Chapter 20: (p. 501) (1)

Limited Response to Discrimination

The good feelings brought on by the integration of the armed forces lasted less than a decade. By the early 1960's the Department of Defense and the civil rights advocates had begun once more to draw apart, the source of contention centering on their differing interpretations of the scope of the Truman order. The Defense Department professed itself unable to interfere with community laws and customs even when those laws and customs discriminated against men in uniform. The civil rights leaders, however, rejected the federal government's acceptance of the _status quo_. Reacting especially to the widespread and blatant discrimination encountered by servicemen both in communities adjacent to bases at home and abroad and in the reserve components of the services in many parts of the country, they stepped up demands for remedial action against a situation that they believed continued at the sufferance of the armed forces.

Nor were their demands limited to the problem of discrimination in the local community. Civil rights spokesmen backed the complaints of those black servicemen who had begun to question their treatment in the military community itself. Lacking what many of them considered an effective procedure for dealing with racial complaints, black servicemen usually passed on their grievances to congressmen and various civil rights organizations, and these, in turn, took the problems to the Defense Department. The number of complaints over inequalities in promotion, assignment, and racial representation never matched the volume of those on discrimination in the community, nor did their appearance attest to a new set of problems or any particular increase in discrimination. It seemed rather that the black serviceman, after the first flush of victory over segregation, was beginning to perceive from the vantage of his improved position that other and perhaps more subtle barriers stood in his way. Whatever the reason, complaints of discrimination within the services themselves, rarely heard in the Pentagon in the late 1950's, suddenly reappeared.[20-1] Actually, the complaints about discrimination both in the local civilian community and on the military reservation called for a basic alteration in the way the services interpreted their policies of equal treatment and opportunity. In the end it would prove easier for the services to attack the gaudier but ultimately less complicated problems outside their gates.

[Footnote 20-1: For discussion of charges of
discrimination within the services, see Ltrs, ASD
(M) to Congressman Charles C. Diggs, Jr., 15 Mar
and 5 Sep 61; and the following Memos: Under SecNav
for ASD (M), 16 Mar 62, sub: Discrimination in U.S.
Military Services; Dep SecAF for Manpower,
Personnel, and Organization for ASD (M), 29 Mar 62,
sub: Alleged Racial Discrimination With the Air
Force; Dep Under SA (M) For ASD (M), 30 Mar 62,
sub: Servicemen's Complaints of Discrimination in
the U.S. Military. All in ASD (M) 291.2.]

It would be a mistake to equate the notice given the persistent (p. 502) but subtle problem of on-base discrimination with the sometimes brutal injustice visited on black servicemen off-base in the early 1960's. Black servicemen often found the short bus ride from post to town a trip into the past, where once again they were forced to endure the old patterns of segregation. Defense Department officials were aware, for example, that decent housing open to black servicemen was scarce. With limited income, under military orders, and often forced by circumstances to reside in the civilian community, black servicemen were, in the words of Robert S. McNamara, President Kennedy's Secretary of Defense, "singularly defenseless against this bigotry."[20-2] While the services had always denied responsibility for combating this particular form of discrimination, many in the black community were anxious to remind them of John F. Kennedy's claim in the presidential campaign of 1960 that discrimination in housing could be alleviated with a stroke of the Chief Executive's pen.

[Footnote 20-2: Robert S. McNamara, _The Essence of
Security_ (New York: Harper & Row, 1972), p. 124.]

But housing was only part of a larger pattern of segregation that included restrictions on black servicemen's use of many places of public accommodation such as restaurants, theaters, and saloons, some literally on the doorstep of military reservations. James Evans listed some twenty-seven military installations in the United States where in 1961 segregation in transportation and places of public accommodation was established in adjacent communities by law or custom.[20-3] Moreover, instances of blatant Jim Crow tactics were rapidly multiplying near bases in Japan, Germany, the Philippines, and elsewhere as host communities began to adopt the prejudices of their visitors.[20-4] The United States Commission on Civil Rights charged that black servicemen were often reluctant to complain to their superiors or the Inspector General because of the repeated failure of local commands to show concern for the problem and suspicion that complainers would be subjected to reprisals.[20-5]

[Footnote 20-3: James C. Evans, OASD (M), "Suggested
List of Military Installations," 9 Jun 61, copy in
CMH. Evans's list was based on incomplete data. A
great number of military installations were located
in Jim Crow areas in 1961. See also Memo, Dep ASD
(Military Personnel Policy) for ASD (M), 19 Oct 62,
sub: Forthcoming Conference With Representatives
From CORE, ASD (M) 291.2.]

[Footnote 20-4: Memo, Lee Nichols (UPI reporter) for
SecDef, Attn: Adam Yarmolinsky, 13 May 63, sub:
Racial Integration in the U.S. Armed Forces, copy
in CMH. Nichols had recently toured military bases
under Defense Department sponsorship. See also
Puner, "Integration in the Army"; news articles in
_Overseas Weekly_ (Frankfurt), November 18 and 25,
1962, and _Stars and Stripes_, November 15, 1962.]

[Footnote 20-5: U.S. Commission on Civil Rights,
_Civil Rights_ '63 (Washington: Government Printing
Office, 1963), p. 206.]

Civil rights leaders were particularly distressed by this form of discrimination, which, considering the armed forces' persistent declaration of impotence in the matter, seemed destined to remain a permanent condition of service life. "These problems involve factors which are not directly under the control of the Department of Defense," Assistant Secretary for Manpower Carlisle P. Runge noted in a typical response.[20-6] Similar sentiments were often expressed by local commanders, although some tried to soften their refusal to act with the hope that the military example might change local community attitudes in the long run.[20-7] Congressman Charles C. Diggs, (p. 503) Jr., did not share this hope. Citing numerous examples for the President of discrimination against black servicemen, he charged that, far from influencing local communities to change, commanders actually cooperated in discrimination by punishing or otherwise identifying protesting servicemen as troublemakers.[20-8]

[Footnote 20-6: Memo, ASD (M) for Asst Legal Counsel
to President, 7 Nov 61, sub: Racial Discrimination
in the Armed Services, ASD (M) 291.2.]

[Footnote 20-7: See transcribed taped interviews
conducted by Nichols of the UPI with military and
civilian personnel in the Charleston, S.C., area in
March 1963, copies in the James C. Evans
Collection, AMHRC.]

[Footnote 20-8: Ltr, Diggs to President, 27 Jun 62,
copy in Gesell Collection, John F. Kennedy
Library.]

Especially galling to civil rights leaders was the conviction that the armed forces had set up artificial and self-imposed barriers to a needed social reform. In the end this conviction seemed to spur them on. The American Veterans Committee, for example, demanded that when a community "mistreats American troops, such as in Montgomery, Alabama, or flaunts its Ku Klux Klan membership, as does Selma, Alabama, the entire area should be placed 'off limits' to purchases by Defense installations and by Servicemen."[20-9] Others were convinced that the federal government was in effect supporting segregation through its widespread economic assistance programs to state and local governments and to private institutions in the fields of employment, housing, education, health service, military affairs, and agriculture. In August 1961 a group of fifty civil rights leaders petitioned the (p. 504) President to end such federal support.[20-10] On a more modest scale, the Congress of Racial Equality asked the Army in August 1962 to declare segregated restaurants in Aberdeen, Maryland, off limits to all military personnel. The activist group justified its demand by stating that "the Army declares dangerous or immoral establishments off limits to soldiers and what is more dangerous or immoral in a democracy than racial intolerance?"[20-11] In this they failed to distinguish between the commander's proper response to what was illegal, for example prostitution, and what was still legal, for example, segregated housing.

[Footnote 20-9: American Veterans Committee, "Audit of
Negro Veterans and Servicemen," 1960, p. 16, copy
in CMH.]

[Footnote 20-10: Leadership Conference on Civil
Rights, "Proposals for Executive Action to End
Federally Supported Segregation and Other Forms of
Racial Discrimination," August 1961, copy in SD
291.2. See also U.S. Commission on Civil Rights,
_Freedom to the Free: A Century of Emancipation_
(Washington: Government Printing Office, 1963), pp.
158ff.]

[Footnote 20-11: Baltimore _Sun_, August 8, 1962. On
the particular problem in the Aberdeen area see
Telg, President Kennedy to John Field, President's
Cmte on Equal Employment Opportunity, 22 Sep 61,
copy in CMH.]

_The Kennedy Administration and Civil Rights_

The strong connection between black morale and military efficiency made it likely that the new Secretary of Defense would be intimately concerned with problems of discrimination. Highly trained in modern managerial techniques, Robert S. McNamara came to the Pentagon with the idea of instituting a series of fundamental changes in the management of the armed forces through manpower reorganization and what was becoming known as systems analysis. Whatever his attitude toward racial justice, his initial interest in the Defense Department's black employees, military and civilian, was closely linked to his concern for military efficiency. Less than a week on the job, he called for information on the status of Negroes in the department. He had heard that some services were better integrated than others, and he wanted his Assistant Secretary for Manpower to investigate. He wanted to know if there was a "fair" proportion of Negroes in the higher civilian grades. If not, he asked, "what do you recommend be done about it?"[20-12] These questions, and indeed all action on civil rights matters originating in his office in the months to come, indicated that McNamara, like his predecessors, would limit his reforms to discrimination within the services themselves. But as time passed, McNamara, like President Kennedy, would warm to the civil rights cause and eventually both would become firmly committed.

[Footnote 20-12: Memo, SecDef for ASD (MP&R)
Designate, 27 Jan 61, ASD (M) 291.2.]

The Kennedy administration has been closely identified with civil rights, yet the President's major biographers and several of his assistants agree that his commitment to civil rights reform did not emerge full-blown on inauguration day. It was only in the last months of his administration that Kennedy, subjected to civil rights demands and sharing the interests and experiences of his brother Robert, the Attorney General, threw himself wholeheartedly into the civil (p. 505) rights fray.[20-13] As senator and later as President, Kennedy was sympathetic to the aspirations of the black minority, appreciated its support in his campaign, but regarded civil rights as one, and not the most pressing, problem facing the Chief Executive. Even his administrations's use of federal marshals during the freedom rides in 1961 and its use of both marshals and troops at Oxford, Mississippi, in 1962 and troops again in Alabama in 1963 were justified in the name of enforcement of federal judicial processes. Well into 1963 he studiously downplayed the civil rights issues involved.

[Footnote 20-13: This discussion of Kennedy's civil
rights position is based on Arthur M. Schlesinger,
_A Thousand Days_ (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1965);
Theodore C. Sorensen, _Kennedy_ (New York: Harper
and Row, 1965); and the following oral history
interviews in the J. F. Kennedy Library: Berl
Bernhard with Harris Wofford, 29 Nov 65, Roy
Wilkins, 13 Aug 64, and Thurgood Marshall, 7 Apr
64; Joseph O'Connor with Theodore Hesburgh, 27 Mar
66. Also consulted were Sorensen's _The Kennedy
Legacy_ (New York: New American Library, 1970);
Victor S. Navasky, _Kennedy Justice_ (New York:
Atheneum, 1971); William G. Carlton, "Kennedy in
History," in _Perspectives on 20th Century America:
Readings and Commentary_, ed. Otis L. Graham, Jr.
(New York: Dodd, Mead, 1973); Edwin Guthman, _We
Band of Brothers: A Memoir of Robert F. Kennedy_
(New York: Harper and Row, 1971); Burke Marshall,
_Federation and Civil Rights_ (New York: Columbia
University Press, 1974).]

Kennedy was convinced that the only answer to the injustices suffered by Negroes was a series of strong laws, but he was also certain that such legislation was impossible to achieve in 1961. To urge it on an unwilling Congress would only jeopardize his legislative program, increase the black minority's feeling of frustration, and divide the nation in a period of national crisis. Discussing the Civil Rights Commission's "non-negotiable" demands concerning the organized reserves, for example, commission member Father Theodore Hesburgh remembered the President saying:

Look, I have a serious problem in West Berlin, and I do not think
this is the proper time to start monkeying around with the
Army.... I have no problem with the principle of this, and we'll
certainly be doing it, but at this precise moment I have to keep
uppermost in mind that I may need these units ... and I can't
have them in the midst of a social revolution while I'm trying to
do this.[20-14]

[Footnote 20-14: Quoted from O'Connor's oral history
interview with Hesburgh, 27 Mar 66.]

Kennedy temporized. He would promptly and positively endorse the principle of equal rights and enforce the civil rights decisions of the Supreme Court through negotiation, moral suasion, executive order, and, when necessary, through the use of federal marshals.[20-15] The Justice Department meanwhile would pursue a vigorous course of litigation to insure the franchise for Negroes from which, he believed, all civil blessings flowed.

[Footnote 20-15: For a critical interpretation of the
Kennedy approach to enforcing the Court's
decisions, see Navasky's _Kennedy Justice_, pp.
97-98, and Howard Zinn, _Postwar America_,
1945-1971 (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1973), ch.
iv.]

Civil rights was not mentioned in Kennedy's first State of the Union message. With the exception of a measure to outlaw literacy and poll tax requirements for voting, no civil rights bills were sent to the Eighty-seventh Congress. Yet at one of his first press conferences, the President told newsmen that a plan to withhold federal funds in certain segregation cases would be included in a general study "of where the Federal Government might usefully place its power and influence to expand civil rights."[20-16] On 6 March 1961 he signed Executive Order 10925, which combined the committees on government (p. 506) contracts and employment policy into a single Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity chaired by the Vice President.[20-17] His order, he believed, specified sanctions "sweeping enough to ensure compliance."[20-18] Finally, in November 1962, after numerous and increasingly pointed reminders from civil rights advocates, the President issued Executive Order 11063, directing executive agencies to take action against discrimination in the sale or lease of federal housing or any housing bought with loans from or insured by the federal government.[20-19]

[Footnote 20-16: Press Conference, 1 Mar 61, _Public
Papers of the Presidents: John F. Kennedy, 1961_,
p. 137.]

[Footnote 20-17: 26 _Federal Register_ 1977.]

[Footnote 20-18: Presidential statement, 7 Mar 61,
_Public Papers of the Presidents: Kennedy, 1961_,
p. 150. See also "President's Remarks on Meeting of
Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity," New
York _Times_, April 12, 1961; Memo, President for
Heads of All Executive Departments and Agencies, 18
Apr 61, copy in CMH.]

[Footnote 20-19: Executive Order 11063, 20 Nov 62, 27
_Federal Register_ 11527.]

Besides executive orders, the White House had other ways, less formal but perhaps more efficient, of getting the federal bureaucracy to move on civil rights. Upon the recommendation of Special Assistant Frederick G. Dutton, the President created the Civil Rights Subcabinet Group in March 1961 to coordinate the administration's civil rights actions. Under Dutton's chairmanship, this group included the assistant secretaries responsible for racial matters in their respective agencies, with White House Special Civil Rights Assistant Harris Wofford serving as executive secretary.[20-20] The group regularly scrutinized the racial programs of the various departments, demanding reports and investigations of racial matters and insuring that the interests and criticisms of the administration were quickly disseminated at the operations level of the federal agencies affected.[20-21]

[Footnote 20-20: Memo, Frederick G. Dutton, Spec Asst
to President, for Secy of State et al., 31 Mar 61,
and Memo, ASD (M) for Dutton (ca. 10 Apr 61), both
in ASD (M) 291.2; Memo, Nicholas D. Katzenbach for
Vice President Elect, 23 Nov 64, Burke Marshall
Papers, and Interv, Bernhard with Wofford, both in
J. F. Kennedy Library. According to Wofford there
was some discussion over just who would represent
the Department of Defense in the group. The
department's initial choice seems to have been
Evans, but Wofford rejected this selection on the
grounds that Evans's position did not place him in
the department's power structure. He preferred to
have Yarmolinsky or Assistant Secretary Carlisle P.
Runge. Yarmolinsky insisted that Runge be included
so that it would not appear that racial reform in
the Department of Defense was a duty only for the
administration's men.]

[Footnote 20-21: See Memo, ASD (M) for Under SA et
al., 7 Nov 61, sub: Minority Representation in
Officer Procurement and Training, ASD (M) 291.2.
See also Memos, Wofford for Civil Rights Subcabinet
Group, 15 Sep, 20 Oct, and 10 Nov 61, copies in
CMH.]

There is evidence that the subcabinet group was responsible for considerable cross-fertilization of civil rights programs among the departments. For example, it appears to have used the experience of black servicemen in interstate travel to move the Department of Justice and, with the assistance of Attorney General Kennedy, the Interstate Commerce Commission toward eliminating such discrimination.[20-22] And it was through the subcabinet group that the Attorney General's interest in minority voting rights was translated into a voting registration campaign among servicemen.[20-23]

[Footnote 20-22: Memo for Rcd, James C. Evans, 21 Jul
61, sub: Meeting, Subcabinet Group on Civil Rights,
Friday, July 21, 1961 (Judge Jackson represented
Mr. Runge); Ltr, SecDef to Atty Gen, 23 Jun 61;
both in ASD (M) 291.2.]

[Footnote 20-23: Civil Rights Subcabinet Group, Notes
on Meeting of 16 Jun 61; Ltr, Spec Asst to
Postmaster Gen to James C. Evans, 26 Jan 62; Memo,
Evans for Spec Asst to ASD (M), James W. Platt, 20
Mar 62; Memo, Harris Wofford for Subcabinet Group,
30 Jan 62. Copies of all in CMH.]

The existence of this group, with its surveys, questions, and (p. 507) investigations, put constant pressure on the armed services. They were not singled out for special treatment, but they obviously attracted the attention of both the White House and the civil rights organizations because their commitment to equal treatment and opportunity affected so many people and their past successes and remaining problems were having a decided impact on American society. In the words of presidential assistant Wofford, the Defense Department was "a world within itself," a world which by its magnitude could make a "significant contribution by its example" to the solution of the nation's racial problems.[20-24]

[Footnote 20-24: Memo for Rcd, James C. Evans, 21 Jul
61, sub: Meeting, Subcabinet Group on Civil Rights,
Friday, July 21, 1961 (Judge Jackson represented
Mr. Runge), ASD (M&P) 291.2.]

The size of the department's racial program alluded to by Wofford also invited the attention of a federal agency outside White House control. The United States Commission on Civil Rights was continually investigating the services, probing allegations of discrimination against black servicemen and evaluating the role of the department in community race relations.[20-25] Of particular interest to an understanding of racial policy in the 1960's is the commission's comprehensive survey, titled "The Services and Their Relations with the Community," which concluded that the continued existence of community discrimination against servicemen and their dependents had a detrimental effect on the morale and efficiency of significant numbers of them. The commission cataloged the traditional alibis of military commanders: "it is not the mission of the services to concern themselves with the practices of the local community"; the commander's responsibility "stops at the gate"; harmonious relations with the community must be maintained; and, finally, in order to achieve harmony, servicemen must comply with local laws and customs. Yet when it came to other areas of community relations, particularly where the general health, welfare, and morale of the servicemen were involved, the commission found that commanders did not hesitate to ally themselves with servicemen, local community controversy and opposition notwithstanding. The commission wanted the services to take a similar stand against racial discrimination in the community. Although its specific recommendations differed little from those of civil rights leaders, its position as an independent federal agency and its access to the news media added a constant and special pressure on the services.[20-26]

[Footnote 20-25: See, for example, Ltr, Chmn,
Commission on Civil Rights, to SecDef, 26 Mar 62;
Memo, ASD (M) for Under SA et al., 7 May 62, sub:
Survey, United States Commission on Civil Rights;
Memo, Under SecNav for ASD (M), 25 May 62, sub:
United States Commission on Civil Rights Survey of
the Department of Defense; Ltr, Yarmolinsky to Berl
I. Bernhard, Staff Dir, U.S. Comm on Civil Rights,
14 Nov 62; Memo, ASD (M) for Under SA et al., 31
May 61; Ltr, Bernhard to Runge, 6 Jul 61; Ltr Runge
to Bernhard, 17 Jul 61. Copies of all in CMH.]

[Footnote 20-26: U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, "The
Services and Their Relations With the Community,"
17 Jun 63.]

Another pressure on the armed forces in the early sixties was exerted by the civil rights bureaucracy in the White House itself. Various presidential assistants subjected the services' reports on progress in the equal opportunity field to unprecedented scrutiny, asking questions that forced the Defense Department to explain or justify its racial policies and practices.[20-27] In March 1961, civil rights assistants on the President's staff inquired about the number of (p. 508) Negroes on the Defense Department's military and civilian screening boards.[20-28] Later, Special Assistant Frank D. Reeves inquired about the employees working in the executive area of the department and suggested that the front offices do something about hiring more black office workers.[20-29] And again as a result of a number of questions raised about the Navy's race policy, presidential assistant Wofford sponsored a White House meeting on 18 September 1961 for several civil rights representatives and Adam Yarmolinsky, Special Assistant to the Secretary of Defense, with the Chief of Naval Personnel, Vice Adm. William R. Smedberg. Beginning with Yarmolinsky's probing questions concerning the perennial problem of racial composition of the Steward's Branch, the meeting evolved into a general review of the Navy's recent problems and achievements in race relations.[20-30]

[Footnote 20-27: For examples of DOD reports submitted
to the White House on this subject, see Memo, ASD
(M) for Harris Wofford, 15 Nov 61, and idem for
Frank D. Reeves, Spec Asst to President, 29 Jun 61.
For examples of White House interest in these
reports, see James C. Evans, OASD (M), Notes on
Civil Rights Subcabinet Group Meeting, 2 Feb and 2
Mar 62. All in ASD (M) 291.2.]

[Footnote 20-28: Memo, Yarmolinsky for Runge, 13 May
61; Memo, ASD (M) for SA et al., 16 Mar 61, sub:
Personnel Screening Boards; both in ASD (M) 291.2.]

[Footnote 20-29: Memo, Frank D. Reeves, Spec Asst to
President, for SecDef, Attn: Adam Yarmolinsky, 19
Apr 61, copy in CMH.]

[Footnote 20-30: Ltr, Harris Wofford to ASD (M), 18
Sep 61; Memo for Rcd, James C. Evans, 25 Sep 61,
sub: Negro Naval Personnel; Informal Memo, Evans
for Runge, 22 Sep 61, same sub. All in ASD (M)
291.2.]

At times this White House scrutiny could be aggressively critical. There was, for example, small comfort for Defense Department officials in Dutton's review of department comments on the recommendations of the Civil Rights Leadership Conference submitted to the White House in August 1961.[20-31] Dutton wanted to know more about the department's inquiry into possible racial discrimination in the sentences meted out by military courts. He was concerned with the allegation, categorically denied by the Defense Department, that black servicemen with school-aged dependents were being moved off bases to avoid integrating base schools. He wanted a prompt investigation. Dutton was impatient with the Navy's explanation for the continuing predominance of Negroes in the Steward's Branch, and he was especially critical of the racial situation in the National Guard. He wanted a progress report on these points. Finally, he was unhappy with the lack of Negroes in officer training, an executive area, he claimed, in which civilian agencies were forging ahead. He wanted something done about that also.[20-32]

[Footnote 20-31: Composed of representatives of some
fifty civil rights groups under the chairmanship of
Roy Wilkins of the NAACP, the Leadership Conference
on Civil Rights presented to President Kennedy a
list of proposals for executive action to end
federally supported segregation. See U.S.
Commission on Civil Rights, _Freedom to the Free_,
p. 129.]

[Footnote 20-32: Memo, Dutton for Yarmolinsky, 26 Oct
61, copy in ASD (M) 291.2 (22 May 61).]

The disquietude White House staff members produced among Defense Department officials was nothing compared to the trauma induced by the President's personal attention. John Kennedy rarely intervened but he did so on occasion quickly and decisively and in a way illustrative of his administration's civil rights style. He acted promptly, for example, when he noticed an all-white unit from the Coast Guard Academy marching in his inaugural parade. His call to the Secretary of the Treasury Douglas Dillon on inauguration night led to the admission of the first black students to the Coast Guard Academy. He elaborated on the incident during his first cabinet meeting, asking each (p. 509) department head to analyze the minority employment situation in his own department. He was also upset to see "few, if any" black honor guardsmen in the units that greeted visiting Ghanian President Kwame Nkrumah on 13 March, an observation not lost on Secretary McNamara. "Would it be possible," the new defense chief asked his manpower assistant, "to introduce into these units a reasonable number of negro personnel?"[20-33] An immediate survey revealed that Negroes accounted for 14 percent of the Air Force honor unit, 8 percent of the Army's, and 2.2 percent of the Marines Corps'. The 100-man naval unit had no black members.[20-34]

[Footnote 20-33: Memo, SecDef for ASD (M), 13 Mar 61,
ASD (M) 291.2.]

[Footnote 20-34: Memo, ASD (M) for SecDef, 14 Mac 61,
sub: Ceremonial Units and Honor Guard Details, ASD
(M) 291.2.]

These were minor incidents, yet Kennedy's interest was bound to make a difference. As Evans wryly put it in regard to the survey of blacks in the honor guard: "Pending any further instructions it is submitted that the alert which has been given in person and by telephone in connection with the securing of the above data may be adequate for accomplishing the objectives contemplated in the [McNamara] (p. 510) memorandum."[20-35] If not conducive to substantive change in the lot of the black serviceman, the President's intervention signaled in a way clearly understood by Washington bureaucrats that a new style in executive politics was at hand and a new awareness of the racial implications of their actions was expected of them.[20-36]

[Footnote 20-35: Informal Memo, Evans for Judge
Jackson, 14 Mar 61, sub: Ceremonial Units and Honor
Guard Details. Remark repeated by ASD (M) in his
Memo for SecDef, 14 Mar 61, same sub. Both in ASD
(M) files.]

[Footnote 20-36: The Coast Guard incident in
particular seems to have impressed Washington. It
was cited by Mitchell, Wilkins, and Hesburgh during
their oral history interviews at the J. F. Kennedy
Library, and it continued to be discussed for some
time after the inauguration in official channels.
See, for example, Memos, Frederick Dutton for Secy
of Treas, 21 Mar 61, sub: Coast Guard Academy, and
Theodore Eliot (Spec Asst to Secy of Treas) for
Richard N. Goodwin (Asst Spec Counsel to
President), 25 Jun 61, sub: Negro in the Coast
Guard, with attached note, Dick [Goodwin] to
President; Ltr, Asst Secy of Treas to Tim Reardon,
31 Jan 62. All in White House Gen files, J. F.
Kennedy Library. The Coast Guard, it should be
recalled, was not part of the Department of Defense
in 1961.]

_The Department of Defense, 1961-1963_

The White House approach to civil rights matters was faithfully adopted in McNamara's department. Despite a reputation for foot-dragging in some quarters--Deputy Secretary Roswell L. Gilpatric admitted that neither he nor McNamara was especially interested in personnel matters and that some of their early appointments in the personnel field were inappropriate--[20-37]the secretary and his assistants issued a spate of directives and policy memorandums and inaugurated a whole series of surveys and investigations. Yarmolinsky was later able to recall eleven major papers produced by the secretary's office during the first thirty months of McNamara's incumbency. Evans's more comprehensive list of actions taken by the office of the secretary's manpower assistant with regard to equal opportunity contained some forty items.[20-38] These totals did not include 1,717 racial complaints the Defense Department investigated and adjudicated before September 1963 nor the scores of contract compliance reviews conducted under the equal opportunity clauses in defense contracts.[20-39]

[Footnote 20-37: Interv, Dennis O'Brien with Roswell
L. Gilpatric, 5 May 70, in J. F. Kennedy Library;
see also Interv, Bernhard with Wofford.]

[Footnote 20-38: Memo, Spec Asst to SecDef for Paul
Southwick, White House, 22 Oct 63; James C. Evans,
"Equality of Opportunity in the Armed Forces, A
Summary Report on Actions and Contributions of the
ASD (M), January 1961-July 1962"; copies of both in
CMH.]

[Footnote 20-39: Although it did not directly affect
black servicemen, the contract compliance program
deserves mention as a field in which the Department
of Defense pioneered for the federal government.
During the Kennedy administration the department
hired hundreds of contract compliance officers to
scrutinize its vast purchasing program, insuring
compliance with Executive Order 10925. See Ltr,
Adam Yarmolinsky to author, 22 Nov 74, CMH files.]

The number of Department of Defense rulings that pertained directly to black servicemen was matched by the comprehensiveness of their subject matter. Many concerned the recruitment of Negroes and the increase in their proportion of the military establishment. Others pertained to off-base matters, ranging from prohibitions against the use of segregated facilities during field exercises to the use of military units in ceremonies and shows involving segregated audiences. Continued segregation in the reserves, the racial policies of the United Services Organization, and even the racial rule of (p. 511) morticians who dealt with the services came in for attention.

Yet if these investigations and directives bespoke a quickened tempo in the fight for equal treatment and opportunity in the armed forces, they did not herald a substantive reinterpretation of policy. The Defense Department continued to limit its actions to matters obviously and directly within its purview. The same self-imposed restriction that kept McNamara's immediate predecessors from dealing with the most pressing demands for reforms by black servicemen and the civil rights leaders continued to be observed. This fact was especially clear in the case of the Defense Department's four major policy pronouncements involving the complex problem of discrimination visited upon servicemen and their dependents outside the gates of the military reservation.

_Discrimination Off the Military Reservation_

In the first of these directives, which was derived from President Kennedy's executive order on equal employment opportunity,[20-40] Secretary McNamara laid down that no departmental facility could be used by employee recreational organizations that practiced racial or religious discrimination. Included were facilities financed from nonappropriated funds as well as all organizations to which civilian as well as military personnel belonged.[20-41] A straightforward enough commitment to a necessary racial reform, the secretary's order could by logical extension also be viewed as carrying the department's fight against racial discrimination into the civilian community. Yet precisely because of these implications, the directive was subjected to later clarification. Official interpretation revealed that secretarial rhetoric aside, the Department of Defense was not yet ready to involve civilians in its equality crusade.

[Footnote 20-40: The Office of the Secretary of
Defense also issued several other statements
implementing sections of Executive Order 10925; see
DOD Dir 1125.4, 2 Jan 62, and OSD Admin Instr No.
31, 13 July 62, both in SD files.]

[Footnote 20-41: Memo, SecDef for Secys of Military
Departments et al., 28 Apr 61, sub: Military and
Civilian Employee Recreational Organizations, copy
in ASD (M) 291.2.]

The problem emerged when the commander of Maxwell Air Force Base, in keeping with his reading of the McNamara order, prohibited the use of Maxwell's dining halls for a segregated luncheon of the American Legion's Boys' State and its playing fields for the segregated Maxwell Little League teams. Assistant Secretary Runge quickly reassured Senator Lister Hill of Alabama that the 28 April order was limited to employee organizations and so informed the Under Secretary of the Air Force.[20-42] But a further clarification and, in effect, a further restriction of the department's policy in discrimination cases was issued when the Civil Rights Commission became interested in the case. "If these activities are not covered by the April 28 directive," the commission's staff director-designate wanted to know, "what is the position of the Department of Defense on them?"[20-43] Runge's (p. 512) response, cleared through Special Assistant Yarmolinsky, was hardly reassuring to the commission. The department did not inquire into the racial rules of private organizations that used departmental facilities, Runge explained, nor did it object when its departmentally sponsored teams and groups played or performed with segregated private recreational groups.[20-44]

[Footnote 20-42: Ltr, Runge to Hill, 14 Jun 61; Memo,
Runge for Under SecAF, 28 Jan 61, sub: Military and
Civilian Employee Recreational Organizations both
in ASD (M) 291.2.]

[Footnote 20-43: Ltr, Bernhard to Runge, 6 Jul 61, ASD
(M) 291.2.]

[Footnote 20-44: Ltr, Runge to Bernhard, 17 Jul 61,
with attached Handwritten Note, signed SSJ [Stephen
Jackson], 13 Jul 61, ASD (M) 291.2.]

With the effect of a stone dropped into water, the implications of the anti-discrimination memorandum continued to ripple outward. The commander of Brookley Air Force Base, Alabama, canceled the sale of subsidized tickets to the Mobile Bears baseball games by the base's civilian welfare council on the grounds that the ball park's segregated seating of Air Force personnel violated the secretary's order. Inquiries from Capitol Hill set off another round of clarifications.[20-45] While the secretary's manpower advisers were inclined to support the base commander's action, some of the department's legal advisers had reservations. Canceling the sale of tickets, a lawyer in the general counsel's office noted, was consistent with one construction of the secretary's memorandum but was not the "inevitable interpretation" since it was the ball club and not the Air Force recreational organization that discriminated.[20-46] Another departmental lawyer warned that if the commander's interpretation was sustained the department would next have to prohibit welfare groups from selling unsubsidized tickets to events where the seating or even perhaps the performers themselves were segregated.[20-47]

[Footnote 20-45: Ltr, Hill to Runge, 26 Jul 61; Memo,
ASD (M) for SecAF, 25 Sep 61, sub: Purchase and
Sale of Baseball Tickets at Brookley AFB; both in
ASD (M) 353.8.]

[Footnote 20-46: Memo, R.C. Gilliat for Bartimo, 31
Jul 61, attached to Draft Ltr, Runge to Hill, ASD
(M) 353.8.]

[Footnote 20-47: Memo, RTA [Robert T. Andrews] for FAB
[Frank A. Bartimo], 1 Aug 61, ASD (M) 353.8.]

Yarmolinsky ignored such speculations, and on 4 August 1961 informed special presidential assistant Dutton that the secretary's office approved the base commander's action. Although the sale of tickets did not technically violate Executive Order 10925, the department's sponsorship and subsidy of segregated events, he said, "is, in our opinion, not consonant with the clear intent of the President's memorandum."[20-48] Yarmolinsky suggested the White House might want to consider proposing to the ball club that the air base would resume the sale of tickets if it could sell a block of unsegregated seats. The White House reply was postponed until after the passage of the foreign aid bill, but the Air Force eventually received notice to proceed along these lines.[20-49]

[Footnote 20-48: Memo, Yarmolinsky for Dutton, 4 Aug
61, sub: President's Memorandum of 18 April 1961,
ASD (M) 291.2 (22 May 61).]

[Footnote 20-49: Note, signed, "MB," 16 Aug 61, sub:
Call From Virginia McGuire, attached to Draft Ltr,
ASD (M) to Sen. Hill; Memo, ASD (M) for SecAF, 25
Sep 61, sub: Purchase and Sale of Baseball Tickets
at Brookley AFB; both in ASD (M) 291.2 (22 May
61).]

On 19 June 1961 Deputy Secretary Gilpatric issued a second major policy statement. This one ostensibly dealt with the availability of integrated community facilities for servicemen, but was in fact far wider in scope, and brought the department nearer the uncharted (p. 513) shoals of community race relations. A testament to the extraordinary political sensitivity of the subject was the long time the document spent in the drafting stage. Its wording incorporated the suggestions of representatives of the three service secretaries and was carefully reviewed by the President's civil rights advisers, who wanted the draft shown to the President "because of his particular interest in Civil Rights matters."[20-50] With their request in mind, and because of what he considered "the tense situation now existent in the South," Runge urged the secretary to send the President the memorandum. Before doing so McNamara asked his general counsel, Cyrus R. Vance, to discuss the draft with the under secretaries of the services and Assistant Attorney General Nicholas B. Katzenbach and Burke Marshall. At the suggestion of the justice officials, the draft was slightly revised; then it was sent once again to the services for review. Finally on 19 June 1961, and only after Yarmolinsky had rejected certain minor alterations suggested by the services, was the memorandum issued under Gilpatric's signature and its provisions passed down to the local commanders by the service secretaries.[20-51]

[Footnote 20-50: Memo, ASD (M) for SecDef, 22 May 61,
sub: Availability of Facilities to Military
Personnel, ASD (M) 291.2.]

[Footnote 20-51: Memo, Dep SecDef for Service Secys,
19 Jun 61, sub: Availability of Facilities to
Military Personnel, SD 291.2. For various comments
on the draft memo, see the following Memos: Vance
and Runge for SecDef, 5 Jun 61; ASD (M) for Dep
SecDef, 16 Jun 51, sub: Availability of Facilities
to Military Personnel; Dep SecDef for Service
Secys, 5 Jun 61, same sub; SecAF for Dep SecDef, 13
Jun 61, same sub. All in ASD (M) 291.2 (22 May
61).]

The policy that emerged from all this careful labor committed the services to very little change. In the first place the title, The Availability of Facilities to Military Personnel, was vague, a legacy of the department's fear of congressional retaliation for any substantive move in the politically sensitive area of race relations. Actually the secretary's office was primarily concerned with discrimination in places of public accommodation such as swimming pools, recreational facilities, meeting halls, and the like while the explosive subject of off-base housing was ignored. Although the order's ambiguity did not preclude initiatives in the housing field by some zealous commanders, neither did it oblige any commander to take any specific action, thus providing a convenient excuse for no action at all.[20-52] Commanders, for example, were ordered to provide integrated facilities off post for servicemen "to the extent possible," a significant qualification in areas where such facilities were not available in the community. Commanders were also "expected to make every effort" to obtain integrated facilities off base through the good offices of their command-community relations committees. In effect the department was asking its commanders to achieve through tact what the courts and the Justice Department were failing to achieve through legal process.

[Footnote 20-52: Interv, author with James C. Evans,
15 Nov 72, CMH files.]

Where the order was specific, it carefully limited the extent of reforms. It barred the use of military police in the enforcement of local segregation laws, a positive step but a limited reform since only in very rare instances had military police ever been so employed. The order also provided "as circumstances warranted" for legal assistance to servicemen to insure that they were afforded due process of law in cases growing out of the enforcement of local (p. 514) segregation ordinances. Again what seemed a broad commitment and extensive interference with local matters was in practice very carefully circumscribed, as demonstrated by the Air Force policy statement issued in the wake of the secretary's order.

The Air Force announced that in the case of discrimination in the community, the local Air Force commander and his staff judge advocate would interview the aggrieved serviceman to ascertain the facts and advise him of his legal recourses, "but will neither encourage nor discourage the filing of a criminal complaint." The purpose of the policy, the Air Force Chief of Staff explained, was to assist servicemen and at the same time avoid disrupting good community relations. The commander should remain interested, but he should leave the work to his judge advocate so that the commander would not personally be "caught in the middle" to the detriment of his community relations program. If local authorities refused to cooperate, the matter should be referred to higher authority who might pursue it with local government officials. Such procedures might keep the commander from becoming embroiled in locally sensitive issues.[20-53] In short, discrimination was to be fought through voluntary action at the local command level, but nothing was to be done that might compromise the commander's standing with the local authorities.

[Footnote 20-53: Memo, Maj Gen Albert M. Kuhfeld,
USAFJAG (for CofSAF), for ALMAJCOM (SJA), 2 Feb 62,
sub: Air Force Policy Statement Concerning
Violations of Anti-Discrimination Law, and attached
Memo, Dep CofS, Pers, for ALMAJCOM, 30 Jan 62, same
sub, SecAF files.]

McNamara's office displayed the same good intentions and crippling inhibitions when it considered policy on the participation of servicemen in civil rights demonstrations. The secretary had inherited a policy from his predecessor who, in the wake of a series of sit-in demonstrations involving black airmen in the spring of 1960, had approved a plan devised by the judge advocate generals of the services and other Defense Department officials. Declaring such activity "inappropriate" in light of the services' mission, these officials banned the participation of servicemen in civil rights demonstrations and gave local commanders broad discretionary powers to prevent such participation, including the right to declare the place of demonstration off limits or to restrict servicemen to the base. Although all the services adopted the new policy, only the Air Force published detailed instructions.[20-54]

[Footnote 20-54: Memo for Rcd, ASD (P), 23 Mar 60;
Memo, Dep Chief, NavPers, for Asst SecNav (Pers and
Reserve Forces), 23 Mar 60, sub: Considerations
Relative to Department of Defense Policy Concerning
Disputes Over Local Laws or Customs; copies of both
in ASD (M) 291.2. For the Air Force instructions,
see Memo, AF Dep CofS (P) for All Major Cmdrs, 30
Mar 60, sub: Air Force Policy Statement Concerning
Involvement of Air Force Personnel in Local Civil
Disturbances, SecAF files.]

This prohibition did not deter all black servicemen, and some commanders, in their zeal to enforce departmental policy, went beyond the methods McNamara's predecessor had recommended. Such was the case during a series of sit-ins at Killeen, Texas, near the Army's Fort Hood, where, as reported in the national press and subsequently investigated by the United States Commission on Civil Rights, the commander used military police to break up two demonstrations.[20-55] The secretary's office reacted quickly to the incidents. A (p. 515) prohibition against the use of military police to quell civil rights demonstrations was quickly included in the secretary's policy statement, The Availability of Facilities to Military Personnel, then being formulated. "This memorandum," Assistant Secretary Runge assured McNamara, "should preclude any further such incidents."[20-56] In specific reference to the situation in the Fort Hood area, the Deputy Under Secretary of the Army reported that as a result of a new policy and the emphasis placed on personal contact by commanders with local community representatives, "a cordial relationship now exists between Fort Hood and the surrounding communities."[20-57]

[Footnote 20-55: Memo, ASD (M) for SecDef, 18 Jul 61,
sub: Use of Military Police to Halt Sit-ins as
Reported by Drew Pearson's Column of July 19 in the
Washington Post; Ltr, U.S. Commission on Civil
Rights Staff Dir Designate to ASD (M), 26 Jul 61;
both in ASD (M) 291.2. The President's office
received considerable mail on the subject; see
White House Cen files, J. F. Kennedy Library.]

[Footnote 20-56: Memo, ASD (M) for SecDef, 18 Jul 61,
sub: Use of Military Police..., ASD (M) 291.2.]

[Footnote 20-57: Memo, Dep Under SA for Counselor,
OASD (M), 12 Jan 62, sub: Off-Base Racial
Discrimination in the Fort Hood Area, ASD (M)
291.2.]

But to ban the use of military police and to urge commanders to deal with local business leaders to end segregation actually begged the question. Significantly, the much-heralded memorandum on the availability of integrated facilities failed to review the rules governing participation in demonstrations, a subject of pressing interest to an increasing number of Negroes as the civil rights struggle moved into a more active phase. Bothered by this failure, Air Force representatives on the policy drafting team had wanted to provide local commanders with guidance before civil rights incidents occurred. The justice officials who reviewed the memorandum at McNamara's invitation, however, were reluctant to see specific reference to such incidents incorporated, and the matter was ignored.[20-58]

[Footnote 20-58: Memo, Vance and Runge for SecDef, 5
Jun 61, ASD (M) 291.2.]

In fact, justice officials were not the only ones reluctant to see the issue raised. It was a common belief in the Defense Department that military service placed some limitations on a man's basic liberties. Because servicemen were assigned to their duty station, subject to immediate transfers and on duty twenty-four hours a day, they were allowed no opportunity for participating in demonstrations.[20-59] The department's general counsel was even more specific, saying that a prohibition against picketing would not conflict with the department's anti-discrimination policies and could be lawfully imposed by the services. "Indeed," he believed, "the role of the military establishment in our society required the imposition of such a limitation on the off-duty activities of service personnel."[20-60] Blessed by such authority, the 1960 prohibition against participation in civil rights demonstrations remained in effect for more than three years.[20-61]

[Footnote 20-59: Ltr, ASD (M) to John de J. Pemberton,
Jr., Exec Dir, American Civil Liberties Union, 31
Jul 63; Memos for Rcd, OSD Counselor, 26 Apr 61 and
9 Jul 63. All in ASD (M) 291.2 (16 Jul 63).]

[Footnote 20-60: Memo, General Counsel for ASD (M), 15
Jun 62, sub: Picketing by Members of the Armed
Forces, copy in CMH.]

[Footnote 20-61: See Memo, James P. Goode, Office of
SecAF, for Stephen Jackson and Carlisle Runge,
attached to Memo, AF Dep CofS (P) for All Major
Cmdrs, 30 Mar 60, sub: Air Force Policy Statement
Concerning Involvement of Air Force Personnel in
Local Civil Disturbances, SecAF files; Ltr, Under
SecNav to Jesse H. Turner, 6 Oct 61, copy in CMH.
See also Ltr, Adam Yarmolinsky to Adam C. Powell,
30 Oct 63, SD 291.2 (14 Jul 63).]

Such restrictions could not last much longer. Given the civil (p. 516) rights temper of the times--1963 witnessed the mammoth march on Washington, the introduction of President Kennedy's civil rights bill, and the landmark directive of the Secretary of Defense on equal opportunity in the armed forces--a total prohibition on servicemen's participation in demonstrations appeared more and more incongruous. Finally, on 16 July 1963, McNamara relaxed the department's policy. Still declaring such participation inappropriate and unnecessary for servicemen in view of their "special obligations of citizenship," he nevertheless lifted the ban on military participation in demonstrations, provided that the uniform was not worn; such activity took place during off-duty hours, off the military reservation, and did not constitute a breach of law and order; and no violence was reasonably likely to result.[20-62]

[Footnote 20-62: Memo, SecDef for Secys of Mil Depts
et al., 16 Jul 63, SD files; see also New York
_Times_, July 16, 17, 20, 22, 28, and 30, 1963.]

Again an apparent liberalization of departmental racial policy actually promised very little change. First, the continuing prohibitions on participation in demonstrations were so broad and so vague that they could be interpreted to cover almost any civil rights activity. Then, too, the secretary left the interpretation of his order to the judgment of local commanders, a dubious blessing in the eyes of the civil libertarians and concerned servicemen in light of the narrow constructions commanders had given recent Defense Department memorandums. Finally, the relaxation of the ban was applicable only to the continental United States. In response to a request for guidance from the European commander, the Joint Chiefs of Staff informed all overseas commanders that as guests of Allied nations, U.S. servicemen had no right to picket, demonstrate, or otherwise participate in any act designed to "alter the policies, practices, or activities of the local inhabitants who are operating within the framework of their own laws."[20-63]

[Footnote 20-63: Msg, USCINCEUR to JCS, 201256Z Aug
63; Msg, JCS 2190 to CINSCO et al. (info copies to
Service Chiefs of Staff, CINCAL, ASD [M], and ASD
[PA]), 221630Z Aug 63.]

The fourth major memorandum on racial matters outlined the department's application of Executive Order 11063 on housing. Racial discrimination in off-base housing had become perhaps the chief complaint of black servicemen who were further incensed by many (p. 517) local commanders who maintained lists of segregated houses in their base housing offices. In some cases commanders referred their black servicemen to the Urban League or similar organizations for help in finding suitable housing.[20-64] Demands that the services do something about the situation were rebuffed. As the Assistant Secretary of Defense explained to a White House official, the Department of Defense had "virtually no direct involvement" in off-base housing, the segregation of which was "not readily susceptible to change by actions that are within the control of the military departments."[20-65]

[Footnote 20-64: Omaha _World Herald_, August 17,
1962; see also Memo, Adam [Yarmolinsky] for L.
White, 7 Sep 62, Lee White Collection, J. F.
Kennedy Library.]

[Footnote 20-65: Memo, ASD (M) for Asst Legal Counsel
to President, 7 Nov 61, sub: Racial Discrimination
in the Armed Services, ASD (M) 291.2.]

Several of McNamara's assistants disagreed. They drafted a housing order for the secretary but not without opposition at first from some of their colleagues. An Army representative, for example, suggested a counterproposal that commanders be ordered to work through the federal agencies established in various geographical areas of the country by Executive Order 11063. An Air Force spokesman recommended the creation of special regional and local community committees, chaired by representatives of the Housing and Home Finance Agency and including members from all major federal agencies. For his part, Stephen S. Jackson, a special assistant in the manpower office, thought these service proposals had merit, and he wanted to postpone action until they had been discussed with other interested federal agencies.[20-66]

[Footnote 20-66: Memo, Jackson for Dep ASD, Family
Housing-OASD (I&L), 8 Feb 63, sub: Implementation
of EX 11063, Equal Opportunity in Housing, copy in
CMH.]

McNamara, however, "readily agreed" with his housing experts that a letter on nondiscrimination in family housing was necessary. On 8 March 1963 he informed the service secretaries that effective immediately all military leases for family housing, that is, contracts for private housing rented by the services for servicemen, would contain a nondiscrimination clause in accordance with the President's executive order. He also ordered military bases to maintain listings only on nonsegregated private housing.[20-67] Again an attempt to bring about a needed change was severely limited in effectiveness by the department's concern for the scope of the commander's authority in the local community. The application of the President's order would end segregation in leased housing, but only a small percentage of black servicemen lived in such housing. The majority of service families lived off base in private housing, which the new order, except for banning the listing of segregated properties by base housing offices, ignored. Barring the use of segregated private housing to all servicemen, a more direct method of changing the racial pattern surrounding military installations, would have to wait for a substantive change in departmental thinking.

[Footnote 20-67: Memo, SecDef for SA et al., 8 Mar 63,
sub: Non-Discrimination in Family Housing; Memo,
ASD (I&L) for Dep ASD (Family Housing), 8 Mar 63;
copies of both in ASD (M) 291.2. The quote is from
the latter document.]

_Reserves and Regulars: A Comparison_

While the interest of both civil rights advocates and defense officials was focused on off-base concerns during the early 1960's, discrimination continued to linger in the armed forces. A (p. 518) particularly sensitive issue to the services, which in the public mind had complete jurisdiction over all men in uniform, was the position of the Negro in the reserve components. To generalize on the racial policies of the fifty-four National Guard organizations is difficult, but whereas some state guards had been a progressive force in the integration of the services in the early postwar period, others had become symbols of racism by 1961. Some fourteen years after the Truman order, ten states with large black populations and understaffed guard units still had no Negroes in the guard. The Kennedy administration was not the first to wrestle with the problem of applying a single racial policy to both the regulars and the guard. It was aware that too much tampering with the politically influential and volatile guard could produce an explosion. At the same time any appearance of timidity courted antagonism from another quarter.