July 26, 1948: President Harry S Truman signs Executive Order 9981, abolishing discrimination "on the basis of race, color, religion or national origin" in the United States Armed Forces.
Black men had served in the U.S. military going all the way back to the founding of the U.S. Army in 1775, in the War of the American Revolution. Units such as the 54th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment in the American Civil War, the Harlem Hellfighters (the 369th Infantry Regiment) in World War I, and the 761st Tank Battalion and the units that made up the Tuskegee Airmen (the 332nd Fighter Group and the 477th Bombardment Group) in World War II had all distinguished themselves, and written their names into America's military history as all-black units.
Still, black veterans returned, and found that it didn't matter that they had fought bigotry in Europe or in the Pacific: They were still treated like garbage at home. Asian veterans faced this, too: Senator Daniel Inouye of Hawaii recalled returning home, with a medal pinning the sleeve of his lost right arm to his jacket, and being denied service in a restaurant.
Part of the argument for desegregation in baseball was, "If we can stop bullets, why not balls?" And so, in 1947, former U.S. Army Lieutenant Jackie Robinson became the 1st black player in modern baseball. His example made civil rights activists turn the argument around, and recommend the desegregation of the armed forces. Truman agreed, had the Order written up, and signed it.
The adjustment wasn't easy. The TV show M*A*S*H, set during the next war with American involvement, the Korean War, showed that some Army commanders resisted, with the idea of that the Army could order them to have black men serving under them, but that it couldn't tell them what to do with them, leading to higher casualty rates than among white soldiers.
When the question of whether to allow gay servicemen and -women was first seriously made in the 1990s, the supporting point was that many of the same points made against it were previously made against black soldiers. Those opposed argued that it wasn't the same thing at all. And they looked like idiots.
A 2000 episode of the TV show The West Wing, set in the White House, showed a discussion of the issue, joined by the show's fictional Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Percy Fitzwallace, played by John Amos:
Major Tate (played by Ted Marcoux): Sir, we're not prejudiced toward homosexuals.
Fitzwallace: You just don't want to see them serving in the Armed Forces.
Tate: No sir, I don't.
Fitzwallace: 'Cause they impose a threat to unit discipline and cohesion.
Tate: Yes, sir.
Fitzwallace:That's what I think, too. I also think the military wasn't designed to be an instrument of social change.
Tate: Yes, sir.
Fitzwallace: The problem with that is, that's what they were saying about me 50 years ago: "Blacks shouldn't serve with whites." It would "disrupt the unit." You know what? It did disrupt the unit. The unit got over it. The unit changed. I'm an Admiral in the U.S. Navy, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Beat that with a stick.
In real life, on October 1, 1989, General Colin Powell, U.S. Army, was named the 1st nonwhite Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
*
July 26, 1948 was a Tuesday. There was only one score on this historic day, but it was in, at the time, the biggest rivalry in baseball: The New York Giants beat the Brooklyn Dodgers, 13-4 at Ebbets Field. Sheldon Jones went the distance for the win. Elwyn "Preacher" Roe, in his 1st season with the Dodgers, didn't get out of the 1st inning. He would get considerably better for them. Johnny Mize and, with some foreshadowing, Bobby Thomson hit home runs for the Giants against the Dodgers. Jackie Robinson went 2-for-4 with 2 RBIs.
