Actually the Marine Corps was not as free to reduce the quota of 1,500 Negroes as General Thomas suggested. To make further cuts in what was at most a token representation, approximately 1 percent of the corps in August 1947, would further inflame civil rights critics and might well provoke a reaction from Secretary Forrestal. Even Thomas's accompanying recommendation carefully retained the black strength figure previously agreed upon and actually raised the number of Negroes in the ground forces by seventy-six men. The 1,500-man minimum quota for black enlistment survived the reorganization of the Fleet Marine Force later in 1947, and the Plans and Policies Division even found it necessary to locate some 375 more billets for Negroes to maintain the figure. In August the commandant approved plans to add 100 slots for stewards and 275 general duty billets overseas, the latter to facilitate rotation and provide a broader range of assignments for Negroes.[10-5] Only once before the Korean War, and then only briefly, did the authorized strength of Negroes drop below the 1,500 mark, although because of recruitment lags actual numbers never equaled authorized strength.[10-6]
By mid-1947, therefore, the Marine Corps had abandoned its complex system of gearing the number of black marines to available assignments and, like the Army and the Air Force, had adopted a racial quota—but with an important distinction. Although they rarely achieved it, the Army and the Air Force were committed to accepting a fixed percentage of Negroes; in an effort to avoid the problems with manpower efficiency plaguing the other services, the Marine Corps established a straight numerical quota. Authorized black strength would remain at about 1,500 men until the Korean War. During that same period the actual percentage of Negroes in the Marine Corps almost doubled, rising from 1.3 percent of the 155,679-man corps in June 1946 to slightly more than 2 percent of the 74,279-man total in June 1950.[10-7]
Yet neither the relatively small size of the Marine Corps nor the fact that few black marines were enrolled could conceal the inefficiency of segregation. Over the next three years the personnel planning staff tried to find a solution to the problem of what it considered to be too many Negroes in the general service. First it began to reduce gradually the number of black units accommodated in the Operating Force Plan, absorbing the excess black marines by increasing the number of stewards. This course was not without obvious public relations disadvantages, but they were offset somewhat by the fact that the Marine Corps, unlike the Navy, never employed a majority of its black recruits as stewards. In May 1948 the commandant approved new plans for a 10 percent decrease in the number of general duty assignments and a corresponding increase in spaces for stewards.[10-8] The trend away from assigning Negroes to general service duty continued until the Korean War, and in October 1949 a statistical high point was reached when some 33 percent of all black marines were serving as stewards. The doctrine that all marines were potential infantrymen stood, but it was small comfort to civil rights activists who feared that what at best was a nominal black representation in the corps was being pushed into the kitchen.
But they had little to fear since the number of Negroes that could be absorbed in the Steward's Branch was limited. In the end the Marine Corps still had to accommodate two-thirds of its black strength in general duty billets, a course with several unpalatable consequences. For one, Negroes would be assigned to new bases reluctant to accept them and near some communities where they would be unwelcome. For another, given the limitations in self-contained units, there was the possibility of introducing some integration in the men's living or working arrangements. Certainly black billets would have to be created at the expense of white billets. The Director of Plans and Policies warned in August 1947 that the reorganization of the Fleet Marine Force, then under way, failed to allocate spaces for some 350 Negroes with general duty contracts. While he anticipated some reduction in this number as a result of the campaign to attract volunteers for the Steward's Branch, he admitted that many would remain unassigned and beyond anticipating a reduction in the black "overage" through attrition, his office had no long-range plans for creating the needed spaces.[10-9] When the attrition failed to materialize, the commandant was forced in December 1949 to redesignate 202 white billets for black marines with general duty contracts.[10-10] The problem of finding restricted assignments for black marines in the general service lasted until it was overtaken by the manpower demands of the Korean War. Meanwhile to the consternation of the civil rights advocates, as the corps' definition of "suitable" assignment became more exact, the variety of duties to which Negroes could be assigned seemed to decrease.[10-11]
Recruitment
Postwar quotas and assignments for Negroes did nothing to curb the black community's growing impatience with separate and limited opportunities, a fact brought home to Marine Corps recruiters when they tried to enlist the Negroes needed to fill their quota. At first it seemed the traditionalists would regain their all-white corps by default. The Marine Corps had ceased drafting men in November 1945 and launched instead an intensive recruiting campaign for regular marines from among the thousands of reservists about to be discharged and regulars whose enlistments would soon expire. Included in this group were some 17,000 Negroes from among whom the corps planned to recruit its black contingent. To charges that it was discriminating in the enlistment of black civilians, the corps readily admitted that no new recruits were being accepted because preference was being given to men already in the corps.[10-12] In truth, the black reservists were rejecting the blandishments of recruiters in overwhelming numbers. By May 1946 only 522 Negroes, less than a quarter of the small postwar black complement, had enlisted in the regular service.
The failure to attract recruits was particularly noticeable in the antiaircraft battalions. To obtain black replacements for these critically depleted units, the commandant authorized the recruitment of reservists who had served less than six months, but the measure failed to produce the necessary manpower. On 28 February 1946 the commanding general of Camp Lejeune reported that all but seven Negroes on his antiaircraft artillery roster were being processed for discharge.[10-13] Since this list included the black noncommissioned instructors, the commander warned that future training of black marines would entail the use of officers as instructors. The precipitous loss of black artillerymen forced Marine headquarters to assign white specialists as temporary replacements in the heavy antiaircraft artillery groups at Guam and Saipan, both designated as black units in the postwar organization.[10-14]
It was not the fault of the black press if this expression of black indifference went unnoticed. The failure of black marines to reenlist was the subject of many newspaper and journal articles. The reason for the phenomenon advanced by the Norfolk Journal and Guide would be repeated by civil rights spokesmen on numerous occasions in the era before integration. The paper declared that veterans remembered their wartime experiences and were convinced that the same distasteful practices would be continued after the war.[10-15] Marine Corps officials advanced different reasons. The Montford Point commander attributed slow enlistment rates to a general postwar letdown and lack of publicity, explaining that Montford Point "had an excellent athletic program, good chow and comfortable barracks." A staff member of the Division of Plans and Policies later prepared a lengthy analysis of the treatment the Marine Corps had received in the black press. He charged that the press had presented a distorted picture of conditions faced by blacks that had "agitated" the men and turned them against reenlistment. He recommended a public relations campaign at Montford Point to improve the corps' image.[10-16] But this analysis missed the point, for while the black press might influence civilians, it could hardly instruct Marine veterans. Probably more than any other factor, the wartime treatment of black marines explained the failure of the corps to attract qualified, let alone gifted, Negroes to its postwar junior enlisted ranks.
Considering the critical shortages, temporarily and "undesirably" made up for by white marines, and the "leisurely" rate at which black reservists were reenlisting, General Thomas recommended in May 1946 that the corps recruit some 1,120 Negroes from civilian sources. This, he explained to the commandant, would accelerate black enlistment but still save some spaces for black reservists.[10-17] The commandant agreed,[10-18] and contrary to the staff's expectations, most Negroes in the postwar service were new recruits. The mass departure of World War II veterans eloquently expressed the attitude of experienced black servicemen toward the Marines' racial policy.
The word spread quickly among the new black marines. When in mid-1947 the Division of Plans and Policies was looking for ways to reduce the number of black marines in keeping with the modified manpower ceiling, it discovered that if offered the opportunity about one-third of all Negroes would apply for discharge. An even higher percentage of discharge requests was expected from among black marines overseas. The commandant agreed to make the offer, except to the stewards, and in the next six months black strength dropped by 700 men.[10-19]