Where I Stand — Mike O’Callaghan: 50 years ago Harry Truman’s courage made U.S. strongers

Monday, July 27, 1998 | 11:45 a.m.

MY ORDERS DIRECTED ME on to Chicago to get discharged. I told my buddy, "Hey man, we don't have to catch the train until tomorrow morning; let's go to the officers club." We started up to the club, and just as we got to the door we ran into the general. He looked at us and said, "Where you boys going?"

We said, "We're going to the officers club."

"Don't you know we don't allow Negroes in here?"

"Well, this is an officers club on an army base."

"Yeah," he said, but this is the permanent club. We have that officers club there in that tent for you colored boys."

Shocked? Don't be, because that's the way it was in 1945 when Capt. James B. McMillan returned to the U.S. from overseas. This is but one example of racism the Las Vegas dentist experienced during World War II and later wrote about in his book "Fighting Back."

During this period of time, and during the following years, First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt was but one clear voice speaking out for racial integration of the military. It wasn't until 50 years ago yesterday, July 26, 1948, that President Harry S. Truman signed Executive Order 9981 which demanded "equality of treatment and opportunity for all persons in the armed services without regard to race, color, religion or national origin."

This executive order flew in the face of a split political party and gave the Dixiecrats, led by Strom Thurmond, the governor of South Carolina, more ammunition to fire at Truman in the once-solid Democratic South. Despite their threat to leave the Democrat Party during an election year, Truman did what he knew was the right thing to do. Political experts warned Truman that he had doomed any chance of remaining in the White House after the 1948 election. They were wrong, he won the election, but the South was no longer a solid Democrat bastion.

Just prior to the 1948 nominating convention a group of leading Democrats wanting to compromise with the Southerners asked Truman to soften his civil rights stand and promote party unity. According to his daughter Margaret, in her book about HST, he replied, "My forebears were Confederates. I come from a part of the country where Jim Crowism is as prevalent as it is in New York or Washington. Every factor and influence in my background -- and in my wife's for that matter -- would foster the personal belief that you are right.

"But my very stomach turned over when I learned that Negro soldiers, just back from overseas, were being dumped out of army trucks in Mississippi and beaten.

"Whatever my inclinations as a native of Missouri might have been, as President I know this is bad. I shall fight to end evils like this."

I had recently returned from an overseas assignment with the Marines when this military integration battle and civil rights fight was taking place. President Truman had already earned my respect by using the atomic bomb to end World War II. His stand on integrating the services was a politically courageous act that earned him an additional feather in his cap. My first hitch in the Marines was with an entirely white outfit through boot camp, advanced combat training and into my unit overseas. The first time I saw a black Marine was when we competed with the 8th Ammunition Company, which was all black.

A few years later, I went back into a military that was racially integrated. Two of my closest friends were blacks, and we worked and ate together. One of them slept in the bunk next to mine, so we took turns shining each other's equipment for inspection and/or when going on pass. Hughley was a fine soldier who carried more than his share of the load.

My third hitch in the military service had me serving in a combat infantry unit fighting in Korea. Here again, it was share and share alike. A man was judged by his physical endurance, courage, marksmanship, combat skills and willingness to carry his load, and more if necessary. It didn't take but one firefight to learn the color of blood coming from a wounded black man was the same as that from a white. Nobody asked the color of the person who donated the blood given us when being placed on a chopper headed for M*A*S*H.

Although Truman had moved the military toward becoming integrated racially, it didn't take place overnight. Even at the beginning of the war in Korea a black regiment with white officers was thrown into combat. They didn't distinguish themselves as a unit and that was the end of any combat military unit being all black or white. The wisdom of Truman's Executive Order 9981 was now recognized as not only being just, it also made for a more effective military force.