon enough.[3-73]

[Footnote 3-72: Kenneth S. Davis, _The Politics of
Honor: A Biography of Adlai E. Stevenson_ (New
York: Putnam, 1957), p. 146; Ltr, A. E. Stevenson
to Dennis D. Nelson, 10 Feb 48, Nelson Collection,
San Diego, California.]

[Footnote 3-73: Memo, Stevenson for the Secretary
[Knox], 29 Sep 43, 54-1-50, GenRecsNav.]

There were in fact three avenues to a Navy commission: the Naval
Academy, the V-12 program, and direct commission from civilian life or
the enlisted ranks. But Annapolis had no Negroes enrolled at the time
Stevenson spoke, and only a dozen Negroes were enrolled in V-12
programs at integrated civilian colleges throughout the country.[3-74]
The lack of black students in the V-12 program could be attributed in
part to the belief of many black trainees that the program barred
Negroes. Actually, it never had, and in December 1943 the bureau
publicized this fact. It issued a circular letter emphasizing to all
commanders that enlisted men were entitled to consideration for transfer
to the V-12 program regardless of race.[3-75] Despite this effort (p. 081)
it was soon apparent that the program would produce only a few black
officers, and the Bureau of Naval Personnel, at the urging of its
Special Programs Unit, agreed to follow Stevenson's suggestion and
concentrate on the direct commissioning of Negroes. Unlike Stevenson
the bureau preferred to obtain most of the men from the enlisted
ranks, and only in the case of certain specially trained men did the
Navy commission civilians.

[Footnote 3-74: The V-12 program was designed to
prepare large numbers of educated men for the
Navy's Reserve Midshipmen schools and to increase
the war-depleted student bodies of many colleges.
The Navy signed on eligible students as apprentice
seamen and paid their academic expenses. Eventually
the V-12 program produced some 80,000 officers for
the wartime Navy. For an account of the experiences
of a black recruit in the V-12 program, see Carl T.
Rowan, "Those Navy Boys Changed My Life," _Reader's
Digest_ 72 (January 1958):55-58. Rowan, the
celebrated columnist and onetime Deputy Assistant
Secretary of State for Public Affairs, was one of
the first Negroes to complete the V-12 program.
Another was Samuel Gravely.]

[Footnote 3-75: BuPers Cir Ltr 269-43, 15 Dec 43.]

[Illustration: FIRST BLACK OFFICERS IN THE NAVY. _From left to right_:
(_top row_) _John W. Reagan_, _Jesse W. Arbor_, _Dalton L. Baugh_;
(_second row_) _Graham E. Martin_, _W. O. Charles B. Lear_, _Frank C.
Sublett_; (_third row_) _Phillip S. Barnes_, _George Cooper_,
_Reginald Goodwin_; (_bottom row_) _James E. Hare_, _Samuel E.
Barnes_, _W. Sylvester White_, _Dennis D. Nelson II_.]

The Bureau of Naval Personnel concluded that, since many units were
substantially or wholly manned by Negroes, black officers could be
used without undue difficulty, and when Secretary Knox, prodded by
Stevenson, turned to the bureau, it recommended that the Navy (p. 082)
commission twelve line and ten staff officers from a selected list of
enlisted men.[3-76] Admiral King endorsed the bureau's recommendation
and on 15 December 1943 Knox approved it, although he conditioned his
approval by saying: "After you have commissioned the twenty-two
officers you suggest, I think this matter should again be reviewed
before any additional colored officers are commissioned."[3-77]

[Footnote 3-76: Memo, SecNav for Chief, NavPers, 20
Nov 43, 54-1-50; Memo, Chief, NavPers, for SecNav,
2 Dec 43, sub: Negro Officers. Both in GenRecsNav.]

[Footnote 3-77: Memo, SecNav for Rear Adm Jacobs, 15
Dec 43, quoted in "BuPers Hist," p. 33.]

On 1 January 1944 the first sixteen black officer candidates, selected
from among qualified enlisted applicants, entered Great Lakes for
segregated training. All sixteen survived the course, but only twelve
were commissioned. In the last week of the course, three candidates
were returned to the ranks, not because they had failed but because
the Bureau of Naval Personnel had suddenly decided to limit the number
of black officers in this first group to twelve. The twelve entered
the U.S. Naval Reserve as line officers on 17 March. A thirteenth man,
the only candidate who lacked a college degree, was made a warrant
officer because of his outstanding work in the course.

Two of the twelve new ensigns were assigned to the faculty at Hampton
training school, four others to yard and harbor craft duty, and the
rest to training duty at Great Lakes. All carried the label "Deck
Officers Limited--only," a designation usually reserved for officers
whose physical or educational deficiencies kept them from performing
all the duties of a line officer. The Bureau of Naval Personnel never
explained why the men were placed in this category, but it was clear
that none of them lacked the physical requirements of a line officer
and all had had business or professional careers in civil life.

Operating duplicate training facilities for officer candidates was
costly, and the bureau decided shortly after the first group of black
candidates was trained that future candidates of both races would be
trained together. By early summer ten more Negroes, this time
civilians with special professional qualifications, had been trained
with whites and were commissioned as staff officers in the Medical,
Dental, Chaplain, Civil Engineer, and Supply Corps. These twenty-two
men were the first of some sixty Negroes to be commissioned during the
war.

Since only a handful of the Negroes in the Navy were officers, the
preponderance of the race problems concerned relations between black
enlisted men and their white officers. The problem of selecting the
proper officers to command black sailors was a formidable one never
satisfactorily solved during the war. As in the Army, most of the
white officers routinely selected for such assignments were
southerners, chosen by the Bureau of Naval Personnel for their assumed
"understanding" of Negroes rather than for their general competency.
The Special Programs Unit tried to work with these officers, assembling
them for conferences to discuss the best techniques and procedures for
dealing with groups of black subordinates. Members of the unit sought
to disabuse the officers of preconceived biases, constantly reminding
them that "our prejudices must be subordinated to our traditional (p. 083)
unfailing obedience to orders."[3-78] Although there was ample proof
that many Negroes actively resented the paternalism exhibited by many
of even the best of these officers, this fact was slow to filter
through the naval establishment. It was not until January 1944 that an
officer who had compiled an enviable record in training Seabee units
described how his organization had come to see the light:

We in the Seabees no longer follow the precept that southern
officers exclusively should be selected for colored battalions. A
man may be from the north, south, east or west. If his attitude
is to do the best possible job he knows how, regardless of what
the color of his personnel is, that is the man we want as an
officer for our colored Seabees. We have learned to steer clear
of the "I'm from the South--I know how to handle 'em variety." It
follows with reference to white personnel, that deeply accented
southern whites are not generally suited for Negro
battalions.[3-79]

[Footnote 3-78: Quoted in Record of "Conference With
Regard to Negro Personnel," held at Hq, Fifth Naval
District, 26 Oct 43, Incl to Ltr, Chief, NavPers,
to All Sea Frontier Cmds et al., 5 Jan 44, sub:
Negro Personnel--Confidential Report of Conference
With Regard to the Handling of, Pers 1013, BuPers
Recs. The grotesque racial attitudes of some
commanders, as well as the thoughtful questions and
difficult experiences of others, were fully aired
at this conference.]

[Footnote 3-79: Ibid.]

Further complicating the task of selecting suitable officers for black
units was the fact that when the Bureau of Naval Personnel asked unit
commanders to recommend men for such duty many commanders used the
occasion to rid themselves of their least desirable officers. The
Special Programs Unit then tried to develop its own source of officers
for black units. It discovered a fine reservoir of talent among the
white noncommissioned officers who ran the physical training and drill
courses at Great Lakes. These were excellent instructors, mature and
experienced in dealing with people. In January 1944 arrangements were
made to commission them and to assign them to black units.

Improvement in the quality of officers in black units was especially
important because the attitude of local commanders was directly
related to the degree of segregation in living quarters and
recreational facilities, and such segregation was the most common
source of racial tension. Although the Navy's practice of segregating
units clearly invited separate living and recreational facilities, the
rules were unwritten, and local commanders had been left to decide the
extent to which segregation was necessary. Thus practices varied
greatly and policy depended ultimately on the local commanders. Rather
than attack racial practices at particular bases, the unit decided to
concentrate on the officers. It explained to these leaders the Navy's
policy of equal treatment and opportunity, a concept basically
incompatible with many of their practices.

This conclusion was embodied in a pamphlet entitled _Guide to the
Command of Negro Naval Personnel_ and published by the Bureau of Naval
Personnel in February 1944.[3-80] The Special Programs Unit had to
overcome much opposition within the bureau to get the pamphlet
published. Some thought the subject of racial tension was best
ignored; others objected to the "sociological" content of the work,
considering this approach outside the Navy's province. The unit (p. 084)
argued that racial tension in the Navy was a serious problem that
could not be ignored, and since human relations affected the Navy's
mission the Navy should deal with social matters objectively and
frankly.[3-81]

[Footnote 3-80: NavPers 15092, 12 Feb 44.]

[Footnote 3-81: "BuPers Hist," pt. II, pp. 2-3.]

Scholarly and objective, the pamphlet was an important document in the
history of race relations in the Navy. In language similar to that
used in the War Department's pamphlet on race, the Bureau of Naval
Personnel stated officially for the first time that discrimination
flowed of necessity out of the doctrine of segregation:

The idea of compulsory racial segregation is disliked by almost
all Negroes, and literally hated by many. This antagonism is in
part a result of the fact that as a principle it embodies a
doctrine of racial inferiority. It is also a result of the lesson
taught the Negro by experience that in spite of the legal formula
of "separate but equal" facilities, the facilities open to him
under segregation are in fact usually inferior as to location or
quality to those available to others.[3-82]

[Footnote 3-82: NavPers 15092, 12 Feb 44, p. 10.]

The guide also foreshadowed the end of the old order of things: "The
Navy accepts no theories of racial differences in inborn ability, but
expects that every man wearing its uniform be trained and used in
accordance with his maximum individual capacity determined on the
basis of individual performance."[3-83]

[Footnote 3-83: Ibid., p. 1.]

_Forrestal Takes the Helm_

The Navy got a leader sympathetic to the proposition of equal
treatment and opportunity for Negroes, and possessed of the
bureaucratic skills to achieve reforms, when President Roosevelt
appointed Under Secretary James Forrestal to replace Frank Knox, who
died suddenly on 28 April 1944. During the next five years Forrestal,
a brilliant, complex product of Wall Street, would assume more and
more responsibility for directing the integration effort in the
defense establishment. Although no racial crusader, Forrestal had been
for many years a member of the National Urban League, itself a pillar
of the civil rights establishment. He saw the problem of employing
Negroes as one of efficiency and simple fair play, and as the months
went by he assumed an active role in experimenting with changes in the
Navy's policy.[3-84]

[Footnote 3-84: See Columbia University Oral Hist
Interv with Granger; USAF Oral History Program,
Interview with James C. Evans, 24 Apr 73.]

His first experiment was with sea duty for Negroes. After the
experience of the _Mason_ and the other segregated ships which
actually proved very little, sentiment for a partial integration of
the fleet continued to grow in the Bureau of Naval Personnel. As early
as April 1943, officers in the Planning and Control Activity
recommended that Negroes be included in small numbers in the crews of
the larger combat ships. Admiral Jacobs, however, was convinced that
"you couldn't dump 200 colored boys on a crew in battle,"[3-85] so this
and similar proposals later in the year never survived passage through
the bureau.

[Footnote 3-85: Interv, Lee Nichols with Vice Adm
Randall Jacobs, 29 Mar 53, in Nichols Collection,
CMH.]

Forrestal accepted Jacob's argument that as long as the war (p. 085)
continued any move toward integrating the fighting ships was
impractical. At the same time, he agreed with the Special Programs
Unit that large concentrations of Negroes in shore duties lowered
efficiency and morale. Forrestal compromised by ordering the bureau to
prepare as an experiment a plan for the integration of some fleet
auxiliary ships. On 20 May 1944 he outlined the problem for the
President:

"From a morale standpoint, the Negroes resent the fact that they are
not assigned to general service billets at sea, and white personnel
resent the fact that Negroes have been given less hazardous
assignments." He explained that at first Negroes would be used only on
the large auxiliaries, and their number would be limited to not more
than 10 percent of the ship's complement. If this step proved
workable, he planned to use Negroes in small numbers on other types of
ships "as necessity indicates." The White House answered: "OK,
FDR."[3-86]

[Footnote 3-86: Memo, SecNav for President, 20 May
44, Forrestal file, GenRecsNav.]

Secretary Forrestal also won the support of the Chief of Naval
Operations for the move, but Admiral King still considered integration
in the fleet experimental and was determined to keep strict control
until the results were known. On 9 August 1944 King informed the
commanding officers of twenty-five large fleet auxiliaries that
Negroes would be assigned to them in the near future. As Forrestal had
suggested, King set the maximum number of Negroes at 10 percent of the
ship's general service. Of this number, 15 percent would be
third-class petty officers from shore activities, selected as far as
possible from volunteers and, in any case, from those who had served
the longest periods of shore duty. Of the remainder, 43 percent would
be from Class A schools and 42 percent from recruit training. The
basic 10 percent figure proved to be a theoretical maximum; no ship
received that many Negroes.

Admiral King insisted that equal treatment in matters of training,
promotion, and duty assignments must be accorded all hands, but he
left the matter of berthing to the commanding officers, noting that
experience had proved that in the shore establishment, when the
percentage of blacks to whites was small, the two groups could be
successfully mingled in the same compartments. He also pointed out
that a thorough indoctrination of white sailors before the arrival of
the Negroes had been useful in preventing racial friction ashore.[3-87]

[Footnote 3-87: Ltr, CNO to CO, USS _Antaeus_ et al.,
9 Aug 44, sub: Negro Enlisted Personnel--Assignment
of to Ships of the Fleet, P16-3/MM, OpNavArchives.]

King asked all commanders concerned in the experiment to report their
experiences.[3-88] Their judgment: integration in the auxiliary fleet
worked. As one typical report related after several months of
integrated duty:

The crew was carefully indoctrinated in the fact that Negro
personnel should not be subjected to discrimination of any sort
and should be treated in the same manner as other members of the
crew.

The Negro personnel when they came aboard were berthed
indiscriminately throughout the crew's compartments in the same
manner as if they had been white. It is felt that the
assimilation of the general service Negro personnel aboard this
ship has been remarkably successful. To the present date (p. 086)
there has been no report of any difficulty which could be
laid to their color. It is felt that this is due in part, at
least, to the high calibre of Negroes assigned to this ship.[3-89]

[Footnote 3-88: Idem to Cmdr, _Antaeus_ et al., 9 Jan
45, P16-3, OpNavArchives.]

[Footnote 3-89: Ltr, CO, USS _Antaeus_, to Chief,
NavPers, 16 Jan 45, sub: Negro Enlisted
Personnel--Assignment of to Ships of the Fleet,
Ag67/P16-3/MM; see also Memo, Cmdr D. Armstrong for
ComSerForPac, 29 Dec 44, sub: Negro Enlisted
Personnel (General Service Ratings) Assignment of
to Ships of the Fleet; Ltr, ComSerForPac to Chief,
NavPers, 2 Jan 45, with CINCPac&POA end thereto,
same sub; Ltrs to Chief, NavPers, from CO, USS
_Laramie_, 17 Jan 45, USS _Mattole_, 19 Jan 45,
with ComSerForLant end, and USS _Ariel_, 1 Feb 45.
All Incl to Memo, Chief, NavPers, for CINCUSFLEET,
6 Mar 45, sub: Negro Personnel--Expanded Use of,
Pers 2119 FB. All in OpNavArchives.]

The comments of his commanders convinced King that the auxiliary
vessels in the fleet could be integrated without incident. He approved
a plan submitted by the Chief of Naval Personnel on 6 March 1945 for
the gradual assignment of Negroes to all auxiliary vessels, again in
numbers not to exceed 10 percent of the general service billets in any
ship's complement.[3-90] A month later Negroes were being so assigned in
an administratively routine manner.[3-91] The Bureau of Naval Personnel
then began assigning black officers to sea duty on the integrated
vessels. The first one went to the _Mason_ in March, and in succeeding
months others were sent in a routine manner to auxiliary vessels
throughout the fleet.[3-92] These assignments were not always carried
out according to the bureau's formula. The commander of the USS
_Chemung_, for example, told a young black ensign:

I'm a Navy Man, and we're in a war. To me, it's that stripe that
counts--and the training and leadership that it is supposed to
symbolize. That's why I never called a meeting of the crew to
prepare them, to explain their obligation to respect you, or
anything like that. I didn't want anyone to think you were
different from any other officer coming aboard.[3-93]