War Blacks In The North And West example essay topic

... rage and devotion to duty at Pearl Harbor earned him the Navy Cross, the first ever awarded to an African American sailor. This honor is even greater in light of the fact African Americans were only allowed to serve in the mess man's branch of the Navy at the time. Though later killed in action in 1943, Miller's legacy of bravery in the face of great danger and discrimination lives on. The need for workers also worked in favor of African Americans. It helped to provide a switch from a focus on agriculture to manufacturing. Many African Americans left the south and migrated north and West to fulfill jobs in war industries.

In 1940 African Americans made up approximately 1.5 percent of the Regular Army and Navy. "Although law and tradition guaranteed the existence of four black army regiments, Negroes had been totally excluded from the Air Corps" (Lowery 531). This exclusion did not last throughout the war. "The racial barrier in the glamorous Air Corps fell in January 1941 when the War Department announced formation of a black aviation pursuit squadron. It was a Pyrrhic victory, however, because the black pilots were trained at separate facilities in Tuskegee rather than at the white airbase near Montgomery" (531).

Tuskegee Army Air Field was opened July, 23 1941; however training didn't begin until November 1st. Tuskegee was located in Alabama so it was a clear indication that black pilots were to be trained although all the trainees were not black. The war department announced in July of 1941 that the 99th Pursuit Squadron would enlist 33 pilots, 27 planes, and 400 men total. It also said that 270 men were also in training to be enlisted as ground and hangar crews. Additionally it stated that Tuskegee had the intention to train 100 pilots per year. In March 1942 the first five black pilots graduated.

"The Tuskegee Airmen breached the color barrier in the U.S. Army Air Corps and went on to compile a distinguished combat record during World War II, a record that serves as an important source of pride for black Americans, who resented the dominant view of whites that blacks could not fight" (531). This event marked 25 years of determined effort by African American Activists. This was one of the main civil rights topics in the WWII era. "In more than 200 missions over Germany in 1945, no allied bomber fell to enemy fighters when escorted by Tuskegee airmen, of whose number eighty-five won the distinguished Flying Cross during the war" (Potts). "The exceptional combat record of the Tuskegee Airmen, who during the war had been such a powerful symbol of armed forces segregation, contributed much to the ultimate demise of Jim Crow in the military" (Lowery 532). During the war, all the armed services moved toward equal treatment of blacks, though none flatly rejected segregation.

"During the last three years of the war the proportion of Negroes in the Army hovered around 8 per cent, reaching its highest point, 8.74 per cent, in 1944. When the war ended in September 1945, there were 695,264 Negroes in the Army, 8.67 per cent of its total strength" (Quarles 224). In the early war years, hundreds of thousands of blacks left Southern farms for war jobs in Northern and Western cities. In fact more blacks migrated to the North and the West during World War II than had left during the previous war. Although there was racial tension and conflict in their new homes, blacks were free of severe racial oppression, and they enjoyed much larger incomes.

After the war blacks in the North and West used their economic and political influence to support civil rights for Southern blacks. Blacks continued to work against discrimination during the war, challenging voting registrars in Southern courthouses and suing school boards for equal educational provisions. The membership of the NAACP grew from 50,000 to about 500,000 during this period. In 1944 the NAACP won a major victory in Smith vs. All wright, which outlawed the white primary. A new organization, the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), was founded in 1942 to challenge segregation in public accommodations in the North.

During the war, black newspapers campaigned for a Double V, victories over both fascism in Europe and racism at home. Few experienced the two conflicts more intensely than the members of the first black tank unit to see combat. An all-black unit with the exception of white officers, the 761st experienced 183 harrowing days of continuous front-line duty in Europe, with the bulk of it with Gen. George Patton's Third Army. The self dubbed "Black Panthers" fought their way through 2,000 miles of fierce action in France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Holland, Germany and Austria, all accompanied by the worst winter in more than three decades. They were in the thick of combat in the Battle of the Bulge and the campaigns that finally crushed the German resistance. "Despite heavy casualties, the 761st never faltered, liberating 30 towns and villages and breaking down the gates of a Nazi concentration camp.

The battalion became one of the most highly decorated units of the war" (Allen). Among those who served in the 761st was a young lieutenant named John Roosevelt Robinson, who is now more commonly known as Jackie Robinson. Robinson's time with the unit was not long or happy. Though segregation on buses on Army bases had recently been prohibited, at Camp Hood, Texas, a white bus driver attempted to command Robinson to take a seat at the back of the bus.

Robinson refused. "He was arrested and court-martialed for "disrespectful" conduct and disobeying orders, he was acquitted, but the incident prevented him from going overseas with the 761st" (Allen). Robinson would go on to become the first black baseball player to integrate the major leagues". The World War II experience was a watershed for African Americans. Jim Crow remained intact, but the ideological bases of white supremacy and colonialism were undermined by the horrors of the Holocaust" (Earle 87). The war experience gave about one million blacks the opportunity to fight racism in Europe and Asia, a fact that black veterans would remember during the struggle against racism at home after the war.

Perhaps just as important, almost ten times that many white Americans witnessed the patriotic service of black Americans. Many of them would object to the continued denial of civil rights to the men and women beside whom they had fought. After World War II the momentum for racial change continued. Black soldiers returned home with determination to have full civil rights.

President Harry Truman ordered the final desegregation of the armed forces in 1948.