The Impact of World War II

African Americans and Women in WWII America

761 Tank Battalion: the Black Panthers

Going Deeper

The following links will help you widen your knowledge:

The Home Front in America in WWII

Black GIs during World War Two  - BBC Witness History

  Essay: How effective was Executive Order 8802 and the FEPC?

  Essay: How far did the situation of African Americans in America improve during World War Two?

  Essay: How far did the situation of Women improve in America during World War Two?

The Experience of African Americans

Although the civil rights advances for African Americans during WWII were small, and mostly snatched back shortly after, Black veterans and workers came out of the war ready to challenge the racial discrimination they faced.  WWII did not change their status, but it changed their minds.

In the Armed Forces

Before

• The US airforce would not accept black pilots.

• Black soldiers were not allowed to fight in the Marines – they served only as cooks, transport or labourers.

• In the Navy Black soldiers served only as mess men (cooks); in 1943 the Navy had over 100,000 African Americans in service but not one black officer. 

• Black soldiers were not allowed to train to be officers. 

Advances

• 1.2 million African Americans fought in the war. 

• An African American 332nd fighter group known as the Tuskagee Airmen was set up; by the end of the war there were 1,000 Black pilots. 

• The 761st Tank Battalion – the ‘black panthers’ – fought in the Battle of the Bulge, 1944. 

• At Peleliu Island in the Pacific 1944, the 17th SeeBee (Construction Brigade) company not only rescued wounded soldiers under fire, but picked up their rifles and fought back. 

• Black soldiers were trained as officers. 

• African American women were allowed to become nurses. 

• Some 400 Navajo Americans served as code talkers. 

• Asian American recruits were integrated into European American units; Chinese Americans were promoted as officers. 

• The NAACP successfully launched legal action to have the sentences reduced of the Black soldiers convicted after the Port Chicago and Guam incidents. 

• Black servicemen and women returned from the war having seen a world beyond their homes, confident and ready to challenge the discrimination they faced. 

Caveats

• The military remained segregated, with the ‘Jim Crow Army’ relegated to support roles and facing unequal treatment and inferior facilities.  The first Black recruits (1942) were not allowed on base unless accompanied by a white officer, and were assigned to inactive duty when trained.  In PoW camps, German prisoners ate in the white restaurants and used the white latrines from which Black soldiers were barred. 

• Black officers were allowed only to command Black soldiers; Black nurses could only treat Black men. 

• The 1944 Port Chicago explosion & ‘mutiny’ highlighted the lack of training and unsafe conditions in which African American soldiers had to work at the docks. 

• In 1944 racial tensions in Guam ended with white Marines killing a number of Black Marines; when a group of Black Marines chased the killers, they were arrested, court-martialled, and sentenced to several years in prison. 

In the Workplace

• Black workers were systematically restricted to the worst, lowest-paying jobs, and were paid less than white workers for the same jobs. 

• Maybe a million African Americans moved from the rural South to urban areas in the North and West during WWII. 

• By 1944 nearly 2 million Black workers were employed in war-production. 

• When A.  Philip Randolph threatened a 100,000-strong protest march in 1941, Roosevelt issued Executive Order 8802, which outlawed racial discrimination in the war industry and set up the Fair Employment Practices Committee (FEPC) to enforce it. 

• In 1944 the Supreme Court ruled that US trade unions had a duty of ‘fair representation’ of both Black and White workers. 

• Black workers ended the war having held down ‘white’ jobs, more confident and ready to challenge the discrimination they faced. 

• African Americans still regularly received lower wages and faced discriminatory hiring and promotion. 

• Many were dismissed when the war ended and the white soldiers returned. 

• African Americans continued to face discrimination in education and housing (e.g.  Levittown was for white veterans). 

• In 1943, discrimination and racial tensions led to race riots in Detroit and attacks on Mexican-Americans in the ‘Zoot Suit Riots’ in Los Angeles. 

• The FEPC had no authority over private companies; it was ignored in the South, and in 1946 Congress stopped its funding. 

• In a number of places during the war, notably in the automobile industry, white workers went on strike against the recruitment of black workers to ‘white jobs’ (such as that in 1943 at the Packard Motor Company in Detroit, where 25,000 white workers walked off the job when the firm announced it would train 12 African-American workers to positions previously reserved for whites).  The 1944 ‘fair representation’ ruling was not enforced until 1960. 

Civil Rights

• African Americans faced Jim Crow Laws, segregation, discrimination and violence (see this page). 

• A ‘Double V’ Campaign called for victory over fascism abroad and racism at home. 

• Membership of the NAACP rose from 50,000 to 450,000. 

• The Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) was founded in 1942, and organised its first sit-ins against segregated restaurants in 1943. 

• In 1944, Irene Morgan, an African American woman, was arrested for refusing to move from the ‘white’ seating section of a Greyhound interstate bus. 

• WWII galvanised the African American civil rights movement. 

• 22 African Americans – including war veterans – were lynched 1941-46, and Black soldiers returned to find white supremacy, discrimination and segregation unchanged, particularly in the South. 

• An attempt in 1948 by President Truman to introduce civil rights was defeated in Congress.  He issued Executive Order 9981 desegregating the armed forced instead, but it was resisted in the military, and not fully implemented until the Korean War. 

The Experience of Women

Although women contributed hugely to the war effort, they faced discrimination, and any advances they achieved during the war seem to have been lost when it ended.  American 'second wave' feminism did not appear until the 1960s. 

In the Armed Forces

Before

• Few women served in the army, mainly as nurses, telephonists and cooks. 

Advances

• 350,000 women joined the armed forces

• Women served in the Women’s Army Corps (WAC), Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP), the Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service (Navy WAVES) and the Marine Corps Women’s Reserve. 

• They served as mechanics, pilots, drivers, gunnery instructors, air traffic controllers, weather forecasters and translators.  Navy WAVES built decryption machines called Bombes. 

• Sallie Braun ran the Army Port of San Francisco single-handed. 

• In 1948, Congress passed the Women’s Armed Services Integration Act, which gave women the right to serve in the military. 

Caveats

• Servicewomen faced gender discrimination from the public and male colleagues. 

• Women of color confronted a double burden of racism and sexism.  The Navy did not accept Black women until 1944. 

• When the war finished, most servicewomen were discharged and their units disbanded. 

• Women veterans were often refused the benefits for veterans under GI Bill. 

In the Workplace

• Some middle class and married women worked, but mostly in jobs such as nursing or teaching. 

• Women suffered wage discrimination. 

• Unions opposed women in employment. 

• 1940-45 the number of women in work rose from 12-19 million – women occupied a third of all jobs. 

• 3 million more volunteered for the Red Cross. 

• Women worked in munitions, aircraft, railways and electronics – in 1939 36 women had worked in shipbuilding; in 1942 there were 200,000. 

• Women worked in heavy-duty jobs such as welders and machinists.  ‘Rosie the Riveter’ became a social icon of working women contributing to the war effort. 

• The Dept of Labor found that women paid more attention to detail, and worked faster than their male counterparts. 

• In 1943, Congress allocated $20 million under the Lanham Act to fund hundreds of war nurseries for an estimated 550,000 children. 

• Employment gave women the experience of independence, responsibility and self-belief. 

• Women experienced sexual harassment and violence at work, in public, and in their homes.  Workplace newspapers spoke of women in sexual language as oddities in the industrial sector. 

• Women occupied only 4% of skilled jobs. 

• Women were still paid less than male workers. 

• Unions sought assurances that women’s wartime work would only be temporary. 

• Black, Latino, Native American, and Asian American women faced particular racism and discrimination in war work and society. 

• When the war ended, nearly all women were laid off

• There was no long-term gain in wage differentials; in 1944 a Bill prohibiting wage discrimination for women failed in Congress. 

• The Lanham funding ended with the war; it was to be America’s only-ever universal childcare programme. 

Civil Rights

• Most women accepted their role as a wife and mother. 

• During the war American society accepted the idea of women in diverse roles. 

• Women experienced a shift in public praise, as they were commended as being competent and intelligent. 

• The National Federation of Business and Professional Women's Clubs (BPW) advocated for women's rights in the workforce, developing a classification system for women with specialized skills. 

• Many married women were happy to return to their role as wives and mothers after the war; the number of women in employment continued to decline. 

• ‘Quickie’ wartime marriages landed many women in unhappy relationships. 

• ‘Second Wave’ feminism did not appear until the 1960s. 

Rosie the Riveter - by Norman Rockwell (1943).  How does Rockwell depict th American working woman of the War?.