Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965 Part 62

1949 65.12 34.88 1950 57.07 42.93 1951 55.27 44.73 1952 54.95 45.05 1953 51.73 48.27 1954 53.43 48.57 1955 51.19 48.81 1956 25.38 74.62 1957 21.66 78.34 1958 23.35 76.65

C. Officer Strength (Selected Years)

_Year_ _Black Officers on Active Duty_ _Total Officers_

1949 19 45,464 1951 23 66,323 1953 53 78,095 1955 81 71,591 1960 149

_Source_: BuPers, Personnel Statistics Branch. See especially BuPers, "Memo on Discrimination of the Negro," 24 Jan 59, BAF2-014. BuPers Technical Library. All figures represent yearly averages.

The Navy had an explanation for the small number of Negroes. The reduced manpower ceilings imposed on the Navy, even during the Korean War, had caused a drastic curtailment in recruiting. At the same time, with the brief exception of the Korean War, the Navy had depended on volunteers for enlistment and had required volunteers to score ninety or higher on the general cla.s.sification test. The percentage of those who scored above ninety was lower for blacks than for whites--16 percent against 67 percent, a ratio, naval spokesmen suggested, that explained the enlistment figures. Furthermore, the low enlistment quotas produced a long waiting list of those desiring to volunteer.

All applicants for the relatively few openings were thoroughly screened, and compet.i.tion was so keen that any Negroes accepted for the monthly quota had to be extraordinarily well qualified.[16-67]

[Footnote 16-67: For a public expression of these sentiments see, for example, Ltr, Capt R. B. Ellis, Policy Control Br, BuPers, to President of Birmingham, Ala., Branch, NAACP, 30 Mar 50, Pers 66 MM, GenRecsNav.]

What the Navy's explanation failed to mention was that the rise and decline in the Navy's black strength during the 1950's was intimately related to the number of group IV enlistees being forced on the services under the provisions of the Defense Department's program (p. 416) for the qualitative distribution of manpower. Each service was required to accept 24 percent of all recruits in group IV from fiscal year 1953 to 1956, 18 percent in fiscal year 1957, and 12 percent thereafter. Between 1953 and 1956 the Navy accepted well above the required 24 percent of group IV men, but in fiscal year 1957 took only 15.1 percent, and in 1958 only 6.8 percent. In 1958, with the knowledge of the Secretary of Defense, all the services took in fewer of the group IV's than the distribution program required, but justified the reduction on the grounds that declining strength made it necessary to emphasize high quality in recruits. In a move endorsed by the Navy, the Air Force finally requested in 1959 that the qualitative distribution program be held in abeyance. On the basis of this request the Navy temporarily ceased to accept all group IV and some group III men, but resumed recruiting them when it seemed likely that the (p. 417) Secretary of Defense would refuse the request.[16-68]

[Footnote 16-68: BuPers, "Memo on Discrimination of the Negro," 24 January 1959, Pers A1224, BuPers Tech Library.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: CHRISTMAS IN KOREA, 1950.]

The correlation between the rise and fall of the group IV enlistments and the percentage of Negroes in the Navy shows that all the increases in black strength between 1952 and 1959 came not through the Navy's publicized and organized effort to attract the qualified black volunteers it had promised the Fahy Committee, but from the men forced upon it by the Defense Department's distribution program. The correlation also lends credence to the charges of some of the civil rights critics who saw another reason for the shortage of Negroes.

They claimed that there had been no drop in the number of applicants but that fewer Negroes were being accepted by Navy recruiters. One NAACP official claimed that Negroes were "getting the run around."

Those who had fulfilled all enlistment requirements were not being informed, and others were being given false information by recruiters.

He concluded that the Navy was operating under an unwritten policy of filling recruit quotas with whites, accepting Negroes only when whites were unavailable.[16-69] If these accusations were true, the Navy was denying itself the services of highly qualified black applicants at a time when the Defense Department's qualitative distribution program was forcing it to take large numbers of the less gifted. Certainly the number of Negroes capable of moving up the career and promotion ladder was reduced and the Navy left vulnerable to further charges of discrimination.

[Footnote 16-69: Ltr, Exec Secy, Birmingham, Ala., Branch, NAACP, to Chief, NavPers, 14 Mar 50, Pers A, GenRecsNav.]

As for the shortage of officers, Nelson cited the awareness among candidates that promotions were slower for blacks in the Navy than in the other services where there was "less caste and cla.s.s to buck."[16-70] Nelson was aware that out of the 2,700 blacks who had indicated an interest in the reserve officer training program in 1949 only 250 actually took the apt.i.tude tests. Of these, only two pa.s.sed the tests and one of these was later rejected for poor eyesight. An Urban League spokesman believed that some failed to take the tests out of fear of failure but that many harbored a suspicion that the program was not entirely open to all regardless of race.[16-71] Reinforcing this suspicion was the fact that, despite the intentions of the (p. 418) Bureau of Naval Personnel and the Navy's increasing control over the appointment process, as of 1965 not a single Negro had been appointed to any of the 150-man state selection committees on reserve officer training.[16-72] Also to be considered, as the American Civil Liberties Union later pointed out, was the promotion record of black officers. As late as 1957 no black officer had ever commanded a ship, and while both black and white officers started up the same promotion ladder, the blacks were usually transferred out of the line into staff billets.[16-73]

[Footnote 16-70: Interv, Nichols with Nelson, 1953, in Nichols Collection; Ltr, Nelson to author, 10 Feb 70; both in CMH files.]

[Footnote 16-71: Quoted in Memo, Dir of Tng, BuPers, for Chief, NavPers, 1 Jul 49, Pers 42, GenRecsNav.]

[Footnote 16-72: Memo for Rcd, Evans, 23 Jun 65, sub: NROTC Boards, ASD/M 291.2.]

[Footnote 16-73: Ltr, Exec Dir, ACLU, to SecNav, 26 Nov 57, GenRecsNav.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: REARMING AT SEA. _Ordnancemen at work on the deck of the USS Philippine Sea, off Korea, October 1950._]

Given the pressure on the personnel bureau to develop some respectable black manpower statistics, it is unlikely that the lack of educated, black recruits can be blamed on widespread subterfuge at the recruiting level. Far more likely is the explanation offered by Under Secretary Kimball, that the black community distrusted the Navy.[16-74] First apparent in the 1940's, this distrust lasted throughout the next decade as young Negroes continued to show a general apathy toward the Navy, which at times turned into open hostility. In September 1961 the Chief of Naval Personnel reported that recruiters were not infrequently being treated to "booing, hissing and other disorderly conduct" when they tried to discuss the opportunities for naval careers before black audiences.[16-75]

[Footnote 16-74: Memo, Under SecNav for Chmn, PPB, 22 Dec 49, sub: Implementation of Executive Order 9981, PPB 291.2.]

[Footnote 16-75: Memo, Chief, NavPers, for Pers B, 23 Sep 61, copy in Harris Wofford Collection, J. F.

Kennedy Library.]

The Navy's poor reputation in the black community centered on the continued existence of the racially separate servants' branch, in the eyes of many the symbol of the service's racial exclusiveness. The Steward's Branch remained predominantly black. In 1949 it had 10,499 Negroes, 4,707 Filipinos, 741 other nonwhites, and 1 white man. Chief stewards continued to be denied the grade of chief petty officer, on the grounds that since stewards were not authorized to exercise military command over others than stewards because of their lack of military training, chief stewards were not chiefs in the military sense of the word. This difference in authority also explained, as the Chief of Naval Personnel put it, why as a general rule chief stewards were not quartered with other petty officers.[16-76] These (p. 419) distinctions were true also for stewards in the first, second, and third cla.s.ses, a fact in their case symbolized by differences in uniform. Most of the thousands of black stewards continued to be recruited, trained, and employed exclusively in that branch, and thus for over half the Negroes--65 percent--in the 1949 Navy the chance for advancement was severely limited and the chance to qualify for a different job almost nonexistent.

[Footnote 16-76: Testimony of Vice Adm William M.

Fechteler Before the President's Committee on Equality of Treatment and Opportunity in the Armed Services (the Fahy Cmte), 28 Mar 49, p. 18.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: BROADENING SKILLS. _Stewards on the USS Valley Forge volunteer for cla.s.ses leading to advancement in other fields, Korea, 1950._]

The Navy inst.i.tuted several changes in the branch in the wake of the Fahy Committee's recommendations. On 25 July 1949 the Chief of Naval Personnel ordered all chief stewards designated chief petty officers with all the prerogatives of that status; in precedence they came immediately after chief dental technicians,[16-77] who were at the bottom of the list. That the change was limited to chief stewards did not go unnoticed. Joseph Evans of the Fahy Committee staff charged that the bureau "seemed to have ordered this to accede to the committee's recommendations never intending to go beyond Chief Stewards."[16-78] Nelson, by now a sort of unofficial ombudsman and gadfly for black sailors, urged his superiors to broaden the reform, and Kimball warned Admiral Sprague that limiting the change to chief stewards might be "justified on the literal statement of (p. 420) intention, but is vulnerable to criticism of continued discrimination."

Without compelling reasons to the contrary, he added, "I do not feel that we can afford to risk any possible impression of reluctant implementation of the spirit of the directive."[16-79]

[Footnote 16-77: BuPers Cir Ltr 115-49, 25 Jul 49.]

[Footnote 16-78: Memo, Evans for Fahy Cmte, 23 Aug 49, sub: Progress in Navy, Fahy Papers, Truman Library.]

[Footnote 16-79: Memo, Under SecNav for Chief, NavPers, 10 Aug 49, MM (1) GenRecsNav.]

Admiral Sprague got the point, and on 30 August he announced that effective with the new year, stewards--first, second, and third cla.s.s--would be designated petty officers with appropriate pay, prerogatives, and precedence, and that their uniforms would be changed to conform to those of other petty officers. He also amended the bureau's manual to allow commanding officers to change the ratings of stewards without headquarters approval, thus enlarging the opportunity for stewards, in all other respects qualified, to transfer into other ratings.[16-80] These reforms brought about a slow but steady change in the a.s.signment of black sailors. Between January 1950 and August 1953, the percentage of Negroes in the general service rose from 42 to 47 percent of the Navy's 23,000 man black strength, with a corresponding drop in the percentage of those a.s.signed to the Steward's Branch.[16-81]

[Footnote 16-80: BuPers Cir Ltr 141-49, 30 Aug 49. See also Memo, Under SecNav for Chmn, PPB, 22 Dec 49, sub: Implementation of Executive Order 9981, PPB 291.2; Memo, Chief, NavPers, for SecNav, 4 May 50, sub: Equality of Treatment and Opportunity, Pers 42, GenRecsNav.]

[Footnote 16-81: Memo, Dir, Plans and Policy, BuPers, for Capt Brooke Schumm, USN, PPB, 17 Jul 50, sub: Secretary of Defense Semi-Annual Report, Negro Enlisted Personnel Data for, Pers 14B; Memo, Head, Strength and Statistics Br, BuPers, for Head, Technical Info Br, BuPers, 25 Aug 53, sub: Information Requested by LCDR D. D. Nelson Concerning Negro Strength, Pers A14; both in BuPersRecs.]

Yet these reforms were modest in terms of the pressing need for a substantive change in the racial composition of the Steward's Branch.

Despite the changes in a.s.signment policy, the Steward's Branch was still nearly 65 percent black in 1952, and the rest were mostly Filipino citizens under contract. Secretary of the Navy Kimball's observation that 133 stewards had transferred out of the branch in a recent four-month period hardly promised any speedy change in the current percentages.[16-82] In fact there was evidence even at that late date that some staff members in the personnel bureau were working at cross-purposes to the Navy's expressed policy. Worried about the shortages of volunteers for the Steward's Branch, a group of officials had met in August 1951 to discuss ways of improving branch morale.

Some suggested publicizing the branch to the black press and schools, showing that Negroes were in all branches of the Navy including the Steward's. They also studied a pamphlet called "The Advantages of Stewards Duty in the Navy" that gave nine reasons why a man should become a steward.[16-83]

[Footnote 16-82: Kimball was sworn in as Secretary of the Navy on 31 July 1951. Ltr, SecNav to Granger, 19 Nov 52, SecNav files, GenRecsNav.]

[Footnote 16-83: BuPers, Plans and Policy Div, "Review of Suggestions and Recommendations to Improve Standards, Morale, and Att.i.tudes Toward Stewards Branch of U.S. Navy" (ca. 2 Aug 51), BuPersRecs.]

Obviously the Navy had to set a steady course if it intended any lasting racial reform of the Steward's Branch, but its leaders seemed ambivalent toward the problem. Despite his earlier efforts to raise the status of stewards, Kimball, in a variation on an old postwar argument, tried to show that the exclusiveness of the Steward's (p. 421) Branch actually worked to the Negro's advantage. As he explained to Lester Granger in November 1952, any action to effect radical or wholesale changes in ratings "would not only tend to reduce the efficiency of the Navy, but also in many instances be to the disadvantage or detriment of the individuals concerned, particularly those in the senior Steward ratings."[16-84] Supporting this line of argument, the Chief of Naval Personnel announced the reenlistment figures for the Steward's Branch--over 80 percent during the Korean War period. These figures, Vice Admiral James L. Holloway, Jr., added, proved the branch to be the most popular in the Navy and offered "a rational measure of the state of the morale and job satisfaction."[16-85]

[Footnote 16-84: Ltr, SecNav for Granger, 19 Nov 52, SecNav files, GenRecsNav.]

[Footnote 16-85: Ltrs, Chief, NavPers, to James C.

Evans, OSD, 19 Jun 53, and Granger, 28 Jul 53, both in P 8 (4), BuPersRecs.]

These explanations still figured prominently in the Navy's 1961 defense of its racial statistics. Discussing the matter at a White House meeting of civil rights leaders, the Chief of Naval Personnel pointed out that all the black stewards could be replaced with Filipinos, but the Navy had refrained from such a course for several reasons. The branch still had the highest reenlistment rate. It provided jobs for those group IV men the Navy was obliged to accept but could never use in technical billets. Without the opportunity provided by the branch, moreover, "many of the rated black stewards would probably not achieve a petty officer rating at all."[16-86]

[Footnote 16-86: Memo, Chief, NavPers, for Pers B, 23 Sep 61, Harris Wofford Collection, J. F. Kennedy Library. See also Memo, Chief, NavPers, for ASD/M, 29 Mar 61, sub: Stewards in U.S. Navy, Pers 8 (4), BuPersRecs; Memo, Special a.s.st to SecDef, Adam Yarmolinsky, for Frederic Dutton, Special a.s.st to President, 31 Oct 61, sub: Yarmolinsky Memo of October 26, Harris Wofford Collection, J. F.

Kennedy Library.]

However well founded these arguments were, they did not satisfy the Navy's critics, who continued to press for the establishment of one recruitment standard and the a.s.signment of men on the basis of interest and training rather than race. Lester Granger, for example, warned Secretary Kimball of the skepticism that persisted among sections of the black community: "As long as that branch [the Steward's Branch] is composed entirely of nonwhite personnel, the Navy is apt to be held by some to be violating its own stated policy."[16-87] To Kimball's successor, Robert B. Anderson,[16-88]

Granger was even more blunt. The Steward's Branch, he declared, was "a constant irritant to the Negro public." He saw some logical reason for the continued concentration of Negroes in the branch but added "logic does not necessarily imply wisdom and I sincerely believe that it is unwise from the standpoint of efficiency and public relations to continue the Stewards Branch on its present basis."[16-89]

[Footnote 16-87: Ltr, Granger to SecNav, 24 Oct 52, SecNav files, GenRecsNav.]

[Footnote 16-88: Secretary Anderson, appointed by President Eisenhower, became Secretary of the Navy on 4 February 1953.]

[Footnote 16-89: Ltr, Granger to SecNav, 24 Apr 53, SecNav files, GenRecsNav.]

Granger's suggestion for change was straightforward. He wanted the Bureau of Naval Personnel to find a way to introduce a sufficiently large number of whites into the branch to transform its racial composition. The task promised to be difficult if the charges leveled in the Detroit _Free Press_ were accurate. In May 1953 the paper (p. 422) reported incidents of naval recruiting officers who, "by one ruse or another," were shunting young volunteers, sometimes without their knowledge, into the Steward's Branch.[16-90]