Rawn James Jr.

In "The Double V", Rawn James Jr. provides an excellent concise history of the struggle to racially integrate the armed forces of the United States. He notes that Crispus Attucks, a free man of color, was one of the colonial protestors killed in the Boston Massacre and that black volunteers fought on both sides in the War of Independence. A large portion of Andrew Jackson's forces in the Battle of New Orleans was composed of African Americans. In the war that preserved the Union, the issue of slavery became increasingly central as a cause of the conflict. Initially reluctant to enlist African American troops in the Union army and navy, President Lincoln was eventually persuaded both of the justice and the crucial need to do so, and units such as the 54th Massachusetts served with distinction. In the years after the Civil War, black Americans served in cavalry units on the Western frontier, where American Indians called them the "Buffalo Soldiers".

With the entry of the United States into the Great War in 1917, a military draft was adopted for the first time since 1865 and on a scale never seen before in American history. It was also the era of Jim Crow and the Woodrow Wilson administration was not inclined to do anything that would challenge the racist status quo. But, as James notes, it was also the era of the NAACP in its early years and the growth of a black middle and professional class in the cities of the North and the upper South that wasn't content with "separate but equal". During the war, There was considerable agitation for the creation of integrated training camps and integrated combat units, with very limited progress.

As the prospect of the nation entering the Second World War loomed a generation later, the bitter lessons of the Great War were remembered in the African American community. This time, James explains, the NAACP would be joined by several more civil rights organizations, such as CORE, the Congress for Racial Equality, and effective leaders, including A. Philip Randolph, president of the Brotherhood of Pullman Porters. They organized the "Double V" campaign- Victory against Fascism overseas and Victory against racism at home. There was stubborn resistance from the armed forces establishment and politicians, particularly Southerners and Democrats depending on Southern votes, but concessions were made by the end of the war.

As James shows, one of the most crucial victories was made possible by the advent of Harry S Truman to the Presidency. At first, he appeared an unlikely champion of civil rights. A son of rural Missouri, in a region of the state that had been fiercely Confederate in its sympathies in the Civil War, he described his mother as "an unreconstructed rebel". In his days before becoming a national political figure, Truman was known to use racist epithets such as "nigger' and "coons" in his references to black people in his private conversations and correspondence. But his bigotry appeared to be of the casual variety that one inherited from one's folks (in Truman's world) and that had nothing to do with actual contact with black people. As James suggests, it seems that Truman's innate sympathy for the underdog proved to be much stronger than the racist customs of his heritage.

Black soldiers, sailors, airmen, and finally even Marines served valiantly on every front in World War II, demolishing the last arguments for white supremacy. Yet, black servicemen returning to their hometowns in the Deep South were often attacked and beaten viciously, while in uniform. President Truman found this deeply disturbing. In 1948, he issued an executive order directing the armed forces to begin the process of racial integration. James credits Truman with political courage for this act. Strom Thurmond of South Carolina led the delegates of the Deep South out of the Democratic national convention later that summer and they formed the States' Rights "Dixiecrat" Party, depriving Truman of their electoral votes while he was also facing a revolt on the left from the Progressive Party and Henry Wallace, as well as the Republican challenger, Thomas Dewey. But with black voters in Northern cities rallying to him, Truman pulled off the upset win of the century.

It would take several more years for racial integration to be completed in the armed forces, during the Korean War. As James records, it would be fully successful and the American military would become a model for what is possible in a society which truly acts as if all men are created equal.… (más)

5073. The Double V How Wars, Protest, and Harry Truman Desegregated America's Military, by Rawn James, Jr. (read 10 Oct 2013) This book does a workmanlike job telling of the awful discrimination blacks endured in World War One and, somewhat surprisingly, things had improved very little when World War II came around. But blacks were determined that those conditions change and when Harry Truman became President he pushed the generals and admirals to change and the result was that in 1949 segregation was officially ended in the military--to the great benefit of blacks and of the military. The Navy was the branch most open to change and I know that when I went on active duty in the Navy in 1951 I saw no sign of racial discrimination. I remember in boot camp our chief suggested to the four blacks in our company that they could have their bunks all together in one corner but they paid no attention to his old-fashioned idea and each bunked in a different area of the barracks, and had different friends.… (más)

Root and Branch is a terrific look back at the methodical demolition of school segregation in the United States in the 20th century. Most everyone knows about Brown v Board of Education – the 1954 Supreme Court decision that was ultimately responsible for desegregating public schools. But many people, including me, may be unaware that that landmark case did not occur in a vacuum. It was, rather, the culmination of a careful buildup of segregation challenges made by the NAACP in lower courts across the country, all of which established the prior precedent that made the ultimate victory possible.

In the same vein of learning things I didn't know I didn't know (if that makes sense), the book was also a fine introduction to the life of Charles Hamilton Houston, mentor to the more-famous Thurgood Marshall and possibly the key figure in the fight against segregation. Author Rawn James shows how Hamilton's first-hand experience with a racist U.S. Army during World War I informed much of his later work.

My one reservation is that the book does wander a bit back and forth in time, and doesn't always do a great job of signposting just when certain events are taking place. But overall, James does a more-than-capable job of presenting both Houston and Marshall as real human beings, flawed in their own ways but ultimately accomplishing a great deal of good for their country.… (más)